Howard Ankin: Finding Business Growth through Ethical Branding and Advertising

In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Howard Ankin discuss:

• The strategic use of media and marketing in legal services
• The evolving role of lawyers in both legal practice and business development
• Building personal and firm-wide brand equity in competitive industries
• Adapting to modern client behaviors and expectations

Key Takeaways:

• Focus on ethical, long-term brand visibility rather than chasing the latest marketing gimmicks. Consistency and integrity build lasting trust.
• Use traditional and digital media together to reinforce brand recognition, especially by being present where your audience already is.
• Develop deep professional relationships by aligning your identity and messaging with authenticity, so clients know exactly who you are and what to expect.
• Stay current on technology and regulations impacting outreach, but avoid tactics that risk client privacy or cross ethical lines.

“There’s no question that the success of any lawyer, anywhere and anytime, comes from having and associating with great people.” —  Howard Ankin

Unlock the secrets of the industry’s top rainmakers with Be That Lawyer: 101 Top Rainmakers’ Secrets to Growing a Successful Law Practice. Grab your ultimate guide to building a thriving law firm now on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F78HXJHT

Thank you to our Sponsors!

Rankings.io: https://rankings.io/

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Episode References:

Good to Great by Jim Collins: https://www.amazon.com/Good-Great-Some-Companies-Others/dp/0066620996

About Howard Ankin: Howard Ankin is the principal owner of Ankin Law, a leading Chicago-based firm he co-founded with his father in 1997. A third-generation attorney, Howard has deep roots in the legal community and longstanding relationships with many clients. Ankin Law has grown to become one of Illinois’ largest filers of injury and workers’ compensation cases, supported by over 90 attorneys and staff. Howard is also a recognized legal leader and active community member, serving on multiple legal boards and earning numerous professional honors.

Connect with Howard Ankin:

Website: https://ankinlaw.com/

Phone: 3126000000

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/howard-ankin-9671743/ & https://www.linkedin.com/company/ankin-law/

Twitter: https://x.com/ankinlaw

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AnkinLawOffice/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ankinlaw/

Connect with Steve Fretzin:

LinkedIn: Steve Fretzin

Twitter: @stevefretzin

Instagram: @fretzinsteve

Facebook: Fretzin, Inc.

Website: Fretzin.com

Email: Steve@Fretzin.com

Book: Legal Business Development Isn’t Rocket Science and more!

YouTube: Steve Fretzin

Call Steve directly at 847-602-6911

Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You’re the expert. Your podcast will prove it.

FULL TRANSCRIPT

Steve Fretzin: [00:00:00] Hey, might be that lawyer fans. I am so happy to announce that be That Lawyer. 101. Top Rainmaker Secrets to Growing a Successful Law Practice has been number one on Amazon for the last few weeks. One of our favorite guests, Walt Hampton, share about the book. This book is a gold mine for any attorney who wants to grow a thriving, sustainable law practice without losing their soul.

Steve has masterfully curated insights from rainmakers who know. What it takes. Thank you Walt Hampton. Thank you everybody. Grab a copy on Amazon today and be that lawyer

Narrator: you are listening to be that lawyer, life-changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice. Each episode, your host, author, and lawyer coach Steve Fretzin, will take a deeper dive helping you grow your law practice in less time with greater. [00:01:00] Results. Now here’s your host, Steve Fretzin.

Steve Fretzin: Hey everybody. Welcome back. It is Steve Fretzin and this is the Be That Lawyer podcast. We are super excited to bring you everything you need to be that lawyer. Confident, organized, in a skilled rainmaker. And sometimes I get so lucky when someone says, Hey, I think I’ve got someone for you. And then I go who’s this person that I’m gonna get?

And then they say it’s Howard Akin. I go, okay, I’m in Chicago. I know Howard Akin. Everyone knows Howard Akin. So it’s just so exciting to have superstars on the show and today’s no different. Howard, welcome to the show. Good to see you. Thanks for having me. Yeah. We’re gonna have some fun today.

Let’s start off with our quote of the show, which we’ve been doing for a long time now. It’s, try your best. Be Everyone, everybody’s friend. That sounds like a quote you probably came up with

Howard Ankin: it did. I gotta tell you, I was, my son is now a senior in high school. He’s about to graduate. My daughter’s a freshman, but anyways, when he was starting in nursery school, I dropped him off.

