Intellectual Strategies: New Client Onboarding

On our initial strategy calls, we often talk about three different things:

     1. Background Legal Information – We want potential clients to have the right background legal information. This general information isn’t legal advice but is helpful, so businesses know if they are asking all the right questions to make smart decisions.

     2. Specific Milestones – Sometimes potential clients want to discuss their specific milestones. By understanding their milestones, we can help sift through the broader issues to provide the most relevant factors for consideration.

     3. Our Onboarding Process – We help potential clients understand our simplified onboarding process involves two easy steps—an engagement letter and a detailed retainer estimate.

The first two topics depend on the circumstances someone is dealing with. While we don’t have an attorney-client relationship on these calls, we’re glad to help founders and startups understand the general issues they should be aware of.

The third topic—Our Onboarding Process—follows a similar approach for all our clients.

So here’s what you should know about our onboarding process when you want to become a client with Intellectual Strategies.

We use a two-step process for all clients and client matters.

STEP 1 – The Engagement Letter

The first step is always the same. We send you an “engagement letter” that says we want to work together. The letter is general and includes a link to the specific “terms and conditions” we use with all our clients. These terms and conditions will be similar to lots of other law firms you might use.

The purpose of the engagement letter is to formalize our working relationship. It shows that we both want to work together.

However, the engagement letter does not create any obligations of performance or payment for anybody. We don’t start work based solely on an engagement letter. And you’re not obligated to pay us anything based solely on the engagement letter.

‍

STEP 2 – The Retainer Estimate

The second step requires both of us to have obligations to each other, including an attorney-client relationship. This step involves you specifying the scope of services desired from our team, us sending a retainer estimate, and paying the retainer estimate.

This is an important step because we—Intellectual Strategies and you, the client—all want to be very clear about what services are agreed to and the cost of those services.

Often our clients select fixed-price packages. Most of our packages come in three varieties:

    · A Basic Package – This is the least expensive and least detailed package for clients on a budget or clients who don’t require it.

    · A Plus Package – This is more inclusive than our basic package and usually includes an additional level of preliminary research, like patent or trademark searching, and accompanying risk assessments.

    · A Premium Package – This is our most inclusive package for clients who want us involved in their overall strategy and to automatically take care of formalities that might come up during their legal projects.

Other types of projects aren’t suitable for fixed fees, so we establish an initial retainer amount based on the hourly scope of work anticipated for that project.

Once we understand the scope of services you need, we send you a detailed retainer estimate, which you can pay whenever you’re ready for us to begin the work.

If you’re ready to set up your free strategy call, simply Book a Strategy Call with us at your convenience.