List building Archives - Page 9 of 11 - The Attorney Marketing Center

How NOT to propose a guest post

January 2, 2014 by David M. Ward

One of the best ways to get targeted traffic to your blog or website is to write guest posts on other blogs in your target market. Guest posts bring traffic from prospective clients, exposure to prospective referral sources, sign-ups for your newsletter, and new clients. They should be a regular part of your online marketing activity.

Getting the go-ahead for a guest post is not that difficult, especially for a lawyer. Show the owner of the blog that you have something to say that will be of interest to their readers, show them that you are qualified to say it, and show them that you can write.

I get a lot of emails offering to write guest posts for my blog. Most of them don’t follow these basic guidelines and get no more than a glance from me before I delete them. Like this one which arrived this morning:

—
Hi,
I am interested in guestâ€™s posting on your site, how much time you will take to review my articles. I assure you that all content will be legal and would add value to your reader.
Here are samples given below:

[links]

Kindest Regards

[Name]
—-

C’mon now, really?

If you want me to consider you for a guest post, sending me a poorly written bulk email with links to poorly written, off-target articles isn’t going to cut it.

Show me that you read my blog and understand my readers. Comment on one or two of my posts and tell me what you like about them.

Tell me what you propose: What would you write about and why would this be of interest to my readers? How would it be different from anything they might read elsewhere?

Tell me why you are qualified to write this. What is your background? Do you have your own blog I can look at? Have you done guest posts on other blogs?

It’s not difficult. And plenty of blogs want guest posts, especially from subject matter experts. You provide their readers with quality information and they provide you with traffic. You get to demonstrate your expertise to a targeted market of prospective clients and they get the day off from writing.

That’s the good news. The even better news is that because so few people follow these basic guidelines, blog owners are inundated with unprofessional proposals like the one above, making it so much easier for you to get their attention.

In fifteen minutes of searching you could find dozens of blogs in your target market that accept guest posts and would love to hear from you. Spend some time reading those blogs and then approach them with a proposal.

Learn more about guest posts, traffic, and marketing online for attorneys.

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

Why lawyers should start a SECOND blog

November 8, 2013 by David M. Ward

“Blog” is a scary word for some lawyers. They think it takes too much time relative to the rewards, and/or that they don’t have anything to write about that anybody (i.e., prospective clients) would want to read.

This isn’t true. But let’s put that aside for now and talk about why you should start your second blog. (If you don’t have your first blog, you can come back and start that later.)

And by the way, don’t call it a blog if that word makes you nervous. Call it a “website with mostly non-promotional content,” because that’s what it is.

Anyway, why should lawyers start a second blog?Â To attract prospective clients, of course. And the people who can refer them.

Here’s the idea: you choose a subject that is of interest to your target market (or the people who can refer them) and that also interests you. You write about that subject and post it on a blog, er, website. Interested people find your content and read it. They sign up for your list to get more of your awesomeness. They promote your content to their friends and followers, colleagues and business associates. Your list grows and grows.

You briefly mention your day job to everyone who visits the site and signs up for your list. You tell them what you do and provide a link to your legal website. Every so often, you remind them about what you do.

So, now you have a list of people who share an interest with you. They know, like, and trust you, and while their trust is not directly related to your legal services, when they need a lawyer who does what you do, it won’t be difficult for them to make that leap.

You create this website, promote it, and have fun with it. You write about things that interest your visitors and subscribers and yourself. Or, if “writing” is a scary word for you, think of it as “curating” other people’s content that you append with your brief comments.

Do you see how this could be easy and how it could also bring you a lot of business? Basically, you are expanding your “warm market” (people who know you). When those people need a lawyer, or when someone they know needs a lawyer, you’ll be at or near the top of their list.

What do you write about (or curate)? Well, what interests you?

If you love sports and lots of your prospective clients do too, bada bing, there’s your subject.

You could write about classic cars, photography, food, exercise, or travel. Whatever floats your boat. Hey, how about boating?

What about referral sources? Well, for other lawyers, you could write trial tips, law office management, or marketing (!) Tell them how you do what you do.

You could write about personal development, productivity, or your favorite technology.

In other words, you could write about anything, so long as there are enough people in your target market who share your interest. And if there aren’t, you could always start your third blog.