On the very first day. And it was just one of those [00:02:00] things where I didn’t know what to do to say to him besides goodbye. Yeah. So that’s the quote that I gave him. And I think it applies to a lot of things during the course of my son’s life and everybody’s life. If you try your best and you’re everybody’s friend, usually you’re going in the right direction.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. I have a senior as well. What’s the next what’s the next step for him?

Howard Ankin: As they say, it might be looking like University of Illinois, like the movie. Oh my God. Risky business. Okay. Yes. Alright. But there’s a school out east that he is we gotta decide in a couple weeks that he talk Yeah.

For deadline. Yeah. He is keeping his fingers crossed. So we’ll see where happens. All right. Good. Good luck. Good

Steve Fretzin: luck. Good luck. Yeah. And my father, the late great lawyer, Larry Fretzin, used to say, if you can’t make a sale, make a friend. And I don’t know that’s the same, but I think, just the idea that we need to develop relationships.

We need to build friendships and even against, adversaries, right? There’s opportunities for. For friendships and new relationships. So really appreciate that quote and I’m happy that you shared that with your son. It’s [00:03:00] it’s pretty, pretty wise. So everybody, Howard Inkin is the owner of Inkin Law.

Been in Chicago for a long time. Been a big figure here. Do us a solid and just give us a little background on how you came to be.

Howard Ankin: My grandfather, which is my mom’s father. And my father were both lawyers. Okay. So it wasn’t my dad’s dad, but it was my dad’s father-in-law. Yeah. But anyways, in my mom’s world, her father was a lawyer.

Her husband was a lawyer, and I’m her firstborn son. I’m not really sure if it was me who always thought when I was gonna grow up, I was gonna be a lawyer, or somehow my mom instilled that in me. But really what I’m doing today is, it’s beyond my wildest imaginations of what I would be doing when I got to grow up to be a lawyer.

But then again, it’s exactly what I would’ve hoped I would’ve been doing from a young childhood.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Do you, at this stage in your career, do you feel like you’re more of a lawyer? Do you feel like you’re more of like a business owner?

Howard Ankin: I try my [00:04:00] best to be a lawyer and if I have like my default.

Is to be a lawyer and to be working on cases and practicing law. Yeah. Although I have a little over a hundred people that are working for me. And so the problems of day-to-day keeping the law business moving that does take takes a lot. Just so happens this year. Maybe we’re past the post COVID world.

I’m set down for probably more cases for trial this year than I ever have. So my focus this year is probably more on law than, then I’d like it to be.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Okay. Okay. But I know you’ve got people in place, like you’ve made a decision and you’ve put people in place to help you with, the management of things so that it allows you to go the direction you want

Howard Ankin: to go.

Steve Fretzin: I.

Howard Ankin: No question about it. I got the best people in the Chicagoland area that work with me, and there’s no question the success of any lawyer anywhere, anytime. Yeah. Comes from having and associating with great people.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. And Jeff, shout out to Jeff Shulkin, a buddy of mine going [00:05:00] back years. And by the way, his wife Lisa, is the one who sold my home and helped me buy my home in Fort Sheridan where I now reside, which I, we absolutely love.

So

Howard Ankin: shout out to the kins. She’s great. And Jeff’s Jeff concentrates in medical malpractice and he’s not only a great lawyer, but. Personality wise, there’s nobody better.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Agreed. Agreed. Let’s get into the weeds a little bit. Starting off with, when I was I’ll call it a kid in my, twenties.

I sold yellow pages. I worked for Erek Yellow Pages. I sold yellow Pages, and it would be a dream come true to talk to a lawyer or a pizzeria or someone that needed full page ads. And we’re going back where some people listening are like a yellow pages. What the heck is that? But talk to me a little bit about.

The sort of, the way that things have changed in the world of marketing for lawyers. ’cause I know, there used to be a lot of limitations to what lawyers could do and now it’s opened up considerably.

Howard Ankin: Going back in time, there was a case in the early eighties that came out of the state of Arizona [00:06:00] where there was a lawyer that in the Yellow Pages actually put like a bold ad about being a lawyer in the Yellow Pages.

