Expand Your Client Base With Bilingual Virtual Receptionists

Here on the Answering Legal blog, we’ve often discussed the benefits bilingual virtual receptionists will bring to a law firm. First and foremost, of course, bilingual answering will reassure any Spanish-speaking clients that they will be understood by your firm. You want to be sure that every client gets the same level of care, regardless of what language they speak.

Besides the client experience, expanding your client base to include Spanish-speaking prospects is also a strong upside to hiring a bilingual virtual receptionist. However, we often hear from attorneys in different parts of the U.S. who say they don’t need bilingual answering because there aren’t many Spanish-speaking potential clients in their areas.

While there are certainly communities in the U.S. with very few Spanish-speakers, they are actually few and far between. In this blog, we’ll be demonstrating that almost wherever you practice law in the U.S., a bilingual virtual receptionist will be a vital tool in expanding your firm’s client base.

Assuring Access To Justice In High-Density Areas

At the risk of stating the obvious, if you practice law in a city with a population larger than 200,000, the ability to answer client inquiries in Spanish is a must. That includes New York and Los Angeles, of course, but also everywhere from Huntsville, Alabama to Des Moines, Iowa (both of which have at least a 10 percent Hispanic population!)

In the 1920 census, the Bureau of the Census found that, for the first time, half of the U.S. population lived in cities. According to the 2020 census, 80 percent of Americans live in cities.

And only 3 percent of the country’s Hispanic population lives in counties with less than a 5 percent makeup of Hispanic people. Nationwide, 19.1 percent of the U.S. population identified themselves as Hispanic on the 2020 Census.

What’s the takeaway from this data? If you live in a city, which the Census Bureau defines as places with more than 50,000 people, you’re very likely to get value out of an investment in a bilingual virtual receptionist. That’s because the U.S. Hispanic population, like most of the U.S., is concentrated in urban areas.

Of course, the denser your area, the more necessary a bilingual virtual receptionist becomes. In cities with historic Hispanic populations like Miami, Houston, and Los Angeles, it’s a real issue if you’re not bilingual, as well as for large cities like New York, Chicago, and even places like Columbus, Ohio.

Some Firms Need More Bilingual Help Than Others

The law, of course, applies to everyone. Unfortunately, it doesn’t always apply to everyone equally. There are demographic factors that interfere with the application of and access to justice, and those cannot be ignored.

For example, there are certain practice areas that, for better or worse, need bilingual answering more than others. Please keep in mind that we avoid making political statements on the Answering Legal blog. What follows are simply facts and statistics, as well as the logical conclusions that can be drawn from them for your law firm.

Practice Areas With Extra Need Of Bilingual Virtual Receptionists

Elder law, in general, is going to become a very profitable field in the future.

One in six people in the United States are 65 years of age or older.

Hispanic populations, like most American demographics, are aging rapidly. Those aging sectors of the Hispanic population will generally be less comfortable speaking English than their younger counterparts, so firms specializing in elder law are going to need a bilingual virtual receptionist even more than most.

The same, unfortunately, is true for criminal defense attorneys.

People of Hispanic descent are overrepresented in the prison population, despite committing crimes at a lower rate than other demographics.

That means that compared to some other demographics, Spanish-speakers are more commonly in need of criminal defense attorneys. Therefore, criminal defense attorneys in much of the United States would greatly benefit from bilingual virtual receptionists.

And, of course, for immigration law, it’s a must-have.

42 percent of immigrants say they speak Spanish at home.

Second to English, Spanish is the most commonly spoken language among the 44.8 million immigrants in the United States. If you practice immigration law, you are going to need to be able to handle clients who are more comfortable speaking all kinds of languages; Spanish is just the most common. A bilingual virtual receptionist will go a long way toward shoring up a potential weakness in your firm’s client experience and lead capturing process.

Future-Proofing Your Firm

The United States has always had a considerable Spanish-speaking population, especially in places like California, Texas, and Florida, which were acquired at different points from the Spanish Empire. Then there are common immigrant hubs, like New York City and Chicago, which were frequent destinations, for example, for Irish, Italian, Puerto Rican, and Cuban immigrants throughout the country’s history.

And, of course, over the last century, cities have grown across the United States, and people of all backgrounds have moved to them, started businesses and families, and lived their lives. That’s how places like Yakima County, Washington, ended up with a majority Hispanic population! All over the country, the Hispanic population is on the rise.

The US census bureau estimates that the Hispanic population of the U.S. will grow to nearly 100 million by 2050.

If your law firm is going to be in business in the next decade or two, you’re going to want a bilingual virtual receptionist. While the number of people who exclusively speak Spanish will slowly fall as time goes on and new primary Spanish-speakers become bilingual themselves, the people who aren’t comfortable speaking English right now are going to age and need help in Spanish.

Get The Best Bilingual Virtual Receptionists From Answering Legal

Beyond these broad categories where Spanish-speaking clients may be overrepresented, there’s a simple question you have to answer: can you afford to cut yourself off from potential clients?

Think about it; if an attorney in Des Moines, Iowa is depriving themselves of up to 15 percent of their city’s potential clients, how many more clients could you be opening your firm to with a bilingual virtual receptionist?

The best place to find one is Answering Legal. Our bilingual virtual receptionists are highly trained and only ever answer for law firms, which makes them experts in everything a lawyer needs from the people answering their phones, from legal intake to a professional demeanor for serious issues.

Don’t believe us? Well, you don’t have to take our word for it. Click here to hear from an attorney who uses our bilingual virtual receptionists every day!

If you’d like to read more about how our bilingual answering service works, click here.

We’re not just a bilingual answering service, either. Our bilingual virtual receptionists are available 24/7, and have a 24/7 support team available to help with anything they or our customers might need. We have a mobile app our customers use to keep up with their messages on the go, and integrations with top law firm software.

Expand your client base, for free. Click here or call 631-686-9700 to sign up for our free trial. For a limited time, we’re offering firms that sign up for our service their first 400 minutes free.