My First 30 Days With LegalZoom
Well, I don’t mean working for LegalZoom. I mean using them as a service and support mechanism for my business.
If you are thinking about starting a new business and you have heard of their services but want to know about my experiences with them, please read this. This is not really a review per-say, this is my experiences so far.
First, setting up the business, in my case a LLC was pretty straight forward and easy. I thought I knew I wanted to have the LLC, so I came up with the name, followed the steps and paid them. Now one thing for me, is I was not 100% clear, still at this point over 30 days in I am still not clear what exactly I can take advantage of in terms of added services.
I had a follow up call with someone from their Equip team. I determined based on what they said it was probably a good idea. With that I would have to do a little less thinking about licenses, legal, compliance reports and taxes. I would have an Account Manager assigned to me as my point person for all of those items and they would help me through. art of the cost included those things. So I felt it was good for me so I can focus on other things.
That leads to a conversation with my Account Manager, pretty much the point person for my account. Again, so far so good. I get along with them just fine, we have a few things in common outside of work. They seem pretty knowledgable as well. Based on that conversation, my big area of need and want was understanding taxes better. I’m simple, I don’t like to play around with Uncle Sam in my personal life. Owning a business is no different for me.
I also had another conversation where I was able to take advantage of legal console, which I didn’t even know I needed. But after the conversation, I needed. So that was a big benefit. And that was due to my Account manager listening to me and asking me the right follow up questions.
Appointment was made, it was about three weeks or so, maybe two and a half after this first call with me Account Manager. The appointment was for today (the day I am writing this), you can read about that here. if you don’t I’ll save you the time, I was on another work call and didn’t answer the phone. No problem right? Wrong, big problem.
The next appointment for the person assigned to me March 5th, almost a month from now. Not good considering I have to file what tax structure I am going with. Also that is tying up my business licenses that need to be done, before March 5th. So my online store will have to wait. Full promotion of services will have to wait. Also, let’s say I didn’t get into the rich overnight business. I got into the I sold one song, I sold one shirt all year and I am going to party hard! I might not even cash the check, just frame it. So every day counts.
And again, I need to be clear. I missed the call and I am furious with myself for that.
Looking through emails, it looks like there was a tax that needed to be filed for in January, I had no idea. So now I am in panic mode. Also, even if that call happened today, I would still be late for that filing.
Looks like I also had to file for last year, even though the business was approved in 2020. So confusion on my part all the way around. Again, it was determined that my biggest need and want, which in sales almost never happens where those two line up was taxes.
Which brings me to what I feel might be a pretty big problem for me as a person just getting into this. The speed at which I get responses has been slow. The speed at which I have been able to lock in critical appointments has been slow as well. Although that lawyer conversation was done pretty quick. So far, I’m not really feeling like I can pick up the phone and call if I have a question or problem. More like sending an email, waiting for the response and hope that the person or function I need to talk to is available.
In conclusion my first 30 days with LegalZoom has been interesting. On one hand, I have learned a lot and leaned on them for some questions and things I need. However, there is a cost to that, in my case approximately an extra $1,500 for a year. Now we are getting into the cost benefit of the service which has me concerned. So far not because of the quality, but because of the speed in which I am able to access what I paid for.
As I stand today, I am wondering if I would have been able to spend less money and get better service if I found local professionals. Well, let’s see what the next 30 days has in store…