Multiple streams of clients

May 20, 2019 by
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Some preach the wisdom of multiple streams of income. “Don’t rely on your law practice,” they might tell you. “Diversify”.

Not so fast.

Building a successful law practice takes a lot of blood, sweat, and tears and if you want to make it, you have to give it everything you’ve got.

Mark Twain, among others, counseled, “Put all your eggs in one basket, and watch that basket”.

I agree.

Once you’ve built a successful practice, you can consider other ventures. But don’t try to do two things at once.

On the other hand, you should diversify your sources of clients. Don’t rely on just one marketing source or method.

No matter how well something is working for you, something else might work better.

And, things change. A strategy that’s worked for you for years may cease to work or may cease to be available. I used to do a fair amount of yellow pages advertising. Need I say more?

Besides, why limit yourself? If you can bring in clients from a variety of sources, without burning out or exhausting your budget, why wouldn’t you?

Jeff Bezos says, “Be stubborn on vision, but flexible on details.”

Take some time to find some new strategies to your marketing mix.

I’ll give you one: marketing joint ventures with other lawyers and other professionals.

This will help.

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Filed Under: Marketing legal services Tagged With: ,

Marketing your law practice one hour a week

May 9, 2013 by
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If you only have one hour a week for marketing your law practice, I would spend that time on the phone. Here’s how I would break it down:

  • Twenty minutes speaking to clients and former clients. I would call new clients to say thank you (in addition to sending them a thank you card) and current and former clients to see how they are doing. These people put food on your table and are your best source of new business. Speaking to them “off the clock” is a highly leveraged marketing activity.
  • Twenty minutes speaking to referral sources. I would call other professionals I work with, thank them for their recent referrals, look for ways I can do something to help them, and brainstorm ways we can work together to our mutual benefit.
  • Twenty minutes reaching out to other professionals. I would call people I don’t know, to introduce myself, find out what they do, and see if there is a way we could can work together to our mutual benefit.

A law practice is a people business. We talk to people to strengthen our relationships and cultivate new ones. If you can’t meet people face to face, the phone is the next best thing.

In some ways, the phone is even better than face to face because there is no travel time. So, with only one hour a week, I would smile and dial.

Of course if I had two hours a week for marketing, I would use the second hour to have lunch or coffee with people I know and people I want to know.

This shows you how to set up marketing joint ventures with other professionals. 

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Filed Under: Client loyalty, Client relations, Leverage, Marketing legal services, Marketing Plan, Networking, Referral sources, Referrals, Relationship marketing Tagged With: