The Most Overlooked Legal Marketing Tool
The most overlooked legal marketing tool in your arsenal is your database. I’m not just talking about the people in the contacts file of your PDA. I’m talking about everyone with whom you interact. Everyone who knows you and everyone you come into contact with on a regular basis should have an electronic “record” stored somewhere that is easily accessible to you and your team.
If you don’t do anything else this year, you should invest in a good tool to manage the information you collect on the people you know. Sometimes these tools are called client relationship management systems. Sometimes they’re called database marketing systems. And sometimes they are just called contact management systems. The point is that you have some system to communicate with everyone you know – regularly.
Legal marketing is about building and maintaining relationships. Frequency of communication is critically important in relationship building. Email, snail mail, phone calls, and meetings – all of those forms of communication shape the relationship you have with someone. You need to keep track of all of these communication events.
I am a big advocate of weekly communication with your database. One short educational email, sent once a week, can position you as an expert and keep you in the mind of people who can hire you and refer clients to you.
If you have any desire to be successful at legal marketing, you need to manage, maintain and utilize your database.
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EmailLegal Marketing: Tactics Matter
I continue to be amazed by two legal marketing phenomena:
- 1.) The number of lawyers who only have one way to get a new client.
- 2.) The number of lawyers who have no idea where their next client will come from.
One of the things I harp on continuously with my clients is consistent execution of client acquisition tactics. A great legal marketing plan includes several forms of media used in several different ways. The fundamentals of any legal marketing plan include:
- Writing (in publications your clients read)
- Speaking (to audiences of potential clients)
- Earned Media (being quoted/profiled as an expert)
- Networking
- Hosting Educational Events
- Developing a Referral/Follow-up System
- Direct Mail
- Advertising (print, web, television, radio, etc.)
- Internet Presence
- Community Involvement
These are the ten categories of media that are most effective in attracting clients to your law practice. You can’t afford to ignore any of them.
Why?
Because clients use different media to find lawyers. Some clients will search the Internet. Some clients will read trade publications. Some clients will call a friend or colleague. Some clients will only realize they need you after they hear you speak at an event. Some will only realize that you are an expert after they see a story about you in the paper.
Some clients will only choose to work with you after seeing your name and credentials four or five different times.
Research has proven that clients only respond to the first marketing communication about 1% of the time. Yet most legal marketing plans do not include multiple tactics delivered via many different forms of media to reach the target audience.
There are three reasons why attorneys don’t use multiple media in creating their legal marketing. All of them are ways of rationalizing their own inactivity. Let’s take a look at each of them and debunk their validity.
Cost
The complaint about cost is a matter of perception. If I told you that spending $10,000 on marketing would bring you in $100,000 in new client cases, would you do it? How about if that same $10,000 brought in $500,000 in new cases?
Great legal marketing delivers a return on investment. It is just like your retirement plan, your stock portfolio or the money you save for your kid’s college education. It will pay dividends if you invest it wisely. The key is learning how to invest those marketing dollars so they work hard for you.
Time
Many lawyers worry that legal marketing will take up a significant amount of time – time they could spend doing legal work. There are two ways to look at the time you spend on client acquisition tactics:
First: You should view your time spent on attracting clients as an investment. If you bill $250 dollars an hour and you spend 10 hours on legal marketing, you have invested $2,500. You should receive a return on that investment of over $25,000. Once again, you need to know what you are doing so that you invest your time wisely.
Second: Great legal marketing will save you time. If you have the right target audience and you hit it with the right message via the correct media, you will attract clients who pay higher fees and refer business to you. This allows you to work smarter and make more money with less effort.
Knowledge
Most attorneys don’t know much about marketing. They don’t teach it in law school. This lack of knowledge is something that will initially hold you back from making decisions about strategy and tactics. In reality, this should work to your advantage as you have no preconceived notions about your own legal marketing capability. So for you, the sky really is the limit.
There are many places you can obtain business development knowledge. You can read books or attend courses. You can learn through the experience of others. Or you can learn by trial and error. I prefer the first two methods to the third but ultimately, you need to educate yourself on the principles of great legal marketing.
If you wait to start you are putting off your own success.
I realize you have a law practice to run. I know there is legal work to be done. I understand that just being a lawyer, doing legal work, is a full time job.
But if you do not dedicate time, significant time, to legal marketing, you will never, ever, control your own destiny.
Where will your next client come from?
If you had a legal marketing plan and invested time in growing your law practice, you would know.
