In our community, mailboxes are uniformly displayed on wooden posts, four boxes to a post. After nearly twenty-five years, our post was looking shabby. My neighbors and I chipped in and hired a guy to repair and paint the post and replace the mailboxes.
He did a great job and we’ve recommended him to some of our other neighbors.
On a recent walk through the neighborhood, I saw some mailboxes that could use his services and I thought about what he might do to get more work. One thing he could do is create a flyer with before and after photos of his work. Those photos tell most of the story. “If your mailbox looks like this [before] and you want it to look like this [after], give me a call.”
How can you use this idea to sell more legal services?
No, not by taking photos of your clients. By using word pictures to describe their situation before and after they hired you.
On your website and in your marketing materials, describe how some clients “looked” when they first came to you, and how they looked at the end of the case or matter.
If you handle divorce, for example, you would describe your client’s marriage situation in sufficient detail to let prospective clients “see” it. Include the facts, the legal issues, the emotional turmoil, and what was at stake.
Follow that with a word picture of the client’s situation after you worked your magic.
It’s storytelling, pure and simple, something you should be doing in most of your writing but especially in your marketing documents.
Facts tell but stories sell.
The best stories are dramatic, of course, but with a little effort, you can inject some drama into even the most mundane or routine legal matters.
Give it a try. Think about a recent client and describe their before picture. What did they want or need and why? What was at stake? What did they fear? What might have happened if they didn’t hire you?
Then, describe the after picture. Resolution. Protection. Compensation. Peace of mind.
Before and after. Photos or word pictures. It’s the same formula. It works for marketing mailbox repairs and legal services.
Marketing is easier when you know The Formula
