Transcript
Tim Semelroth (00:00.098)
I mean the reality is you can do the best job for a client and odds are if you make no effort to maintain the relationship after you’ve worked for them, they will forget who you are within two years.
Al Ludwig (00:14.914)
Tim Simaroth, welcome to the Law Firm Brand Builders Podcast.
Tim Semelroth (00:18.222)
I’m happy to be here. It’s a rainy day in Iowa, so it’s nice to be inside where it’s dry talking to you.
Al Ludwig (00:25.934)
It’s actually a nice day for me over in in Baton Rouge. Might be able to see the Mississippi River right outside of my window, all the way there on the on the right. But you are the owner of Iowa’s Lord’s Injury and Disability Law Firm, RSH Legal. you also happen to be a client of PMP, which made this connection pretty easy for us. I follow you heavily on LinkedIn. And one of the things that stands out to me is when you talk about teaching. You mentioned that if you weren’t a lawyer, that you would have been a teacher like your mom. And and following you on LinkedIn and getting to know you a little bit.
it’s easy to notice that there’s an there is an influence there. You teach at Iowa law, you’re on stage teaching at conferences and other places across the country. You’ve done tons of CLEs. So you very much seem like a teacher with a with a diff a different classroom. So you know, do you feel like that teaching background of your mom as well as your just general affinity towards it has helped you build the brand to be as successful as it is and as well as the law firm?
Tim Semelroth (01:20.736)
Absolutely. So actually it’s it’s not just my mom. My mom is a teacher. My wife was a teacher. I have a sister who’s a teacher. So I’m kinda like the Mona Lisa vito of you know background. And but being a teacher is something that that comes very naturally to me, probably because of how I grew up. And I find that that’s the way I want to be in the courtroom too is
You know, I don’t want to be a salesman in the courtroom, I want to be a teacher, and hopefully the jury views me as such.
Al Ludwig (01:55.896)
Yeah, and with teaching, have you found that a has led to kind of a referral net network for you as well, where others in the industry look at you as kind of one of the preeminent people, especially for big trucks and commercial vehicles. And has that led to business for you?
Tim Semelroth (02:12.14)
Definitely. I one of the ways that I am am known around the country is I do a lot of of teaching at trucking CLEs. And so oftentimes I’m the only person in the room from Iowa. And so when people have a a truck wreck case, they think of the guy who, you know, they saw at the C L E. I and so that’s why I
I always make a point to to mention at least a couple of times that I’m from Iowa, whenever I present and and that’s that’s proven to be a a a very successful strategy for getting referrals.
Al Ludwig (02:51.242)
And I also saw another LinkedIn post where you talked about the Boy Scouts and you get you and you gave some talks about it. All I really need to know about trying cases I learned in the Boy Scouts. And so I was curious if you could tell me a little bit about that and and what are those lessons you learned in the Boy Scouts that translate over to that experience of being a trial lawyer.
Tim Semelroth (03:11.534)
Sure. So the actually I I tell people all the time, other than being a lawyer, the job that I had the longest in my life was I was a Boy Scout camp counselor. I was an Eagle Scout. I I I taught, worked at Boy Scout Camp for eight years. And you learn lessons along the way. I mean, obviously the the Boy Scout motto is be prepared. And that is an important lesson both in
Scouting and in trying cases. You never want to be caught off guard in the courtroom. It’s there there are other important lessons just in terms of you know, we we really try to be a a good citizen in in our in the communities that we’re we’re part of and and that goes along with the Boy Scout slogan of do a good turn daily. And overall, just I I mean, at Boy Scout Camp when I was
you know, 16 years old, I was managing people. And so a lot of the lessons, the early lessons I learned as a manager, I use every day now. you know, whether it’s making sure that that you clearly explain what you want before you you send somebody off to do a project, whether it’s recognizing that that everybody has you know their own love language.
In terms of, you know, some people need praise, some people you know, want you know, in at at scout camps, sometimes it’s like, hey, you know, I can get this person to come work for me if I can give them an extra night off a week. And and so, you know, we that flexibility has helped when it comes to staffing our office. I for for several years I had a paralegal who lived in Georgia just because she was great and and
We find a way to make it work.
Al Ludwig (05:12.534)
Love it. Yeah. I I’ve actually I’ve seen law firms randomly open up a office in a different state and I’ll talk to some of those those law firms. I go, Did did you have like a really good attorney that was moving and you just you did not want them to leave the law firm? And it’s ninety percent of the time it’s it very much is Yep, that’s pretty much it.
