The Attorney Marketing Center--Earn More. Work Less

Are you attracting the wrong clients?

April 17, 2024 by David M. Ward

You don’t want to attract people who can’t afford to hire you. You also don’t want to attract clients who have gone through several attorneys before you and “can’t seem to find the right one”.

But you also don’t want to attract prospective clients who are completely happy with their current firm and not looking for anyone else.

You want to attract your “ideal” clients, those with the right combination of needs and wants and temperament, who are looking for the help you provide and are willing and able to pay for it.

You may occasionally work with a client who isn’t ideal, i.e., tolerate them, but you shouldn’t target them.

You should target your ideal and focus on them in your marketing.

Start by taking inventory of your current and former clients. Make a list of positive attributes you want to attract, i.e., attributes exhibited by clients you’d like to clone if you could, and another list of negative ones you want to avoid.

Create a profile of your ideal clients’ industry or market, their problems and goals, their financial strength, and other factors that define what makes them ideal.

You want more clients who are like your best clients; this is what they look like.

What then? How do you find them?

The best way is via referrals. People tend to associate with people much like themself. People in their market or industry or neighborhood. People in their age group or who have similar interests. People they know, like, and trust.

And the businesses and professionals they work with or patronize.

Whatever it is that makes your ideal clients ideal, referred ideal clients makes them better.

Because they come to you pre-screened and pre-sold.

Yes, there are other ways to find ideal clients, and they may provide you with bigger numbers. Advertising in a trade publication, for example, might generate a lot of leads who fit the profile you seek. But there’s no easier or more profitable way to bring in ideal clients than through referrals.

How to get more referrals

Filed Under: Referrals

Too long; didn’t read

April 16, 2024 by David M. Ward

Lawyers tend to write articles and documents and memos and cover letters and emails… that are too long. They seek completeness and accuracy and to persuade someone of something, but often wind up doing anything but. Their writing is often long-winded, repetitive, boring, and ultimately persuades no one.

Search engines favor longer articles. But to be effective, they have to be well written. If they are, in terms of sales, long copy usually pulls better than short copy.

What can you do? Learn how to write long copy effectively or hire someone to do it for you. One takes time and practice, the other takes money and the good sense to invest it.

But that’s not the end of the story.

Yes, write long when you’re selling something (your services) or want to make love to Miss Google. But it’s okay to write short copy in your blog or newsletter, on social, in email, and for other purposes. In fact, it is often the best thing you can do.

Writing shorter pieces allows you to write more often. Your audience hears from you more frequently and is more likely to read what you wrote. That gives you more opportunities to “speak” to them and remind them about what you do and how you can help them.

You’re able to be in their minds and mailboxes more often, leading to more new clients and legal work for you.

This is a short message. If you got this far, it means you read it. We connected. That’s good.

Something else. Not only does writing longer articles mean you connect with your audience less frequently, your readers often save those longer articles to “read later” and we all know that later often never comes.

Yes, they do see that you emailed them again or published another post and that has value even if they don’t read your message. But it’s better if they do.

Ultimately, the best thing to do is to write both long and short articles, posts, and emails, and let each do their job.

How to start and write an effective email newsletter

Filed Under: Communication, Copywriting, Writing

Education-based marketing

April 15, 2024 by David M. Ward

One of the best ways to market your legal services is to teach clients and prospects about the law. That’s what they want to know when they go to a search engine or click a link. They want to know how bad their problem or situation is, available solutions, the risks, and their options.

And if they are searching for a lawyer, they want to know why they should choose you.

Educate them and they will be much more likely to choose you, because the information you share not only helps them decide to do something about their situation, it shows them you have the knowledge and experience they need and want.

Which is why you do seminars and presentations, write articles and books and newsletters, and create other types of what we now call “content”.

One of the simplest ways to do this is through a blog. You can add a blog to your website, or set up a separate blog, easily and inexpensively (WordPress is free), and use it to write anywhere, even on your phone.

A major benefit of a blog is that you own all the content. You don’t have to send people to other platforms that might bury your content, censor it, or distract visitors with content from other lawyers.

A blog also supports any other marketing you do—networking, social media, advertising, and referrals. People hear about you and visit your blog to learn more. As they consume your content, they sell themselves on taking the next step.

That next step might be to contact you and ultimately hire you, or sign up for your newsletter, which allows you to stay in touch with them until they hire you.

Okay, before you ask, the answer is no, you don’t have to be ‘blogger’ to benefit from a blog. You don’t have to do all the things bloggers do: SEO, engaging with visitors, curating comments, or creating a never-ending series of fresh posts to please the hungry search engines. You don’t have to post continually on social media, appear on other people’s podcasts or channels, or advertise.

