Marketing Archives - Back Office Betties

A selection of articles related to marketing and branding your small law firm to stand out from the competition and increase client count.

Tag Archive for: Marketing

Networking Is Important for Attorneys – Here’s How to Do it Effectively

August 1, 2023

In the competitive world of law, standing out and creating professional connections is vital to an attorney’s success. Networking is a crucial skill for enhancing your reputation, finding new opportunities, and expanding your legal practice. Whether you’re a seasoned lawyer or fresh out of law school, effective networking significantly impacts your success.

In this blog post, we will explore the importance of networking for attorneys and provide tips on how to do it effectively.

Why Is Networking Important for Attorneys?

Networking is more than just collecting business cards and growing your connections on Linkedin. It’s about building genuine, lasting relationships that benefit your legal career.

Referral Opportunities

A strong network of fellow attorneys can be a significant source of new business for your law firm. The more people you know, the more likely you’ll be to receive referrals for cases your fellow attorneys are too busy to take on or are outside of their practice area.

Knowledge and Collaboration

Networking events provide opportunities to meet legal professionals from varying areas of expertise. Engaging in discussions or listening to presentations can broaden your legal knowledge and even lead to collaboration on cases and projects.

Reputation Building

A robust network of attorneys can enhance your reputation within the legal community. Word-of-mouth referrals and recommendations from respected colleagues boosts your credibility and visibility.

Professional Support

You’re bound to face challenges throughout your career as an attorney. A well-established network can be a source of emotional and professional support, offering guidance and advice during difficult times.

How to Network Effectively for Attorneys

Now that we understand the importance of networking, let’s look at some actionable tips to help you do so more effectively.

1. Define Your Networking Goals

Before jumping into various networking events, set clear objectives. Determine what kinds of connections you want to make and the specific areas of law or industries you want to explore.

2. Attend Relevant Legal Events

Choose conferences and networking events that are aligned with your practice area and interests. Specialized events offer excellent opportunities to meet like-minded professionals and make valuable connections.

3. Be Approachable and Authentic

Avoid jumping straight to collaboration with overly sales-oriented pitches. Networking is about building authentic relationships. Try to be genuinely interested in getting to know others and actively listen and engage in the conversation.

4. Leverage Social Media

Linkedin can be a powerful tool for expanding your professional network. Share your legal insights, join and participate in relevant groups, and connect with your peers in the legal community.

5. Offer Value to Others

Networking is a two-way street! Be ready to help those in your network by offering your expertise, providing referrals, or connecting them with other relevant contacts.

6. Don’t Forget to Follow Up

After attending networking events and meeting new contacts, follow up with a personalized message. Remind your new contact of who you are and where you met. Offer to meet for coffee or a virtual chat to continue your conversation and strengthen your connection.

7. Join Professional Legal Associations

Become a member of legal organizations or committees that align with your interests and expertise. These groups often host events or have online platforms for networking within your niche.

8. Host Events or Webinars

Take initiative and organize legal events yourself! Hosting gatherings about relevant legal topics can position you as an authority in your field and attract other legal professionals looking for valuable insights.

9. Be Patient and Persistent

Building a strong legal network takes time. Nothing happens overnight, so be patient and persistent. Networking is an ongoing process, but the connections you make today will yield benefits in the future.

Conclusion

Networking is an essential skill for attorneys looking to advance their careers and expand their law firms. Remember, networking is not about collecting as many contacts as possible, but about fostering meaningful connections that lead to long-term relationships in the legal community. So, attend those events, connect online, and watch your network and legal practice grow.

Want more ways to grow your legal practice? Schedule a Free Discovery Call today.

How Virtual Assistants Can Manage Your Law Firm’s Social Media Presence

May 8, 2023

Attention small law firms! Are you struggling to manage your social media presence?

You’re not alone. Many attorney entrepreneurs find themselves in the same boat. For one, you most likely didn’t learn social media management in law school. And we’re willing to bet you don’t have time between casework and admin work to squeeze in yet another responsibility.

Don’t worry – help is at hand! Virtual assistants can help you streamline the process and make it a breeze.

Law Firm Social Media Strategy

First things first: You can’t execute without a strategy.

A virtual assistant can help you create an amazing social media strategy that will:

Align with your law firm’s goals
Connect with your target audience

Here’s how they’ll do it:

1. Define your goals:

Before creating a social media strategy, your virtual assistant will need to determine your objectives. What do you want to achieve with your social media presence? Is it to increase awareness, drive traffic to your website, generate new leads, or build relationships with clients?

