LexBlog is proud to be an official media partner for Clio’s annual Clio Cloud Conference. In the week leading up to the event, we will be featuring an exciting mix of content, including interviews with speakers, guest posts from Clio employees, and more. Today we have an interview with Andrea Evans, an attorney who runs her own intellectual property law practice, and holds bachelors degrees in Mathematics and Civil Engineering, in addition to a J.D. from The George Washington Law School. Andrea will be speaking on Monday from 3-3:30 in Empire Ballroom A & B, on “The ‘Refrigerator’ Social Media Method: Cool, Modern & Connected.”

You have bachelors degrees in Mathematics and Civil Engineering; how did you get into intellectual property (IP) law?

After graduating from Spelman College and Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech), I attended The George Washington Law School in Washington, DC.  The law school’s intellectual property’s stellar reputation intrigued me.  I took advantage of all of the intellectual property classes offered by the law school and fell in love with the idea of being an intellectual property lawyer.  After graduating from law school, I worked at the USPTO as both a Patent Examiner and a Trademark Examining Attorney before launching The Law Firm of Andrea Hence Evans, LLC.

What makes you passionate about what you do? 

I’m extremely passionate about educating others about the importance of protecting and enforcing their intellectual property.  After hearing heartbreaking stories from inventors and entrepreneurs about being scammed and not being able to find a reasonably priced and a high quality experienced attorney, I launched my Firm.  What makes me passionate about being an IP attorney is that I know that I am directly helping my clients to pursue their dreams with their innovations and brands and I am thankful to be an extension of their team.

What’s the greatest challenge in your work and, if you had a magic wand, what would you do to change things?

The greatest challenge in my work is having to tell clients that their invention is not patentable or that their trademark is already in use.  It’s not easy to be the messenger of bad news but I feel good knowing that I’ve saved the clients time and money prior to having to rebrand or destroy their prototypes and products.  My magic wand would give every small business owner and every inventor the knowledge to recognize the need to protect their intellectual property and to learn more about their options. Often, clients don’t recognize the need to consult with an IP attorney until they are being challenged, sued or actual confusion occurs.

How can lawyers benefit from social media?

How can you not benefit? You can be the best lawyer and graduate from the best law school, but if potential clients do not know that you exist, your practice will never grow or thrive.  Social media is a free resource that can be used to expand and grow your brand which in turn will grow your practice! Clients like working with skilled attorneys they know, like and trust.  Social media can be used to nurture and foster relationships.

If attendees could take one thing from your presentation, what do you hope it would be?

I hope that attendees will walk away from my presentation feeling empowered and confident about using social media in a way that is “cool, modern, and connected” – the refrigerator social media model I’ve created!

You can contact Andrea through her website, or on Facebook or Twitter.