Is there a more creative way to do this at scale without going the DC firm setup route? (For a non attorney)
The biggest issues are the fee-splitting rules in every State. While state bar rules vary state to state, one thing they all pretty much have is fairly strict rule prohibiting attorneys "splitting" fees with non-attorneys. Realtors have a similar situation, although usually not quite as restrictive.
Attorneys are allowed to pay "marketing fees", so most people trying to do what you and OP are describing try to set it that way. The issue is that it's very hard to make how much the "marketing fee" is change based on how much the attorney makes. That pretty much prevents making the fee as a "percentage" because it ties the amount the non-attorney gets to how-much the case is worth, which sounds like impermissible fee-splitting to most State Bars.
When attorneys try to skirt the line or get too aggressive with giving kickbacks or percentages to non-lawyers that is performance-based, they usually get turned in either by A)Other lawyers, who think they aren't playing fair, or B) The non-attorney they were splitting the fee with,when they get into some kind of later dispute about how much they should make. A
non-attorney typically doesn't get into any trouble for taking a % from a lawyer, that's just typical performance-based marketing, but the attorney can get censured or disbarred for it. Plus, most attorneys are somewhat scared of getting anywhere near the line, so they avoid a lot of marketing arrangements that could actually be beneficial to both parties.
Charging a flat-rate per form filled on a site other than the actual attorney's is the most common. The affiliate/marketer typically is limited though, because they have to SEO or market a non-attorney site to collect the data, (while not holding that site out to be an actual attorney's site because that is considered unauthorized practice of law), Take that lead data and send it over to the attorney, and then hope the attorney gives them an upfront flat-rate kickback and then takes on the risk of that lead not panning out. Attorneys are resistant to doing it that way though, because they don't like to pay the upfront money for the lead, and then contact the lead who turns out to not be a good case.
Personally, I have an advantage, because I know Internet Marketing and can legally fee-split with other attorneys, which I do on mass tort cases. Most of the attorneys I talk to in that field like the idea of having "Internet wizards" generate traffic for them that is incredibly valuable, they just always want to pay out just a flat-fee, and only on leads that actually retain them, which forces the marketer to have to work a lot harder to generate quality leads even though they can't vet the leads themselves.
The cleanest way is almost always going to be just working with 1-2 attorneys that you completely trust, and set it up so there is some kind of flat-rate per referral upfront, and then maybe a backend "SEO/directory listing fee" they can pay later that is actually payment for a good lead that makes them money.
