012. How To Protect Your Boss Lady Empire, Legally - Christina Scalara

Let's talk legal, boss babe! Something that is so important to every business owner, but tends to be super confusing is how to legally get your business together and set up for success! 

 Christina Scalara, owner of The Contract Shop, a one of a kind boss lady who is blazing her own trail after graduating law school and ditching the traditional route! 

 In this episode, Christina and I talk about steps that you can take, today, to start protecting yourself and your business legally so that you can feel confident in your everyday business practices and have all the legal angles covered. 

 If you want to dive in on ways that you can improve your business and make better legal choices, this is the episode for you! 

 Want to get to know Christina Scalara more: 

 Purchase a contract from her shop for your creative business at The Contract Shop

 Find The Contract Shop on Instagram

 Connect with Christina on Instagram

 Are you apart of our Boss Lady Facebook Support group? Come and join us, HERE! 

 Follow Courtney on Instagram

 Connect with Courtney and She Social for more resources HERE

 This episode is not meant to be legal advice - if you are seeking legal advice you should always reach out to a legal professional. 

 Mentioned in the podcast: 

http://thelegalpaige.com

 Some of the links above are affiliate links - please see our privacy policy HERE

 Song: MBB - Beach Music promoted by SF Music. 

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Christina Scalara is the attorney and founder behind the contract shop, a contract template store for creative entrepreneurs, wedding professionals and coaches. Three years ago, Christina found herself dreaming of pursuing a more creative path and she started to look for alternatives to her in-house legal job. She explored everything from teaching yoga to becoming a freelance graphic designer to even opening an Etsy shop in the process. She ended up coming full circle by creating a business that brought the benefit of her legal training to help her fellow creatives when Christina is not staring at a computer or awkwardly standing on cafe chairs for the perfect overhead latte photo, you can find her in the woods doing things that are sometimes dangerous, but always fun like riding horses, skiing, and reluctantly camping. In this interview, Christina and I have a high vibe conversation all about how boss Babes like you can protect yourself legally. So if you want to get in on this amazing conversation, keep on listening.

Speaker 2: 1:17

Hello. Hello. Welcome to the Hashtag files. This podcast is dedicated to helping you step and learn how to monetize your authentic self. I'm your host, sugar, social media and marketing. On this show, we talk strategy and ready to learn how to grow your business and create a positive impact in the world by being unapologetically who you've come to the right. Let's get into it.

Speaker 1: 2:06

Hello everyone. Welcome to the Hashtag Files podcast. I want to welcome a very, very special guest today. Christina Scalera is. Hi Christina. I'm so excited to have you today. How are you? Hi Courtney. It's great to be here. I'm so excited to talk to you too. So now you know that I. well, if anybody's been listening to this podcast for awhile, they know how much I love boss Babes who blaze their own trail and I feel like your story is very much one that you designed on your own from an attorney of law to owning an online contract shop for creatives and starting a podcast

Speaker 3: 3:00

like that is amazing. Did you ever think that that would happen for you after law school and can you tell us a little bit about your story and how you got started? Sure. Um, yeah, I mean I definitely, it's funny because in the creative world I feel like I have a lot of people that are like, I love what you're doing. I want to do what you do and have an online shop and sell digital products. The people I went to law school with are like less than amused. I went to a really good law school and if you go out on your own as an attorney, especially from the school that I went to your, like the Mcdonald's of lawyers. It's crazy. So funny that you say that. Yeah. Um, I don't mind at all because I'm like, hi, I'm in Colorado and South Africa or wherever, right. He's like real answer wherever I wouldn't be here. Right. No, but there's definitely been a process of overcoming that as an insecurity. Um, you know, just having like the subtle jabs and the backend to compliments. But yeah, how I got here and now people are wanting to follow the same path. It's funny, those same kind of people that were like, you totally blaze that trail. So I love women like you, like because that's me. Like that's been my, I didn't know it when I was like starting out that I was actually like doing that. But like I look back at my life, I'm like, oh my gosh, like no one was really doing that when I was doing it. Like that's pretty cool that I even had the balls to go out and I know I saw you had like a Zenga site or something. I was like yes. That's where I, my very first social media and a lot of people left because like I even met my boyfriend in eight and a half years on my space, so like social media is like, oh, that's hilarious. Yeah, no, I think if you can go out there. My, my brother founded a couple of years ago and I think I may have had it removed. Like I reported my own account when I was six, when I was need to be seeing this, get rid of that. It was just crazy. I'm like, wow, this is, this is like, I have literally lived that amount of years since then, you know, 14 years ago at the time I was like, ah, this is crazy. Like that's how old this stuff is. But yeah. So anyway, I've always been into um, like in the internet computers. I don't know if you guys ever remember the game pets, like with a z. yes. I totally remember that game. I was like totally like selling puppy litters at nine and 10. I was like a sims person. Oh my gosh. I never got into Sam's. I've always been an animal person I guess, but yeah, it was like hexing the code files on the back end and so I've always been like this kind of, by the way, I wasn't good at it. Like my hex poppy's would come out like blue and missing saying I was good at this. I was just saying I did it. But yeah. So anyway, I've always been into that. And so all throughout law school, I know you have struggled with just completing the coursework. It gets overwhelming and so I would find that my escape during college and then law school would be these Internet outlets and I didn't really know that. Like blogging was a thing and people made fun of blogging when I was in school and um, you know, just kind of like, oh, like everybody and their mom has a blog and everybody's a hipster. And I was like, okay, so blogging isn't a real career and now I see this. This isn't, I'm so mad that I like listened to the mass. I call it dumb ass ass instead of listening to myself. I did that like 90 percent of my life, right? Yeah. So that's kind of like where I was coming from and I, I have this very rebellious spirit and I get very frustrated about things easily when they're not running very efficiently. And so I was, I was working in law firms during my summers, like that's what you do. You Click at law firms, work in these places that try to woo you over and wine and dine you. And they like the law firm that I worked at in Atlanta, they had been voted the best bar in Atlanta for like two years. It was just crazy that this was the lifestyle that I was in. And I remember having a conversation at that bar. I'm with one of the, like their head office was in Ohio and so like they're managing partner from Ohio had flown down and I think I was 21 or 22 at the time and he was like, you know, so what do you want to do? What kind of law do you practice for a very serious. And I was like, I dunno, I just want to be happy and he thought I was the biggest bubble head he'd ever met, but you can't be happy, you have to work for 40 years and then you can retire and then whatever up here. So that's kind of where I like, that's the place that I was at leaving law school after that you were like, well if he's sitting here telling me that I'm not going to be happy and he's doing what I thought I wanted to do. Like this definitely isn't the thing for me. Yeah. And it was just, it was a lot of stuff that was happening during law school. Like I said, I went to a really good school and like the rumors that you hear about drug use at good schools is very true. And so I was sitting here drinking my coffee while other people are taking stronger substances, shall we say. And I'm feeling like I, I very much at the time had a victim mentality. I'm like, this isn't fair. Like I'm playing by the rules. I'm not getting good grades like down on myself. And now it's like the best thing that ever happened because I wasn't offered a job through what's called Oci on campus recruiting or on campus interviews with OCI stands for. And so I had to find a different job and I ended up getting a really good job out of law school. It was working in house at a kid's toy company and it was like Super Fun and yeah, it was, it was a great job. There were some complications though at the same time happening with my health and my personal life. And so I basically had to make the decision like, do I continue to work full time because I was working full time for this company before I graduated from law school. Before you graduated? Yes. Do I go, do I go to law school and work full time? So like basically to 40 plus our jobs that we do. I was studying for the bar because if I was coming up and so continued to go on this path graduated. So that eliminated a lot of stress from my life. But then like the health problems were already there. I mean, it just had been accumulating over the last three years of this very stressful law school and um, I had to decide what to do with my life basically. I'm like, do I continue to go down this path and live a really unhealthy lifestyle? And I had had some severe like things that happen. Yeah, put me in the hospital a couple times. So I basically, I'm not good at moderation at all. And I went and the total opposite to me, I didn't feel like you might say that. So