2. Identify your target audience:

Determine who your ideal clients are and where they spend their time online. This information will help your virtual assistant:

Create content that resonates
Identify the best social media platforms to focus on

3. Choose the right social media platforms:

There are numerous social media platforms, but not all of them will be right for your law firm. For example:

Linkedin and Twitter can be great for professional networking and thought leadership
Facebook and Instagram can be effective for building relationships with potential clients

4. Develop a content strategy:

Your virtual assistant will determine which types of content will be relevant, informative, and engaging to your target audience.

5. Create a content calendar:

Consistency is key when it comes to social media! Your virtual assistant will determine how often your law firm should post each type of content.

Content Creation

Once you have a strategy in place, it’s time to take action!

A virtual assistant can help you execute your law firm’s social media strategy by creating the very content they determined will be best. Here are some examples of content types:

Blog posts
Text posts
Photos
Infographics
Carousel posts
Graphics
Videos
Guides
FAQs
Testimonials
Case studies

From blog posts to infographics, they’ve got you covered.

Social Media Account Management

Finally, your virtual assistant can take on the ongoing management of your social media accounts for you. They will:

Engage with your audience:

Social media should be a two-way conversation! Your virtual assistant will engage with your followers by responding to comments, questions, and direct messages.

Measure results:

Monitoring your social media metrics and tracking your progress is essential. Your virtual assistant will track your metrics to ensure a good ROI.

Post continuously:

Remember that content calendar? Your virtual assistant will ensure that it’s being followed and that engaging content is being posted regularly.

Evaluate Strategy:

Your virtual assistant will keep you up-to-date with the latest social media trends and best practices. They’ll keep an eye on algorithm changes and help you adjust your strategy accordingly, so you can be sure that your posts are reaching your target audience.

Summary

In summary, a virtual assistant is a valuable asset to any small law firm looking to improve its social media presence.

And the best part? By outsourcing your social media management to a virtual assistant, you’ll have more time to focus on what you do best – providing legal services to your clients.

Ready to take your law firm’s social media presence to the next level? Schedule a free call with our Growth Solutions Strategist today.

Live Chat for Law Firms: Do Attorneys Need It?

April 11, 2023

The legal landscape is becoming increasingly digital… and law firms (even the smallest law firms) need to adapt to changing client expectations. Live chat is a great first step.

Law firms that have live chat on their websites see the following:

Enhanced engagement
Improved client experience
Increased generation of new business.

What Is Live Chat?

Live chat is a real-time online conversation tool. It allows your visitors to chat with your law firm right on your website.

In this blog post, we’ll review the benefits of live chat for law firms… and discover why more and more attorneys are adding it to their websites.

1. Increased Engagement

Client engagement is crucial for law firms. It builds trust and establishes strong relationships. Live chat enables your law firm to engage with potential clients on your website in real-time:

Answering questions
Addressing concerns
Providing immediate support

This creates a personalized experience and a warm first impression for potential clients.

You can also use live chat to offer help and guidance to leads who are browsing your website… but haven’t contacted you. All you need to do is initiate a chat yourself.

2. Improved Client Experience

An exceptional client experience is essential for generating referrals and positive online reviews.

Live chat improves the client experience by offering a convenient contact method. Your clients can chat with your law firm without needing to make a phone call or send an email. As a result:

Response times are reduced
Long waiting periods are eliminated
Your law firm shows that you value your clients’ time

3. Capturing Contact Information

Capturing leads and generating new business is essential for your law firm’s growth. Live chat is an effective tool to help.

You can require your visitors to provide contact information when initiating a chat. Such as:

Name
Email address
Phone number

That contact information can then be used to follow up with leads later on. This makes live chat a fast, low-effort way to capture leads that you can nurture into potential clients.

4. Increased Website Conversion Rates

What is website conversion rate? It refers to the percentage of website visitors who take desired actions. Examples of desired actions are:

Calling your law firm
Submitting a contact form
Scheduling an appointment

Live chat boosts website conversion rates by offering an immediate way for potential clients to contact you. Many people are more likely to engage in a chat conversation than navigate through your website or fill out a contact form.

Live chat can also help address objections or hesitations in real-time. Allowing you to overcome barriers to conversion and guide leads toward taking action.

5. Competitive Advantage

In today’s competitive legal industry, it’s crucial to stand out. Offering a convenient contact option, like live chat, gives you a competitive edge. It also demonstrates that your law firm is tech-savvy and customer-focused.