You can do any of that if you want to, or use your blog as a sort of online brochure, a place YOU send people to learn more about you and what you do.

To do that, set up a simple blog (it takes ten minutes) and write 5 or 10 posts about your area of expertise. Link to your blog from your website, put the url on your business card and in the “signature” of your emails, and when you talk to someone and they want to know more about what you do, send them to your (website and) blog.

This is an easy and extremely effective way to educate prospects, clients, and referral sources about what you do and why someone should hire you.

How to set up a blog for your law practice

Filed Under: Blogging, Online Marketing

How to get more prospects and clients to say ‘yes’

April 12, 2024 by David M. Ward

You’re in the risk mitigation business. You help your clients avoid or prevent risk and lessen the consequences when something goes wrong. The safer a client or prospect feels about the advice you provide them, the more likely they are to follow that advice.

The same is true for hiring you.

How can you reduce your clients’ (especially new clients’) perceived risks and, therefore, make it more likely that they will hire you?

Submitted for your approval:

Free content. Articles, blog posts, presentations, books, reports, webinars, podcasts. Show them what you know, how you think, and how you can help them.
Free consultation. Give them an hour with you to hear what you think about their problem, recommend solutions, and get a sense of what it will be like having you represent them.
Money-back guarantee. They are satisfied with your work or pay nothing. Limit this to one week or one month, or one case or engagement. Enough for them to see what you can do and decide if they like the cut of your jib.
Special offers. Discounts or free services for new clients, or for specific services, situations.
Testimonials and reviews. Lesson their risk by proving you can do what you promise, as you have done for others.
Likability. All things being equal, clients prefer hiring lawyers they know, like, and trust. Help them get to know and like you and they’ll be more likely to take a chance on you (and then you can earn their trust).

These may not be appropriate for every practice or service, but consider them. You don’t have to advertise or promote your offer to everyone, offer it ad hoc, and see what happens.

If something works, it could provide you with an incredible advantage over your competition, and bring in a lot of clients who otherwise might have said, “I need to think about it”.

More. . .

Filed Under: Marketing legal services

How do you know what prospective clients really want?

April 11, 2024 by David M. Ward

Sure, you can ask them. During a meeting or consultation or over coffee. You can also look at their website or blog, read their book, listen to their presentation or interviews, or send them a survey or questionnaire.

The problem is, people often don’t tell us what they really think or want.

Some don’t know what’s possible or have trouble articulating what they need
Some tell you what they think makes them look intelligent, more successful, or a better person
Some tell you what they think you want to hear
And some play everything close to the vest and don’t tell you much of anything

If you really want to know what people want, we’re told to watch what they do. What do they purchase, who do they hire, what do they invest in? But even this can be misleading or give you an incomplete picture.

One of the best places to find out what prospective clients really want is to watch what they do on social media.

See what they talk about, comment about, or ask. See what they’re excited about or complain about. Yes, there is a lot of pretending on social, but people often get emotional about things they want or don’t want, let down their guard and reveal what’s really on their mind.

But perhaps the best way to find out what prospective clients really want, and one of the simplest, is to talk to the person who referred them to you. There’s a good chance they know.

Which is yet another reason why you should prioritize referrals as a source of new business.

How to get more referrals from your clients

Filed Under: Communication, Referrals

Winning

April 10, 2024 by David M. Ward

Okay, maybe you’re not the best lawyer in town. Other lawyers have better skills, more experience, a better track record, deeper pockets, more charisma, and better connections. They look better, smell better, and have a boatload of energy.

How can you possibly beat them?

By working harder than they do? Maybe. But that gets old.

You beat them not by outworking them, but by out-marketing them.

That doesn’t mean your marketing has to be amazing. Just better. You do a few things well and do them more consistently and enthusiastically.

It means knowing your market—what they want and need—and committing to helping them get it.

It means providing great “customer” service to all of your clients, and building strong relationships with your key clients and referral sources.

It means making marketing your top priority. Something most attorneys are unwilling to do.

They go through the motions. Or believe they only have to do good legal work and the growth of their practice will take care of itself.

You know, the ones who say, “I didn’t go to law school to become a salesperson…”. Who don’t understand that the legal work is only one part of building a successful practice. Or think marketing of any kind is unprofessional and beneath them.

You can beat them.

Because you understand that a law practice is a business, first, and job one is bringing in a steady stream of clients and keeping them happy.

When you do that, you might not be the best lawyer in town, but you might be the wealthiest.

Filed Under: Marketing legal services, success

Tell ‘em about the client who said no

April 9, 2024 by David M. Ward

Or waited too long to say yes and got burned. Or hired a lawyer with less experience and lost the case. Or didn’t follow your advice and had to spend thousands more to have you fix it.