Speaker 1: 9:33

I'm like a go all in or like not at all, like moderation in balancing balances my word of the year and I feel like we're in August eighth of 2018 and I'm like ethically balanced eight months into my chair.

Speaker 3: 9:48

I think that's okay because I've, I mean I've learned to learn like my balance doesn't look like, you know, I wake up and I have this great morning and then I work and then I take some rest and I worked at like, that's not my balance. Looks like my balance looks like 20 hour days, followed by sleeping for two, traveling across the country, flying back and then working for the next week and then just sleeping for the next week. There's no balance on a day to day basis. I mean I try to do like, what did I call an anchor activities. So I try to work out or hike because I live in color. Um, so I try to always have like Elissa anchor activities, like more morning ritual. It doesn't change no matter where I am. Everything that happens in between those like hiking and morning ritual, it's all fair game.

Speaker 1: 10:34

Whatever happens, happens. We're just going to roll with the punches.

Speaker 3: 10:37

Yeah. Yeah. And I mean honestly that was like a big hang up for my success because I, I always felt like I had to have, even in law school I couldn't study until I had like the perfect color post it notes and they were all on my desk in a certain way and I'm kind of OCD.

Speaker 1: 10:52

I am too. I'm not, I am in certain aspects. It's funny, my little sister has been visiting and she was holding her underwear and I'm like sitting, what are you doing? I opened my heart attack. I was like, but like my ocd, so like, but I guess we all have it in different areas so I can relate to.

Speaker 3: 11:10

No, for sure. And like I'm not saying this to be funny or this is a real condition that people have. I actually it manifest to. I pick my cuticles, which I'm not. I'm very proud of. That's a hard thing to kick for. Sure. Yeah. So anyway, I'm getting back to this. I was just having a lot of health challenges. Not good at moderation. Decided to be a yoga teacher and again, don't do anything in moderation. So I'm like where's the best yoga school? Well technically it's La. A lot of people might argue that it's India, but I was like, yeah, not going to India. I've heard a lot of bad things. Everyone's still tells me I should go, but I'm not really about it. So I went to La and San Francisco and between two I got certified to not only teach yoga with Andy Carpenter, not, but also got certified as a prenatal teacher because of the health problems I was having. I couldn't be in a hot yoga room and that's what everybody does. So it's very frustrating for me. But Prenatal Yoga, you absolutely cannot heat the room. Like those mamas are creating their own heat and like hot tub, it's the same thing. They can't write. So I taught prenatal yoga and I was not very good. I'm going to be honest, courtney, because I focus way more on the business stuff like building the website, blogging about health and yoga stuff. All of that was way more interesting to me than showing up for class on time and teaching. And I was good. Like I remembered their names. That's very important when someone's pregnant because basically they usually have a toddler attached to them so they're just like a boob to someone in their life and they wanted to recognize individual. So I actually was a pretty good freedom. A little teacher in that way. Um, but you know, I, I would push them a little bit too hard because I'm just a little bit of a, like when I work out I work out to the Max and so I just wasn't, it wasn't a good prenatal yoga teacher. And I'm fortunately around this time I had started to investigate other careers. I know you had said you had focused on a lot of different dental careers and things like that. I was focusing a lot on different lettering and design because of the blog. Like I had to learn how to take my own photos. I had to learn how to design things. I had to learn how to put a pinterest graphic together, what pinterest was. I had to learn how to do calligraphy so we can have cool stuff on instagram. And so it was like all of these things that I could have taken up as a career that led me to this creative community that I'm now a part of. And Yeah. So one of the things that happen, I just like very fortuitously came into the creative community about the same time that the rising tide society started. Oh cool. Yeah, yeah. I remember being like one of the first 700 people to join their instagram account. And I was like, Oh wow, this is so cool. Feels like forever ago it was, it was like three years ago. So yeah. So, um, but I remember watching it and I was like, wow, that's amazing. We have a thousand and like by the next day they had like 30,000 or some crazy number. And I was like Whoa. And so just completely enamored with this creative industry, like realizing there's people behind it. Like this is a movement, this isn't just like a freelancer union, like doing their own thing. It was really, really fun. It was a really great time and I still didn't know what I was doing and so I spent literally my last dollars more than my last dollars to go to three different creative workshops, retreats, that kind of thing in the fall of 2015. And that was where everything changed for me, so that was where I made connections, people that were my peers that are still my peers that I think most people would consider influencers now I'm just opportunities to work on people's businesses as back to being a lawyer. I'm going back to what had been doing on the side because the yoga stuff hadn't really been paying and just translating that into basically what they needed, which they didn't need full service legal help. They needed something that was in between$450 an hour lawyer and legal zoom.

