I have terrible news: your clients don’t give a shit that you’re a Super Lawyer.
Generally speaking, potential law firm clients aren’t interested in how many awards you’ve won, because those kind of industry standard competency qualifiers are meaningless to them. It’s not like people understand what it means to be a ‘Super Lawyer’, like they understand what it means to be a ‘Super Bowl MVP’. I mean, sure, a layperson could identify the fact that a ‘super’ lawyer is probably better than an ‘average’ or ‘awful’ lawyer. But, what leverage does being maybe slightly better than average bring you?
Selling any type of service, including legal services, is more about how well you focus on your clients’ issues than it is about how well you compensate for your own. (You’ve got your AV rating, and your overpriced sports car . . . but, that’s better than a spray tanning addiction, I suppose.) So, it pays (literally) to think about how to identify your clients’ problems in a way that resonates with them. And, here’s an easy strategy for meeting your potential clients’ needs when they’re searching online: Think of the 10 most frequently asked questions that your existing clients have, and create content consistently on that subject matter. Since those clients are mostly plugging in long form questions related to the serious problem they want resolved, like ‘I was injured at work, can I sue my boss’ — not ‘tort law Cincinnati’, by the way — if your content answers that question, and is titled in a similar fashion . . . Guess what? You’ve become a highly relevant and sought-after search result. Keep doing it, and you become even more relevant, and even more sought-after.
And, while picking the right questions is important, you also need to be sure that your message resonates with your potential clients. So, don’t write like a lawyer, write like a layperson — or, in a way that a layperson understands. And, if you can help it — don’t farm out the content work. Do it yourself; and, that will make you more authentic, and seem more accessible.
Law firms often tend to reflect on their own comfort, rather than their client’s — but, getting out of your comfort zone is the key to developing your modern marketing chops.