Tim Semelroth (05:30.272)
Absolutely. I I mean, even within the state of Iowa, you know, we have we have offices in Cedar Rapids, Des Moines, Dubuque, and each of those offices can be traced to the opportunity to hire talent. A a really good lawyer who’s from that community and we want them as part of the team. So we’re gonna find a way to make it work.
Al Ludwig (05:51.758)
So is it easier managing younger Boy Scouts as a sixteen year old or managing younger younger attorneys as a fifty something year old?
Tim Semelroth (06:00.566)
Wow. You know, I think they they each come with their unique challenges. You know, I’ve never had to ask a person at the law firm if they’ve taken a shower this week, you know, which is is something that when you’re you’re managing young teenage boys in particular, you know, can be a question that you want to ask. So but it’s you know, ultimately people are people and and and I think
The sooner you get practice as a manager, whether it’s at Boy Scout Camp or it’s at McDonald’s or wherever, is is gonna pay off and probably make you a better manager when when you have a law firm.
Al Ludwig (06:41.034)
And and you had listed number one as be prepared as one of those five lessons. When it comes to being prepared for a big trial, a a big truck wreck trial, can you estimate how many hours you think the firm collectively puts into the preparation for something like that?
Tim Semelroth (06:58.656)
gosh. I would say that for every hour. So let’s say a an average day in trial is is is probably six hours of testimony. I mean, you’re easily spending, you know, anywhere from five to ten hours getting ready for that one hour in the courtroom because you don’t want to waste the judges’ time. You don’t want to waste the jury’s time.
You want everything to go in smoothly and clearly and and ultimately I think that being organized is a is a clue. you know, it it it it it it sends a message to the jury that that you are credible and you know what you’re talking about.
Al Ludwig (07:42.914)
Yeah. Well, this is the Wall for Brand Builders Podcast. So I’m jump into some some brand items. You know, you you built a a substantial brand out there in Iowa in many different ways. And I did some some digging this this morning looking at the RSH name and the slogans like fighting for fair fairness and how much search volume they get. And it was I found it interesting. It was more people type RSH legal.
And fighting for fairness combined into Google, then personal injury lawyer Cedar Rapids or personal injury lawyer Des Moines, which for me, when I when I do that type of research, it signals a lot of brand building has happened for many, many years for for that to be uncovered. As you were building the RSH brand, did you ever second guess the name of the firm or the slogan fighting for fairness anywhere along the journey?
Tim Semelroth (08:32.238)
Sure, but you know part of it comes from my work with PMP. So it’s why we call ourselves RSH legal is is a very simple story. And that is the guy who founded the firm, his name is his last name is Riccolo, my last name is Summelroth, and my partner Presley’s last name is Henningsen. Those are three names that few people can spell and few people can pronounce.
And so once we decided to jump into mass marketing, we realized that we needed to shorten up the firm name. And so that’s that’s where RSH Legal came from. And then in terms of fighting for fairness, again, it was a situation. So RSH legal is fine. It’s a pretty generic name. We needed something catchy that people would remember. And
And so it was around that time that they had done a lot of research in changing the name of the American it used to be called ATLA, the American Trial Lawyers Association. And so what we did, or the Association of Trial Lawyers of America wanted to, when they made the change to the American Association for Justice, it was because that there was a lot of studies showing that.
Being for something is leaves a better impression than th than being of something. And so so I was I was just brainstorming, okay, what what do we want for a URL? Because the thing about any initials is, you know, people get wrong all the time. You know, it’s it’s it’s R H S, it’s R S H, it’s you know, it’s whatever. And so having alliteration, having
you know, fairness obviously is something that that’s a value that a lot of our clients want. That’s why they’re calling us, is because they they want a fair shake in their case. And so all of that translated to fighting for fairness. Now, with that being said, it’s long. It you know, I wish it was shorter, but it’s it’s something that that is pretty catchy and I knew that it was a good decision.
Tim Semelroth (10:48.822)
when we started getting checks from insurance companies that were made out to fighting for fairs.
Al Ludwig (10:54.99)
Okay. Yeah, I mean the the pro that it has is sure it’s a little long, but all the words are simple. And you have the alliterative aspect of it with the three Fs. Little little bit easier than the original law firm name. You know, I I I love what I I saw a a firm name just the other day. It was it was five last names, and every single one of them was similar to the the ones you mentioned there. Whereas where it basically sounded like how many syllables can we get into the name of this law firm?