Speaker 1: 15:13

Whereas we all know that they have good things, but like I feel like you still need to know what you need before you even go on legal zoom, which is half the battle.

Speaker 3: 15:19

Right? Yeah. And I mean I would, I would argue that it's a great resource, like generally speaking, but it doesn't do much if, if you're in a specific profession, like if you're a wedding photographer, they're general contract for services is not going to cover any of the intellectual property stuff that you need to consider as a photographer. So yeah. So anyway, that, that was kind of how this whole thing got kicked off. I kicked it off under my name. I had no idea what I was doing. I didn't make any sales for the first three months and just like a total disaster and I was like, this is not going to work out. And um, that's the worst feeling, but we've all been there but it did work out and I don't want to like skirt that under the rug. I very intentionally kept making connections until one of those connections stuck and it was a big enough connection that it was able to be like the launching pad for my career. And so I don't want to say that it was like one singular thing because I think that's what everybody is waiting for as an entrepreneur. Like you're just waiting for that one big break. And I did have like a break but I don't want to say it was like the one big break. Like there was a lot of other things that I had to do to keep that momentum going. So anyway, that's just a tangent, but I just want to remind people if you're waiting for that one big break, stop like lots of little breaks for yourself.

Speaker 1: 16:35

Yeah. They all kind of add up to one big break. It's not necessarily one. Right? Yeah, that's so true. And that's amazing. Wow. So from law student working and then working at the toy place to like becoming a yoga teacher too, like wow, what a journey you've been on. How exciting. I love that because that's me too. Like, and I feel like a lot of people are very similar in the fact that they've had a lot of different career paths or different ideas and they all kind of lead them to where they are. So like to the people who are like trying to seek out that one job or that one thing that they want to do, like just keep going after whatever feels good and like I swear everything will line up the way it's supposed to.

Speaker 3: 17:16

Yeah. Like as I was driving up to Nashville for a calligraphy workshop with someone who I actually really love nowadays, Jessica Peddicord, I always want to say her, her maiden name, Jessica peddicord. Now simply Jessica Murray. Yeah. I, I did a calligraphy workshop with her and that was like, I mean it was just like looking back I was like, what were you doing? But I am glad that I had that space to play around and um, you know, I gave myself that permission even though it was a real stretch financially and resource wise.

Speaker 1: 17:47

Yeah. Well, and I feel like that's one of the biggest misconceptions is like you see people online that are like quote unquote successful and people think that like, you know, it happened overnight when really it's like, for me it's literally 10 years in the making. Like my first contract I ever typed up on word whisper, like completely legal contract. But I thought it was neat. Yeah, I love that story. I know like, I think I was thinking about it the other day, um, when I made that podcast was like, oh my gosh. Like I would consider that was my first, you know, real step into the because I didn't become a lot of people like, oh, because you like kids. And I was like, no, I mean I like kids. That's not why I'm in India. I'm going to antiques. I wanted control my schedule, I wanted to control my income and that to me that's like a lot of them big part of what entrepreneurship is. So that is amazing. Oh my gosh. I love, I love to hear that. Do you, are you still an avid

Speaker 3: 18:38

yoga practice or not really? I wish I were better, but um, yeah, not really. I, I live up in the mountains of Colorado now and so I have a lot more fun things I think I think of Yoga people, the mountain lakes that you can hike to and like the glaciers that, that I can go up on the middle of August and winter and stuff that appeals to me a lot more and I'm bringing my horses. I've always been a horse person so I'm bringing my horses out here.

Speaker 1: 19:07

Gosh, that's amazing. I love Portland is similar as far as like the outdoors. He thinks

Speaker 3: 19:13

yes and you can ski your rebel. Most years this year's a little hot, but usually you can ski around. In my own head,

Speaker 1: 19:18

been skiing or snowboarding. My boyfriend was making fun of me because I don't know if it's because my mom wasn't a big snowball. My Dad lived in Colorado and worked on a ski lift. I'm like, dad, how have you never taken any of those? Very strange, and he's like, well, your mother wasn't really into it and I'm like, oh my gosh. Of course. That's why we never win, but I'm determined. Well, our new thing is my boyfriend and I are going to be buying a trailer next summer. We're gonna live in it for a year and go around the entire United States. So we're going to be doing. I'm going to put myself completely out of my comfort zone and try as many adventurous things as I possibly can, so I'm going to put skiing on my list of things to try.

