I saw the above sign in Firehouse Subs a few weeks ago. Such a simple message, but crucial for any business.

As your lawyer, I strive to do my absolute best every day. All the fancy business cards in the world cannot make up for poor service.

You deserve better. After thinking about whether or not to start my own business, I decided to do so. I want to help you.

The single most important part of my law practice is YOU. Without great clients who value my work, I’m nothing.

Marketing really doesn’t matter. Operations matters.

If I’m ever operating below what you need or expect, please tell me. I want to earn your recommendation based on top notch legal work and dedicated client service.

A couple weeks ago, I received an interview request from a Wall Street Journal reporter. She found me on a list of attorneys that use Twitter (I’m aflusche).

Yesterday, I was included in a Wall Street Journal article called Twitter Goes Mainstream. It’s a great article that talks about Twitter being used outside the early-adopter crowd of techies. Here is the portion that mentions me:

Other users are flocking to Twitter as an easy self-publishing and promotional tool. People are using it to build up their professional reputation by sharing updates about their work in a less time-intensive way than starting a blog. Andrew Flusche, an attorney in Fredericksburg, Va., recently used Twitter to promote a webinar he was holding on trademark registration. The session got 15 attendees, compared with seven for a subsequent seminar he didn’t promote on the service.

Mr. Flusche, 26, has also found the service handy for referring cases to experts in other areas, as well as keeping up with professional contacts he doesn’t see often. “You get interesting glimpses of them,” he says. “It’s a different way to network with people and get to know them.”

I didn’t receive this interview by doing anything spectacular. I just responded promptly to the reporter’s request. She was on a deadline, and I had the time to call her back.

Help yourself by helping a reporter.

I hosted a free law class for entrepreneurs a few weeks ago. The seminar itself went really well.

Now the ABA Journal, a national lawyer magazine, has written a story about the class. It’s in the context of lawyers offering free classes to the community to market their services.

I’m definitely excited to have such great coverage of anything I do. And I strongly believe in giving valuable information to the community. Free educational classes are a win-win for everyone involved. The attendees get to learn about a legal topic, and the lawyer gets to meet lots of new potential clients.

A friend of mine just posed an interesting question to us: What is a Blog?. I encourage you to go visit his site and ponder that a little bit. What really is a blog? Pardon me while I take a step away from legal content and provide my thoughts.

I chose to setup AndrewFlusche.com as a blog because it’s a great format for teaching people. Blogs enable the author to write lots of short, informative articles. I can categorize the articles, and they are all easily searchable. This allows my readers and clients to later find the information they need on my blog.

Other methods of web publishing do not provide the ease of use and flexibility that I find in a WordPress blog. Static sites are a pain to update and organize. Forums are not the proper method for a single author to publish info for others to read. And a wiki works best for collaboration, not single-author articles.

To me, a blog is best way to effectively teach people online. As a Fredericksburg lawyer, I enjoy writing useful content that will hopefully help someone out of a legal bind.

Photo by Stuck in Customs

I whole-heartedly agree with Seth Godin’s point that resumes are pointless. Especially for lawyers.

They’re a way for Big Law to try to choose from hundreds (possibly thousands) of applicants that are clambering to enter their hallowed halls. It’s sort-of standardized testing. Give each applicant a single page (standard for lawyer resumes), and see what awesome things each person can include on the page.

I wonder what a big firm would do if somebody submitted a resume that was printed in landscape orientation.

This website is now my resume. You can read about me and you can also visit my other site if you want even more information.

It’s my way to show that I’m more than a single piece of paper.