David M. Ward – Page 58

Can you give me some advice?

October 28, 2022 by David M. Ward

When asked this question, most attorneys reply with, “Visa or Mastercard,“ because they’re not in the advice-giving business, they’re in the advice-selling business.

Free consultations are no exception.

You don’t charge the would-be client for a free consultation, but since a preponderance wind up hiring you, you still get paid.

What about free information you provide via a blog or newsletter, video or podcast?

You don’t speak to the viewer or listener about their situation, but they still get your valuable information and opinions. And many who consume said information will hire you or refer business to you.

So you still get paid.

We’re lawyers. We always get paid.

Free advice and free information are effective ways to market legal services. But are they right for you?

Some attorneys want to get paid for their advice and information, besides getting paid for their services. And many attorneys do.

Many attorneys don’t offer free consultations. If you want their advice, you write a check. Some attorneys don’t offer free content. You want to know what they know, you buy their book or course. Or hire them.

What’s the right way to go?

Do the math.

If you get more clients by offering free consultations and/or free information than you would if you didn’t, there’s your answer.

But not always.

It depends on how much time you need to invest to give those consultations or create that information. And it depends on the quality of the clients that result from your efforts.

Some clients are worth more. Bigger cases, more work, repeat business, more referrals, more contacts they can introduce you to, more opportunities they can help you find and exploit.

It’s complicated.

And then there’s the matter of your marketing.

If you have a big back end, you can afford to spend more on the front end. It’s an investment. If you know the value of building a list and staying in touch with it, you’ll be inclined to create more free information, not less.

And then there’s the matter of your gut. What does it tell you?

You shouldn’t do anything just because all the cool kids are doing it, or not do it because they aren’t.

Hey, just some things to think about. And talk to your people about.

If you want to talk to me about it, I take Visa and Mastercard.

Filed Under: List building, Marketing legal services

The options paradox

October 27, 2022 by David M. Ward

People say they want a lot of options. But they don’t. Experiments prove this, including a famous one labeled “The Jam Study”.

Researchers set up two tables with fruit jams for purchase. One table had 24 different flavors of jam. The other table had 6.

The table with 24 flavors got 50% more shoppers to visit. But. . . the table with 6 flavors got more sales.

3% of shoppers bought something from the table with 24 options; 30% bought something from the table with just 6 options.

The reason is simple. When confronted with too many choices, people find it difficult to choose. Our brains prefer fewer options because it is easier to decide.

When you’re speaking to a client or prospect about the services you offer, don’t give them too many options. You’ll get fewer sign-ups.

In the calls-to-action in your emails and web pages, don’t include several “asks”. Don’t ask them to download something and share something, fill out a form and Like your post.

Too many options usually gets fewer people to do anything.

So, how many is too many?

You have to test that and find out, but, as a general rule, one or two options is usually best.

One option, “Fill out this form” gives them a choice between getting your report or other incentive (by filling out the form) or getting nothing. They either want the report or they don’t.

Two options, “Service A or Service B” or “Relief from your problem (by hiring you) or continuing to have that problem (by not hiring you)”. Much less to think about.

In marketing, less is (usually) more.

Here’s the formula for getting more clients and increasing your income

Filed Under: Copywriting, Marketing legal services

New clients from old contacts

October 26, 2022 by David M. Ward

It’s exciting to meet new people, whether prospective clients or business contacts who can send you referrals, and this should be a regular part of your practice-building routine.

That doesn’t mean you need to get dressed up and go to networking events, however. You can do this without leaving your home or office.

My “Lawyer-to-Lawyer Referrals” mini-course makes this easy. It shows you how to find them, what to say, and what to send them, and is not just for other lawyers but for any type of business or professional contact.

But I don’t want you to do that. Not yet, anyway.

Because it’s a lot easier to get referrals by re-connecting with your old contacts. Including (or maybe especially) your old clients.

People who would know your name if I mentioned it to them. People who will remember you and ask how you’re doing since you last spoke. People who have sent you referrals in the past, or would have if they had had any to send.

Because they know, like, and trust you.

Yeah, those people.