Speaker 3: 19:56

Yeah, absolutely. It's a wonderful sport and I wish more people would try it out because it's not scary. No, I'm throwing you up on the stuff that I'm going off of

Speaker 1: 20:08

being compared to snowboarding is so much easier and way less scary, so I'm like, okay, well I'm down to try that first before I hop on a snowboard because I can't even barely see on a skateboard.

Speaker 3: 20:20

Yeah, I love skiing. I have not tried snowboarding, but from what I understand it is way easier to learn skiing and then harder to get good at it and then snowboarding see opposite, so it's way easier or way harder to jump on a snowboard and then it's

Speaker 1: 20:34

easier to get like really good do tricks and stuff on snowboards, but I've never heard that before so. Okay. Starting a business is obviously scary and hard and like I feel like the legal aspects

Speaker 3: 20:48

of starting a business or overwhelming in general, but like you start reading some of the legal aspects of like contracts and whatnot and it's intimidating just like the legal jargon and the language. What would you say is your number one piece of advice that you would give to a new business owner who's worried about being legally covered? Yeah, so I think everybody as my friend Courtney Johnson, she's a copywriter and she says she was like, I just didn't want to go to jail at the beginning of my business and I had the same feeling as a lawyer. I think a lot of people just, and again this is anecdotal, I don't have empirical proof to back this up, but I think a lot of people just feel like they're gonna go to jail. Like, you know, the money that they just got into their bank account with somehow fraudulently acquired and they're going to get found out. So it's not even this imposter syndrome in the way that I've heard life coaches and things. Uh, you know, people like that talking about it. I think it's like this imposter syndrome that we have that like, wait a second, that was way too easy. Like, no one, I'm used to being handed a paycheck every two weeks and like watching all the money drain out of it for taxes, like you still have to pay taxes. That is how you go to jail if you don't pay your taxes, you don't pay taxes, you jail, let's just put that. But, um, but, you know, I think it's, it's that, that thrill of getting that first client or even like those first few client payments were. Or if you have a product, like I sell a digital product watching those first few digital product sales come in and they're like, whoa, whoa, mind blown. I think it's that moment where you're like, oh, oh crap, what next? Like, am I going to go to jail now? Like this was way too easy. And in reality it's not easy. It's easy in that moment, like while you're out with your friends and you're watching sales come in on your phone, sure, that's easy, but you forget the six weeks that you put into developing a course every single day and night and the launch before that. So, um, so I think that's the fear that people have and then as far as overcoming that fear, I, I'm like one of those people that, and I think a lot of your listeners might be like this, I really enjoy if I have some kind of ailment or disease, like I want to find out biologically why that's happening. I think for a lot of us to dispel this fear, we can do the same exact thing. Like we can figure out like, okay, if we know exactly what we need to have in place, like what is actually happening behind the scenes here that we haven't checked out yet. We can feel better about this because we know like rationally everything is going to be okay. Right? Like if you get a shot, you know that like the, maybe this is a bad example, but I'm like if you are getting a, if you were taking a vitamin right, like you can understand how that vitamin is working in your body, you can understand how your digestive system absorbs it, how it's working. You can rationally understand that you are no longer scared to take that medicine or that vitamin. Yep. So the same thing can happen with your business where if you know that you need, um, so it's a pretty simple like checklists that I have in my head anytime I'm starting a new business, which I've started quite a few llcs and things like that just because of different partnerships had. So the first thing I always do is I go and I get an employee identification number. This is something free,

Speaker 1: 23:51

literally takes five minutes.

Speaker 3: 23:54

It's very easy. It's from the irs, it's unlike irs.gov, or you should Google e I n irs, um, and you'll find the application for it. The only catch with it is that the irs website actually has office hours. So if you go at 10:00 at night or 11 or whatever that closing time is, and they are closed, you'll be very confused because it will not allow you to get one. So go when they're actually open. And then the next thing. So the Ein allows you to open any kind of bank account, pay pal account, Amazon Account, a shopify merchant credit, like whatever it is, finances are all tied to your Ein. That is like creating a new social security number for your business. So it's like a business as a new person at that point. It's really, really helpful not only for opening these separate accounts, which I think is the most important step and starting a new business so that you're not commingling funds from your past accounts.

Speaker 1: 24:46

Oh yeah. I learned that one real quick. One guy and he was like, that's like the number one way to be in trouble with the tax people. And I was like, oh I didn't, I didn't even know that. Like I, I had a different paypal that didn't have a different bank accounts,

Speaker 3: 25:00

right? Stripe, paypal. So a lot of people, they'll forget like one or two accounts. And so I mean it's not like I'm not gonna say that you're not going to get in trouble, but I really don't think it's a huge deal. Like just fix it when you can. Now, now that you're listening to this right here, you know you need to have different accounts and so you know that's all tied to that Ein number. So that's free. Most bank accounts are free to set up. A lot of people ask me like what's the difference between a business and a checking or a business and a personal checking account. Can I just get a personal but personal accounts usually have a limit of$5,000 a month. So the way that I've gotten around this and I can deposit any amount of money that I need to every month, no matter how many clients I've worked with or what I've made is I've actually worked with a local bank and a local bank typically will offer free business checking accounts are different than your wells Fargo's in your tastings because right then there's no fee and you can do like if you have a crazy awesome month and you make$15,000 now you don't have to wait two months to get the rest of that money into a bank account. So, which I mean, I know a lot of you are like, oh well I don't need to worry about that for a while, but you might,

Speaker 1: 26:10

I would start expecting that now so you can manifest it in your life like don't put that. There you go. Follow Courtney.