And then let’s compound that with complexity of last names, and it just becomes impossible to remember.
So definitely doing that that shortening was was a smart thing. Did did you was there a intentional reason to go with legal there instead of like injury lawyers or anything like that?
Tim Semelroth (11:43.374)
So at the time there was already an RSH law and and there was a there was a television show that was popular called Boston Legal. And so we we wanted to make sure the firm name clearly, you know, made clear that we were a that that we were lawyers, and so we needed law or legal, you know, with the RSH. And then you know, at the time we were big into
I mean, the whole goal was to shorten, right? And so I mean, our, you know, we do business as RSH legal, you know, personal injury lawyers. I mean, otherwise you we you know, we do that for for our Google business profile, you know, purposes. But you know, we wanted you know, we were moving from Riccolo, Summelroth, and Henningsen. So you know, we weren’t gonna add a bunch of extra words or or syllables.
Al Ludwig (12:40.844)
Gotcha. Gotcha. And y and y’all do more than just personal injury too. And I I think that’s one reason to keep it a little broader and then add those modifiers like you mentioned to for for SEO purposes and and for you know case generation purposes where where need it, ha have the various DBAs so that you can do that. When when when looking at the makeup of RSH, about how much of it is motor vehicle accidents versus other practice areas.
Tim Semelroth (13:07.202)
gosh. So what I tell people is Iowa only has three million people in the entire state. And so f for making sure that we have the right kind of diversification, we have lawyers that do every flavor of contingency feed work, whether it is you know, traditional personal injury, car accidents, fall cases, workers’ compensation.
medical malpractice, nursing home abuse, neglect cases. We also have somebody that does social security disability. We have a couple lawyers that do plaintiff’s employment law cases. And so oftentimes I’m just looking at the numbers within silos. I mean that’s the report that I get from our marketing team. But I would say that probably at least I’m trying to think. I would say at least
Half of our non Social Security disability cases that we sign up in a month are some form of motor vehicle accident case.
Al Ludwig (14:07.852)
Yeah, and and I think what you hit on there is an important to call out when you’re in a state that is only three billion people, being able to do more than just one thing obviously allows you to make more revenue because you’re doing more things, but it also opens up your pool of former client referrals because you helped them with a disability case or a workers’ comp case or something else. And then they themselves or a family member got into a wreck later on. Most of them are looking at you as well they’re
That’s my lawyer. Not necessarily like that’s my injury lawyer. Let me go find my disability lawyer. Let me go find my workers comp lawyer. But that’s my lawyer. And so I’m calling them first once they’re once they’re in the door with you. So I think it’s a a smart play. And I think the the first time you and I talked earlier this year, you know, I looked at Cedar Rapids and my hometown’s Baton Rouge. I’m from Louisiana, about four and a half million people. And I looked at the size of the markets and it was like 93rd and 94th. I was like, wow, it’s like the
the same size. So I have a a good apples to apples comparison. But then I went to my my step two to figure out is it truly apples to apples? Because so there’s so many different impacts on how you need to treat a market based off of the various inputs. And I very I very much very quickly realized very apples to oranges because you know when we’re looking at you know can I get more MVA cases out of a market?
The first thing I’m going do after look at the population is how many wrecks are there? And you know, in in Cedar Rapids there there were like sixty per less wrecks, despite the population only being like twenty or thirty percent lower. Or no population being about the same amount. it’s like well well, why is that? And that’s starting to uncover the little aspects of each market around the country. It’s like, okay, well, the Cedar Rapids DMA has three times the land mass, has better infrastructure.
the average household income is twenty thousand dollars more. So you have people that aren’t in as as much of a pinch, right? Where like if something happens to them, they need to act now. And then compounding that with the South just is very litigious and got into the the personal injury space a long time ago. So for three decades there’s been like seven times the personal injury spend in in that market versus like
Al Ludwig (16:29.42)
Cedar Rapids. So I’m backing all that out. I’m going, okay, so the the actual pool of cases there is significantly lower once I put all those those pieces into place. And then allows us to better understand what our share voice might be per injury wreck in the market. And sorry, I went kind of down a a rabbit hole there, but my mind just kind of starts going through all those little aspects when I’m when I’m comparing and looking at markets.
