Lindsey Busfield
Vice President and Partner · Optimize My Firm
From High School English Teacher to Agency Partner & SEO Guru | Lindsey Busfield
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"You have to be okay with to say to the to a consultant or to anybody, whether that be you or me, this is missing the mark. This is not where I am. And that's okay because again, you and I are just outside sources listening
Key Takeaways
- ◆Lindsey went from high school English teacher to agency partner by taking a three-day aptitude test in New York, which gave her clarity on her natural wiring and helped her articulate gifts she couldn't name before.
- ◆When she worked for her parents' pasture-raised egg company, she discovered she loved the creativity in project management and compliance work, which eventually led her into the marketing and SEO world.
- ◆After five years as an entrepreneur and partner at Optimize My Firm, the hardest part isn't strategy but daily accountability between partners on business development and operational management decisions.
- ◆Lawyers know their business has problems but won't talk about them because it feels weak; the ones who succeed are willing to open the door and ask for help from someone outside who can give them an honest opinion.
- ◆Law school teaches you how to be a good lawyer, not how to run a business, so owners get pulled into tasks outside their aptitude when they should be sourcing help for what they're not good at.
- ◆When doing discovery with a client, they often give surface answers not because they're hiding but because they don't know how to dig deep enough to find the real problem, so you have to probe it out of them.
- ◆Before hiring a consultant, do your due diligence, ask questions, and be willing to tell them if their solution misses the mark because they're outside sources offering what they see, not necessarily what your actual problem is.
Full transcript
Show
Chad
Welcome back to Process Over Pressure. I'm Chad Paris. My guest today is Lindsey Busfield, Vice President and partner at Optimize My Firm, where she leads operations for an SEO and content marketing agency that helps personal injury law firms get found and grow. She's also a fellow podcaster, host of the Personal Injury Marketing Minute, with well over a hundred episodes in the can. But here's what caught my attention. Lindsey started out, didn't start out in marketing. She started as a high school English teacher with a philosophy degree raised by serial entrepreneurs. And at one point she was standing behind a counter at Starbucks asking herself, How in the hell do I get out of here? What she found wasn't a shortcut. It was a process of figuring out who she actually was, what she was wired to do, and how all those scattered pieces fit together into a role today that she says it doesn't even feel like work. That's the conversation today, the messy middle, the clarity. Lindsey, welcome to the show.
Chad
Well, it is been it is really great to have you on the show. and so again, she's she's a fellow podcaster, so she's really good at this and I'm just trying to learn from her. So I just want everybody to know that before we get started. she has a really good podcast. Mine's okay, but it's fun. So
Chad
Yeah. Well, so you know, when we talked about this and one of the things I I really, you know a former educator myself, who was a school teacher, I think that's what really caught me at first. I was like, you know, this is gonna be really fun because we've both been in a classroom and God knows we've seen chaos at its finest. I tell you today, school teachers are they're they should have a halo. They're s they're they're special people. And I did it for 10 years and said I'm out of here. So I guess I want to just start and ask the question. How do you go from an English teacher, philosophy, into this SEO guru?
Chad
That's that's way to do it.
Chad
Why not?
Lindsey
But I talked to my parents. They had just started a new pasture-raised egg company. They needed some some support with compliance and with marketing there. So I went and went to go work for my family business and loved it. Loved putting the pieces together for the compliance department. I loved the creativity that came along with project management and marketing and started traveling a lot to go audit.
Chad
That's cool.
Chad
No. Yeah. I love it. I and and the thing I love about that is is that I think, you know, you you said something there. When we go to college, you know, we we we go to high school and then we go to college and you really either go into workforce. Nothing wrong with that. There's some great trades out there. or you go or you go to college. And when you go to college, I would say I think it's fair to say majority of people when they go in have a thought of what they want to become. But they really don't know because I think that season in your life is when you develop some things that you enjoy, you don't enjoy. You start kind of, I guess, figuring it out, really is what you call it, right? And and you you the beautiful thing about your story, it's very similar to mine, is that we start on this path. And I think a lot of people like get in a job and they start the path. And they think, Well, I'm locked in, I can't do anything but this. And that's not true because. I got out of education, went into sales and and grew into being a director of a a a a V a senior vice president executive. If you'd have asked my high school teacher if I'd have been an executive one day, they'd have probably laughed. But that's the beautiful thing about what we what we can and cannot do is it's you're not defined to one thing. You can be whatever, and you really can you gotta explore and learn. And and and I think you and I are both are sitting in a place where we're doing things that we're passionate about. And we love getting up and going to work. What's the difference from going to work than just having a job? Do you agree?
Chad
Yeah. Yeah.
