What creates marketing challenges for legal nurse consultants?
Consider these common marketing challenges for legal nurse consultants.
Fear and low self-confidence
Listen to the underlying emotion in this question.
“If you have no experience, is it realistic that an attorney will contact you?”
Consider your mindset.
- Are you convinced that what you know is of value to an attorney?
- Do you understand how the healthcare system works? Many attorneys don’t.
- Do you know how to read a medical record? Many attorneys don’t.
- Do you enjoy finding the needle in the haystack, the one piece of information that changes the whole complexion of a case? Many attorneys don’t have the time to find these nuggets.
Before you can sell an attorney on your services, you have to be sold on them yourself.
Everyone starts with never having done a case for an attorney. We are stood at the same starting gate. The attorney who finds your website does not know what kind of experience you have. (Now, if you don’t have a website, you are harder to find. Having a website is a bare minimum requirement.)
One attorney said to me many years ago, “I don’t want to hire you if you have never testified.” I said, “If no one hires me to be an expert, I won’t get that experience.” He did not hire me, but someone else took a chance and did. After this attorney gave me the opportunity to be an expert, I testified for 20 years as a liability expert.
Get practical support and suggestions for this marketing challenge for legal nurse consultants from Wayne Schoeneberg, a trial attorney and expert on fear and confidence issues. Get the details about How to Live Beyond Fear at this link.
Competition with paralegals poses marketing challenges for legal nurse consultants
“How can LNCs counter the claim by attorneys that they don’t need LNCs because paralegals are much cheaper?”
The attorney says to you, “Why should I hire you? I have a paralegal.” Paralegals are usually involved in litigation for the purposes of drafting documents, obtaining medical records and possibly even doing summaries of records or depositions. They almost never have a medical background. They may miss pieces of information in a medical record that you will see because you have medical training.
When you encounter this common marketing challenge for legal nurse consultants, the key is to be able to explain how you are different from a paralegal – without putting down the skills of the paralegal. “Yes, I understand you have a paralegal. I use my medical background to focus on the medical issues, whereas the paralegal is helpful for drafting documents and obtaining records.” Read my conclusions when I researched the differences between LNCs and paralegals so you are better able to answer this question.
Lack of current clinical experience
“Do you have to be working clinically to be valuable as an expert? If you have years of experience, and good education, will this substitute for not working in your field?”
Your years of experience may qualify you to review cases behind the scenes, but may precluded you from acting as an expert. This is highly dependent on the regulations of the state in which the case is located. Some states require an expert to have current clinical experience, while others require the expert to be working in that field at the time of the incident, or within a specified period. But there is plenty of work for non-testifying legal nurse consultants.
Are you holding yourself back? I hope my answers to these common marketing challenges for legal nurse consultants helped you.
Got a question? Send one through the comments section below this blog.
Pat Iyer MSN RN LNCC coaches legal nurse consultants who want to expand their businesses, or get off the starting block. Check out her coaching program here.