The Attorney Marketing Center--Earn More. Work Less

Faster than a speeding bullet

May 29, 2025 by David M. Ward

Yes, I know, you are more powerful than a locomotive—at least that’s what you want your clients to believe. You’re invincible—in the courtroom, boardroom and everywhere else.

As images go, that’s hard to beat.

But are you faster than a speeding bullet?

Your clients would like this, too.

They would like you to complete your work, settle their case, or deliver your work product quickly, because the faster you do that, the sooner they get the benefits they desire. And (they hope) save a bundle on legal fees.

So you might make “speed” a part of your marketing message.

It can’t be your “unique selling proposition” because, of course, lawyers can’t promise results, quick or otherwise, but it’s a good way to show prospective clients an advantage to working with you.

Show prospective clients, and the people who can refer them, that you are someone who gets the job without delay.

How do you suggest “speed” without promising it, or sounding like a fast-talking car salesman?

Carefully.

When you schedule appointments, offer to see the client today or tomorrow, instead of two weeks out, and schedule those appointments at ten-minute intervals, suggesting that you are busy and work fast.
Under promise so you can over-deliver. Tell clients “two weeks” and complete the work in one. Surprise and delight them and create a story they can share.
If you use testimonials or quotes from positive reviews on your website or in ads, highlight comments that praise how quickly you got to work and completed it.
Talk about how you created many forms and checklists in your practice that allow you to expedite your work process.
Update your website with a “modern” look, quicker navigation, and ease of use.
Compare and contrast—describe how “most firms” (your competition) do things and show how you are different (better, faster).

Talk fast, walk fast, and show clients you have high energy. Because lawyers who move quickly usually work quickly.

Most lawyers emphasize quality and trustworthiness and you must, too. But most lawyers don’t even hint at speed, so if you do, you’ll stand out.

Filed Under: Law office management, Marketing legal services

Don’t do any marketing until you do this

May 27, 2025 by David M. Ward

No matter what services you offer or marketing methods you use (or may want to), your first step is to identify your ideal client.

Not anyone who may need to hire you, your ideal. They are a perfect match for you, and you are for them.

You want a match because it will make your marketing easier and more effective. You won’t attempt to attract “anyone”–that’s too difficult and expensive, and you might wind up with clients who aren’t a good match.

Create a profile of your ideal.

Start by describing their legal problem. What’s wrong? What is causing them pain? What do they want to achieve? Why do they need an attorney?

Next, define the company or individual you want to attract. What stage of life or business are they in? What industry or market? How big are they? What are their demographics? What do they believe, fear, or want? How much work do they have for you? What kinds of cases?

Be specific. The more focused you are in creating this profile, the more likely it is that they will be attracted to you, and the more likely it is that they will hire you and be a good client.

The simplest way to create this profile is to create an amalgam of the attributes of current or former clients you enjoyed working with.

Go ahead, think about your best clients over the last year or two. The ones that make you say, “If I could only get a few more like (them)…”

Who are they? What are they like? Why are they ideal?

And why are you ideal for them? What is it about your practice, your style, the mix of services you offer, and other factors that make you the ideal lawyer for them?

Do this for each of your practice areas or services.

Once you have identified your ideal client, the next step is to articulate what you would say to them if they asked how you could help them and why they should hire you instead of anyone else. This will help you create your marketing message, which is your next step.

This message is key to all of your marketing. It will be imbued in all of your presentations, emails, web pages, ads, conversations, and so on, and is fundamental to attracting the right clients.

Yes, it takes a lot of time and thought, but it’s worth it, because when you have the right message, you get the right clients.

This shows you how to identify your ideal client and what to say to them:

The Attorney Marketing Formula

Filed Under: Marketing legal services

Can you ever stop marketing?

May 22, 2025 by David M. Ward

I’ve talked to lawyers who no longer do any marketing. They say they don’t need to—they get all their work from existing clients, through referrals, and based on their reputation in their community or niche. They’ve “put in their dues” and are now enjoying the fruits of the hard work they did at the beginning of their career.

Or they are so busy with work, they need to focus on that and no longer have time for marketing.

How about you?

