If I were starting my law practice today, here’s what I would do to bring in clients

May 7, 2012 by
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If I were opening a law practice today, my “marketing plan” would be very different than it was when I opened my office thirty-plus years ago.

The Internet changes everything.

So. . . here’s what I would do:

I would start by setting up a web site to showcase what I do. It would be my online brochure as well as a mechanism for networking and lead generation. It would be an information hub, the center of all of my marketing activities.

My web site would be a self-hosted WordPress blog so I could update it without depending on anyone else. I would spend less than $10/yr. for a domain, and less than $10/mo. for hosting.

I would keep things simple, with a clean, professional look. I would favor quality content over bells and whistles. The look would say, “competent, confident, accomplished and approachable,” because that’s what I would want if I was looking for an attorney.

I would add articles and other content to the site, to provide value to visitors and generate search engine traffic. I would continue to add content, seeking to make my site the most comprehensive in my practice area. When someone needed an answer, everyone would point them to my site.

I would make it easy for visitors to contact me through the site and I would encourage this. I want people to ask questions. My answers bring me one step closer to an appointment and a new client. Their questions and my answers would also give me fodder for new content.

I would add testminonials and success stories to the site, providing social proof of my capabilities and add a dramatic aspect to otherwise dry material.

I would set up a lead capture system, using an autoresponder to deliver an online newsletter. I would encourage visitors to subscribe so I could stay in touch with them. Over time, I know they will become clients, provide referrals, and generate even more traffic to my site through their social media channels.

Once my hub was set up, my focus would be to drive traffic to the site and grow my list. I would start by leveraging my existing contacts, telling them about my site and the benefits of visiting. I would ask them to spread the word to the people they know.

Every piece of printed collateral, including my business cards, would include a link to my web site. Every email I sent would link to the site. Every article I wrote would include a resource box and a link to my site.

I would become active in forums and on social media. I would do some networking and speaking to meet new contacts and to stay up to date with the news in my target market.

I would look for other professionals who target my market and propose writing for each other’s blogs and newsletters. If they were physically near me, I would meet them for coffee and explore other ways we could help each other.

I would regularly email to my list, notifying them of new content on the site and sending them other content I found that I thought they might like to see. I would stay in touch with them so that I would be “in their minds and their mailboxes” when they needed my services or encountered someone who did.

I would let people know I appreciate their referrals and thank those who have provided them in the past. I would suggest other ways they could help me, i.e., forwarding my emails to their friends and contacts, promoting my seminar or other event, or introducing me to people they know that I should meet.

I would look for ways to provide added value to my list and even more so to my clients. I would give them information and advice, but not necessarily in my practice area or even anything legal.

I would smother my clients with attention, exceeding their expectations in every way possible, because I know the best way to build a law practice is with referrals from satisfied clients and other people who know, like, and trust me.

Wait. . .  the Internet doesn’t change everything. Marketing is the same today as it was thirty years ago. The Internet just makes it easier, quicker, and less expensive.

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Filed Under: Client relations, Email, Image, List building, Marketing legal services, Marketing Plan, Newsletters, Online Marketing, Referrals, Social media marketing, Technology, Web traffic Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

How to get more clients to choose YOU as their attorney

April 30, 2012 by
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You have a list of prospects, don’t you? These are people who get your newsletter or ezine, who read your blog, or with whom you otherwise communicate on a regular basis.

Some will hire you. You don’t have to say or do anything special. When they are ready, they will call.

Others will never hire you. No matter what you say or do. It doesn’t matter why they won’t hire you, that’s just the way it is. They can help you in other ways: referrals, traffic to your web site, Likes and follows.

Then there are the “maybes”. They may hire you, they may not. The fence sitters represent the biggest potential for you. What you say and do can influence them to get off the fence.

How do you get more people off the fence and dialing your number?

One way is to make an offer. Something that compels them to act.

One of my subscribers sent me the ezine he sends to his list. In it is an offer he makes to the “new clients” who lurk on his list. His offer: “Mention this newsletter and we will credit one hour of billable time against your first monthly invoice.”

Simple. You have to become a new client to take advantage of the offer. From the attorney’s perspective, it’s certainly worth one hour of credit to get someone to become a first time client.

Is he giving away that one hour credit to people on the list who would hire him anyway? Yes. But it doesn’t matter. It’s small potatoes. He earns much more by getting the fence sitters as new clients.