Lindsey
how you actually become this. And and it feeds into both learning about the career options out there as well as kids learning about themselves and about their natural aptitudes and what they are geared for, because it might not be what their peers are geared for or what their parents were geared for, but what really resonates with them. And I'm I'm a big believer in aptitude testing to because it honestly changed my life. I went and took aptitude testing while
Chad
Yeah, I totally agree. I think I think you're you're spot on because I I I I like it for the people listening to this as well. And then and it's not just for for high school. I mean, even people I think who's been in their business for ten or fifteen years and they're not being fulfilled. There there's a lot of things out there, and you have to well, first of all, you have to be willing to to explore and and search because you're right. There's there's not a book out there that says, here are all the jobs in the world that you could do. you you you gotta start with What are you good at? What is your passion? Like start there. I chances are what you're good at and your passion, there's a job surrounding that. I I promise you. They're they're out there. You just have to kind of search for them and and really understand who am I? What am I, what do I like, what I don't like. You know, and that's okay. I mean, you don't have to be, I don't think all of us come out of a box the same way. That's what makes us cool, is that we're all different and we all things that make us happy make us is different. and we need to we need to to lean into that, I think, more. I think, especially younger people, like as the world is evolving with all the technology and AI and all the stuff that's out there, like the jobs that you and I got when we started, is not even I mean, they're not I mean, there's so many gonna be so many different types of jobs, and you gotta really, I guess, lean into what what you're good at.
Lindsey
You do. And AI is clearly coming in and changing a lot of things. And I recently wrote an article about how AI is going to be reshaping the workforce. And because there's a lot of fear around it. And it's how, you know, how do I raise my kids for jobs that are gonna be obsolete? And you know, how do you know which jobs are gonna be obsolete in ten years? And how do you, you know, make adjustments for that? And I think one of the answers is project management, looking
Chad
Totally agree. And it's and it's changing every day. I mean, as as AI is is continuously growing, continuously you know, I say I tell people all the time, like like it's just a we're just touching the tip of the iceberg of what it's gonna be and and where it's gonna go. And it's funny, I I wrote this article that put out it's called AI the boogeyman. And because I think there's some fear, right? Everybody s thinks of this AI is this really ugly word and what is it? Don't really know it. Is it You know, is it is it gonna suck my brain out? You know, what is it gonna do to me? And and so I I wrote this article based on that because I think there's some people that just are f are fearful of it and and and rightfully so. anytime you start having things that come out that are going to what we what we all hear, and we hear this a lot, it's gonna replace people. Like we're just not gonna have people doing anything, we're gonna do all that. And, you know, I I hear that and I I think it's a great point. But I also think you're you're missing the the grand scheme of thing because even even with AI, there's still a a human element that has to be there. There the the the they'll never replace this, this conversation, this human element, this human touch where we can actually in engage with people. And I think when COVID happened, we all went into this recluse state of mind, rightfully so. where and and I'm not being political, but wherever you decide you sit on it. I don't I don't care. But we did. I mean, at the end of the day, we all we all went to our own little spot and we kind of reclused and and and I think that mindset really kind of shifted a lot of people's belief and and thought and thought, well, you know, if if if I don't really need to hire people, I just, you know, I can do it on my own. And I don't think that's true. I think this human element will always be there and it needs to be there. I I'm a firm believer in in looking at AI as a is a is a workflow solution to help your people be more successful.
Chad
Yeah.
Chad
That's right. Yeah.
Chad
Couldn't have said it better myself. That is just fantastic the way you said that. And that's so true. I wanna I wanna I wanna lean back into something that's I think you talked about a little bit earlier and and 'cause I definitely want to make sure that I I talk about this. I think it's really cool. You you took a three day aptitude test. You went to New York, took a three day aptitude test, and 'cause you mentioned about, you know, aptitude and finding who you are and all those. And you know, we all I think People listening are like, my God, I gotta take a test to tell me who I am. so I I wanted to talk about that 'cause I think I think it's a val I think it's a very important thing, in helping people understand their gifts, what they're what they're created to do. and so t t tell me a little bit about that and not only the the test you took, but what it helped you Think about your career and where you wanted to go and and how it helps your clarity and your vision of of where where where's where does you know where do I go and where do I fit?
Chad
Yeah.
Chad
Mm.