Since you’re reading this, I’m going to assume you (still) do (some) marketing. You may have changed what you do, or how much you do, but your marketing is still an important part of your business. The question is, can you see yourself ever slowing down or stopping?

Here are my thoughts:

You might want to (or need to) continue marketing, or do more of it, to get to “the next level”. No matter how successful you are, there’s always the next level.
You might want to expand your marketing to get big enough to justify hiring a team to do most of it. Or, if you already have a team, to hire someone to supervise them.
If you get a large percentage of business through advertising, it’s profitable and doesn’t take a lot of your time or energy, you should do more of it. Look for ways to expand into other markets, and ways to increase your ad “buys”.
If you advertise, but it’s not as profitable as you think it could be, talk to some experts. A few simple changes might make an enormous difference.
Consider new marketing strategies. You might find some are easier, less time consuming, or more profitable. Writing a newsletter, for example, takes less time than networking.
Do more of the marketing you enjoy, less of the marketing you don’t. If you like what you’re doing, you won’t have to force yourself to do it and you’ll get better and faster.
Consider that what’s working today may not work tomorrow. Keep your options open and continually experiment.
Never make the mistake of thinking you need to do everything yourself. If you want to grow, you can’t do everything yourself.

Repeat business and referrals may be the ultimate marketing strategy for attorneys, but it’s not the only game in town.

Filed Under: Career satisfaction, Marketing legal services

Client surveys

May 20, 2025 by David M. Ward

Lawyers ask questions to diagnose clients’ problems and prescribe effective solutions. We question witnesses and other parties to learn what they know and how they can help or hurt our case. We hire experts and ask for information and advice to help us better manage our cases.

Questions are the cornerstone of legal work. But they can be much more.

Asking questions—through surveys, questionnaires, interviews, and even just conversations—can dramatically improve a lawyer’s marketing and practice management.

What can you ask? Here are a few ideas:

Ask prospective clients how they found you and what they heard or read. Did they see an ad? Where? What caught their attention? Were they referred by another client or another professional? What were they told that inspired them to make an appointment?
Ask new clients how they were treated at their first appointment. What stood out about what they saw and were told? Was everything explained to their satisfaction? Did they understand fees, costs, and other terms? What did they like best? What could you improve?
Ask existing clients what groups they belong to, to help you identify where you might advertise, network, write articles, or speak.
Ask your subscribers (newsletter, blog, social media) which topics they’d like you to write about.
Ask clients if they know about your other services. “Did you know we also do X?”
Ask everyone if they might anyone (at work, in their neighborhood) who might like a free copy of your new report or a link to your video.
Ask all clients about their industry or market, business or practice, to “get to know them better” (to create more effective marketing collateral and offers).
Ask all clients if they would recommend you to others and what they would tell them. This could lead to reviews, testimonials, referrals, and ideas for improving your services or your marketing message.
In conversation, when you learn a client or contact knows someone you’d like to meet, ask if they would introduce you.

You can pass out questionnaires at presentations. You can conduct “exit surveys” at the end of cases. You can add “getting to know you” questionnaires in your “new client kits”.

And you can ask clients for feedback or information about themselves or their business any time you meet.

Questions like these can not only help you create more effective content and marketing messages, they can help you strengthen relationships with your clients and contacts because they really will help you get to know them better.

Filed Under: Client relations, Content creation, Increase your income, Law office management, Marketing legal services

Stop worrying about things you can’t control

May 15, 2025 by David M. Ward

You don’t have time to worry about the cases you lost, the mistakes you made, or the people who aren’t happy about something you did or didn’t do.

You can learn from them, and you should, but don’t dwell on them. You have other things to do.

Someone criticized you? Didn’t keep their promise? Dented your car?

Let it go.

Stop worrying about politics, traffic, and world events. Unless you’re getting paid to worry about something, let it go.

Let go of bad news. If it’s news, it’s already happened. Focus on the future.

Professionally, focus on your legal work, marketing, and managing your practice or career.

Personally, focus on what you can do and stop worrying about things you don’t control.

Filed Under: Dealing with stress, Law office management, Personal development

How to get more (and better) testimonials and reviews

May 13, 2025 by David M. Ward

Other than a referral, there’s nothing more persuasive to a prospective client than testimonials and positive reviews. The words of other clients speaking about the great results you got for them, how you treated them, and why they recommend you are incredibly persuasive.