But let’s be honest, a one hour credit is only mildly enticing to someone who might have to pony up $10,000 or $20,000 to hire you. It’s not going to get someone who isn’t ready to hire an attorney off the fence. What it might do is get someone who is ready to hire an attorney to choose you instead of any other attorney.

You must assume that yours isn’t the only newsletter your prospect reads. If you’re the only one offering a one hour credit to new clients, however, when the fence sitter is ready to hire someone, it could tip the balance in your favor.

For prospects who aren’t ready to hire an attorney, you will have to do more than offer a one hour credit. How do you convince someone who isn’t ready? I’ll cover that tomorrow.

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Filed Under: Blogging, Closing the sale, Copywriting, Email, Marketing legal services, Newsletters Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

If I could use only ONE marketing tool

March 27, 2012 by
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I started this post intending to make the case in favor of email as my favorite marketing tool. There’s no question that it is one of the most effective ways to deliver messages to people who can hire you or refer someone who can. It’s (almost) free, almost everyone has an email address, and email is still more popular than social media.

With the click of a button, you can send out an email to hundreds or thousands of people, and almost as quickly, get orders or phone calls and appointments.

Strange that so many attorneys (most?) don’t use email in their marketing, at least not as much as they could. Or should.

You may have a list of people–clients, former clients, and business contacts–but if you’re not communicating with them on a regular basis, you’re not going to get their business. They forget about you, or they forget how to contact you, or they’re just not motivated to contact you because. . . you haven’t contacted them.

The point of having a list, indeed, of all of your marketing efforts, is to stay in touch with people. Or as I put it, “. . .to be in their minds and their mailboxes so that when they are ready to hire a lawyer, or know someone who is, there you are. . .”.  Email is one of the most effective ways to stay in touch.

So, I was going to say email is my favorite marketing tool, but that’s not quite accurate. Nope. My favorite marketing tool is. . . a sales letter.

Lawyers may not call it that. We’ll call it a newsletter or information or anything but a sales letter (because we don’t sell, right?)–but whatever you call it, and however you disguise it, if it’s designed to get someone to do something, it’s a sales letter. My favorite marketing tool.

A sales letter is words, on paper (or electrons), that communicate a message and an offer or a request. People read it and call for an appointment, Like your web page, or sign up for your seminar. You can send it by postal mail, or by messenger. Hand it to someone in person, or deliver it via fax or text message. You can post it on your blog, web page, or on Facebook.

Oh, and guess what? Every time you talk to a prospective client on the phone or in person and you tell them about your services and what you can do to help them, you’re delivering a sales letter. A spoken sales letter.

Do yourself a favor and write it down, so you can send it by email.

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Filed Under: Communication, Email, Newsletters, Online Marketing, Relationship marketing, Salesmanship, Writing Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

“Who the hell are you and why are you contacting me?”

March 15, 2012 by
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Begin rant. . .

I got this voice mail message the other day: “Hi David, this is Joe Blow. Please give me a call at [telephone number]. . .”.

He didn’t say who he was (other than his name, which I did not recognize) or why he was calling. He didn’t give me any reason to call him back.

Guess who I didn’t call back?

I shouldn’t have to tell anyone this but it happens often enough so I guess I do: when you leave a message, tell people who you are and why you are calling.

Are you a client? A colleague? A fan? Do you want to hire me? Is there an issue I need to look into? Do you have something to propose?

When you leave a voice message, give them a good reason to call you back.

And. . .

State your name clearly. Spell it (unless it’s very common). Say your number slowly so they can write it down. Repeat the number so they don’t have to listen to the message again. Give them your time zone and the best time(s) to reach you. Say please and thank you.

Common courtesy and common sense.

And. . .

The same goes for email.

Tell people who you are and why you’re writing. What do you want them to know or do? Give them a web site so they can find out more. Use correct grammar and spelling. Format your email so it doesn’t look like a DECLARATION OF WAR! And get to the friggin point!

When you contact someone for the first time, you’re making that proverbial first impression. The only thing they have to go on is that email or voice mail message. Make it professional. Show them you care. Because if you don’t care, why should they?

Rant over. . .

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Filed Under: Communication, Email, Image, Law office management, Personal development, Salesmanship Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,

6 rules for saving time with email

February 22, 2012 by
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Leo at Zen Habits says most emails are too long. They take too long to write, too long to read, and too long to respond to.