Your old contacts will take your call and respond to your email. And most of them will be glad to hear from you.

They’ll want to know why you’re calling or writing, of course. Just say something like, “I saw your name (or thought about you) and wondered what you were doing since the last time we spoke”.

Catch up with them. Business, family, life. Ask about them. They’ll ask about you.

This is easy to do, doesn’t take a lot of time, and can bring you a lot of repeat-business and referrals.

And you don’t have to ask.

If they have legal questions or need help, or they know someone who does, they’ll tell you about it. Simply because you’re on the other end of the phone or sitting in their email inbox.

If they don’t, that’s okay. Confirm that you have their best email and ask if you can stay in touch.

And then stay in touch.

Lawyer-to-Lawyer Referrals (for professionals) and Maximum Referrals (for clients)

Filed Under: Referral sources, Referrals

Onboarding new clients

October 25, 2022 by David M. Ward

I download a lot of apps to try out. I delete most of them almost immediately.

It’s not the app necessarily. Many of them come highly recommended, have great reviews, and look like something I can use. So, why do I kiss them goodbye so quickly?

Because they don’t make me feel welcome.

They make me sign up before I can see anything. Their instructions are confusing (or there aren’t any). They assume I know things I don’t know, or they do things in ways I’m not used to and don’t explain why.

I’m the customer. You should make me feel appreciated. Take me by the hand, show me around, and help me get started.

Don’t just point out a list of features. Help me start using them.

Some apps do it right. From the first click, they invite you into their world, and an exciting world it is. They show you everything you need to see and hide (for now) everything you don’t. They make you feel like they know what they’re doing and you will be well taken care of.

The app might not have every feature you want. It might not be the best at everything it does. But you fall in love with it because of their exceptional onboarding experience.

Something attorneys should seek to do with new clients.

Make them feel welcome, appreciated, and safe. Make them feel like you’ve done this before and they are in good hands. Make them fall in love with you and very happy they downloaded you.

Filed Under: Client relations

Better than digging ditches

October 24, 2022 by David M. Ward

A lot of lawyers love what they do. A lot don’t. A lot of the ones who don’t love it (or like it) do it because they make a decent living and don’t know what else to do.

If you find yourself in the latter group, if you’re okay with the job but aren’t passionate about it, one thing you might do is let go of the need to love everything and focus on the parts you do.

Love the money? That’s fine. Love helping people? Great. Love being able to use your brain and not get your hands dirty? That’s a win in my book.

But what about the things you really don’t like but feel you have to do?

You have a choice. You can find other ways to get the job done. Change your practice area, market, or clients. Change your marketing methods. Change your worklows and habits. Delegate the work you don’t like or aren’t good at.

Your other option is to change your mindset. How you feel and think about what you do. Maybe you don’t want partners or employees, but maybe you could make that work.

Reframe the boring parts or cringy parts by seeing them as a small but necessary means to an end. An end you truly want and are willing to make sacrifices to get.

And then focus on the things you do love and do more of them.

There will always be parts of the job you don’t like. You might not like getting up early, fighting through traffic, and arguing with people all day.

But some things are worth it.

Filed Under: Career satisfaction, Dealing with stress

Sorry, you don’t qualify to hire me

October 21, 2022 by David M. Ward

Wouldn’t it be great to be able to pick and choose who can (and can’t) hire you?

It would and you can start doing it immediately.

Decide who you want as a client in terms of demographics, industry or market, and other factors, and don’t accept anyone else. Or, accept them if you want to, but don’t target them.

Invest your time and resources attracting your “ideal” client.

This will necessarily be a small segment of the entire market of people who might need your services. Why limit yourself?

Because it will make your marketing much more effective and your practice more profitable and enjoyable.

You’ll bring in better clients, the kinds you have determined you want to work with, and eliminate ones you don’t.

Many prospective clients will seek you out because they’ve heard about you from people they know and trust. They’ll be pre-sold on you and your services and won’t need a lot of persuading to sign up.

These clients will be able to pay you and will have a lot of work for you (because you targeted clients who do). They’ll also have more referrals for you, people like themselves who are a good fit for you.