If you are allowed to use them in your marketing, you should.

Liberally.

Use them on your website, in emails and newsletters, in brochures and handouts, on social media, ads, presentations, and everywhere else a potential client (or referrer) might see them.

They speak to your capabilities and trustworthiness and what it’s like to work with you. They are the quintessential “social proof” clients look for and are persuaded by and you should do whatever you can to get them and use them.

How do you get them? You ask for them. And make it easy for clients to comply by giving them a form to fill out or a link to a page.

The best times to ask are when a client is happy with the settlement, when you deliver the work product they need and want, or when your bill turns out to be less than they expected.

Happy clients are more likely to give you a good review.

You can make reviews more likely by providing clients with other reviews or testimonials you have received and mentioning how important they are to you and how you appreciate them.

You can improve testimonials by providing clients with questions that prompt them to supply details—about the services they received, how they were treated by you and your staff, the results you got for them, and how they feel about their experience with your firm.

You might ask them to share there their biggest concerns before hiring a lawyer, or how working with your firm compares to working with other firms. You might ask if they would recommend you to friends or business contacts and, if so, what they would say.

Another thing you can do to get more testimonials is to talk to new clients about the subject even before you start working. Ask them, “If you’re happy with our work, will you be willing to give us a positive review?” When they say they will, you’ll be able to remind them about that later when the work is done.

One of the easiest ways to get a testimonial is when a client praises you or thanks you in an email or phone call or in person. Thank them for their kind words and ask if you can quote them in your marketing.

I’ve done that many times.

Write up what they said, send it to them for their approval, and encourage them to edit or change anything. You’ll often find them adding additional details or comments, making the testimonial much more powerful.

I encourage you to focus on getting more testimonials and using them. They’ll make your marketing more effective and your practice more profitable.

Filed Under: Marketing legal services, Reviews, Testimonials

3 quick tips for improving (all of) your marketing

May 8, 2025 by David M. Ward

If you want to get more clients and increase your income, no matter what kind of marketing you do (or how much), there are 3 principles that will improve your results.

The first is to focus on outcomes.

Lead with it. Emphasize it. Build your message around it.

The details of what you do, and how you do it, usually get in the way of what clients want, which is to improve their business or life by getting an outcome they want you to deliver.

That means your marketing should primarily talk about the big picture. What will the reader or listener get when they hire you? How will they be better off?

Talk about “benefits,” and not so much about “features” e.g., how you make that happen.

The second principle is curiosity. Give prospects just enough information to stimulate a question; don’t satisfy that curiosity with too much information.

If they’re curious, if they want to know about the process or procedure, if they want you to prove you can deliver the benefits, they’ll ask for more information or ask for an appointment and thus, take a step closer to hiring you.

The third principle is clarity. Your message should be simple, easy to understand, and easy to act on. That means, don’t give them too many options because, as the saying goes, “a confused mind says no”.

The simplest way to foster clarity and make a “yes” much more likely is to tell prospective clients exactly what to do next. Spell it out. Tell them to call, for example, give them the number, and tell them “when,” i.e., “today” or “immediately”.

It’s also a good idea to tell them (again) why they should.

These principles are simple but powerful. Use them in all of your marketing to show clients they will get what they want. Do that and you’ll get what you want.

Filed Under: Copywriting

Good enough is good enough

May 6, 2025 by David M. Ward

To do a good job for your clients, you don’t need to get amazing verdicts, write award-winning briefs, or win accolades for your oratory skills. You don’t need to be the best lawyer in town. You need to deliver excellent results and keep your clients happy.

And good enough is (usually) good enough.

The same is true for your marketing.

Let’s use “content marketing” as an example.

As you know, content (articles, newsletters, videos, seminars, etc.) can attract prospects, build authority, and show prospects and referral sources what you’ve done for other clients. It is very effective at showing the world what you know and how you help your clients.

You can build a thriving practice with content marketing.

But if you’re like many attorneys, you don’t create a lot of content because it takes time to do it well and time isn’t something you have in abundance.