He has made a habit of writing shorter emails, five lines or less. Everyone is better off.

Here are his 6 rules for short, effective emails:

  1. Keep it to 5 sentences. No more. I stole this from five.sentenc.es of course, but I’ve used it for years and it works. I usually try to do fewer than 5.
  2. Figure out your main point. If you think you need more than 5 sentences, you haven’t figured out the key thing you want to say. Take a second to figure it out, and stick to just that.
  3. Ask one thing. Don’t ask 10 questions, just ask one. Or two at the most. You’re much more likely to get an answer quickly.
  4. Edit. If you stretched it to 8 sentences, cut out 3.
  5. Link. If you need to refer to info, include a link to it on the web.
  6. Post it. If the info you need to share isn’t on the web, put it there. Create a long answer or long background document (then edit it to the essential info) and post it online. Use your blog, or one of the many free tools for posting info. Create an FAQ if it’s useful. Link to it in your email.

Ironically, it might take longer to craft a shorter email as this famous quote from George Bernard Shaw quote reminds us: “I’m sorry this letter is long, I didn’t have time to make it shorter.” So if you bill by the hour, you’ll actually earn more by writing shorter emails. (Insert smiley face here. . .)

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Filed Under: Communication, Email, Productivity, Writing Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

A simple way to promote your law practice with email without being spammy

February 20, 2012 by
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I just updated my (personal) email signature. Now, everyone who gets an email from me will see, “Author of Evernote for Lawyers” under my name and contact info. It is hyperlinked to the sales page for the book. If my emails get forwarded to anyone, they will see it, too. These few words tell people I am an authority (book author) and, of course, they also promote the book.

Your email signature has your contact information but it can also be used to directly promote your specific legal services (i.e., a list of your practice areas), your blog and it’s valuable content, your next speaking event, or your new book.

Take some time to review your signature and update it with links or information. Here are some more ideas:

  • A direct link to your most popular blog post
  • A link to the FAQ page on your web site
  • A link to a “welcome” page on your web site
  • A promo for your newsletter
  • A mention of you or your firm in an article or blog post
  • An offer (e.g., free consultation, free report, seminar discount)
  • A call to action (e.g., “Call now to schedule your appointment”)
  • Links to your social media profiles

While you’re at it, consider curtailing or even eliminating all of the disclaimers and legalese that are so prevalent in lawyers emails. Do they really protect you? Will someone really be able to claim that because you sent them an email you were their attorney or you gave them legal advice? I’ll let you answer those questions, but I can tell you that from a marketing standpoint, they don’t help. They push people away at a time when you want to invite them to come closer.

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Filed Under: Email, Marketing legal services, Online Marketing Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Save time and reduce mistakes with form letters

February 2, 2012 by
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I suspect that as much as one third of the mail and email messages you send each week are routine responses or messages. Inquires are answered, new clients information is transmitted, newsletters are mailed. You probably have some of these saved as form letters. You may also store snippets of text you use frequently, ready to copy and paste into your outgoing messages.

If you’re not doing this, now is the time to begin assembling a library of form letters, just as I’m sure you have for pleadings, discovery, and agreements.

If you do use form letters, it’s a good idea to review them to see how you can make them better.

Not only do form letters save the time otherwise spent drafting an original letter, they also save time spent instructing others who respond on your behalf. After all, it’s a lot quicker to tell your assistant to “send letter 3-B” rather than explain what you want them to say (or dictate the letter yourself).

Form letters also reduce mistakes. You won’t forget to tell someone something that is already in your letter.

Form letters also reduce the number of incoming calls seeking additional information or clarification. Clients and prospects will like seeing that you are prepared and thorough.

The first step to improving your form letter library is to make extra copies of every letter and email you send over the next week or two. If you use Evernote, you can send everything into a temporary notebook for this purpose or assign a “form_letters” tag. You might also want to go through your sent email folder for the last few months and selectively forward emails to your Evernote email account. You can do the same with digital copies of letters sent by regular mail.

Also, go through your incoming mail. You may be getting letters sent to you that are (a) answered by phone or in person (i.e., at the consultation or meeting), (b) not being sufficiently answered, or (c) not being answered at all. Send these to your email account, too.

(For more ways to use Evernote in your law practice, check out my Evernote for Lawyers eBook.)