Speaker 3: 26:17

So okay. So they have their Ein. The next most important thing is to get something kind contract in place. And so if you're selling products, that's some kind of privacy policy and terms and conditions. We saw the GDPR mckennon earlier this year. So you all know about privacy policies,

Speaker 1: 26:32

you know now because the chaos. Yes. So

Speaker 3: 26:36

we all know that we need to have a really tight privacy policy that we need to enforce it. We actually have to follow what we're saying. We're in that privacy policy. Um, and then the terms and conditions of your website, those are my favorite. I know a lot of people are like, what? Like that's so boring.

Speaker 1: 26:50

But you said on your website like the boring stuff at the bottom or whatever it said. I was the cute. I feel like I want to put that on my website now because it was so cute because now especially that you say that it's one of your favorites, like it totally makes sense that it says

Speaker 3: 27:05

it is, it's, it is like my favorite, so I'm, I'm like obsessed with the show versus right now it's a little Raunchy. But um, other than that it's really good and like I feel like I get to be my own king louie of my own domain. Like I'm not like your terms and conditions that is you dictating to the world how they are able to use your website and the things on your website. Um, it's also a helpful place if you're a blogger to go and look at other websites and look and see how you can use their images for like a blog post roundup for a holiday gift roundup.

Speaker 1: 27:38

So true. That's a huge thing because I talk about this all the time. Like is even on Instagram, I use all my own photos because of this one time because I started off as a social media manager. I thought that's just what I wanted to do and it was a part of this really big like social media manager group and the literally this post scarred me for life and I'll never, ever, ever do this because of what I saw. This woman, she shared someone's photo on instagram. She gave him credit and like did all the things she thought she was the super. She actually never asked for permission and so the photographer who had taken the photo astropad take it down and I don't know if this is like legally sound or whatever, but like it was enough for me to know whether it could be possible that it scared me. But long story short, I'm the photographer sent her an invoice for$600 for having it up even though she took it down just for using it without her hip, his or her permission. And I was like, okay, if you don't use someone's photo, like ask Dmm, get the permission, screenshot it. And like

Speaker 3: 28:37

I absolutely agree it. And because that. That's the thing is this is a little off topic. So like, we'll get back to the list of things you need, but that's a really good point, courtney, because a lot of people will give people credit thinking that's, oh great. Like I give them credit, like I shared their stuff. They're getting out there to more people. I did them a favor, but ip intellectual property is a photographs, blog posts, calligraphy designs, um, you know, books, songs, like whatever it is that, that's all considered Ip. So if you take that, which is super easy to do now with screenshots, especially on your phone and you screenshot something shared on Instagram, you are, especially if you credit someone you've now stolen their property and then told them that you did

Speaker 1: 29:25

let me give you an alert on your phone,

Speaker 3: 29:27

right. And show them exactly how and where and when you did that. And so they are able to then take a screenshot and be like, hey, you are using my stuff without paying for it. So, so yeah, it's not enough to give credit. In fact, giving credit is kind of harmful. Um, I'm not saying like, yeah, don't get telling them. Right. I absolutely agree. I'm saying like and again, like I don't give legal advice generally the big population, so this is just information for you guys to take and use as you will, but personally I like to 10 people. I think it creates a great relationship and open to you guys to work together. Um, and then it also lets them know that you were thinking of them and I've never had someone say no. Like they're all really thrilled, really excited or if they're like a bigger photographer, they just don't get back to me and I don't use it and I find something similar.

Speaker 1: 30:17

Exactly. I think that's exactly what she said. Like either they say yes or they don't say anything and then there's your answer. So it's like you might as well ask, but yeah, she literally got an invoice for$600 and had to pay it. And that scarred me for life because at that point I wasn't making any kind of money. I was very new and I was like, Holy Shit. Like if I got a$600 invoice in my email right now ruined mean joe. Like that would not be good. And so I've been really, really adamant about teaching my audience, like not using other people's photos without asking her and screenshotting it. So you can prove that they told you. Yes. Right.

Speaker 3: 30:54

Yeah. And um, yeah, so I think that's important. That's a really good point when you're starting a business. So yeah, just to get back to that list, we had the Ein, we had the terms and conditions if you have any kind of website and privacy policy, um, and then any kind of client service contract. So like if you just sell products online then you're not going to need a client service product contract, but if you are selling some kind of service, right? Like if you're managing someone's social media portfolios or if you are, I'm designing their website or designing their logo or doing their calligraphy suite for their wedding. Like those are all clients or you're a yoga teacher and you're providing private instruction at their house. Those are all service based businesses that you're running and you're providing a service and the terms of that service need to be outlined and that's the appropriate place to do that is in the client contract. Yep. It's really important to have a client contract just because I like to think so. You guys are already saying this is where people get all tripped up because they're like, oh, I don't want to send a client contract that's going to scare them off and you know, I'm going to lose a client. I'm not going to make money, but like you guys are already dealing with legal stuff every single day. You go to the doctor's office, you sign a hip of disclosure or confidentiality statement. You go to the grocery store, you pay with your credit card and you sign a little thing that says you're going to repay your credit card company. I'm in full for the purchase you made that day. You sign a new lease on an apartment and get usually totally screwed because they won't let you change anything on it. So you guys, you guys are already engaging in all kinds of legal transactions every, you go to someone's website nowadays and it's like, do you accept our cookies that these are all legal transactions that you are taking part in every single day? And so yeah.

Speaker 1: 32:43

So why should we be thinking that it's going to scare away clients by contract?

