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referral sources

Marketing, Messaging, Technology

Thanksgiving: How to Treat Your Best Referral Sources

Since many law firms rely almost exclusively on referrals to generate business, it’s essential that those law firms tend to the care and feeding of their best referral sources.  But, lots of lawyers tend to take referrals for granted, and just assume that they’ll keep on coming in, even if they don’t do anything to maintain the sources of those referrals.

But, even the healthiest of referral sources can drop out of your program, if you ignore them for too long.  So, here are a few ways to make sure that your best referral sources stay that way.

-First off, (literally) reward them for referring you cases.  Some law firms keep gift cards on hand, to hand over when a referral is made.  Others send an end-of-year flower arrangement, or a collection of candies.  This is probably the most overt way to make sure that your referral sources seem cared for.

-Next, make sure that you stay in touch with your referral sources, in at least a couple ways: First, maintain contact with your best referral sources, so you can talk to them about how your business is going, and tell them about your evolving clients needs.  Second, send them marketing messages on a recurring basis, whether it’s adding them to your enewsletter list or even creating a specific drip campaign for referral sources.  Keeping tabs on your referral sources both in-person and online is really useful for ensuring future business.

-Lastly, you should make an ongoing effort to educate your referral sources about the kinds of clients you’re looking.  Even if your requirements don’t change, it’s useful to keep reminding the people who send you cases, and about the kinds of cases you want.

Staying on top of your referral sources, means that your baseline business revenue should remain stable, as you add new referral sources and marketing channels.

Marketing, Messaging

Merry Christmas, You Filthy Animal: How to Avoid the Law Firm Holiday Card Trap

When it comes time to send out Christmas or holiday cards at the end of the year, most law firm owners manage that process about as effectively as Clark Griswold lays down Christmas lights.

It’s usually a scramble to construct a full client list, and then actually sending out physical cards is a time-consuming and repetitive process, like no other – it’s enough to give you carpal tunnel syndrome, all by itself.

This can, and should, be much easier.

First, law firms should be able to easily and quickly call up a complete client list.  And, that list could be housed in any number of places: the contacts feature in a productivity software, the client or matters tabs in a case management software, the contacts list in an email marketing program or customer relationship management software – and, all of those lists should be downloadable as an Excel or CSV file, which would allow the list to be transferred to another software.

Second, there’s probably no need to send paper cards anymore, unless you’re of the mind that that substantially differentiates you from others in a largely online world.  If paper cards are your thing, send your list to a vendor, and farm out that work.  If you’re cool with electronic cards, send them out via your email marketing program or CRM, which should always have your full list of clients and referral sources readily accessible.

It makes little to no sense to sink your own and your staff’s productivity for the sake of sending out season’s greetings, when you could be spending that time finishing out the year on a strong note, by completing some work for client, or planning for the next year, by generating revenue projections, selecting new marketing campaigns and flattening bottlenecks blocking efficiency.

And, if you really want to stand out, try sending out holiday cards for lesser holidays, like Flag Day or local holidays.  You’ll have far less competition, and you’ll be more likely to get noticed.

Marketing, Messaging

Get Out: Why Lawyers Love Referral Marketing and Why They Should

Law firms love in-person referral marketing for the same two reasons lawyers love most things: (1) it’s always been done that way, and (2) it’s comfortable for them.  Generally, lawyers rely on tradition and ease as explanatory for just about everything they do.  In many ways, these two things have come to define the practice of law.  And, the proposition holds for in-person referral marketing, which is still (far and away) the method by which most law firms are built and maintained.

But, there’s another, more subtle reason that lawyers should love referral marketing — and, that’s because it’s not directed at prospective clients.  So, it serves as a great way to market a law firm with gloves off, as it were.  As soon as an attorney attempts to directly engage a client, burdensome solicitation rules come into play.  But, if you’re getting most of your business from referral sources, you need not engage those referral sources via the same rules. You can directly approach a referral source and say pretty much anything you want to them, in the interests of accessing a client pipeline. Under a regime that discourages direct client solicitation in a number of ways, this is the next best thing: to acquire a reliable mouthpiece.  And, that’s the main reason why clearly elucidating your business proposition to your referral sources, nailing down calls to actions and referral patterns and continually educating your referral sources on what you do is so essential to any thoroughgoing lawyer marketer.

Such it is that, for most lawyers, the most direct path to new clients is around them.