Potential clients compare many law firms before making a decision. Stand out by offering immediate support and addressing their concerns on the spot.

6. Cost-Effective Communication

Is there a cost-effective way for law firms to implement live chat?

Absolutely!

Legal virtual receptionist providers, like Back Office Betties, can handle your live chat services for you. You’ll provide instructions on how to handle conversations. And professional legal receptionists will represent your law firm in real-time.

Moreover, live chat streamlines communication and reduces the back-and-forth that comes with email. Meaning you’ll spend less time on non-billable work and see a faster path to inbox 0!

Conclusion

In today’s digital age, live chat is increasingly valuable for law firms:

Improving client experience
Capturing valuable leads
Generating more new business
Providing a competitive edge in the legal industry

Long story short, it’s time for attorneys to embrace the power of live chat!

Schedule a call with our Growth Solutions Strategist today. Learn more about professional, legal live chat services and how they can help your law firm.

Stop Wasting Your Time on Bad Leads

March 7, 2023

How Most Attorneys Look for Leads

In a perfect world, lawyers and law firms wouldn’t need to prospect for leads. A steady flow of clients who are ready to retain legal services would contact your firm on a regular basis.

In the real world… prospecting for leads is a necessary evil. There are many ways to do so, and there are attorneys who find success with each of these common strategies:

Advertising
Content marketing
Pay-per-lead

With that being said, it’s not always that easy to find quality leads that turn into paying clients! A lot of the time, it feels like you’re panning for gold — and that’s a time-consuming process that doesn’t positively impact your bottom line.

So how can you generate leads that are likely to sign a retainer? It all starts with knowing how to find the gold amidst all the dirt.

Lead Quality Matters

One good lead is better than two hundred bad ones. In fact, the two hundred bad leads will cost you more when you consider the time spent providing them with initial consultations, as well as the amount of time your staff spends on the initial screening and intake process.

Unfortunately, you don’t have a lot of control over who contacts you. But there are methods you can put into place to encourage your target clients to contact you and discourage bad fits before they even call your office.

The first step is to understand exactly what makes your dream clients right for you. What characteristics do they share? Marketing experts often stress the need for a client persona, and it’s a good strategy for attorneys as well. Once you know exactly what sort of person you’d like to attract, it becomes easier to figure out how to attract them.

But… you probably didn’t go to law school with the intention of becoming a marketing expert.

Your time has a lot of value to it, and we’re trying to save as much of it as we can. It’s often more cost-effective to outsource your lead generation to someone who’s an expert in the field. Fortunately, help is available that doesn’t require you to bring a new staff member on board!

Charging for Consultations

This goes against a lot of conventional wisdom about how law should be practiced, but charging for initial consultations can make good sense for your practice. Every attorney who offers free consultations has one or two (or three dozen) stories about consultations where they gave out valuable information and never heard back from the potential client again.

Your time has value. Stop giving it away for free! The potential clients who are likely to be scared away by paying for a consultation are often the ones that wouldn’t wind up signing with you anyway.

One way to encourage leads without offering free consultations is to apply the cost of the consultation to your retainer if they decide to sign with you. That way, you’re still offering something of value to those clients who are likely to sign with you, while discouraging people who are just looking for free legal advice.

Phone Pre-Screening of Leads

Here’s another way to weed out bad leads before they take up any of your time: Pre-screen your leads before offering that in-person consultation. A knowledgeable staff member can easily ask initial screening questions over the phone. That way, the only leads that take up your time are the ones that are likely to convert into paying clients.

Many of your law office’s administrative tasks can be performed by someone without a J.D. Make sure you’re not wasting your time doing tasks that aren’t the best use of your time and training.

Outsourcing Legal Administrative Tasks

A virtual legal receptionist or a virtual legal assistant may be exactly what you need. By choosing one of these options instead of hiring someone locally, you’ll have a skilled staff member who understands the needs of the legal field. If you choose to work with service providers like Back Office Betties, you also won’t have to worry about paying for benefits or covering leaves or sick time! Because we think a legal staffing solution should solve your problems, not create more of them.

Schedule a call with our Growth Solutions Strategist today to see how we can help you take extra tasks off your plate and improve the quality of your leads at the same time!

6 Tasks to Delegate to a Virtual Assistant

January 11, 2023

How much of your time is spent on administrative tasks instead of actual legal work?

More than you’d like to admit, right?

You know that you could use some help. But let’s be honest — it’s expensive and time-consuming to hire a new staff member. And, while the idea of a virtual assistant is appealing, you’re worried they won’t understand the specific needs of law firms.