Speaker 3: 32:47

Right? And so the way I like to approach clients, especially if you're newer in business and you are afraid a client is going to be scared off by your contract, is to explain how it's beneficial for the client because it is true. Yeah, it's not helpful for the client. If you say that you're going to provide a service and you don't give any kind of information about how that's going to be provided, how they're going to be invoiced, what timeline that looks like. What happens if you need to cancel, you know, like people get sick, you have family members that pass away and you have to go take care of your mom or dad, God forbid, or like whatever. So things happen in our lives. You are pregnant, you know, like there's just things that pop up that won't allow us to do our jobs and the same thing for our clients, like they might need your services and then until they don't and you don't want them to just like go missing and you have no idea if they owe you money or not. The contract is all there to define everything I just talked about and listed not only for your benefit but mostly for the clients so they know that you're going to be held accountable, you're going to provide the service and they're going to know exactly how that service is going to be provided for so that they're not sitting there in the dark scared to spend$3,000 with you because they have no idea where that's going.

Speaker 1: 33:53

Yeah, yeah. You know, it's really funny that you say that because I signed a new client this week and before we even got on the call, she was like, I'm a little nervous because I've had some scrutiny before and so of course, like that's never fun to go into a call back. She was like, oh, now I have to prove to her like I'm not gonna, screw her. So we get on the call and it was so easy because the reason that she got screwed as, because they literally set up a transaction via facebook messenger and that was it and she sent money and I'm like, well there's your red flag number one. Never send some money to somebody. First of all be a venmo because that's for friends and family, not for business transactions and number. If you had a contract, not only would it cover you, it covers both sides, like I know what I need to give to you and you know, what you need to give to me in order to make this work. And so I look and I feel like contracts, you know, I use them for everything. Like I just want to cover my ass on every little thing just because. Why not? Because I've heard of even like influencers that we're working with, big name brands like brands that have I told you right now, like even be like, oh my gosh. Yeah. That's a, that's a huge brand that everybody would recognize who hadn't paid them just because they didn't have a contract and they didn't legally, morally they should have and they did that stuff they were supposed to, but they have found a loophole because there was no contract and I'm just like, it can happen to anybody. So you might as well cover yourself as you can.

Speaker 3: 35:10

Yeah, yeah, no, I, I talked about this on a different podcast, but that absolutely happens a lot. It's shocking and I think people just feel like, oh, it's a big brand. They have a lot of money.

Speaker 1: 35:21

Yeah, I think that's exactly like it's a brand recognition thing. Like, oh, there are there any target? Like they're totally fine and it's like, no, not necessarily, right.

Speaker 3: 35:30

Yeah. No, it happens all the time. And so, um, yeah, let's, that's all I have to say about that is it does, it happens more often than you would think so.

Speaker 1: 35:44

Well, and I think that's like a go and it's all, it's all different kinds of businesses from just being like an in quote unquote. And I say that not to offend people because I think influencers are awesome, but if you're just an influencer versus like someone like me who's maybe coaching them or taking over their entire social media like contracts can be used and all different kinds of businesses when you're providing a service for somebody and definitely it's worth the investment to get the right contract and have yourself covered

Speaker 3: 36:14

and quickly. So actually that's a little bit of a side note too. But part of the reason I started the contract shop is because it took me two weeks. This is embarrassing guys. It took me two weeks as a lawyer to send. I had two very interested a private yoga clients. That was how I was going to make money. I had a mentor, long story short, um, I was going to be providing private yoga and that was because yoga teachers don't really make that much money teaching and studios and stuff. So I had two people that were super interested, um, very well off financially, not price resistant. Like it was going to be a great kind of situation. I was going to come to their house, set everything up, give them their yoga session, leave, and it was going to be a nice paycheck for me. I could not even get my ish together enough to send them a contract within two weeks than I did. I made it in Photoshop and if you guys have ever tried to word document in shop, like difficult. Oh my gosh. So anyway, it was just a total disaster. When I finally gave it to these two clients, they were like, oh, we don't even want this service anymore. Like you can't even get back to us within two weeks. So

Speaker 1: 37:21

I don't know. That's so true though because yeah, like I've seen that happen with a lot of people have they, they don't know what to do and they way they take too long because they're nervous or insert whatever reason here and then yeah, you potentially could lose the client.

Speaker 3: 37:34

Yeah. For me it was, I just like didn't have a contract to send to them to close the deal and it took me two weeks to write it because there's not just like, you don't graduate from law school with a Bank of contracts in your pocket. You have to do it just like everybody else, you know, you're obviously better informed at what needs to be in there and what happens if this clause gets enacted versus this. But I didn't have anything to send to them and so that was part of the reason I started this is because you know, someone's really in a pinch, they can come, they can download our template and then fill it out and send it to a client in less than 10 minutes. So don't lose clients because you're waiting

Speaker 1: 38:09

because you're waiting and like really to once you invest in something like the contract shop and you get your contract situated and then you can, you know, make sure it's easy to have it there and you just use it and you get a good system that you can send it over for both parties to sign in. You're pretty much good to rock and roll,

Speaker 3: 38:27

so. Absolutely. Yeah. So the last thing I think on that list, so we covered his bank accounts. I'm a privacy policy plus terms and conditions. So those two things usually go hand in hand, a client contract or client service agreement. And then I think the last thing that we haven't covered that people are like, wait, why aren't they talking about this as an llc? So if you're in the United States, I don't remember what they're called in Canada. I'm sorry, Canadian friends.

Speaker 1: 38:48

I know. I haven't been of Canadian clients and I like, some of this happens to me all the time we started because I'm like, oh yeah, that's different for you.