That it wasn’t just his name and phone number. And they said that lawyer advertising was a violation of lawyer ethics. And Case went up to the Supreme Court and they basically said, no lawyers are allowed to advertise. And that basically opened up the floodgates on advertising.

And, today some of the biggest personal injury firms in the country were the ones that, jumped on the bandwagon for the advertising. There’s a lot of things that even happen today that involve the marketing or advertising the law firms where sometimes, I’m saying like, look, I’m never gonna do that.

And I constantly say that to myself. My firm is never gonna market or advertise that way. But I find that it becomes, more the norm because everybody’s always pushing the envelope. Yeah. But yes, things are completely different [00:07:00] today. As far as marketing advertising goes, then you know, historically somebody would put a ad in the yellow pages.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. So what, obviously things have moved, to online and I remember, selling web, I moved from Yellow Pages to selling websites and they were like the first websites that were coming out and everything. People just looked at me like I was nuts. Because who’s gonna go to this website on this, thing called the internet?

We’re aging ourselves out a little bit here, but how, so how did you then figure out the marketing, did it start with relationships and building your business that way, and then moving into more advertising and marketing?

Howard Ankin: So let me ask, let me answer, let me finish up your last question then I’ll get into your second question you’re saying is what’s the difference between advertising today and what advertising or marketing was previously?

It’s more than just like tv, radio, or billboard today. Like we know today that, there could be like a major news story calamity that occurred that it can occur anywhere in the country. And if something happened at nine o’clock in the morning, anywhere in the [00:08:00] country, by lunchtime, if not sooner, there are, it’s up on the internet.

It’s posting all about articles about what the liability is for that type of law what type of cases certain law firms have done previously, so on and so forth. Also like people can, like geofence around, if there’s a calamity, they could figure out who is like, who was at that rock concert when something collapsed on it.

And then like geofence targeting advertising ads and so on and so forth. All that’s related to that. Going from like somebody having to look in a Yellow Pages or. In advertising on a radio. This is like where the advertising is basically putting a street sign up across somebody’s home.

Done, in the ether on the internet in order to reach people to say, Hey, we’re the right law firm for you. Yeah. It, it’s really totally different today than it ever was for

Steve Fretzin: my

Howard Ankin: purpose.

Steve Fretzin: Okay. So [00:09:00] then take us forward then, like what have been the most effective strategies for your firm now, up till now, and then where do you think things are going?

Like where do you see things heading?

Howard Ankin: As far as the marketing and advertising of our office, I think we try to do things more traditionally. What’s ethical and then also what may violate, certain technology laws. So like for example, like in a different time you might’ve always had like a capper or chaser or somebody that like, you know, maybe bought a box of donuts for somebody, like at the local police station, went through the back photocopied like a police report and tried to get, get a case.

Wow. Wow. Okay. The modern day world of that is the police report goes online. Right when you’re at the accident scene, you could have people that are hacking into a database pull out that police report and then you could have somebody that’s like actually texting [00:10:00] somebody like in real time that says Hey, I wanna represent you in the case.

Yeah, my office would ever do any of this out. Now

Steve Fretzin: that seems like the underbelly of the profession.

Howard Ankin: But it was the technology point of it is, what I’m making is the texting of somebody directly. It not only violates ethical laws, but it violates technology law. So for example, like for marketing advertising, somebody may be able to come to the Fretzin website and check out what’s happening.

Now typically like you would’ve to wait and you would’ve to put up like, here’s my email address or my phone number and wait to get contacted. What people are doing today is like, they can take that data where they know who is pinging them or looking at their website, and then they actually know like where that person’s, who that person’s name is, address, phone number, so on and yeah.

Yeah. They try [00:11:00] to where they could be like. They could try to contact them. And what I’m saying is like how people do that can violate a number of technology laws in in trying to like contact somebody back who was only looking at you but wasn’t interested in that engagement. So where we’re going with marketing and advertising, both from ethical rules and both from technology rules, is.

The ability with technology to get very aggressive about marketing, to advertising to people. That’s where we’re at now, and the law has not caught an up yet to both the ethics and the technology. So it’s where we’re at right now for some places is we’re in the wild west. Yeah. Of marketing. Of marketing advertising for legal services.