You need a trained assistant who understands the legal field. Someone you can delegate tasks to with the knowledge that they’ll be handled correctly. And it wouldn’t hurt if you only had to pay for the time that you need.

Enter your new virtual legal assistant. These professionals specialize in working in the legal field. They understand the specific needs of law practices. Here are some areas where a VA can help your practice.

Client Acquisition

Client acquisition is essential (and hugely time-consuming) for the vast majority of law firms. Unfortunately, it’s an area that doesn’t directly generate income. You can spend hours of time looking for new clients without making a dime for your practice.

However, when it’s done well, client acquisition can set your firm up for success — after all, you can’t bill a client you don’t have. Virtual legal assistants are skilled at marketing and outreach. And once you have those new clients, your VA can handle your intake process for you. No more time wasted by you or your staff collecting basic information from clients.

Calendar and Email Management

How much time do you spend wrangling your calendar and replying to emails? If you’re like most lawyers, the answer is ‘too much.’ Your VA can maintain your calendar and screen your email for you, freeing you up for other work.

They can also help maintain your firm’s calendar by scheduling appointments, sending reminders, and following up with clients.

Document Management

Few fields are more document-dependent than law. You need your documents created, organized, and stored in a secure and easily accessible way. You may even have specific software for the task. This is one of those areas where general VAs might run into trouble — they won’t necessarily know best practices around legal document management or be familiar with management software.

With a virtual legal assistant, though, you’ll have someone who understands the importance of document management and can assist you in a cost-effective way.

Billing and Payroll

Is billing a hassle for your firm? Trust me when I tell you you’re not alone. It’s necessary for everyone, but that doesn’t mean it’s fun. Why not hire a skilled legal assistant to help with billing and/or payroll? You won’t regret handing these time-consuming tasks off to a qualified VA.

Process Documentation

Process documentation is a vital first step in moving away from doing everything yourself. In order to be able to hand tasks off, you need to know what those tasks are and have instructions on how they should be performed. A virtual legal assistant can help document the processes at your firm and create workflows and knowledge bases that allow you to hand the tasks off to others.

Social Media, Content Writing, and Website Management

Most lawyers are familiar with advertising — for years, law firms have relied on billboards, radio and television, and the Yellow Pages to market their services. And these outbound methods of advertising work (at least to an extent). But more and more potential clients are turning to the internet to research and find attorneys. If you aren’t accessible on social media or via a website, you’re missing out on a big source of potential clients.

But who has the time to maintain a social media presence or update a website?

A virtual legal assistant can help with that, too. They can handle your social media platforms and create content for your website that will educate, engage, and appeal to people who are actively looking for legal help. Plus, a legal VA is knowledgeable about legal advertising restrictions, so you’ll receive content that’s written with professional standards in mind.

A Virtual Legal Assistant Can Do So Much More!

This list isn’t exhaustive — a law firm virtual assistant can help you with all sorts of things. Want to learn more? Contact Back Office Betties today for more information on how virtual legal assistants can help your law firm!

Putting the Client Experience First

March 16, 2022

How can firms stand out in a crowded online space and make meaningful connections with clients?

This is the question that drives Gyi Tsakalakis, President of AttorneySync, a legal marketing agency that helps leading lawyers grow their practices through digital marketing. Gyi shares how solo law firms should approach marketing, the client experience, and their digital footprint to gain a competitive advantage.

They Don’t Teach You This in Law School

When it comes to running a firm, most lawyers aren’t prepared for the marketing side of things.

“I’m a licensed lawyer, even though I’m not practicing. And I can tell you when I went to law school, they didn’t teach marketing and business stuff,” says Gyi. “Especially now with all the tools and technology and social networks and all this internet stuff—lawyers get overwhelmed,” he adds.

You went to law school to learn the history of law, not to learn how to create Facebook ads, right?!

“Unless they came from that background or had been an entrepreneur in another context, why would we expect them to know anything about running business marketing, especially when it comes to digital?”

Yet marketing can help attorneys establish a larger client base and grow sustainably…when done right. The key to marketing a solo firm, says Gyi, is looking at the big picture: client experience. This encompasses client engagement, client intake, and client service. If a firm has poor client experience, all the marketing in the world can’t help them grow.

Gyi particularly focuses on the importance of handling client intake, which sets the stage for the rest of the client experience.

An ineffective client intake process might look like this:

A website visitor clicks on the chatbot and asks a question and never receives an answer.
A referral emails the firm using the primary email and doesn’t receive a response for 2 weeks.
A potential client finds the firm’s phone number online, calls, goes through an automated answering service, and gets frustrated when they can’t speak to a person.
A potential client calls the firm and leaves a message, and does not get a call back until the next week.

Despite all of the work done to get clients through the door, this unpleasant client experience will cause drop-offs at an early stage of client intake. “You’ve got to fix that stuff first before you actually spend a single dollar on marketing,” Gyi explains.

How to Stop Wasting Marketing Dollars Through Client Experience

Get more bang for your buck by focusing on the client experience. This approach will help you retain the leads coming in, ensuring that your marketing is pulling in leads that convert rather than leads that drop off during intake.

How can a solo firm put this into practice? First, think about every experience that a potential or current client has with your firm.

Try asking these questions:

What does a potential client see when they search your name online?
What do they see when they arrive at your website?
What happens when they call you?
What happens when they email you?
Where can they reach you?

Everything you set up has to be viewed from their perspective, not just what’s most convenient for you.

The answers to these questions can guide solo law firms in creating client-centric processes. Ultimately, the real goal is to answer client questions and help them identify if your firm is the right fit for them right away. That’s not always realistic, so the next best thing is to set their expectations and stop their search.

Establishing a solid client experience could mean the difference between keeping a lead in your funnel and a lead heading back to Google to find the next lawyer to work with.

The #1 Marketing Tool Every Lawyer Needs

If there’s anything that Gyi wants lawyers to take away from marketing it’s this: you absolutely must sign up for Google My Business.

This goes back to his approach to the client experience. “People are gonna go look for information about you online,” Gyi explains. “Google has the lion’s share of search traffic.”

How you appear in Google is going to make a big difference for those searches. If your firm doesn’t show up on Google, for instance, it’s likely the search will stop there. However, if your firm shows up with a website, reviews, and a phone number, they are more likely to get in touch.

Think of Google My Business as the website before your website…and it’s free! All you have to do is claim the profile and fill it out. This boosts your digital presence and legitimizes the firm for clients. You wouldn’t have a law office without a sign on the building, and you also shouldn’t have a law firm without a digital presence.

Enlist a Marketing Expert

Solo practitioners have a lot on their plate, and running a firm can mean learning on the go. You can’t master everything at once! Get the most out of your marketing with a strategy that maximizes marketing dollars spent by building a digital presence that brings in leads for your firm and turns them into paying clients.

If you’re ready to amp up your digital presence and stand out in a crowded market, you can reach Gyi at attorneysync.com, connect with him on LinkedIn, or follow him on Twitter.

Your Business, Your Choices

February 24, 2022

Michelle Pippin leveraged her experience as a virtual assistant and direct response copywriter into a career as a coach and mentor for entrepreneurial women. As founder of Women Who WOW, Michelle spends her days helping business owners across the United States (and eight other countries) reach and exceed their goals.

Michelle serves up her simple but effective ways to tweak marketing that will make a huge impact for small businesses—entirely on their terms.

Write Your Own Script for Success

Taking charge of your marketing strategy can mean the difference between intentional growth and treading water to get by. Driven by her own journey, Michelle is on a mission to help small businesses write their own scripts and custom-create success.

Michelle offers this analogy for entrepreneurs:

“My dad’s a builder. We live on the Outer Banks and his houses make it through every storm because he has solid construction. And I realized that in business, regardless of industry or how many years you’ve been doing it, the same principles of solid construction apply.”

You can build your business any way you want as long as you focus on solid construction first.

6 Ways to Simplify Marketing for Your Small Business

Once you have built your business, you can make your business engine run on whatever you want to feed it. Whether you’re sending direct mail or running multiple social media accounts, once you’ve established a strategy that works, you’ve struck marketing gold.

As a direct response copywriter and former direct mail marketer herself, Michelle is familiar with how much hard work marketing requires. Luckily, she’s also discovered some gold nuggets of wisdom that can be used for marketing regardless of industry.

1. Cut out the fluff.

Don’t worry about being present on all of the marketing channels. You’re just one person, not a team! Instead, start by mastering one channel. Get that channel working well and use it as the foundation for your marketing rather than spreading yourself too thin trying to do everything at once.

2. Look at what everyone else is doing…and do something else.

Don’t fall into the trap of trusting a “business guru” with one “surefire” way to help your business grow with marketing. If you do, you’ll end up with a standardized playbook that’s just like every other business. Create your path instead of following the masses. Consider where your audience is and how you want to reach them, and build a marketing plan around those pillars.

