The second best source of new clients

January 14, 2014 by
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According to a study of online marketing metrics, the best source of new clients (customers) is through generic search engine traffic. Nothing else comes close.

You probably knew that.

What you may find surprising is what’s number two. According to the study, it’s email, which is 40 times more effective than Facebook and Twitter.

So, if you aren’t leveraging generic search engine traffic by creating and posting quality content online, you’re missing out big time. Prospective clients go to search engines looking for information about their legal situation, the available solutions, and for lawyers who can help them. Post information that answers their questions and provides those solutions and they will find you.

You don’t need to hire a team of experts. You don’t need to spend a lot of time. Once a week or so, write 300 to 500 words about something prospective clients want to know and might go looking for and post it.

Make sure you use keywords in the title and body of your post and follow a few other best practice to tell Uncle Google and his cousins what your post is about. Remember, search engines want to help their customers find what they’re looking for. Write and post that content and they’ll help you find prospective clients.

Now, not everyone who finds your website and reads your content is ready to hire you right away. In fact, you have to assume that most visitors to your website aren’t ready. In a few days or a few months, or perhaps a few years, when they are ready (or know someone who is), they probably won’t remember you. There’s a good chance they’ll wind up on some other lawyer’s website.

Unless. . . you stay in touch with them . . through email. . . the second best source of new clients online.

Your website needs to collect visitor’s email addresses. If it does not, you’re losing business. Probably a lot of business. Even if you practice in an area where most people make a hiring decision quickly like personal injury or criminal defense, because some clients wait and some clients are unhappy with the first attorney they hire.

Offer your visitors something free as an incentive to sign up for your email list. A report, checklist, form, or ebook. Add a form to your site to make it easy for them to opt in. Use an autoresponder to collect emails and automate much or all of the “staying in touch”.

Marketing online is not difficult and does not take a lot of time. Create search engine friendly content and build an email list. They are the number one and number two best source of new clients online so if you do it, you won’t have to do much of anything else.

Need help? Get my course on Internet marketing for attorneys.

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Filed Under: List building, Marketing legal services, Online Marketing, Web traffic Tagged With: , , , , ,

Email marketing for lawyers

July 25, 2013 by
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I talked to a lawyer yesterday who told me looks forward to reading my emails every day. I hear that a lot.

There’s a lesson in this.

When you deliver value–information, ideas, stories, tips–you can email your list often. Even daily.

Your readers will look forward to getting your emails and they will read them.

The ones who don’t, the ones who either don’t read your email or unsubscribe from you list, would probably never hire you anyway and you can safely let them go.

The ones who like your emails:

  • Know you. They know your name and what you do.
  • Like you. They like hearing your “voice” and reading your advice and stories.
  • Trust you. They see that you are consistent, dependable. They see that you are continually solving legal problems for other clients and believe you could do the same for them.

So. . .

  • When they need your services, they’ll almost always call you instead of any other lawyer
  • When they know someone who needs your services, they’ll refer them to you instead of any other lawyer
  • When you ask them to “Like” your page, share your article, or invite their friends and contacts to register for your seminar, there’s a good chance they will

Compare this to lawyers who don’t have a list. They have no way to stay in touch with prospective clients so none of the above can occur.

And compare this to lawyers who do have a list but either don’t send value or don’t email often enough:

  • When they do email, it goes into spam or is not recognized, so it is not opened and read
  • Or, it’s been so long since they have heard from the lawyer, they don’t really know, like, and trust him, and thus, won’t hire him (or refer)
  • Or, the email is opened and read but it’s been so long since they heard from the lawyer, they’ve already hired someone

You don’t have to mail every day. Once a week is fine. But do mail often and do deliver value.

Your emails can be short and sweet. A tip, a quick story, a reminder. If you write an article or blog post, send that. If you find an interesting article or video on someone else’s site, send them a link. If you have an interesting case or client, tell them about it.

Email marketing for lawyers is simple. Build a list and build a relationship with the people on that list.

You know you’re doing it right when your subscribers tell you they look forward to getting your emails.

Want to know how to build a list and what to send them? This shows you what to do.

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Filed Under: Communication, Email, List building, Marketing legal services, Newsletters, Online Marketing, Relationship marketing Tagged With: ,