Chad
It it it I I think that's I think that's so cool because you know, we we often we you know, there's a lot of different tests out there. There's a lot of things of and and and I'm I would imagine a lot of people have taken them, right? You know, some some employees require you to take them now before you even start the job with them. and I've I used to I used to have this thought about is like, man, those things don't work. They're no good. This this is dumb, right? probably not alone. I'm sure there's lot of people that think about that. But I think for for people who are are are very gifted, they just don't know how to articulate their gift or they don't know how to pull that gift out. I think these tests are fantastic because it it helps you to be in the right thing. You know, w think about like this. When we when we go do a job or we have something that we do, we we either we're either in two classifications. We're either doing the job that we hate, And we're miserable and we go to and we're going because and then it's ended up being just about a paycheck and we're miserable and we do that and like we're can't wait to retire. A lot of people do that. Or we're in a job that we actually make a living and we're having a really good time and it's fun. And and we and we may work till we're 80 because we enjoy doing what we're doing. and I think those are the people that are finding those that are the ladder are those that are finding things that they're really good at and finding the the self-purpose that their skills and their tools help them do. And I think that's what these tests are great for, to put you in that way before the latter part of your life to start reaping the things that you're good at.
Chad
I couldn't couldn't couldn't trade more. So so let's let's talk a little bit about I mean we've kind of we've kind of talked a bit about our our you know how we got to where we are. Let's talk about where we are today. myself included, yourself, you're an entrepreneur, you're you're a business owner, I'm an entrepreneur, I'm a business owner. you know, there's a there's a belief out there that, you know, when we when we decided that we want to open our own business that we just became instant millionaires. Not true. And and so I I always like to talk about that because I think there's this if I had a dollar for every time I heard somebody say, Man, I'd really like to go and do that. I'd like to start my own company, but never do. I would probably be I probably wouldn't need to do this podcast nor at work. but I think that's that's you know, being an entrepreneur in in yourself and and how how many years have you been an entrepreneur on your own now?
Chad
Okay. So in five years, what what do you what do you what what's it been like? What what's it like to sit in that seat?
Lindsey
Have a similar vision. So for us, it has really been a team project to build this and see where it can go. And yes, it's a challenge day to day figuring out what are the right business development strategies for us, what are the right operational management strategies for us, who's going to be doing what, and how do we hold ourselves and each other accountable. So it's there's no big picture that we we see on a daily basis. It's kind of hard to see the success that we've had when we're still in the
Chad
Yeah, I think, you know, that that's so so true. And and you you you s you talked about you mentioned kind of what you you know what you're doing and and the and the part that a lot of that resonated with with me, but the accountability part and and I think I don't know, that that really like kind of touched me a little bit on that and and the fact that I think when we think about business owners, we think about entrepreneurs and we think about starting something, you know, oftentimes I have conversation with business owners and I don't know it I don't know the right word to call it. I don't know if it's pride or whatever, but they're they're in a season where they built something and to ask for help or to to admit that I did it wrong is very hard for people.
Chad
And so I I I even even so I've had law law firms I've talked with on my podcast and you know it's a different it's a different season and and you know you you work sp you know a lot with them is especially I think for in my experience from the lawyers it's it's even harder because they spend a lot of time in school. And they're if you're a lawyer, you're a smart person. You you you you can't go to law school without being a smart person. So they're very smart. But most are very prideful people. And and not in a negative way. I don't mean that like in a negative way. I mean they're they're they've spent a lot of time, a lot of school money to do it. but even in my conversation with some of the lawyers is they know there's problems, but they don't want to talk about it because it makes them look weak or something like that. And and maybe I'm not using the right words, but I see that happen a lot. And but the ones that say, Hey, you know what? Lindsey, come in, I need your help, are the ones that succeed because they're willing to To open that door and and have somebody give them a honest opinion on it and say, Here's how we can make it better. is that your experience too? it's just been mine from the
Chad
Good trip.
Chad
Yeah. That's that's and that's it. I mean it's it's being willing to to ask for help. Ask and and putting the right people inside that to help you with something. I I had a a conversation the other day where I was talking with a client and probably you'll probably relate to this. And they they've been very successful, do very well. w from the outside looking in, people would say, Man, that that business is is solid. And this happens a lot. And then you get the trust where they ask you to come in and you kind of start doing some deep dive and you start doing, you know, looking behind the curtain, so to speak, is what I call it. You you look behind the curtain. And you start offering some suggestions. And I think there was like this aha moment with some with them, with with this particular person. I'm sure you've dealt with it too, is It it it's our job as as a consultant, as as kind of working with people, is to s to help them see behind that curtain and put it into clarity for them. Because sometimes the clarity part is they're they're they're especially when they're the owner, they're so busy, like their minds going a million miles an hour, and goes back to something that you said is the app that may not be their aptitude. That may not be what they're really good at. And so having that consultant to come in that that can do those things for them is kind of actually very helpful if they allow it.
Chad
Absolutely. Amen.