3. Take your time before scaling.

While Michelle is the first to tell you she’s all about scaling, she’ll also warn you that you need something to scale first. Before you start worrying about scaling, make sure you have a process in place that’s already working for bringing paid clients through the door. Otherwise, you’re setting yourself up for big losses.

4. Close the gap between seller and buyer.

Attorneys should always be in conversations that attract clients in some capacity. As a small solo firm, this might mean a lot of one-to-one conversations to build relationships and networks. As you grow and scale, this will likely shift to one-to-many conversations (such as through newsletters, emails, social media, and blogs) since you don’t have time to interact with every potential lead. Use your conversations to remove sales friction by answering common buyer questions, showcasing your authentic self, and providing value to audiences.

5. Get creative.

Michelle shared a story with us about a female attorney who works solely with fathers seeking custody of their children. By organizing meetups for fathers in this situation, she was able to reach her audience at a low cost while nurturing relationships with potential clients.

As a solo practitioner, you’re only limited to your imagination! It might seem like having a big budget and tons of time would be the best-case scenario for your business, but it can be a hindrance. Without those luxuries, solo attorneys get creative instead of using the same prescriptive playbook that bigger firms are using.

6. Stay in conversation with your market.

Staying in conversation with your market should be easy if you love what you do. It’s okay to keep the conversation short and fun, even as a professional. Remember: not everything has to be a dissertation! You might share a tip or a story with your audience, or even just a word of encouragement.

Create Messages that Wow

If you’re a woman entrepreneur in law looking for resources to grow your small business without compromising on what matters most to you, check out Michelle Pippin’s episode of Solo de Facto here.

Expert Marketing Tips for Solo Attorney Success

February 16, 2022

This Solo de Facto guest is an expert communicator and PR guru. Brad Swezey is the president of Just Small Biz Marketing and vice president of PR4Lawyers. Brad shared his wealth of knowledge about marketing as a solo practitioner, from common challenges to basic steps to start building a winning marketing process for your business.

Why Small Law Firms Need Marketing

We asked Brad to tell us one thing that he wished attorneys knew about running a successful law firm. His answer: that marketing is a key to success.

Unfortunately, your skill as an attorney doesn’t mean you’ll automatically get clients. This can be a tough pill to swallow for attorneys just starting out, as well as seasoned practitioners! As Brad points out, attorneys aren’t taught how to market themselves in law school. So when you set out to start a small or solo firm, many times you don’t have the basic skills to stand out in a sea of other qualified attorneys. It’s even harder when you are competing against bigger law firms with established reputations and a dedicated marketing budget.

Without the right marketing skills, a solo attorney is going to struggle to get the right clientele. When they struggle to get clientele, they won’t know how to pay the bills.

The marketing knowledge gap was made even more apparent by COVID. When attorneys could no longer rely on face-to-face networking, they began to realize that relying on one channel to get business comes with risks. As more attorneys delve into marketing for their practices, they’re faced with a big learning curve.

Common Marketing Challenges for Attorneys

Brad has pinpointed a few common challenges that attorneys run into when they start marketing. Which of these challenges resonate with your small firm?

Face-to-face network opportunities are more limited. When attorneys can’t go out and talk to people in person, they need new strategies to get people to come to them. Attorneys don’t always know what opportunities are out there for them, or how to get started.

Attorneys are not familiar with the concept of a marketing funnel—i.e. attracting leads and nurturing them through stages of awareness, consideration, and decision-making. Many people view lawyers like they do auto repair shops. You don’t think about finding one until you need it. Clever solo practitioners can use marketing to establish themselves as the obvious choice before their audience even needs them.

Solo firms feel like they’re competing with big firms. This can lead attorneys to use generic messaging that mimics what the big firms are doing when instead they should be leaning into being solo practitioners. Instead of looking at being a solo firm as a disadvantage in a crowded market, use it as a tool for unique positioning.

Practitioners don’t view marketing as a long-term investment. An investment in marketing isn’t too different from an investment in law school, according to Brad. If you trust in the process and don’t expect magic results, it will eventually pay off…just like spending money on law school is an investment in a well-paying career. On average, most businesses should devote about 10% of target revenue to marketing.

How to Start the Marketing Process as a Small Firm

It’s not uncommon to be intimidated by the marketing process, especially if you’re running a solo firm. Brad recommends a few foundational places where busy practitioners can start to build out their marketing without spending a ton.