For help in creating and growing your second blog (or your first), click here.

Filed Under: Blogging, List building, Marketing legal services, Networking, Online Marketing, Referral sources, Writing Tagged With: blawg, lawyer blog, lawyer blogging

Simple, inexpensive, and oh so powerful marketing for lawyers

October 9, 2013 by David M. Ward

How would you like to have five or ten local businesses or professionals passing out your report, brochure, or other propaganda to every one of their customers or clients?

Okay, here’s what you do:

Make a list of categories. What type of business or professional has customers or clients in your target market?
Make a list of candidates. Go online and find websites of businesses and professionals in those categories in your market. Put a star next to the names of those who have a newsletter, blog, mailing list, or social media followers.
Contact each candidate and tell them you have a proposal that could be to your mutual benefit. Basically, you’re going to hand out their literature to your clients and prospects and they’ll do the same for you.
Create a handout. This could be anything with your name and contact information on it–a brochure, report, coupon, gift certificate, free consultation offer, or anything else. Have them do the same.

Print the handout. Create a pdf version, too, for email lists and website visitors. On your handout, add a different code for each cross-promotion partner, so you can see which ones are sending you the most business.

Now, all you have to do is pass out each other’s literature. When your supply gets low, notify your partner so they can provide you with more, and of course, you want them to do the same.

Okay, that’s the idea. Simple, isn’t it? But very effective.

You may have to contact ten or twenty candidates to find a few who understand the power of this idea, but you only need a few. Why? Because a cross-promotion carries with it the implied endorsement of the cross-promotion partner (so make sure you choose good quality businesses and qualified professionals). A handful of partners passing out your information to hundreds of people every day could bring you more business than you can handle.

Marketing for lawyers doesn’t need to be complicated or expensive. Cross-promotions allows you to leverage the lists of other professionals and businesses, bringing targeted traffic to your website and hot prospects to your phone.

For more ways to get traffic and clients by leveraging OPL (other people’s lists), get this.

Filed Under: Advertising, List building, Marketing legal services, Marketing Plan, Online Marketing, Referral sources, Referrals Tagged With: cross promotions, joint-ventures, other people's lists

Attorney advertising: don’t let this happen to you

September 25, 2013 by David M. Ward

The other night I heard a radio commercial for a tax attorney. Not a “tax resolution” firm that does offers in compromise, a regular tax firm. At least that’s the way it was presented.

This was during “drive time” on a station that probably has many hundreds of thousands of listeners.Â Drive time radio is expensive, especially on a show with a big audience. How many listenersÂ have a tax problem and can afford to hire an attorney?

I’m sure the attorney doesn’t need many clients to pay for the ads and turn a profit. But why not advertise on a Sunday “investor” show? Small audience, but much more likely to need a tax attorney. And the cost of that kind of show is a fraction of the cost of a “drive time” ad buy.

Anyway, I’m listening to the ad, waiting for the call to action. Now if you were running expensive ads on drive time radio, what would you want as the call to action?

You would want to offer a free report, wouldn’t you? So you could build a list of people who aren’t sure they need an attorney and need more information. A list of people who don’t have a tax problem right now but think they might soon.

Yep, that’s what you’d want. You are an attorney advertising genius.

But not this attorney.

This attorney made the same mistake most attorneys do in their ads. The call to action was to have listeners call the attorney’s office to make an appointment. (I don’t remember if he was offering a free consultation.)

The ad never mentioned the attorney’s web site. No “free report”. No way for the attorney to generate leads of prospective clients so he could stay in touch with them.

Call or don’t call. Those were the options.

Of course there’s nothing wrong with telling people to call for an appointment. But don’t make that the only option. Reach out to the “maybes” and get them into your marketing funnel. Build a list of prospective clients. Some of them are going to need your services at some point and you want to be “in their minds and their mailboxes” when they do.

One more thing. If you’re driving home from work and hear a radio commercial, what’s easier to remember a phone number or a website?

Exactly.

Anyone who advertises today and doesn’t include a website is really missing the boat.

You don’t have to advertise, but you do need a website. Find out what to do here.