If you are ready to take your law firm to the next level or if you just want to attract better clients so you can spend more time with your family, give me a call. 888.692.5531.
The Foundation of Law Firm Marketing
The foundation of business development is good communication. This means sending a message that is received and acted upon. In order to motivate the receiver to take action, the message must be relevant and it must be delivered in a way that will resonate with the target audience.
There are four primary audiences you must engage regularly with your communications efforts. These are the groups of people who are responsible for bringing your firm 90% of your business. These groups are:
1. Suspects
2. Prospects
3. Clients
4. Evangelists
Here are some details about each group to help you determine how to engage them.
Suspects are people who you think have a need for your service. Here are some examples: For an immigration attorney a suspect is someone from another country who wants to live in the United States for an extended period of time. For a divorce attorney a suspect is someone who is thinking about leaving his/her spouse. In the world of the litigator, a suspect is someone who is seeking justice as the result of a perceived wrong-doing.
Suspects don’t know who you are or what you do. They fall into this grouping because they MAY have a need for your services.
Prospects are people who have expressed a need for the services you offer. They have called you or requested information from you. Prospects may or may not have a sense of urgency about resolving their issue. The key is that they have identified themselves as being interested in your services.
Clients are people who have paid for your services within the last calendar year. If they have not paid they are not a client (I realize there are pro-bono clients but we are not addressing them in a business development context).
Evangelists are your referral sources. They are clients who work with you multiple times and/or refer you to others. I would also put referral sources (other attorneys) into this category.
Good business development begins with understanding the people who are in each category. Each of these groups is at a different point in their relationship with you. Your communication should be designed to advance people from one group to the next.
Think of it as climbing a ladder.
You want suspects to climb up to the next rung on the ladder and become prospects. You want prospects to climb up and become clients and you want clients to climb up and become evangelists.
This happens almost exclusively through education and relationship development.
Suspects become prospects when you educate them on the need for your services. Prospects become clients when you educate them on the need for urgency in taking action on their situation. Clients become evangelists when you deepen your relationship with them to the point of intimacy.
Here is an example:
Jack Long is a trust and estate attorney in Dallas, TX. Every month he does a no cost seminar for the clients of a local insurance agency. About 20-25 people hear him speak on the importance of having a will and the value in hiring an attorney to help you prepare one. At the start of his presentation the folks in that room are people Jack suspects may need his services.
After each presentation, about 3 or 4 people come up to Jack and ask him questions. He stays until the last question is answered and he immediately follows up with the people who sought him out. These folks are prospects.
Of the 3, 4 or 5 people who contacted Jack after the presentation, one or two usually hire him to draw up their will. They become clients. When Jack brings them on board he lets them know that he also provides other services such as a living will and a durable power of attorney. If his new clients don’t have Jack provide those services, he will continue to educate them (through newsletters, events and other forms of media) on the importance of those instruments.
Jack also hosts quarterly client appreciation events, sends out a monthly printed newsletter and a weekly email newsletter. These communications tools are often passed on to other people as his clients become evangelists. (Jack encourages his clients to bring their friends to his client appreciation events).
Great communication is one of the keys to success in any business. Effective business development starts with matching the right message to the right market. Suspects need a different message than prospects. Prospects need a message that is different than the message you deliver to your clients.
Get the message right and deliver it to the right market and your revenue with grow exponentially.
How will you engage each of these groups of people in your law firm communications? You should have a plan that includes multiple messages delivered via multiple media for each group. If you don’t, you need to call me right away. 888.692.5531
Your Law Firm is Leaking
Each and every month you lose influence over your clients. Each month some of the people who have paid you the highest fees or done the most work with you become less and less interested in you. Each month your stellar reputation fades a little more in the minds of the folks who refer you new clients And most people are probably not doing anything about it.
Why?
Because most people are lazy.
You lose 10% of your influence with your clients, prospects and referral sources for every 30 days you do not have contact with them.
This means ten months from now, the great client you had lunch with today will have forgotten all about you. It means the doctor who sent you that great referral last week will have a hard time remembering what you do for a living. It means the business owner you met at the networking event yesterday will not recognize you if you hit him with your car next spring.
So what is the solution?
The answer is to start communicating with these people. Each month you should have some kind of communication with your clients, prospective clients and referral sources. This communication can be a newsletter, it can be a card or it can be a phone call or an email. It really doesn’t matter how you interact with them. You simply want to remind them that you are here and ready to help them and the people they know.
Some people will say: “I don’t have the money!”