Steve Fretzin: Got it. Okay. Alright, so then don’t give away any secrets, but so are you focused primarily on, pay-per-click and SEO and those kinds of things? Or are you doing [00:12:00] networking and getting your people out there to meet with other lawyers and be thought of when things come down?

What is it a mix?

Howard Ankin: So for me, I mean my FA law firm is really probably like we’re a decade behind in what we’re doing. Okay. It’s not, it’s like for my law firm, we’re just not that sophisticated. Like these things that I’m talking about. This is nothing that my firm is doing. Okay. Your general, like your general like radio, tv, billboard, those types of things.

That’s what my firm does, but more to the idea of we just wanna. Different than like advertising injured, call me. The idea of the advertising that, that I’m trying to do for my law firm is I am here like a brand, okay? And like you should just know that this is what I do and I’m an option for you. And if you need me, call me.

Also with an injury case, a lot of times the success for the field that I’m in, but probably for the [00:13:00] success for most fields. Is knowledge is power and the sooner that a client can get the information that they need, okay, that could help them both from the perspective of winning the case, but also from the perspective of feeling self-help, feeling well.

’cause nobody wants to have a legal matter hanging over their at. So anyways, from our purposes we try to make it where we’re an option. People know who we are. Okay. And try to have that good reputation out into the ether so that they know. Then you ask, how do we, do we do pay per click or that type of stuff.

Yeah. That moves us a little bit closer to the needle or closer to the bottom, I would say. Where. If people are going on, if somebody’s going online and then they’ve already heard of us, that’s that zero moment of truth where it’s oh, I heard of this one before. Yeah, we do a lot of pay per click and and website optimization.

Steve Fretzin: Okay. With proven [00:14:00] SEO and digital marketing strategies that drive actual clients to your firm, rankings.io prides itself on proof, not promises mentality. The best firms hire rankings.io when they want rankings, traffic, and cases. Other law firm marketing agencies can’t deliver, get more rankings, get cases, and schedule a free consultation@rankings.io today.

Hey everybody, it’s Steve Fretzin as the, I’m the host of the Be That Lawyer Podcast, and if you’re serious about growing your law practice, let’s talk. I’ve coached hundreds of attorneys to build bigger books of business without selling, chasing, or wasting time. This isn’t a sales pitch, it’s a real 30 minute.

Strategy session to explore what’s possible for you in your practice. Just head over to Fretzin.com and grab a time that works for you and let’s make this your breakout year. Then what’s your take on how an individual lawyer or maybe a firm develops a brand? That’s, we’ve got business development, marketing, and branding, and I think there’s confusion and people call business development, marketing and vice versa.

But [00:15:00] then we get into like what is a brand and why? How does someone build a, McDonald’s built a brand and Tiffany’s built a brand, Mercedes has a brand, law firms also have brands. How do, but how does that, how do you build that?

Howard Ankin: And that’s typically like some, like I find just ’cause I’m into marketing and advertising, so I’m looking to see what other people do so that they have their voice.

I think some people do it well and I think there’s a lot of people who may not do it well. Part of it to me is if I was going to run a TV commercial, felt like anybody could come. From like another state and then just put their face onto my commercial. That I don’t think then is something that’s done well.

So like this concept that we’re a hard charging lawyer or we’re gonna get you, or all that kind of stuff. Yeah, it’s a brand, but that’s the same [00:16:00] type of brand that everybody else has. Okay. I think there has to be a brand where one your brand. We’re a society of specialists. Doesn’t matter if you’re a lawyer or whatever other your specialty is, everybody has a specialty.

And what you really wanna know is when you say McDonald’s or you say like any of these other brandings, you know that you’re gonna get like something that really tastes well, that’s gonna be very cost effective, that you’re gonna get fast if you’re buying McDonald’s. And the way that they do McDonald’s is every single time you eat there.

It’s always the same. It doesn’t matter if you’re in small town, USA or in the heart of the loop. It’s always the same and it’s always right. So same way with law. If you come to this law firm, this is what we do. Okay? And whether you’re the most expensive in town, ’cause you’re the best or you’re the more cost effective lawyer.

And whether this is my field of expertise or that’s my field of expertise. [00:17:00] That’s a lot of times, like what I also wanna do is I wanna affiliate myself. I’m on a lot of different law boards. Okay. And I even though like injury is my field and I sit a lot on those injury fields, I also sit on a lot of Illinois State bar and national Boards and so on and so forth.

