Lawyers typically market their services by shouting into the crowd, hoping that they will be heard by the right people.
How often has an ad rep told you that your ad will be seen by a bazillion people every minute of every day, or some such nonsense? Probably every time you talk to someone intent on selling you advertising, right?
Of course, ad reps want to sell you on the notion that eyeballs are critical in “getting out your message.” In reality, you don’t want to get out your message – you want to get it out to the right people at the right time.
This is the problem that lawyers avoid when marketing – how to be sure that they are reaching the right people, not just people in general. After all, do you really care if someone with a bunch of money in the bank and no debt knows that you practice bankruptcy law?
That’s why you should always concentrate on targeting your marketing message to the people most likely to hire you (or the people who influence those most likely to hire you). Whisper in their ear. Educate them about what you do and why it may be an option worth investigating.
The first step in ensuring that you target your marketing correctly is to review your clients, and to determine who you’ve liked the most. Not the best paying clients or the most plentiful ones, but the ones you’ve genuinely enjoyed working with the most. Often those will be the ones who paid you the most and were most plentiful, but not necessarily.
Take a good, hard look at those clients to see the common denominator. Do they all share characteristics? Do they live in close proximity to one another? Have children of similar ages? Do they own pets? Married, single, widowed, divorced? Gay or straight? Old or young?
From there, you can learn about their common likes and dislikes, what they read and what they do for fun. Walk a mile in your client’s shoes by getting to know them. In doing so, you’ll learn where and how to market to them.
From there, you can be confident that you are whispering in their ear.
Because when it gets too noisy, people just put in earplugs.
Photo courtesy of ashley.adcox.