Do you have a real business or are you just playing around? You need to invest money in your client acquisition efforts in order to develop a real business (a law firm is a business by the way).
It costs less than a dollar to purchase and mail a greeting card each month. It costs about $2 to send out a printed newsletter (in small quantity). Email is practically free – just type and hit send.
But some people will need to be convinced. Here’s how the math works:
You mail 1000 newsletters at $2 each (the cost for printing and mailing). You mail 1000 greeting cards at $1 each. You type and send 1000 emails to the people within your database (only to those from whom you have received permission). You do these three things every month. That is a total monthly expense of $3000.
Let’s say it takes you three months to see any business from these efforts. So you have spent $9,000 in keeping up with the most valuable 1000 people in your database.
On the first day of the fourth month you get a client as a direct result of these efforts. This client is your average client. And your average client pays you $10,000 in fees.
Was your investment worth it?
Yes.
Will you get more than one client from these efforts?
Most likely. There is a cumulative effect to this kind of system. After about six months you will start to see more and more interest in your services. It takes some people a little longer to absorb the information and react.
Will you get more clients by doing this compared to doing nothing?
Definitely.
What are you waiting for?
If you need a kick in the rear end and want some help in setting up this type of system, give me a call. If you want me to show you how, I will. If you want me to set it up, I will. If you want me to do this for you each and every month I will.
You can be lazy and outsource this system to me or I can show you how to do this for yourself. The choice is yours but doing NOTHING is the worst choice you can possibly make.
Call now. 1.888.692.5531
How to Set Up a Law Firm E-Newsletter
An easy, low cost way for law firm’s to stay in touch with clients and to grow their business is to send out a regular e-newsletter. Law firm e-newsletters are basically newsletters that you send to clients and referral sources through email. See “The Value of a Law Firm E-newsletter” to learn why your law firm should be sending them out and not using a service to do it for you. It is not difficult. Any attorney who knows how to send an email can send an e-newsletter. Here are the basics of how to set one up for your law firm.
How Law Firm E-Newsletters Work
A quick Google search for e-newsletters will bring up several sites that offer e-newsletter templates that are just waiting for you to add the content. E-newsletter sites like http://www.constantcontact.com and http://www.mynewsletterbuilder.com use web content management systems to build their newsletters. The beauty of a web content management system is that users don’t have to know HTML or web programming in order to make updates. In other words, attorneys can pick templates that they like, add content and then send them out.
Any attorney who has ever posted a blog or a comment for an online news story has used a content management system. Basically, you go to a web page, log in, and start typing in the field that is designated for text. Hit “enter” or “post” and your content appears on the Internet with all the formatting that was designed by the web developer.
Each of the companies that offers e-newsletter services has a slightly different set up, but the basic details are 1) set up an account, 2) select a design or make your own, 3) upload or enter your contacts, 4) start writing. For attorneys who have a technical slant and want to add more to their newsletter, you can upload graphics, video, and more. Also, if you want your e-newsletter to match the formatting and colors of your law firm’s website, ask your web developer to do this for you. This should take them less than an hour and it’s worth it. Continuity of design is an essential piece of effective marketing.
In addition to making it incredibly simple for anyone to send e-newsletters, these companies also offer basic analytics about how your firm’s e-newsletter is doing. You can see if and when your contacts are opening the newsletter, if they are forwarding it, and if they select any links you may have included. This is a great way to find out what topics are most interesting to your individual contacts.
Some e-newsletters are sent out daily, weekly, or monthly. But, no one wants to get an e-newsletter from their lawyer everyday! A once a month e-newsletter is perfect for connecting to legal clients, prospects and referral sources. There are some e-newsletter services that allow you to buy articles from them for as little as $15 per month. While doing this allows you to connect with your contacts, it doesn’t give you a chance to let them hear your unique voice. Writing and sending out your own e-newsletters can take very little time once you get the hang of it.
Important Things to Remember
Don’t let your e-newsletter become spam. Include quality content that will make people want to read it. Don’t buy an email list or simply start sending the newsletter to every email address you have. Most email programs now allow people to flag spam. The e-newsletter service gets a report every time your firm’s newsletter gets flagged. If your emails are routinely being flagged as spam, they can and will freeze your account and refuse to do business with you. They will literally blacklist your company and you will have to use a different service all together.
Click continue reading for more.