Because if somebody comes to me I’m a little bit prolific as far as getting my name out there, but I’m not the best lawyer for everybody. I wanna know other lawyers and I wanna know who’s the person to go to for that case. Yeah. And I there’s a lot of lawyers who’ve done a very good job of basically saying, for this problem, I’m your guy.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah.

Howard Ankin: So I’m,

Steve Fretzin: yeah. I’m 26 years old in 1996 and I was in a plane crash in crystal Lake, Illinois. I had broken both my arms. Some people know this story a little bit, but I remember my dad, again, lawyer pushed the phone to my ear and said, talk to your lawyer. He’s Bob. Meet Bob, and of course we know Bob Clifford, right?

Yeah. [00:18:00] It’s who was the specialist that was thought of for aviation? There weren’t a lot of calls made, I think there, so how you build a brand in a particular niche, or how you build a brand as, someone that’s consistently getting results and has great results for clients or great service and communication I think is something that really important.

Are those all the things that you feel like go into your brand that you’re able to then put out there in the form of marketing and advertising and such? One, sorry to hear you were involved in an accident. Now

Howard Ankin: what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger. Exactly. Part of the marketing and the branding is also is staying true to what your marketer brand is.

Like we were talking about before, like there’s a. People that could do a lot of things to like try to get a case or try to do this or whatever, so it’s like anything else in life, there’s a lot of times where there’ll be like some new tech, new technology or new way to do something and I find myself a lot of times telling people I’m like, it sounds great.

I’m sure people are gonna, [00:19:00] do very well with that, but I just don’t believe in it. So it’s like just something that I’m just not gonna do. So part of the marketing of advertising for me is, I meet a lot of people, and not just law, but a lot of walks of life where like they, they change the religion.

Like they change their socks, they change who they are by what it is. I, my post friends in life they’re still the same friends that I had going back to preschool and kindergarten. You gotta so maybe that’s just my brand. The client knows that. They’re gonna have somebody that’s gonna not only be here for them for this case, but if they call ’em 25 years from now, and they, they just wanna talk about how like the, like the Lauer law, law, room to shirt.

I guess I’m gonna be there to give them legal advice. Other people are like, I’m the lawyer. This is what I do. And when the case is over, it’s over. It’s different marketing, different branding.

Steve Fretzin: And I think too, I think, people put out different vibes of who [00:20:00] they are, what they’re about, what makes them tick.

And I think part of that authenticity and part of putting that out there is you’re trying to attract clients that appreciate that are like you, right? So like I’m thinking like I wanna work with the nicest, smartest lawyers in the world and I do. And I think that I put that vibe out. And anyone that isn’t that pulling into that category.

Probably isn’t calling me. I don’t know who they’re calling, but they’re not calling me, which is great. ’cause I’m not interested. So I think in your space too, somebody that wants, someone that’s gonna, break ’em over the head with a hammer or a chainsaw or whatever it is that they’re doing.

That’s gonna attract a certain type of person and then you’re gonna attract a different type of, that’s what your brand represents him. Different than that.

Howard Ankin: Yeah. One of my things here is I, we don’t. With some exception, but I have a lot of people that work for me. I don’t like hiring anybody here.

If they go through an interview process, I’m usually like the last point of contact where I am, talking to somebody. So again, whether it’s law or any other field, you don’t wanna have [00:21:00] the Sunday night glutes. Like when that alarm goes off at five 30 in the morning or whatever it is, you wanna jump out of bed and have a skip for the day and you wanna have a zest for what.

So especially in law. Because it is it is all encompassing. It’s not only the field of expertise that you have, but who your clients are. If you’re doing this, most lawyers, this is a 15 hour day endeavor, five and a half days a week. So if you’re not happy with who you’re helping and you don’t like the type of stuff that you’re helping with.

Your burnout rate is gonna be unbelievable, and you’re not gonna have the zest for life. So anyways I find for me, it doesn’t matter what field it’s in, any lawyer that I meet, and it doesn’t matter if they’re a traffic ticket fixer or they’re billing at $3,500 an out. Okay? That same satisfaction the lawyer could have if.