Connect with referral sources. Making connections is free! Establish relationships with other attorneys who fill in gaps of expertise. If you get a lead or have a current client who could use their help, send them along. You will surely get referrals in turn!
Partner with organizations and associations to present webinars and seminars. For example, an estate planning lawyer can set up a free seminar in partnership with a funeral home to educate their clients and bring in new leads.
Network on social media. Use popular channels like LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to reach audiences and network with other attorneys. One note of caution: don’t feel like you need to use all social networks at once. It’s okay to stick to one channel that works for your business!
Reach out to local reporters. Offer to be a source or subject matter expert for relevant articles and TV spots. This gives you an opportunity for free publicity and to make connections within your community.
Create content that educates your ideal customer. This might be podcasts, blog posts, or videos that provide valuable information to people who are seeking services like yours.
Niche down! You can’t do everything or serve everyone. It might be tempting to offer a large spectrum of services to increase your chances of bringing on more clients, but this can result in bad marketing and burnout. Narrow down to your clearest, most direct messaging to find your perfect audience.

Attract the Right Clients

As a solo practitioner, you’re already doing your own thing. You might as well focus on finding the types of clients who will pay you for what you bring to the table. It’s time to use your marketing efforts to attract the right clients at the right price point to build a successful solo firm.

To hear more from Brad in his episode of Solo de Facto, listen here.

The Importance of Being Yourself in a Solo Practice

February 10, 2022

Elisabeth Pickle is the founder of The Mindful Counsel, a boutique estate and trademark law firm based in Scottsdale, Arizona. After starting her career in medicine, Elisabeth realized that her true passion was in advocating for people. When her family lost her beloved grandfather’s farm due to a divorce, Elisabeth found her niche—making sure other families would not have to go through what hers went through.

Recently, Elisabeth realized that she wanted to stop being someone she wasn’t in her professional life. Since then, she has mastered the art of showing up authentically and attracting the right clients with her marketing.

Standing Out From Big Box Firms

Why is it important to show up as your authentic self as an attorney?

For some, this might be scary. Elisabeth realized that once the results started coming in, it was the best business decision she could have made. That’s because it allowed her to show potential clients that she is a lawyer they can confide in.

Like many solo law practitioners during 2020, Elisabeth struggled trying to figure out how to pivot at the beginning of the pandemic. However, during this time, The Mindful Counsel homed in on its mission and its target audience. This growth edge allowed Elisabeth to explore new ways to connect with her ideal client.

Authenticity Leads to Creativity

Elisabeth has managed to go where not many attorneys have gone before: TikTok. Elisabeth will be the first to admit that her TikTok presence was “never supposed to be a thing.” At first, Elisabeth used TikTok to watch other professionals—lawyers, doctors, dentists, and financial advisors—connect with their audiences.

Then she had an epiphany: TikTok could be an amazing channel for marketing her practice.

Connect with potential clients using engaging content. TikTok is a great place to provide information that gets potential clients thinking about estate planning on an engaging platform.
Create and share content inexpensively. A great thing about TikTok is that you can reach a lot of people with just a little bit of time invested.
Generate demand for your services. Get the wheels spinning! Estate planning isn’t top-of-mind for everyone, but creating TikTok videos has helped Elisabeth plant the seed in the minds of her followers.
Make “boring” topics interesting. Estate planning can be very It can be challenging to get people excited about following an estate planning practice. However, Elisabeth has gotten great positive feedback from the public.
Show your audience that their attorney is a human being. Create authentic marketing that goes beyond perfectly-polished websites and ads content.

How to Attract Your Ideal Clients with Authentic Marketing

Despite finding success on TikTok and identifying her authentic voice for The Mindful Counsel, Elisabeth admits she couldn’t have planned it any better on a piece of paper. However, she does have advice for attorneys seeking authentic ways to reach their audience:

Start small! You don’t need to become a TikTok star to show your “real” side. Create an unscripted YouTube video that tells viewers who you are, who you serve, and how you can help them.
Make sure you’re reaching your audience in the right places. Elisabeth’s TikTok marketing works because she is trying to reach young and midlife professionals interested in planning ahead for their families. The message might be the same, but changing up the medium will help you reach new audiences.
Take more risks. Even though lawyers are risk-averse by nature, when you’re running your own practice you have to take risks. It’s okay to try a new way to connect with your audience because it just might work out.

Discover Your Authentic Message

If Elisabeth’s story teaches us anything, it’s that you don’t have to be perfect to sell yourself as knowledgeable legal counsel. Whether through TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, or another marketing channel, consider taking a chance to show your human side to attract your ideal client.