Chad
Absolutely. I've heard that more than once. Like when you go to law school, they teach you how to be a lawyer. That's what they do. They teach you how to be a really good lawyer. And they are. They're good. They do not have business classes where you're sitting in there and you're learning how to run the business. And you know, when you think about it and it's and it's it's we're talking about law firms, but It's really any business. Like when you go into own running a business, I mean, there's certain things that I'm really good at and there's some things that I'm not good at. And I learned very early on that the things that I'm not good at is where you source and where you go to find the help. And 'cause it allows me to do things that I'm really good at. And I think that's that's the the approach that I take and I'm I'm I'm sure you take when when talking with them is that, you know, you you can't fix every problem today. But what you can start doing is is resolving these individual problems that's gonna make the process better. It's gonna make your company flow better. And and just like with SEO or any of it, like you gotta start somewhere and you got to build a foundation.
Chad
Yeah, we're under the use of the right.
Chad
So something I want to ask you here, and and I'm gonna I'm sure it's never happened to you, so I'll say that. have you ever been in a situation with a client where you're trying to do discovery and they just don't know? And you have to it's almost like probing it out of them to get to where they can openly see it. Because I've met with them and and you ask a question and they'll do a very surface qu answer. And it's not because they're trying to hide from it. It's because they don't know how to dig deep enough to know where it is.
Chad
We don't know what data they're supposed to be collecting and PPIs that they should be looking at. They look at
Chad
is educating people that here are the metrics that you can have some realistic goals, and here's how much you need to be spending in order to get to those goals. So our SEO require us and having people have an understanding that just basics it really requires us to understand how modelings work and function and how do we be able to appropriately engage what earnout strategy is working because of And and so, you know, for for people that are out there, you know, that are listening or or hearing this, and maybe they're a law firm or maybe they're a business owner, and they're and they're they're like, you know, this is kind of resonating with me. How how do they how do they get in touch with you? How do they how do they even start? Because what I find is is sometimes people hear this and then they're like, Well, that's me, but But how do we how do we take that first step? Like what would they need to do to take that first step in the right directions to getting some help? Finding the right program to align with those goals. So if there's a lot of must get and get some help with your SEO and figuring out how the preparations fits into that, they can find out that I'm gonna optimize my card background. something like the focus hardware. So sit down and then think about first of all that part of the public and then figuring out if you're gonna be in three months to six months, eight years, five years, and you're going to have to work. And and that's the key. And so I I say that on top of that is you have to you have to do your due diligence and find and and ask questions. And and really if you've got if you're out there and you've got, you know, if people are, hey, I need some help, or you're looking for a consultant or somebody to work with, you need to be, you need to find the people that are that are generally wanting to hear the problems.
Chad
And and and evaluate them and give you the right solutions. And I will I say this all the time. You have to be okay with to say to the to a consultant or to anybody, whether that be you or me, this is missing the mark. This is not where I am. And that's okay because again, you and I are just outside sources listening. Like we're we're just offering what we see. Doesn't mean we have the right answers because it may be, you may be yeah, I see that, but that's not where my problem is. It's over here. And you have to be willing to say that.
Chad
Well, Lindsey, it has been an absolute pleasure to have you on the show. really insightful, really just good to get to know you and and and and and hear about how you started, how you came through and and kind of what you do today. And and I you've you've been very successful with helping law firms with their SEO and and really giving giving them some tools to help their business grow. 'Cause like we said, they're not business people, they're lawyers. And so it's it's it's it's It's okay to ask for help.
Chad
Haven't we all? So again, thank you guys for joining. I'm Chad Paris for Stonefly Consulting. if check me out at stoneflyconsulting.com, love to work with you. so would Lindsey as well. we we if you got something out there you're working on and need some help, we're happy to help. So we'll cut it there. that was fun. it was I I hope it was very conversational. That's what I wanted to be. It was just very relaxed and not I didn't want you to have to be this scripted garbage. Like it's kinda I think it was raw. That's what I liked.
Chad
So what I'll do is is I'll I'll send you the raw footage or we'll cut this up and we'll link you on there. love for you to go to the to the my my YouTube channel and subscribe or share or whatever. And I'll do the same with yours. but yeah, if and and and again if if our paths cross and there's some I I I I love doing this because I also like building my network and getting to know people that are really cool and and do some great stuff. So if we can ever, you know you ever need any s help or you got some things you want to bounce off. Love to. I would I would absolutely love you. Send me a schedule, I'll hop on that. Love to do that. And and I think I yes, I would love to do it. And you know, anytime we can collaborate, man, I think it's fun to do and get to know just start somewhere, get to know each other. There may be some paths we could cross. So I'd love to do the show though.
Lindsey
Yeah, yeah, I'll I'll send you some information on that. pretty much it's just kind of find a time that works for both of us and we'll we'll hop on and get it done. Alright, thanks. You too. Bye bye.
Chad
Yeah.
Chad
Awesome. Look forward to it. Well, you have a great rest of the day. Thank you very much. Bye bye.
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