I’m the best at traffic [00:22:00] tickets. You know what I’m saying? And when somebody has this issue, they’re coming to me. Okay. And when you talk about marketing or advertising or building a, building a brand, the lawyer that says, I’m the traffic ticket guy, that’s a brand, like I know that lawyer as much as I may know, the lawyer that’s billing $3,500 an hour.

Yeah. Okay.

Steve Fretzin: Just, I’m gonna throw a little bit of a curve ball at you here, I hope, hopefully you’re cool with it. But obviously AI is coming hard and fast at us, and one of the things that people are starting to do is they’re starting to search less on Google and more through chat, GPT or some of the forms to get information, to get answers, to find something that’s gonna be more of a direct fit.

Are you seeing that as a potential? Benefit or a potential problem in, in, in particularly in personal injury where a lot of people are spending a lot of money in different areas.

Howard Ankin: The chat GBT, that’s one of these where it’s it’s gonna [00:23:00] be here whether you like it or not, and it’s coming.

Yeah. Like any technology where you may not wanna be the original adopter, I would say. I think there’s some lawyers that are getting in trouble with yet DVT because they’re trusting it too much. Or there was some people, like at the beginning where they were putting information, they were using the technology wrong.

Yeah. Private information was getting out into the ether and that wasn’t going well either. So I will tell you, for me, my, my personal, I. I’m jealous of other lawyers that are highly adopted and in such A GBT now, and I keep trying to use it more, but at the same time, I really don’t. It’s like having a lawyer give legal advice.

I don’t really wanna question the people that I talk to. If you’re so used to if you’re so used to trusting people that you’re talking to all the time and then you use, and then you have a technology [00:24:00] where you can’t really trust what you’re getting, it’s. Yes. Jet, jet, GBT it’s gonna completely transform the world that we live in.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah, I guess I’m thinking like, all right, I want to take a trip to Europe and I’m gonna just plug in all of the things I want to do, my behaviors, what I, what, what’s important to me in a trip. If you can’t do that in Google, and get an answer. So the idea is that, eventually I could see, essentially this, not only like custom making a trip for me, but like booking everything, based on knowing me and knowing what I want.

And I’m wondering if in the legal space, the people that are investing in search engine optimization and pay per click and people that are counting on something like Google for their. Their total business, like they’re 10 million a month in Google, whatever that, that may affect their ability to compete.

If things change and they’re not maybe staying up with it. I guess that’s where I was going more, more so than how it’s used on the backend.

Howard Ankin: But all I could say is about, this is ultimately [00:25:00] whatever field of law that you’re in. There’s a lot of times where there’s legal decisions that have to be made and there’s business decisions that have to be made.

Okay. And on the legal decisions that have to be made, check GBT may ultimately start taking jobs away from support staff in the law, where firms may need less of that because the technology will help. But in terms of the lawyer itself, where they have to help their client make business decisions or life decisions.

Or and especially when you have strong attorney-client relationships where the lawyer and the client trust each other. That will be more of a focus now where the lawyer will be focusing more on business and life decisions with clients and, the formulaic work of like writing, like that unbelievable brief that will [00:26:00] probably end up being, they’ll probably be.

Less focus on that and more focus on this. And it’s like anything else maybe we like get to more trials or that type of thing, like going forward because like lawyers will have more time for, all right. See,

Steve Fretzin: okay. We’ll see. Last question then we’ll get to our game changing book.

If there was there one thing that happened in your career? That you either regret or like a mistake you made or something that just made you better, stronger, but you needed to make that mistake to, to learn and improve. Because we all make mistakes. We all have things that happen in our lives that take us back and maybe it’s a bad hire.

There’s all kinds of stories that I pick up on this show about, just things. But I think a lot of it is what we gain from it.

Howard Ankin: I guess for me, and maybe it’s just my personality, I always am trying to do it better. I’m always trying to get to the next rung of a ladder. I’m always trying I’m all about self-improvement and at least for me, since I’m the most imperfect person, I [00:27:00] could see imperfection in other people and other people where like they, they see that imperfection and they like, they’re mad about it or they don’t like something about it or whatever.

I just take the fact that understanding that they’re so good in other ways, but understanding that we’re humans and that this person is not perfect, and then we try to build that person up or make them better. So I just hope that people deal with me. I know that I’m imperfect. I’m always trying to make myself better if I, get up in the morning and I got that zest for life for the day.