The Value of a Law Firm E-Newsletter
One of the easiest, low cost ways for law firms to keep in touch with clients, prospects, and referral sources is an e-newsletter. E-newsletters are newsletters sent via email. Many attorneys buy into a legal e-newsletter service that specializes in sending out e-newsletters on behalf of law firms. Someone else writes the content, does the layout, and sends it out to their clients with some generic contact information about the law firm. Like everything else in technology, e-newsletters have evolved. Now any attorney, at any size firm can send out their own, customized e-newsletter.
The problem with using an e-newsletter service is that the information has to be fairly general in order to appeal to the numerous contact lists of hundreds of different law firms. When attorneys write the content themselves, they can tailor it so that it appeals to the unique individuals on their contact list.
Sending out an e-newsletter has become as easy as online bill pay or sending an email. It does not have to be labor intensive or time consuming. Many law firms who send out monthly e-newsletters are doing it in less than three hours a month. With a very minimal time investment, you can connect with all of your important clients, prospects, and referral sources. You can position your firm and yourself as experts by providing information and knowledge about your field of law. You can also keep your contacts up to date about any changes that may be happening within your firm.
Build an E-Newsletter to Build Your Brand
One of the wonderful benefits of an e-newsletter is how it builds your law firm’s brand. It provides a wonderful opportunity to let clients get to know you. With so many lawyer jokes circulating the globe, it’s easy to forget that most people are naturally intimidated by attorneys. As an attorney, you have a breadth of knowledge in a complicated subject area. Use your firm’s e-newsletter to remind people that, behind all of your expertise and experience, you are still human.
If you’re just starting out or are still trying to let people know about your niche, then an e-newsletter is a great way to get the word out. Each week you can write a short 300 - 500 word article about recent changes or little known facts in your field of law. While this might sound intimidating at first, don’t be daunted. Spend a few hours brainstorming a variety of topics that you can write about. Plan to write one featured article and then add at least one more section. Depending on your field of law, the additional section can be a link to an article that you found interesting or it can be about upcoming community events.
Link Back to Increase Activity
One of the best ways to use an e-newsletter is to include several links in the e-newsletter to your blog or to your website. The more visitors you have coming to your website, the more likely it is that Google will give your website a high ranking. High rankings mean a higher listing in search results.
If you have a blog on your website, encourage clients to visit the blog by mentioning some of the blog titles in your e-newsletter. If you are having a contest, are running a special, or if your firm is participating in a local community event, include the generic information in the e-newsletter but have the specifics listed on your website. This will drive interested readers to your website and will increase your traffic.
Continue reading for more on E-Newsletters.
How to Convince People to Take Your Advice
Do people regularly ask for your opinion and then do their own thing?
Are you amazed when people pay you for your advice and then immediately disregard it?
Have you ever wondered why this happens?
One of the questions I frequently receive from attorneys is: “Why don’t my clients take my advice? I have their best interests in mind but they don’t want to listen to me.”
The answer lies not in what you say but in how you say it.
There are three specific steps that will help get people to put your good advice into practice. They are:
1. Make an emotional appeal
2. Give them specific action steps to follow
3. Associate negative consequences with NOT following your advice
Here’s some additional detail on the steps listed above:
Engage Me and I will Respond
Your future clients (prospects) are screaming this at you.
A couple of days ago I met someone who I am certain that I will never forget. This was not a famous person. This was not someone who was a business leader. This was not a polished speaker or influential pillar of the community.
This person is one of the best marketers that I have met in a long time. The minute she opened her mouth I was captivated. As I watched her presentation, I re-learned how to approach someone in a non-threatening manner and capture their interest.
Who was this marketing genius? Was it someone who had years of experience? Was it someone who had years of expensive marketing education?
Speak Like a Human and Get More Business
The conversation began just like the dialogue I’ve had many times with attorneys in just about every area of specialization. The attorney sitting across the desk from me began:
- “I’m really smart. Graduated top of my class. I clerked for Judge Smith. I interned at Smarty, Smarter and Billem and I was in Super Lawyers for my specialization in my state. In my current role, I help NGOs mitigate risk, terminate unproductive agreements and negotiate adequate consideration in transactions where we relinquish certain protected rights.”
As I scratch my head, he continues:
- “I just don’t understand why I have such a hard time finding clients.”
This conversation takes place a few times each month. Sometimes it happens on the phone and sometimes it happens in person. Sometimes the attorney is a “high potential” in a big firm who just can’t originate new business and sometimes he is an attorney in a solo practice who wants to make more money.
The problem is that these smart attorneys don’t know what the real problem is.
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