Terri talks to Kristina Jones about how being a creative problem solver and listening to her husband James talk about his experience in the court system led to the birth of Court Buddy, a software solution that provides people and businesses with access to an attorney when needed, regardless of their financial status. This is part one of a two part interview.
Who is Kristina Jones?
Court Buddy President and Co-founder Kristina Jones is a Los Angeles native and a Florida International graduate for both her Undergraduate and Master’s degree from The School of Journalism and Mass Communications. Kristina’s Master’s Degree from FIU was in tandem with Miami Ad School’s Art Direction Portfolio Program.
As an Art Director, Kristina went on to work for Advertising Agencies in both California and Florida and had the honor of creating campaigns for San Diego Tourism, Disney, Greater Fort Lauderdale Tourism, SeaWorld, Walmart, Silver Airways, and Kaplan University to name a few. Kristina’s experience with these brands has allowed her to see how media and advertising effect the sales and growth of major corporations.
Kristina was able to take the experience creating content for other brands to help her create her own brand Court Buddy with her husband James Jones Jr. Esq. Court Buddy’s website, courtbuddy.com, matches people with attorneys based on their budget. Court Buddy is helping to bring the legal system to people who previously did not have access to it. Kristina handles the company’s advertising, marketing and social media.
Show Highlights
Kristina grew up in Los Angeles and was a creative kid who left for Miami as soon as she graduated from high school
She started in marine biology in Miami but ended up in advertising after she did some soul searching in college and seeing what her aunt was doing in the advertising space; she wanted to provide creative solutions to problems and wasn’t doing well in her sciences classes
Once she realized that she could take inspiration from what has been done before to apply it to advertising and problem solving, and she credits her aunt for the advice that gave her freedom
Kristina was a Miami Heat dancer when she met her husband, James, at a party
James started his own law firm right after they got married and she had just started a new job
Kristina talks about how the idea for Court Buddy came from James noticing the number of people asking him for help before they went into court because they didn’t have representation; they didn’t think they could afford attorneys
They saw solo-practitioner attorneys looking for clients, too, which led them to research how attorneys could operate to provide services to people who needed representation and Court Buddy was born
They applied for 500 Startups in San Francisco and it took two tries to get in
Getting to their 500 Startups interview was a series of misadventures including a rainstorm, a mis-scheduled flight, a car that wouldn’t start, being stuck in an elevator, and a locked door
Terri’s Key Takeaway
Having an outside perspective combined with a deep understanding of a problem can lead to creative and disruptive solutions.
Contact
Kristina can be reached at Kjones@courtbuddy.com. Check out Court Buddy at https://www.courtbuddy.com/.
You can follow Terri on Twitter at @terrihansonmead or go to her website at www.terrihansonmead.com or on Medium: https://medium.com/@terrihansonmead.
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