Speaker 3: 38:55

I mean I think they're just called corporations or something. Um, I'm, I'm ruining this. I'm not a Canadian attorney. I don't pretend to be and that would be very bad. Um, but if you are in the US and if you do business in the US, then it, this is a relevant discussion for you. So a limited liability company is an LLC and so sometimes called the limited liability corporation. Depends on what state you're in. So that is basically the legal shield that you can put up in place. So if anything happens, your LLC is the one who is bearing the brunt of whatever is owed to the client or the the lender if it's a financial thing or if there's any kind of liability and fault, it's your company, um, that's, that's taking the fall there. So that's why an LLC is important. And then kind of combined with that is insurance. So there's a lot of different types of insurance you can get as a small business owner or an entrepreneur. Um, my favorite kind to look for is general liability, but also if you're doing any kind of coaching or consulting, there's something called errors and omissions insurance, you know, and so that sometimes it's also concurrently referred you as professional liability coverage. So those two, the Eno and professional liability coverage does it the same thing. Those two things, those last two things, the LLC on the insurance, if you really want to cover your butt, those are two great things to invest in. Usually an LLC is relatively inexpensive,

Speaker 1: 40:20

I don't know. And I did, and it was like boom, boom, it was pretty much done pretty quickly and it didn't cost us an arm and a leg at all.

Speaker 3: 40:29

Right. Insurance is going to be a little more expensive, especially eno or professional liability insurance that's going to be the most expensive kind you can get. But um, but yeah, so if, if you guys are interested in going the full mile there, that's everything that you could consider. And I think if anybody has those things that we just discussed in place, the contract, the LLC that's separate bank accounts and even insurance on top of that, then I think someone's in a really good position to be working with clients and can feel confident putting themselves out there for any kind of business partnership or opportunity that is there for them to take.

Speaker 1: 41:07

Wow, that's awesome. Well, first of all, you made me feel really good about myself because I had everything but the insurance definitely going to go look at that today. So I'm like, Yay. I have all my ducks in a row. And I, I tried really hard but it is confusing because there's so much. It's like the Internet is a blessing because you can find out anything, but it's also kind of a curse sometimes because you can find out anything. It's like overwhelmed with information. It's like, what do I do, where do I get started? So I love checklists because I feel like it simplifies of like just like a starting path of like getting herself, you know, legally compliant and your business legit so that you can feel competent about the stuff that you're providing for your clients and your in your products and services when it comes to like having a lawyer or something like that on staff. How, how often is that really needed? And let's say someone was to get themselves in a legal bind. Like what would you say would be the best, like you know,

Speaker 3: 42:03

action that they should take to find the right lawyer for them? Yeah. These are great questions. Courtney. I'm having a lawyer. I mean, we haven't even covered a lot of the things that business owners will encounter, but you know, you guys later in your business skimming the top for sure you're going to have to deal with trademarks, copyright issues, we touched a little bit on that. Um, partnerships, merging your business, selling your business. Like these are all things. There's, there's a lot more than that we haven't talked about that just aren't relevant to the general audience, but they might be for you at some point in the near future. So that's all. Those are all things that lawyers can help with. Um, you know, negotiations, if you're, if you're not a fan of confrontation there, you can actually outsource that. You can actually, um, you know, hire a lawyer to do that, that on your behalf if there's a client who's not paying you. So there's a lot of things that

Speaker 1: 42:53

wow, never even knew that could happen. Negotiations. Yeah. I mean, I guess I knew that, but I didn't even think about like if a client owed money and you didn't want the confrontation because I'm definitely the non confrontation type, but I've gotten better it

Speaker 3: 43:05

because I had to be. Yeah. Well actually it's funny because I just found out about this resource. Um, my, I have a shopify coach, he coaches me on how to have a better shopify site and his wife is named Julie Elster and she has a service called a just tell Julie Dot com is the service and she is not a collections agency, but she apparently is very good at getting payments that are not, that are still outstanding basically. So Julian, my life, I know I, I really like what she's doing and she's just a really smart, quick witted

Speaker 1: 43:41

take a problem and turn it into a business because you're good at it. Like that's amazing.

Speaker 3: 43:48

Yeah, totally. So, um, so I really liked what she's doing and I think that's a great resource. Before you hire a law firm, she's much less expensive than a law firm or collections agency potentially. So you know, there's a lot of things that you have or you know, even when when card payments fail, someone's bought your course and they still owe you nine payments or something like these are all things to consider. Um, so I mean there's a lot of things that lawyers can help you with and so of. So I have two different businesses. I have the contract shop, which is what we've primarily talked about here today. That is what you guys will see mostly. And then I actually have a separate business that I run with my partner and he's a twelfth year attorney so it's not just like me, like bumbling around, like he's actually there helping me double checking all of my work. Um, and we have a third associate that helps us on just some research and stuff. So that's, that's my law firm. It's called sclare Ip law. It's totally separate. You probably won't ever see it on the Internet because we're so booked out with clients right now that we're only working with the clients we currently have. That's always a good thing, a good thing. But at the same time, you know, some of the clients in the law firm, they like to keep a summer retainer and so they will just kind of have the ability to call us at any time during the work week and talk through some of the issues they're having. Um, some of them are more conservative and they're just like, hey, we have this negotiation negotiation coming up or we have this client that we're dealing with and so we'll handle those matters on a more like acute specific basis. So I think it and then other people are just constantly, you know, really and dealing and getting new partnerships and creating obligations for their business and things like that. And so we're handling all that for them. And then most of my clients are like one off, they just need a trademark registration and that's it. Yeah, I mean I think it really depends on your business. If you are the kind of person who would rather have like a check in call, there are happy lawyers that are more than willing to provide that for you. I think one great subscription model like that is actually autumn Witt Boyd, and then my friend is actually launching. She's a fantastic lawyer. Like if I told you all her credentials, I mean you would just, if they made sense to you, right? Like they're not in context to you guys, but like I'm like, whoa. I'm. So if you look at, um, at, at the legal page.com, she's launching soon and she is going to be offering something nominal services. I'm incredibly relatable in the creative industry, so go check her out. But yeah, I think for, for creatives and people and coaches and people that are listening to this podcast, just entrepreneurs, you were much better off at most stages of your business. Finding someone who understands your business rather than someone who went to Harvard and has like all the best credentials and the best pedigree. You're going to spend so much time educating someone that doesn't know anything about your business. And that's the advantage I have with my clients. Right? Like I see their business, I follow them on Instagram, I interact with them like I, I get their business. It

