It’s not what you’re thinking. It’s not advertising, networking, social media, blogging, or speaking. It’s not even referrals, although that’s a big part of it. 

Many lawyers don’t think of it as marketing, but it is. The smartest and most profitable kind of marketing a lawyer can do.

And here it is in a nutshell:

Give your clients more value than they pay for and expect. 

Don’t roll your eyes. . .

Yes, it takes times and energy to do this. You’re giving away what might otherwise be billable hours, your knowledge and advice. 

So there is a cost. But if you do it right, it’s not an expense, it’s an investment. With an astronomical return. 

When you give clients more than they expect, they fall in love with you. As a result

• You increase client retention. Clients aren’t tempted to hire another lawyer or firm, even if that lawyer or firm has significantly lower fees. This means the lifetime value of your clients is much higher than what most lawyers get. They are relatively immune to leaving and this is true no matter what the state of the general economy or your clients’ industry or local market.
• Higher retention means you get more repeat business. It also means your clients are likely to give you more of their legal work, not just some of it.
• Stronger client relationships mean you can charge fees commensurate with the higher value you deliver. 
• You also get more referrals from your clients and their business contacts to “repay” you for all the added value you deliver.
• You develop a reputation for proving excellent service and, through word-of-mouth, attract better clients who hear about you. You also attract bigger cases and more business opportunities.
• Your reputation allows you to attract more professionals and business contacts who want to work with you.
• Your enhanced reputation makes your other marketing easier, more effective, and more profitable. Overall, you have lower marketing costs, better results, and higher profits for you.

Surprise and delight your clients. They’ll be happier and so will you.

Have you ever considered a marketing task and talked yourself out of it because you “didn’t have the time”? 

Actual work, appointments, meetings, appearances, reviewing files, billing, calls, email, supervising employees, taxes, banking, all need to be done and doing them doesn’t leave much time for anything else. 

Including (especially) marketing. 

But hold on. If an activity turned out to be worth it, could you find the time to do it?

Would it be worth doing (something) once a week for 45 minutes if it brought in a new case or client every month? Would it be worth doing something 30 minutes every day if it brought in two new clients each week? 

Do the math. It’s your practice. What would it take for a marketing task or activity to be ‘worth it’ for you?

How much time, money, effort, for how much return? 

Once you have an answer, test the idea. And give it enough time before you conclude it is (or isn’t) worth it. 

But hold on (again). You might find that something wasn’t worth it, e.g., you invested three hours this month and saw very little (or no) return, but that doesn’t mean you can’t improve. You might be one tweak away from creating a flood of new business. 

Try again. Try another approach. 

You might find ten things that don’t work. That’s okay. All you need is one that does.

To persuade prospective clients to hire you, you want them to know that what you will do for them is simple, but not easy. There’s a lot of work to do, much of it is complex and difficult, but you have the knowledge and experience to do it.

Because you’ve done it many times before. 

In your marketing messages, don’t confuse “simple” with “easy”. What you do isn’t easy. If it was, any attorney could do it, and that’s not the message you want to convey. 

It’s simple but takes a lot of skill, experience and hard work. They’ve chosen the right attorney for the job because you’ve helped many others through this process and are ready to do it for them. 

Imagine if you suggested otherwise, that what you do is easy to do. That’s not what a client who is being asked to pay big bucks to think. 

So, choose your words carefully. 

Choosing you is simple. Hiring you is simple. Working with you is simple. 

But the work isn’t easy.