Filed Under: Advertising, Copywriting, List building, Marketing legal services, Online Marketing, Web traffic Tagged With: call to action, free report, media buy, offer, radio advertising

Audit your website

August 1, 2013 by David M. Ward

When was the last time you audited your website?

Okay, you need to do that. You need to go through the pages of your site and make sure that all of the requisite elements are present.

Like your contact form. Have you made it easy for website visitors to contact you by phone and email (at least)? Is there a link to this on every page?

Or your newsletter sign up form. You want visitors to join your list so you can stay in touch with them until they are ready to hire you or refer someone. That should also be on every page.

How about a page that lists all of your services, with links to sub-pages providing details about each of those services?

But here’s the thing. Your website may have these and other essential elements and you may think you’ve got things covered. But having them isn’t enough. They need to be easy to find, easy to understand, and easy to use. It’s hard to be objective about things like this.

So, after you audit your website, I suggest you find someone who has never seen your website and ask them to do the same.

Ask them to go through your site, page by page, and tell you what they see and what they think. You might do this with another lawyer, i.e., they go through your site and you go through theirs.

Give some instructions, i.e., “find the services I provide,” “sign up for my newsletter,” or “email me and tell me you want an appointment.”

Have them report if they hit any snags along the way. Was everything easy to find? Was it easy to understand? Did anything slow you down? Did you have any questions that weren’t answered?

Have them start on your home page, and then start again on one of your blog post or article pages, i.e., “landing pages” where they might enter your site if they find it via search.

After they read the home page, ask them to tell you what page they went to next. How long did they stay there? How many pages did they click through to get to something they wanted to see?

The best way to do this is to sit them down in front of a computer and watch them. As they go through your pages, have them narrate their journey–what they see and what they think.

See if they can quickly navigate through your site and find everything you have asked them to find and anything else they are attracted to. This is very valuable information.

You’ll learn what your website visitors encounter when they arrive at your site. You’ll see what you need to add, improve, move, or replace. You’ll know what questions visitors ask themselves as they arrive at and click through your site. And you’ll see how long it takes them to find the key elements that make your site work.

In Make the Phone Ring, I identify nine essential website elements for attracting (prospective) clients and getting them to hire you or take the next step. Whether you create your own websites or hire someone, if you want to get more clients online, you need to know what these elements are and how to implement them. Check it out on this page.

Filed Under: Blogging, Law office management, List building, Marketing legal services, Newsletters, Online Marketing, Technology, Web traffic Tagged With: client audits for law firms, website inventory

Lawyer advertising on Craigslist: Why You Shouldn’t (And How to Do it)

July 31, 2013 by David M. Ward

Most people who look for a lawyer on Craigslist are primarily looking for “cheap prices”. The same is true of most classified advertising sites or publications targeted to the low end of the consumer or small business market. Experience, reputation, “customer service,” and other hallmarks of professionalism are secondary.

Offering “discount prices” is, for most lawyers, ill advised. You’re competing with other lawyers who will undercut you, as well as paralegals, form preparers, and others who troll in the lowest depths of the market.

Unless you wish to position yourself as a “discount lawyer” and offer rock bottom “prices,” stay away from Craigslist and publications like it. Clients who hire the best lawyers and are willing to pay top dollar for those lawyers usually don’t look for them on Craigslist.

There are exceptions. Some people who look on Craigslist do want a good attorney and are willing to pay top dollar. They may go to Craigslist out of habit, because that’s where they go to find other deals. But wanting to save money when buying a used car doesn’t necessarily mean you have the same mindset when hiring an attorney.

But how do you find these people unless you are advertising on Craigslist?

You find them not by advertising your services but by advertising your seminar. Or you book. Or your report.

You sell your book or give it away and build a list of prospects. Yes, most of the people on that list will have a “low price” mentality, but so what? Some won’t. Some will hire you and pay your regular fees.

In addition, some of the people on your list know people who aren’t “low pricers” and will refer them. Others on your list who today demand low prices may tomorrow find their circumstances (and attitude) changed and be willing to pay your “higher” fees. (Probably after they hire one of your low cost competitors and find that they got what they paid for.)

Lawyer advertising on Craigslist is possible. Just don’t advertise your services.

How to market legal services on the Internet. Click here.