Tim Semelroth (16:59.106)
Well, that’s what I love about working with P and P because you bring that national perspective. So one of the things that I’ve valued most about our relationship is that there may be a a marketing angle or, you know, I get pitched to do a a certain type of media. And I will always send that to you guys and say, What do you think? And I I get really great insights like, wow, that’s that’s really overpriced for your market or
Hey, you know, I would I would recommend this versus that. And so, you know, one of the benefits of working with an agency that works on a national scale is that you get that kind of insight.
Al Ludwig (17:39.87)
And and the way I always look at anything that comes through the door is whether they’re asking for two thousand dollars or they’re asking for two hundred thousand dollars, it’s well, if I deploy that in a different way over here, what’s gonna give me the better result? And there’s certain other intangibles, right? If if you come to us with something, but then also tell us I’m also highly connected with this and I’m I’m looking at it from a relationship angle as well. Well, that’s a that’s an X factor that we have to consider.
But for the most part, I I was analyzing something for one of our clients recently and it’s you know, it was a hundred thousand dollar thing. And it’s well, here’s immediately what I would do if I had an another hundred thousand dollars. And that quickly answered, well, then no, let’s not do this. Either save the money or do this other thing. And it makes the decisions just a lot, a lot easier. Well, tell me a little bit about what the future holds for for RSH. We’re in a interesting time in the the legal world with
The implementations of of AI, the the MSO structures and and private money coming in. Have you been in any of those conversations with anybody or seeing it unfold in your your markets up there in Iowa?
Tim Semelroth (18:52.962)
So I get, you know, the the email pitches and the occasional phone call from somebody who is asking if I’d like to inject some capital into into how we operate. And so honestly, right now that is not something that that I’ve you know is is a big priority for us. And you know, there are many reasons why. One of which is we we have a great team. I mean, we have seventeen lawyers
we have, you know, over fifty staff members and and we have become successful because those people in the team. And so I I’m just I my big concern about private equity is how it how that would impact the the work environment for our team members. And and and also you know, when it comes to the sure, you can always buy more T V ads, you can always you know buy more billboards and and those have their place.
But you know, for us, you know, our most valuable cases come from attorney referrals and from past clients. And so that’s where we often look to in terms of where we want to invest. And and I think I think I think we’re best in class in in the state of Iowa in terms of the the things that we do to to get referrals.
Al Ludwig (20:15.65)
Yeah, and I think you got a lot of things going for it for you out there. We d we discussed a little bit how Iowa is it’s still a state that is, you know, less saturated on average than most places around the country when it comes to to this to this space. And there’s there’s certain areas in the in the country that are like that for a variety of reasons. Some of them is just happens to be the the the laws surrounding insurance and and law firms and others, there’s some some other aspects. But if you’re already there, like you’re gonna
You’re gonna try to build your business there, you might as you might as well. And I think, you know, Iowa’s been one of those those places where, you know, thank goodness you you haven’t had to to like some of these places in the South, like South Carolina and Louisiana, if you wanted to try to be the number one guy out there, it’s it’s just consistently having to throw more money down. But building that referral network, th that’s a big mo. Yes. And what you’ve done over the years with the marketing, I and and then also putting yourself out there as that that teacher and that
utmost professional obviously has led all to that to all that because when I was in-house and then of course in all these conversations I have with law firms, I hear the same thing, right? Where the best cake cases come from either internal referrals from my attorneys or staff. They come from external retur referrals from other attorneys, or they come from my former past clients. Because typically those are the most vetted types of cases, right? And they’re also
haven’t gone to anybody else yet. So you’re not the second, third, or fourth one that’s now reviewing this. You’re the first one and you get that first shot at it. And the I was actually having this conversation with a a law firm yesterday where he talked about that their best cases came from their internal contacts. So his contacts, his 50 something lawyers contacts. And that luckily that was a byproduct of starting the market.
a decade and a half ago, building up the firm, bringing in these cases, having to hire more people, getting more people on board and and just having that full ecosystem thinking and how whether it’s marketing or operations or hiring, it has a much bigger impact than that initial dollars dollar spent to get the do the two or three dollars back. And so I love that you kind of brought that up and and kind of reaffirmed that as we as we continue hearing things.
Tim Semelroth (22:36.984)
Well, and that takes money too. I mean, the reality is is that you can do the best job for a client. And they odds are if you make no effort to maintain the relationship after you’ve worked for them, they will forget who you are within two years. And and so we you know, we have monthly print newsletters, we have twice a month e newsletters, we have
An active presence on social media. If you’re in our system, you get a birthday card, you get a holiday card. I mean, we are we spend time and money to make sure that the people who we work for never forget us. And hopefully that means that even if somebody listens to this podcast and says, Well, gosh, maybe I should throw some money at Iowa because it’s not as saturated as as Baton Rouge, hopefully.