And I, I made myself a little bit better than I was yesterday. That’s it. Yeah. But when you. Yeah, there’s a lot of times where I wish I was a, I wish I was a little better. I knew a little bit more before, but then at the same time when I look at it over a longer period of, like a longer period of look back and I’ll just be happy that I eventually got to where I got to go.

Yeah,

Steve Fretzin: Do we spend enough time giving ourselves a break and giving ourselves like a [00:28:00] compliment or a congratulations? And I joke about my father being someone who, as a lawyer, father, grew up in the projects in Chicago and, getting a compliment outta him was you might as well just pull teeth right outta your face.

And I have the same struggle like giving comp. So I have to really work myself up to remember how great people are and how much they’ve improved, and how, you know that even to your point, imperfections, that’s what makes people human. I love that. And but I think we have to make ourselves better, but we also have to give ourselves a break and look at the, look at where you are.

Look at where I am, look at, all the good that we’re doing in the world, and then focus on that sometimes, and maybe not the, the negatives.

Howard Ankin: Some people, Steve, some people will do a little bit better. Some people will do a little bit worse. As we started with this, if you try your best, there you go.

Everybody’s friend. Everybody will get to where they need to go and it will all work out.

Steve Fretzin: Howard Ankin going full circle. I love it man. Well done. Played sir. Alright, let’s go. So let’s talk about good to greats since you mentioned about, improvements. [00:29:00] That’s your game changing book.

I’ve read that, I know we’ve mentioned on the show a couple times is that one that you keep going back to as a is a good read?

Howard Ankin: I dunno if I keep going back to it. Probably ’cause I don’t have enough time to, do what I’m doing today. But I guess it would be a good read going back to it.

But it’s exactly what we’ve just been talking about now, like everything’s good. But you always wanna make it better. Yeah. Yeah. And that’s really what, that, that’s really what that book was about for me. Yeah.

Steve Fretzin: I lo I love that. And I’m the same way. I’m, my wife gives me a hard time.

She’s what are you talking about? You’re killing it with, all the things you’re doing and the book coming out and all this stuff coming out. And I’m like, I know, but I continue to. Now that’s, but I think it’s somewhat healthy to, to continue to challenge ourselves and to continue to try to improve and be better for us and for our clients and everything.

Not a lot, as long as you don’t get too crazy with it. Let’s take a moment. Thank our sponsors rankings, io can out some great stuff. And Pim Con coming up in October, the la her podcast with my friend Sonia. Doing great work there. And then if you haven’t [00:30:00] checked out the Fretzin website, I’m just gonna give you, give a plug for myself that.

We’ve got podcast articles writing for above the law. We’ve got videos, we’ve got all kinds of great content there. So go to Fretzin.com, check that out, and I know it’ll help you figure things out and get better at the business side of lawyering. Howard, if people wanna reach out to you, they wanna hear more about ink and law, what are the best ways for them to find you and your firm?

You could

Howard Ankin: call me at three one two 6 million. That’s 3 1 2 oh. You like that? 6 0 0 0 0 0 0. Which is part of the marketing advertising. Or you could reach me at ankin A-N-K-I-N law.com.

Steve Fretzin: Fantastic. Thanks man. Thanks for being on the show, sharing your wisdom, taking us through marketing, branding, and all the different elements of there.

And and I’m happy that we got to meet. I’ve heard nothing but great things about you. So thanks again for coming on the show, sharing your wisdom.

Howard Ankin: This has been really great. I appreciate you, Steve, having me on the show with you.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah, absolutely. And hey, thank you everybody for hanging out with Howard and I for [00:31:00] half an hour, getting your daily dose of medicine, of business development, marketing, time management, all the different things we cover on this show.

Highly recommend you go back and listen to some previous episodes if you’re, if you haven’t, if you’re new to the show or whatever, but just so much information and great stuff here. Thank you everybody. Take care. Be safe. Be well. We will talk again soon.

Narrator: Thanks for listening. To be that lawyer, life-changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice, visit Steve’s website Fretzin.com for additional information and to stay up to date on the latest legal business development and marketing trends. For more information and important links about today’s episode, check out today’s show notes.