Filed Under: Advertising, List building, Marketing legal services, Online Marketing Tagged With: attorney advertising on craigslist, classified ads for lawyers, classified advertising, craigslist, lawyer advertising on craigslist

Email marketing for lawyers

July 25, 2013 by David M. Ward

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? ThisÂ shows you what to do.

Filed Under: Communication, Email, List building, Marketing legal services, Newsletters, Online Marketing, Relationship marketing Tagged With: email marketing for law firms, email marketing for lawyers

Email marketing for attorneys

June 6, 2013 by David M. Ward

Yesterday, an email arrived in my inbox. See if you can tell what’s wrong with it:

–BEGIN EMAIL–
David,

First of all thanks you for subscribing over the years. I know
many of you have read my books or taken some of my courses
and I truly appreciate that.

The reason I have been so passionate in creating an online
business over the years is because it is the perfect way to
reach people worldwide and EXPRESS YOUR CREATIVITY.

I have tried the do this in my [Product names] . . . as well as my music.

——————————
QUICK NOTE:

Our once a year World Class [Product Name] Certification
Program starts next Monday June 10. Only a few spots left.

[Link to sign up]

——————————

THE SECRET OF LIFE

In my opinion it is doing what you love and sharing it
with others (and best of all make a living at it).

But rather than talk about it let me SING it to you
with some help from [Famous singer]…

[Youtube link of famous singer with writer of email]

In this You Tube channel you will see a part of me
many of you haven’t. In 1976 I got a Masters in
[Music degree, school]

. . .

–END EMAIL–

Okay, that’s enough. The rest of the email discusses his music and asks us to subscribe to his Youtube channel. He then mentions that he is working on another product and signs off.

So, what’s wrong with this email?

1. Who is this guy?

You can’t tell from the email itself but this is a list I signed up for a long time ago and I haven’t heard from this guy for at least six months. I don’t remember anything about him or what he does.

When people subscribe to your list, you have to write to them regularly or they forget who you are and that they signed up on your list. At best, they delete your email or unsubscribe. At worst, they flag your email as SPAM and now, when you do write to your list, your emails get filtered out and don’t get read.

You must write regularly, and frequently. You want to build a relationship with your readers, so that they know who you are and look forward to hearing from you. You don’t know when they will need to hire you, or know someone who does, and if you’re not in their mailboxes and their minds when that occurs, you’re not going to get the call.

2. “I know many of you have. . .”.

When you write to me, write to me. Don’t write in the collective. Say “you” not “many of you”.

Even if there are thousands of subscribers on your list, write your email as though it is a personal communication sent only to one reader. Me.

3. What’s in it for me?

When you write to me, tell me something that will make my life better. Give me something valuable–a tip, a link to something I can use in my business or personal life. There is nothing in this email that does that.

I’m blazing through my inbox, reading and saving a few emails that have something of value for me and deleting (and unsubscribing) everything else. If you want me to read your email, give me a reason. Give me a benefit. Tell me what’s in it for me.

4. “I have been so passionate about. . .”.

Your readers may care about what you are passionate about, but only if they share that passion or they have a relationship with you. The rest of us don’t care. We have our own problems to solve and lives to lead. We’re busy. We don’t have time to look at what you’re doing and did I mention, we really don’t care?

Ironically, I do share his passion for expressing my creativity. I also like the music of the famous singer he refers to. But I didn’t go watch his videos because I can watch videos of the famous singer any time I want. I don’t care that years ago, this guy played with him. So what? Lots of people did. I don’t know them, either.

On the other hand, when you have a relationship with your subscribers, you can share with them something about you that has no direct benefit to them, and they will pay attention.

When you have a relationship with someone, they’ll read your emails, Like and Tweet your posts, send their friends to your website, and respond to your requests. When they need your help, they’ll hire you. When they have a referral, they’ll give it to you. And when you share a video of you playing with a famous musician, they’ll go watch, because they probably don’t have a relationship with anyone else who did that and it might be neat to go see someone they know in a video with someone famous.

Build your list. Build relationships with your list.

Email marketing for attorneys. Click hereÂ for details.

Filed Under: Client loyalty, Client relations, Communication, Copywriting, Email, List building, Marketing legal services, Newsletters, Online Marketing, Writing Tagged With: email marketing

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