In Brief Legal Writing Services

“…at the end of the day, nothing beats a firm handshake, direct eye contact… and a smile.”

There’s a lot to learn when you’re starting your own business.

Trust me. I speak from experience.

Just deciding to take the plunge is scary. Then you’re confronted with all of the legal and technical aspects of getting your new venture off the ground. Throw in the 21st century emphasis on branding –especially branding through digital marketing — and it’s easy to feel completely overwhelmed.

Does your new business have a Facebook page? How about LinkedIn? Speaking of LinkedIn, how do you build a winning profile? Once you’ve done that, how do you optimize it? That’s just the beginning. Do you have a website? If you build a website, should it include a blog? Is blogging really an effective marketing tool?

Should you tackle all of this yourself, or hire someone to do it for you?

Are you intimidated yet?

Personally, figuring all of this out wasn’t as hard for me as it would have been if I didn’t have prior experience creating an online presence and building a brand. I did that after my memoir, Truth Be Told: Adam Becomes Audrey, was published in 2012. As an indie author, you learn to do everything yourself.

Yes, book promotion resulted in a healthy appreciation for social media. On the other hand, launching In Brief Legal Services resulted in renewed appreciation for good old-fashioned social networking. There’s a lot to be said for getting out and meeting new people with common interests and experiences. There’s even more to be said for meeting new people with different interests and experiences.

To that end, I’ve joined the Central Connecticut Paralegal Association, and I had a blast at its annual Employer Appreciation luncheon in Hartford. Because I’m a firm believer in active participation in any group I join, also I’m writing an article about the event for an upcoming edition of the CCPA’s newsletter, Paraphrase. I’ll let you know when it comes out. In the meantime, I am sure I’ll get involved in more groups as In Brief Legal Writing Services grows.

Of course there are no guarantees. Sometimes old-school networking pays off. Sometimes it doesn’t. But at the end of the day, nothing beats a firm handshake, direct eye contact… and a smile.

It’s official. In Brief Legal Writing Services is finally open for business.

Or at least it will be by the time you read this.

So I guess you could say that I’m ready to get to work — except for the fact that getting to this point has been a pretty big job in and of itself.

It all began with a tremendous leap of faith. Yes, making the decision to start my own business was the biggest, and arguably the scariest step I’ve taken but it was just the first. Since then I’ve been taking a lot of “baby steps.” Among other things, I enrolled in a couple of web design classes so I could learn how to create my own “virtual workplace.”

Each class was six weeks long. Building this site took the better part of three weeks. Along the way, I had more than my share of frustration. I stumbled, I fell. I got up. I tried again. I cried. I resisted the urge to throw my computer out of the window. I learned a lot and believe it or not, I had fun.

Yes, I could have paid someone to create a site. I suppose that would have been quicker. Perhaps it would have been easier. I am sure I could have spared myself a lot of exasperation.

But in the end there’s no guarantee that I would have gotten a site I like as much as this one. And I definitely wouldn’t have gotten the satisfaction of designing it myself.