Once you have assembled a sampling of letters and emails, the next step is go through them and ask yourself,

  • How often do I send all or part of this information?
  • Is there anything in here that I could save and use?
  • Is there anything here that could be improved? Expanded? Clarified?
  • Is there anything here that could be put into a form letter?

Take the time to create or expand your library of form letters and get in the habit of using them. And every time you dictate an original letter, ask yourself if some or all of it could be added to your library.

If five percent of your current messages today are form letters, and you could increase this to just ten percent, you should see a significant time savings.

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Filed Under: Email, Law office management, Productivity Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Evernote and my plan for achieving “Inbox Zero”

October 11, 2011 by
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I have tens of thousands of emails in my Gmail inbox. At last count, 16, 503 are unread. I have over 50 labels set up. I don’t use any of them. It’s a mess

When I first learned about Inbox Zero I swooned. The idea is intoxicating. When your inbox is empty, you are no longer overwhelmed by email. You are in control. You enjoy a Zen-like feeling of tranquility. You process your email inbox once or twice a day, keeping it at zero. You have a “mind like water”.

I loved the idea, but the thought of going through tens of thousands of emails was about as appealing as a state bar complaint.

Email has long been the final frontier in my productivity makeover. I’ve resisted changing for a long time. But now, I have a plan.

My plan involves my favorite productivity tool, Evernote, which I use for collecting information and managing my projects and tasks. I use it all day long, in every part of my work flow, as my tool for Getting Things Done. Read my previous posts on how I use Evernote for getting things done.

Right now, when I get an email that requires action of any kind (a reply, a call, review, read, etc.) or that is related to a project I’m working on, or is something I want to keep for reference purposes (receipts, newsletter ideas, research, documents, etc.), or something I am waiting for, I forward that email to Evernote. I then tag it and incorporate it into my gtd system.

If an email requires a reply that will take no more than two minutes, I do it. I may also send a bcc to Evernote.

Sometimes, I get emails requiring action that I don’t send to Evernote. An example is an email I got recently from someone I hadn’t spoken to in a long time. I didn’t want to dash off a quick reply, I wanted to give it some thought. In this case, I added a @Reply label and archived the email in Gmail. When I’m ready to reply, the label will help  me find it.

Yes, I could also send these to Evernote, but I like having the orignial email connected to my reply. And, if I do send it to Evernote, I want to do so after I’ve replied, so I have both the original email and my reply in one Evernote note.

So, here’s my plan for achieving email bliss using Evernote and Gmail:

First, when I have some quiet time, (this will probably require several sessions), I will go through my Gmail inbox, scanning (not reading) and quickly doing the following:

  1. Unsubscribing from newsletters I don’t read.
  2. Adding @Reply label to anything I need to reply to that will take more than two minutes but does not need to be tracked.
  3. Sending Action and Reference items to Evernote.
  4. Trashing or archiving everything else.

Once my email inbox is empty, as new emails come in, I will review and process them, as follows.

  • If it requires a response or action that will take two minutes or less, I will do it, then Archive it; if I want to, I can also send a bcc to my Evernote account.
  • If it will take more than two minutes but I don’t need to keep notes, add it to a project, or track it, I will label it @Reply and do it as soon as possible.
  • If I’m waiting for a reply or for something to occur, I will send it to Evernote (and add a @Waiting tag).
  • If it’s something I want to keep for reference, an important email, an exemple of a good sales letter, a receipt, or something I want to read later, I will send it to Evernote.
  • All other emails will go into Archive or get trashed. At day’s end, I will again have an empty Inbox and an empty mind.

The premise behind all of this is to identify emails that need action. That’s key. Everything else is reference and can be found through search.

Note, I will use just one label in Gmail, @Reply. I am open to adding others down the road, but only if they truly serve me. For example, I may find it easier to label emails @Read/Review in Gmail, rather than sending them to Evernote for that purpose. I may also add labels for specific projects, or use them temporarily (e.g., for promotions). But for now, one label will do.

Wish me luck. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Have you achieved “Inbox Zero”? What do you think of my plan?

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Filed Under: Dealing with stress, Email, Law office management, Productivity, Technology, Time Management Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Do lawyers need a blog?

January 10, 2011 by
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The Attorney Marketing Center web site launched in 1998 and transitioned to a blog in 2007. At that time, I wrote an article detailing the change, David’s Website Diary, and promised updates. To be honest, I forgot about the article and didn’t update it until today.