Listen to Elisabeth’s episode on Solo de Facto here!

Why Attorneys Should Be Podcasting (and How to Get Started)

February 4, 2022

Casey Cheshire, Founder of Ringmaster Conversational Marketing, joined Solo de Facto to discuss why podcasting is one of the best marketing channels for building connections and landing new clients. Find out how investing in a podcast can be a big money-making decision for busy attorneys.

How to Grow Your Practice With Podcasting

When it comes to marketing for a law practice, starting a podcast might not seem like the most obvious choice. However, Casey has discovered that creating a podcast can build brand awareness, bring in new leads, and help attorneys create content that their audience wants to consume. “New clients come from connections,” Casey says, “and there’s no more efficient way to create these connections with your valuable time than podcasts.”

Podcasts are the perfect opportunity to build rapport and have focused conversations without distractions. At the end of a conversation, the host and the interviewee have gotten to know each other well. Once the podcast is published, the listener gets to know the host and interviewee. Podcasts create a medium where attention is focused on the individual and the information being provided.

8 Reasons Why Attorneys Should Use Podcasts for Marketing

1 – You get to sit down with your perfect customer.

Podcasts are a wonderful way to reach your target audience. You can get even more niche than paid advertising by setting up interviews with the exact customers you are trying to attract. For example, if you prefer business customers, like CEOs, you can create a podcast that speaks with CEOs in your area of business. You can learn about their wants and needs while establishing a network of potential clients.

2 – You will connect with new leads.

It can feel overwhelming to take time out of your busy day for a podcast. Time is limited and extremely valuable, and rare when everyone is trying to get on your calendar. However, setting aside a dedicated time for one-on-one conversations with someone you want to work with could lead to new business later. If you are intentional with your interviewee list, your podcasting schedule can easily become a goldmine of warm leads.

After all, as Zig Ziglar says, “If people like you they’ll listen to you, but if they trust you they’ll do business with you.”

3 – Podcast guests become your future audience.

One of the great things about podcasts is that your current guests become your future listeners. More than that, their network is full of new listeners and potential clients. Investing in a business podcast means investing in short-term and long-term brand awareness.

4 – You can establish authority in your field.

When you start having conversations with your ideal customer, you can really showcase your knowledge and strengths as an attorney. You will have a lot of chances to demonstrate your level of expertise and show that you know what you’re talking about. This will help establish you as a thought leader and an authoritative voice in your niche. Now listeners will be more likely to reach out to your firm to get help because they trust you and your guidance.

5 – A podcast can expand your practice’s reach at a low cost.

Not only can you convert your guests into new work opportunities, but you will also be creating a marketing channel that could help you reach hundreds, even thousands, of listeners. Paid advertising can bring in new customers but it’s often costly and doesn’t guarantee new customers. Setting up a podcast doesn’t have to be costly and can bring in new customers organically, without relying on a big ads budget.

6 – You can build relationships of trust.

Podcasts are a great way to let your audience get to know you. Your conversations with guests will give listeners a peek into your personality, opinions, expertise, and working style. When listeners get to know you, they will start to trust you and feel comfortable reaching out when they need an attorney.

7 – You will learn how to serve your ideal buyer better.

By using your podcast to make connections with ideal customers, you can ask questions that will give you a competitive edge. Turn your interviews into a feedback loop that informs the future content you create, the right messaging to reach the right clients, and future outreach strategies. With a podcast, you can get insights from your target audience straight from the source that will help you build a more successful practice.

8 – Overcome ad blindness with a fresh approach.

We see hundreds of ads every day. People see so many ads that they don’t even realize how many ads they’ve seen! At the end of the day, the average person won’t remember an ad that they saw. What will stick with them is an amazing conversation they heard on a podcast. Attorneys can stand out and cut through the noise by creating an engaging people-centric podcast.

Turn Your Podcast Into New Business

You don’t need a huge budget to add a podcast into your marketing mix. By setting up your show with a solid foundation, you can build valuable connections that can bring in big returns on your investment. For people who are nervous about taking the leap into podcasting, Casey recommends taking these small steps:

Swing for the fences. Invite high profile and “out-of-your-league” guests. You may be surprised by who will say yes.
Figure out a few core questions you want to ask your guests. This will help you get to the core of your podcast’s voice and purpose.
Develop a name that gets to the heart of what your podcast is about.
Practice! Partner up with somebody who can give you constructive feedback to improve your interviewing skills.

Interested to hear more from Casey on podcasting? Listen to his interview on Solo de Facto here.