The truth is, you can create good content in less time than you might imagine.

The simplest way to do that (other than outsourcing) is to lower your standards a bit. Just like your services, good enough is good enough.

That means you don’t need to research and write scholarly journals or publish pages and pages of information. You can make a statement or observation, ask a question, tell an interesting story, and call it a day. A few paragraphs are enough.

It also means that you can repeat yourself.

Take something you said a few months ago and say it again. Because there are always new people joining your list or reading your article or post that weren’t around a few months ago, and because many of the people who were around before didn’t read what you wrote, or won’t remember it.

You can also repeat your message with different stories or take-aways, because many readers and followers previously didn’t have the problem you’re writing about and didn’t pay much attention. Now they do have that problem and will hang on your every word.

You also don’t have to be original. You can write what other lawyers write about because few people follow or subscribe to more than one or two lawyers.

Finally, the quality and quantity of your content isn’t nearly as important as the consistency with which you deliver it.

To successfully market your practice with content marketing, you don’t need to write brilliant prose or a lot of it. You just need to show up regularly in the mailboxes of your target market, and thus remind them that you are still available to help them.

Doing that once a week is (more than) good enough.

Filed Under: Content creation, Marketing legal services

How to be the top lawyer in your niche

May 1, 2025 by David M. Ward

Most lawyers work hard to keep their clients happy. They do good work and serve their clients to the best of their ability. For the most part, they are available when a client needs them and encourage their clients to contact them whenever they have a question or concern.

Most lawyers are also transparent with their clients. If they don’t have the required skills or experience to do the work, they don’t fake it. They tell the client the truth and offer to refer them to another lawyer.

The best lawyers, the top lawyers in their niche, do all that and more.

What do they do? More than anything, the best lawyers in their niche or market go out of their way to get to know their clients on a personal level.

They learn all about their business and industry and the people in their lives. They get to know them so well they are able to help them proactively.

The best lawyers don’t have to be asked. They know what their clients want and need and routinely send them information and ideas and opportunities, and introduce them to other professionals, vendors, customers, and even employees.

Like a good partner (or parent), they watch out for them.

They make their clients feel cared for and safe. Their clients trust them and want to work with them and wouldn’t think about going anywhere else.

There is a powerful bond between client and lawyer. No sales pitches or fancy marketing is necessary to convince them (or their referral) to hire you.

It’s a very lucrative and enjoyable way to build a law practice.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

How to increase your fees right now and why you should

April 29, 2025 by David M. Ward

Okay, I’m guessing. I’m guessing that you’re like many attorneys and you haven’t raised your fees for a long time, ostensibly because you’re afraid that if you do, you’ll lose clients.

Yes, some clients might leave. But most won’t. They won’t leave because it’s a pain in the behind to find another attorney and bring them up to speed, and they’re afraid they won’t find someone as good as you.

You do good work, and if it’s been awhile, you deserve a raise. Even just to keep up with inflation.

Your costs have increased. Rent, payroll, copies, taxes—it never ends, and if you don’t raise your rates to at least keep up with the cost of living, you’re falling behind.

Your clients are used to inflation right now so if you increase you fees, nobody will be surprised.

How do you go about it?

Should you increase your rates by a standard amount across the board, a set percentage for all clients? Should you increase the rates for some clients more than others? Should you do it all at once or in stages, over time?

I’ll bet questions like these that are part of the reason it’s been a while since your last increase.

Start by talking to your accountant or financial advisor. They can give you guidelines about how much of an increase is warranted, based on your numbers and also based on what other professionals they represent are doing.

The other question is what to tell your clients.

Yes, tell them. Don’t have the increase just show up on their bill and hope nobody notices. Be transparent. Tell them how much, when, and why. In plain language.

Don’t rant about how much your costs have increased, but do explain which of your costs has increased. Tell them you’ve absorbed the increases for a long time, but you can’t do that anymore.

They’ll understand. And appreciate that you’ve held the line for as long as you did.

But here’s the key. As much as possible, explain this to your clients “one on one” and not via a form letter.

They need to hear your voice and you need to hear theirs. If there are questions or issues, you’ll be able to address them without delay and with the respect they deserve.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: attorneys fees