Professionals and businesses in your target market will more readily steer people your way, because they’ve also heard about you from people they trust, some of whom will be their existing clients.

Is this starting to sound too good to be true?

Maybe it is. Maybe your message won’t resonate, your reputation won’t precede you, or people won’t trust you or want you anywhere near their clients and contacts.

But maybe they will.

How about finding out?

Start by understanding that “not everyone is your customer” and that you get to choose.

Choose well, my friend. You might be pleasantly surprised and handsomely rewarded.

If not, you can always go back to marketing to everyone and taking what you get.

Here’s how to choose your niche market and ideal client

Filed Under: Marketing legal services, Marketing Plan Tagged With: ideal client, Niche marketing

How to get 4 articles out of one idea

October 20, 2022 by David M. Ward

Leverage is my name. Content my game. If you want to play this game, behold a simple way to turn one idea for an article or blog post, video or podcast, into 4.

Choose a subject. It doesn’t matter what it is—anything you know something about. It can be as simple as “torts” or “trusts” or “the rule against perpetuities” (JK).

If you’re not sure, choose something at random.

Once you’ve got a subject, write down ways you could write about that subject based on these 4 categories:

Actionable (How to Do X, How I Do X)
Inspirational (You Can Do X, You Can Get X)
Analytical (How X Works, The Details, The Steps)
Explanatory (Why it Works This Way, How Things Used to Be, What I’d Like to See Changed About X)

Let’s say you decide to write about “negligence”. Your 4 articles might be:

Actionable: How to Represent Yourself in Small Claims Court, 3 Things I Always Do Before I File a Lawsuit, How to Maximize the Value of Your Case
Inspirational: You May be Entitled to A and B and C, How I won a ‘Lost’ Case, What Happened When My Client Tripped and Fell and Thought it Was His Fault
Analytical: How Damages are Calculated, What You Need to Prove to Win Your Case, What is The Reasonable Person Standard?
Explanatory: How Our System Developed (and Why), How to Improve Our System, Why Legal Expenses Are So High

Hold on. We’re not done.

I promised you 4 articles out of one idea, but you can use these categories to dig deeper into your subject and come up with even more ideas.

For example, if you plan to write about why legal expenses and lawyers’ fees are so high, you might come up with 4 (more) articles:

Actionable: Five Ways to Reduce Your Legal Fees
Inspirational: How My Client Built an 8-Figure Business Without Spending a Fortune on Lawyers
Analytical: What I Spend Each Month Just to Keep My Doors Open
Explanatory: Why Hiring a ‘Low Cost’ Lawyer Costs You More, Not Less

And thus, one idea may lead to dozens.

If you find yourself unable to come up a subject to write about, instead of racing around wildly searching for ideas, take something you deal with every day and know well, extrapolate concepts related to it (based on these 4 categories) and come up with 4 (or more) ideas, not one.

Love means never having to say you’re sorry; leverage means never having to say “I don’t know what to write about”.

More ways to get ideas to write about

Filed Under: Content creation, Leverage, Writing

Converting contacts into clients

October 19, 2022 by David M. Ward

You have a list. Business contacts, subscribers, followers, and friends. People who read what you write and listen to you when you speak. People who know, like, and trust you, or are on their way to doing that.

Now what? How do you convert these folks into clients and income?

Sending them information is good. And easy. Write about their problems and the available solutions, about their market or industry, about your services, and about other topics that will be of interest or value to them.

Keep doing that but realize that they can get most of this information at the library, surfing the web, or following other lawyers.

To convert these folks into clients and referral sources, to people who send you traffic, to people who look forward to hearing from and make a point of sharing your information with others, you need more than just information.

You need connection.

You do this all the time offline. You can do it with your digital contacts.

There are two things you need to do.

First, you need to know the people on your list or in your market. Who are they, what they do, and what they want (and not just legally speaking).

What makes them tick?

Study your market. And talk to the people in it. What are they excited about? What keeps them up at night? What is it like to walk in their shoes?

Because understanding is the first step towards connecting.

The second thing you need to do? You need to allow them to get to know you.