We will you know, that’s something that that you can’t buy with billboards, right? Is doing a good job for people and then making sure they never forget you.
Al Ludwig (23:43.264)
Sometimes there’s there’s also another reason why the markets aren’t saturated, and that’s because it’s hard to go in there and and actually make the money work for you. And I I’m sure that has been a part of it. So Yeah. Yeah I guess the the last thing I kind of wanted to cover, I always like to hear interesting stories about the legal field. And some of the most interesting conversations I’ve ever had is just simply asking, what’s an interesting case that you’ve worked on?
And I’m curious if you have any specific one that comes t comes to mind and if not, if there’s one that’s just a most impactful or memorable one for you.
Tim Semelroth (24:22.766)
Well, you know, I’ve been doing this for twenty eight years. So I I’ve had a lot of interesting cases, a lot of you know, important cases over time. But I still remember a case that I had, and this is you know, probably talking about on a podcast is not very helpful because I don’t think there’ll ever be another one exactly like it. But I once represented a pair of carpenters who were at a farm
doing a job in the middle of in the middle of Iowa and they offended the the farmer’s forty year old son who lived there. And and that that led to a fist fight, which then led to the farmer’s son going into the house and getting a gun and and shooting one of the the carpenters as he was running away. And so yeah, yeah.
So I I remember that case against the farmer and his son for for many reasons. One, I you know, I I had to do the deposition of the son while he was in prison. Two is the the the farmer himself wanted to fight me during his deposition. and and and and one of the the other lawyers involved who’s now an Iowa Court of Appeals judge was
was reciting everything that happened into the record because he like came across the table at me and I stood up. And so she’s she’s just repeating, okay, the the deponent has stood up and is leaning across the table at at plaintiffs counsel. Plaintiffs counsel has got up and is Yeah. It’s like why
Al Ludwig (26:05.856)
Listen to commentary of a boxing match or something. Yes.
Tim Semelroth (26:08.754)
Yes. But I I’ll tell you in trial, the the most memorable thing that happened was so luckily for my client, the gun involved was a twenty-two pistol, so not a super powerful weapon. And he got shot in the butt as he was running away. And so there were, you know, he had four bullets that were all in the butt. So
We we got the x-ray, you know, where they identified where the bullets were. We this is this you know, obviously this is like over 20 years ago. So you know now you’d be doing it all digitally. We we got a negative of it so you could see the the the where the bullets were, but they were it was what’s called a a pelvic image. So, you know, it shows the pelvis. So you can see, you know, where where the bullets lodged. And so I lifted up that.
negative to the jury and every man on the jury crossed his legs defensively as they saw where the bullets landed. And so that I I tried that case, I think I had been out like four years. And the I I had just tried it right before my fifth year law school reunion. So I remember going back to the reunion and w everybody was talking about the cases that they were doing. And
I I had the best story.
Al Ludwig (27:35.966)
And I’m sure that jury has they still tell the story of that case to this day. How did that case land on your desk?
Tim Semelroth (27:40.43)
How did you
I think it was a referral to our firm. so it was it was a local lawyer who they reached out. But you know, how it landed on my desk is, you know, gravity goes downhill, right? So the two guys the two guys who founded the firm are just like Hey, hey hey Tim, why don’t you go out to Powasheek County and and try this case for a week? Well that’s a
Al Ludwig (28:10.808)
Fantastic. I’ve heard some good ones and that’s that’s definitely up there as as one of the more interest interesting ones. Well Tim, I I appreciate your time. Thanks for joining the the Law Firm Brand Builders Podcast. And you know, if you ever need anything, we’re right here for you. And if anybody needs to find you, where can they they find you?
Tim Semelroth (28:30.104)
Well, our URL is fightingforfairness dot com and as as you mentioned, I am an active LinkedIn user. I I post every week and and my goal when I post on LinkedIn is to be interesting, educational, or entertaining to other lawyers. And so I I only like I said, I only post about once a week, so I’m not gonna overwhelm you with posts, but
Usually it’s about a lesson that I learned either in a a trekking case that I’m working on or a lesson I learned as a a law firm owner.
Al Ludwig (29:06.742)
Love it. Well Tim, thanks so much.
Tim Semelroth (29:09.486)
Thank you.