Speaker 1: 46:53

makes all the difference even with like a tax person to like go out there that are for creatives. I literally ran into this problem. I went into a text meeting with Joe. It was like the worst meeting of my life. You wouldn't eat. First of all, he wouldn't even talk to me. I don't know if it was because I was a woman or whatnot. It was super awkward and just looked at Joe just talked to Joe. He had no idea what our business even was. He was like saying all these things about us not being profitable. I'm like, actually bro, like we are profitable right now. Like it was so awkward, but I didn't know at that moment until I talked to one of my girlfriends that was like, no, there's people who are out there. Her made for our kinds of businesses. It's the same thing with lawyers and tax people like finding somebody that deals with creative entrepreneurs is gonna save you so much time and energy and you're gonna feel so much better about interacting with them because they're gonna. They're gonna. Understand.

Speaker 3: 47:39

Yeah, absolutely. I'm not saying that's like the best person to find, so I think there's a nice delicate balance and so the two attorneys that I, I'm referring I think are great fits for anybody that's listening to your audience, but there's also a lot of people out there that are like that. They just couldn't cut it and they're calling themselves the creative lawyer or whatever and they basically just hung up a shingle and they're flying by the seat of their pants, googling everything. So you don't want that either, just because they know your business to an extreme is not an excuse for them to be a poor lawyer. So you need to find that balance where they're actually good at what they do from the legal perspective, but then they also understand your business because they have one foot in there. So they might, I really liked page. I really like autumn because they are not dedicating their entire lives to becoming like the lawyer for creatives or whatever. Um, but they, like, they're very good lawyers and then they also understand the creative industry, if that makes any sense. So yeah,

Speaker 1: 48:37

I'll link them down below in the show notes too, just because there's going to be people who listen to this are like I need them.

Speaker 3: 48:44

Yeah. And then there's another gal he met from BC, Canada and her name is Alva as Lonnie and she, she seems like she is like perfect for this audience so I just want to throw that out as a recommendation as well if you're in. I think she does help people set up LLC is more generally in Canada that's allowed. But I know for sure that she practices in in British Columbia.

Speaker 1: 49:07

Oh that's amazing. Yeah, because a lot of my, a lot of my audience is Canadian so that would be definitely helpful for them because they can get a little tricky sometimes because things are a little different there than they are here.

Speaker 3: 49:17

Yeah. I met somebody and Ontario but I, I don't know her personally. We just kind of met in passing so unfortunately I know most of you are in Ontario or BC, but I don't have anybody for Ontario, Alberta and Saskatchewan and I'm like, sorry guys, I just, I don't know.

Speaker 1: 49:35

There's so many and I have and I have clients in every different one and I'm like, and half the time I'm like, how do you even say where you live? Like I don't even know.

Speaker 3: 49:43

Oh my gosh, I love kids. I want to go back. I went there this summer.

Speaker 1: 49:48

I have never been, but I've heard so many good things and I love all my clients are so nice and just, I don't know. And it's gorgeous like outdoorsy types of people like hello, I want to go and like see Bam, like, that sounds amazing.

Speaker 3: 50:04

Well last night

Speaker 1: 50:07

least when you think of a social media and showing up in the world authentically and unapologetically as who Christina is, what does that look like for you and how do you want to create an impact in the world using your platforms on social media and your voice?

Speaker 3: 50:21

I want to make people smile. Yes. This whole time. Yeah. I, I'm like a really goofy, silly person, but that's not really who the lawyer is supposed to be. So I feel like I have to balance that. Um, like I, I was always the, the associate at our firm that was playing pranks on everybody they love it. Um, you know, so that's just like who I am, but then I also understand that that's not socially acceptable and that's not who people have in their mind as an attorney. I want to make people smile whether that's like they download one of our products and they're like, wow, this was exactly what we needed. It solved the problem. We were able to move on, like it's saved us months of working with a lawyer if that's their smile. That makes me happy if I can like throw something stupid up on an instagram story and you know, it's just like this silly post that I made or like a goofy video or like meet with a double chin. Those are the kinds of things. I put it up on my instagram all the time and if that's what's making people smile and that makes me happy. So I would just really love to keep people smiling so much. And it's so true. Like, um, like I think it's cool that that's what you want to do and in your profession because I feel like sometimes the legal stuff can be a little intimidating and if that's your goal is to make people smile, it's going to make the experience much better. Um, awesome. Well can you tell us where people can find you and I'll link everything down below but just to give people a little bit more about where they can find you if they want to connect with you after this podcast. Yeah, absolutely. So the best place to go is the contract shop.com and we're actually going to be having a little. So Courtney and I talked before, we're going to give you guys a couple extra freebies and things like that. If you go to be social.com forward slash the contract shop. So that will be linked in the show that she said and if you want to follow us, my. So the contract shop has its own instagram, it's just the contract shop and then if you want to follow me and like the more goofy side of me and the business, we all see that Christina scalera and let's see a l, e r a so you can follow us in those four places and we would love to see you. Awesome. I will link all that down below. Thank you so much for taking the time to come and talk to my people and drop some knowledge on us. We really needed that. So thank you. Absolutely. It's been my pleasure. Thank you so much for having me, courtney. Of course. Bye.