Your words of warning or advice might go in one ear and out the other. So don’t just tell them, show them. Paint a picture in their mind, visually depicting what happened to other clients.

For example, if you have a client or prospect who says, “I need to think it over,” you might respond with something like this:

“I had a client say the same thing to me, but unfortunately, he didn’t ‘think it over’. Now, every time he opens his mailbox, a pile of collection letters falls out. Two weeks ago, Sherrif’s deputies knocked on his door and served him another lawsuit, and last week, his car was repossessed. Now, he has to ask his brother-in-law to drive him to work.”

Word pictures show people what’s at stake and give them a mental image that won’t let them forget it.

Filed Under: Communication, Copywriting

Your practice grows faster when you do THIS…

April 8, 2024 by David M. Ward

For years, I’ve been saying that it only takes 15 minutes a day to market a law practice successfully. I’ve said that because if I said “one hour” you probably wouldn’t do it, and also, because it’s true.

15 minutes is all you need.

But do it “every day,” not just when you have some free time.

Make it a habit, a commitment. Put the time on your calendar as an appointment with yourself and don’t miss that appointment.

If you don’t schedule this time, you won’t do the work. Life will get in the way. Especially if you don’t like marketing and have to force yourself to do it.

But if you keep that 15-minute daily appointment, your practice will grow faster than you ever thought possible.

Why? Because of the compound effect of doing it every day.

Things get easier. You get better. Momentum occurs and accelerates.

Not just because you’re doing the activities themself but by doing something every day, you condition your mind that marketing is important to you. Your mind accepts this and goes to work for you, finding new ideas and better ways to do them, making connections, seeing things you would otherwise miss, and it does this all day (and night), not just when you’re doing the activities.

And here’s the thing. The actual activities aren’t that important. What’s important is that you do something—anything—related to bringing in new business and increasing your income.

Anything.

You could read a few pages of a book (or my blog), brainstorm ideas for your next article, do some research for your current project, edit something already written, hang out on social and see what others are doing that you could comment on (or do yourself), or make a phone call and say hello to someone you haven’t spoken to in a minute.

Anything related to marketing and building your practice. Including sitting quietly and thinking about what you want and how you can get it.

By the way, if 15 minutes is too much, do 5. Or two. Because it’s about the commitment and consistency, not how much you do.

Do anything. But something. Every day.

You might want to start by reading this

Filed Under: Marketing Plan

Study success

April 5, 2024 by David M. Ward

Jim Rohn said, “If you want to become more successful, study success.”

How do you do that? By studying successful people. People who have accomplished what you want to accomplish. People who inspire you. People you would like to learn from and emulate.

Lawyers who have done what you want to do. Entrepreneurs. Business leaders. Great speakers and writers and philosophers.

You can find successful people in your city or on the Internet, in biographies and the pages of history, and even in fiction.

Read their books. And books about them. Listen to their presentations and interviews. Most of all, watch what they do because their actions will tell you more than their words.

Reflect on what you learn. Ask yourself, why are they successful? What are their philosophies? What are (or were) their daily habits? What advice would they give you if you spent an hour with them?

Think about them often. When you have a problem, ask yourself what they would do about it. If you have an important decision to make, ask yourself what they would advise you to consider.

But don’t just read and think about them, write about them, in articles or in your journal, and talk about them and their philosophies in your presentations. Tell others their story and why you admire them.

If you want to be more successful, study success. And successful people.

Filed Under: Inspiration, Personal development, success

Shrek would have made a good lawyer

April 4, 2024 by David M. Ward

On the outside, Shrek was tough and scary. A monster who could slay dragons and vanquish villains. On the inside, he was gentle and kind.

Your clients want you to be Shrek on the outside, fighting their enemies, protecting them, and being tough. On the inside, where they deal with you, they want you to be warm and caring and easy to talk to.

How do you attract clients by showing them your strength without scaring them off with bluster?

By being open and friendly and warm in your writing and speaking, in your blog and newsletter, on social media, in the “About” page on your website, and in all of your marketing.

That means not writing like a lawyer. It means being informal and open, speaking directly to your readers and listeners, and not putting distance between you by writing the 3rd person.

It means being “normal” and friendly on social media. Some lawyers sound anything but. They come off as “too cool” to talk to people, sounding distant, or worse, sarcastic or confrontational.

It’s not complicated. If you want people to approach you, you need to appear approachable.

That means making people feel comfortable about talking with you and working with you.

You can do that. You can be warm and friendly and still be professional.

You can show people you’re tough and also easy to talk to.

Shrek did it and so can you.

Filed Under: Communication, Content creation, Marketing legal services