Sorry, but you didn’t miss much.

From a technological standpoint, not much has changed since I switched to the blog format. I’ve changed the color and layout and added some new plug-ins, mostly having to do with social media integration, but not much else.

My site has grown because I focused on creating content, not on the latest bells and whistles. Content creates value for visitors, allows you to demonstrate your expertise, and brings traffic from search engines and from word of mouth. And so the number of subscribers to my newsletter has grown and the number of blog subscribers has grown and I have continued to sell products and services.

Do you need a blog? If you want to get more clients online I think you do.

A blog has several advantages over a static web site. As you update your content, search engines are notified and they bring visitors. As those visitors see the solutions you provide, they may (a) take the next step toward hiring you, (b) connect with you by subscribing to your newsletter or your blog feed or commenting on your posts, or (c) tell others about you via social media.

Your blog allows prospects and referral sources to see you “in action”. Your content is not just puffery about how great you are it is an exemplar of your abilities. As visitors become familiar with your style and hear your “voice,” as they get to know and trust you, your preeminence grows, your traffic grows, and your client base grows.

You can set up a blog yourself  in about an hour. WordPress makes is easy. There are many free and inexpensive “getting stated” videos available and you can hire people inexpensively to do it for you. Contact me if you would like some referrals.

Once you have your own blog, you control it; you don’t have to wait for tech support to do updates for you, you can do them yourself. It’s as quick and simple as using a web browser. And, other than paying for hosting (under $10/month), it’s free.

What about content–do you have enough to say? Trust me, you have enough. There is an endless amount of material you can supply. Everything from posts about the law and procedure in your practice areas, success stories you helped created, general business (or consumer) advice, guest posts from experts (referral sources) in allied fields, and much more. A post can be as short as a few paragraphs and as simple as you commenting on something you found on another web site or blog or in the news. And you can outsource content creation, too.

A blog may seem to be a big commitment but think of it as the front door to your online office. You won’t be there 24/7 but your presence will be. If you write an offline newsletter, publish articles, or do any public speaking or networking, you are already doing the things that are done online through a blog.

If you have a web site, you have something you can point to and that’s good. But you have to do the pointing. If you want free traffic, you need a blog.

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Filed Under: Blogging, Communication, Email, List building, Newsletters, Online Marketing, Social media, Social media marketing, Technology, Web traffic Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

What do SEO and client relations for lawyers have in common?

December 20, 2010 by
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“I’m a busy lawyer. I don’t have a lot of time to write a newsletter or blog.”

Good. If you have time to write a lot, your clients and prospects might not read what you send them.

While frequency of contact is important, quality is far more important. Instead of writing low-quality weekly messages, you’ll do far more to strengthen your relationships and build your reputation by sending a high-quality missive once a month.

I am subscribed to hundreds of blogs and email newsletters. My email inbox and RSS feed reader are inundated. Several times a day I peruse these offerings. I spend most of that time skimming the headlines and deleting or archiving nearly every article. I may scroll through ten or twenty percent but I probably read no more than two percent. The ones I read (and, often save) are where the real value for me lies.

I stay subscribed to this multitude of newsletters and blogs because they give me a sense of what’s trending in my areas of interest. I also find articles I can share with my Twitter and Facebook companions. And, I do find articles worth reading. If I don’t have time to read them on the spot, I save them to read later. Many of the publications I follow publish several times per week; some of the bigger publications publish twenty or thirty articles per day.

I filter through a large quantity of articles looking for the few of high quality. Sometimes they come from the multitude. More often, they come from the handful of sources that consistently provide high quality material. They may not post frequently and not everything they post is golden, but the most useful material (for me) usually comes from the same sources. Those are the ones I look forward to and make sure I read.

So, if you write a newsletter or blog, you don’t have to write every day or three times a week or even weekly. Write when you can but make it worth reading. Your clients and prospects will appreciate it.

Apparently, uncle Google agrees. Carolyn Elefant writes that while in the past, quantity of keywords and links to a web site determined primacy in search engine ranking, Google has modified its algorithm to better reflect the quality of those keywords and links. You don’t need everyone linking to your site, so long as you have the right ones.

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Filed Under: Blogging, Client relations, Communication, Email, Productivity, Relationship marketing, Social media, Social media marketing, Writing Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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