That means opening up about your personal life. Not everything, but something. Your life outside of work, your family, what you do for fun.

Let down your guard a bit and show people your human side.

Flaws and mistakes and struggles included.

Because that’s what people relate to. That’s what people will like and come to trust.

You don’t have to be an open book. Confess all your sins. A few details go a long way.

Do you have any photos or memorabilia in your office? Things visitors notice and ask about? Do you ever brag about your child hitting a home run in the big game? Do you ever talk about a tough case and how you (eventually) won it? A mistake in judgement you once made and the lesson it taught you?

In your newsletter, talk about the kinds of things you talk about in person. Let people see you’re just like them and they’re just like you.

That’s how you connect. And convert contacts into clients.

Filed Under: Communication

We’re having leftovers today, k?

October 18, 2022 by David M. Ward

If you’re like me (and you are), you do too much research and have a lot of material you don’t use. And this is true of most of your writing, but especially long-form: reports, briefs, books, and presentations.

And there’s nothing wrong with this.

Question is, what do you do with the stuff you don’t use?

Do you save it to another file, in case you might need it later? Do you throw out the content but save the citations or links? Do you delete everything and not give it another thought?

What do I do? I set up a folder for each chapter or section of the work-in progress and put unused notes and my first attempts to write something in that folder. I call the folder “leftovers.”

I call it that because it reminds me of how good leftovers are the next day when you’re scrounging for something to eat in the fridge. It may be cold, but there’s nothing like day-old pizza or chicken or hamburgers, yes?

Great, now I’m getting hungry.

Anyway, call this folder whatever you like: notes, ideas, unused, snippets, research, drafts. I’m sticking with leftovers.

But here’s the thing.

While I offload anything I don’t use to this folder, I hardly ever look at what’s inside this folder.

That sounds dumb, doesn’t it? Then why do you save this stuff?

Because the point isn’t just to have a folder of unused bits-and-pieces I can go back to if necessary, and occasionally it is, it is to give me a place to put things I’m not sure about while I’m in the process of writing.

I might need this or want that; let’s put it in a safe place for now and I can decide later, my brain says.

It allows me to stay in a state of flow and write the first draft quickly, without looking over my own shoulder, thinking about how and when I might use one of these gems.

It’s all about the speed.

Yes, there are times when I realize that what I’m about to move to the leftover folder is something I will need or can use in something else I’m writing, or soon will. I put these elsewhere. No, I don’t have a name for this place. I’m open to suggestions.

Anyway, that’s what I do, and it works for me. What do you do?

Actually, I don’t have time to chat. We had pizza last night and it’s almost time for lunch.

Filed Under: Writing

The chicken AND the egg

October 17, 2022 by David M. Ward

Most lawyers don’t think about it. They present what they do to the world and see who’s interested.

“Here’s some information about the law and about me and my services. If you have this problem or that desire, here’s what I can do to help you.“

When someone shows interest, they talk to them and show them more.

In time, these lawyers get to know more about their clients and their markets and are better able to serve them and more easily market to them.

This works.

But there’s another way.

The other way is to build your audience first and tailor what you do and how you present it to appeal to that audience.

You find a niche that has a need (and the ability to pay a lawyer). You study the niche and learn all about it. And you create marketing materials, websites, and approaches that speak to that audience.

With the first approach, the market is bigger, but there is more competition. It is harder to stand out, and marketing is less effective and more expensive.

The second approach has less competition, marketing is less expensive and more effective, but by definition, the chosen niche is smaller than the broader market.

Both approaches work; which approach is right for you?

Maybe both.

Offer your services broadly and see who finds you. Learn about them and their market and build relationships with them and the people they know.

At the same time, choose a niche market, study it and target it.

I used both approaches in my practice. I started broadly, learned how to practice law and how to pay my bills.

And then I settled in on a couple of niche markets, which allowed me to grow bigger, faster.

Sometimes, the easiest way to find a niche that’s right for you is to look for it among your existing clients.

How to find the right niche for your practice

Filed Under: Marketing Plan Tagged With: Niche marketing