Most people are familiar with subscription-based services at this point – they’ve been around for more than a hundred years. It has become a common business model for businesses in various industries. There are subscription personal care companies, landscapers, marketers, streaming services, and seemingly endless others. However, for whatever reason, the subscription model hasn’t seemed to catch on in the legal field (partly because it’s hard for most lawyers to understand that something other than the billable hour exists), which is particularly interesting when you consider business law, where a subscription model can provide numerous benefits to clients.
Business owners often find themselves in situations where they need legal advice and counsel (it could be as simple as a couple of questions about an employee situation or something more in-depth like risk management guidance for a new company strategy); contracts, agreements, and policies and other services provided by lawyers. Whatever the case may be, businesses often forgo getting the legal services they need, and a major reason for this is that the cost is unpredictable, and most businesses are looking for services that fit into a budget and are predictable.
Subscription-based legal services solve many of the issues most businesses have with legal services and provide some significant advantages that aren’t as readily available through the traditional hourly billing model used by the overwhelming majority of lawyers and law firms.
Here are some benefits and advantages of subscription-based legal services and why businesses should consider a subscription service as an alternative to the traditional hourly billing most law firms use:
More Convenient and Efficient
Business owners are concerned with convenience and efficiency, running a business is time-consuming and most business owners aren’t interested in adding services that are a hassle and can’t be managed efficiently. Here’s the problem most legal services have – they are neither convenient or efficient – everything is handled as an isolated incident, so when a need arises the business owner usually has to spend time getting the lawyer up to speed, answering numerous questions about the business in general and the specific situation, which leads to services being delivered in an inefficient manner (not to mention a higher bill for the time spent getting everyone on the same page). Subscription legal services solve these issues since the subscription model lends itself to the lawyer being more of an advisor and counselor. There isn’t the need to catch up on what the business does, what it has been doing, and what the strategic vision of the company is, the lawyer already knows these things. This allows for services to be delivered faster, questions and issues to be addressed quicker, and for the services to be better aligned with the business’s strategy.
Proactive
Most law firms deliver services to businesses from a reactive standpoint, they only show up when there is already a problem, issue, or lawsuit. This is problematic to business owners for two reasons; one, it’s going to be more expensive to fix a problem that’s already occurred, and two, it’s going to be more time-consuming. Two things business owners aren’t looking to waste our time and money. Subscription-based services have the built-in advantage of being proactive. Problems, issues, and concerns can be spotted and addressed in advance, there is no hesitance to call the lawyer and discuss business decisions, questions, or concerns in advance because there is nobody watching the clock and preparing to send out an hourly bill for some unknown (and costly) amount. Using subscription-based legal services to identify and address potential risks before they become full-blown issues saves money, time, and significantly reduces the potential liability on a business.
Budget-Friendly
Subscription-based services are budget-friendly and predictable, hourly billing is anything but. Businesses like to be able to budget out costs and keep an eye on what’s being spent where, that’s virtually impossible if you’re paying by the hour and have no idea how many hours something will take. Subscription-based legal services are billed at a flat monthly rate, making it easy to build into a budget the cost for legal and plan accordingly. It’s transparent and straight forward, which addresses a major concern around legal services: what’s this going to cost?
Strategic Partnership
Most legal services are offered in a one-off, stand-alone manner that focuses only on the issue at hand, without consideration or understanding of the bigger picture of what a business is trying to accomplish. This isn’t the most effective way for businesses to access or use legal services. Think about what a general counsel does for a major corporation – they are first and foremost strategic advisors around business strategy and risk. That type of relationship is unmanageable with hourly billing, no small business wants to pay to use a lawyer in that way, it’s probably cost-prohibitive. Subscription services allow for more of a strategic partnership as opposed to a series of random, once in a while engagements. Regular check-in and strategy sessions can be included with a subscription allowing businesses to build a lasting relationship with an advisor who understands the business and the objectives.
Have questions about how subscription legal services could benefit your business or legal questions in general? Contact us for a free consultation.