If it's more defense work that you are after, then spend your marketing funds going to see Construction Defect attorneys. That's who will generally be retaining your services. Take a potential client out to lunch, preferably one that has expressed interest in using you or at least providing information such as names of colleagues who might be interested in your services. You can also hit up insurance companies that provide liability insurance to contractors and architects. There are three major ones.
If you find you want Plaintiff work, spend some of your marketing efforts on Personal Injury Attorneys and HOA's. Do enough of this kind of work and eventually you will start to see the same players over and over. You'll probably get a sense of who you would like to work for.
One word of caution. There are attorneys out there that burn through experts. You get hired but it take a parting of the Red Sea to get paid. One expert walks away from the work and the next victim steps in to get the same treatment. Talk to colleagues to find out who the worst offenders are and steer clear. Sometimes just standing around listening to others chitchatting away will give you lots of information. Store it away like a research project.
There are undoubtedly a few larger A/E firms that have a significant portion of their business that comes from construction defect litigation. I'd go talk to those guys as well and let them know that you are interested in working for them if and when their own staff cannot handle the work load.
I keep a digital folder of experts that I have encountered in the field, who they work for, what they drive, and if I have a photo, I put that in as well. I also include little tidbits of information discovered through conversations. I initially started it as a way to remember names and faces and as a way to appear that I remembered that the last time I saw them they were in the middle of a divorce or recovery from surgery. But the project sort of grew into a quasi private investigator sort of file.
BTW Ron, someone had to give you a star.
"If you are going to walk on thin ice, you might as well dance!"
