2009: Refocus and Get Serious About Marketing

By Donna Erickson
©Erickson Marketing, Inc.

It's a new year and time to update the marketing plans for your firm, your practice groups, and each attorney. Be sure that the plans address today's economic conditions, including practical, attainable objectives that will help you to retain your good clients and bring in new clients.

Here are a few tips to help you achieve your marketing objectives in 2009:

Personal Discipline.

Keep these three points in mind as you start each week:

1. Focus your efforts. Identify your non-billable priorities for the quarter on a planning worksheet. (Contact Erickson Marketing if you would like to receive a free copy of the template we have developed.)

2. Manage your time. Identify how much time you are willing to commit to marketing activities and set aside time each week to accomplish your objectives. This could be breakfast, lunch, dinner, evenings or weekends, depending upon your schedule.

3. Weekly lists. Target at least three non-billable marketing events each week. Create a list detailing your specific objectives. Check off the list those activities that you complete, add new items as appropriate, and carry them forward to the next week.

Key Areas to Address.

Focus on these key components of business development to improve your business relationships:

Expand existing client relationships. Review your list of open clients. Who would you like to continue working with long into the future that has the potential to send you good work?

• Keep abreast of their industry, their challenges and opportunities, current and future.
• Find out what business issues keep them up at night and address how you can be of assistance in relieving that stress.
• Determine what you can do to help them be successful.
• Offer to meet at their office rather than your own.
• Make it a point to review the client's web site before every meeting to stay current with public news.
• Write down a few activities that you could do to expand that relationship in the coming months: lunch, dinner, theatre, golf or attend a ball game. Is there an opportunity for you to co-present with the key contact at a seminar or trade association event?

Reconnect with past clients. Review a list of clients from 2007 that you did not work for in 2008. Identify those that you would like to continue working with that have the potential to send good, profitable work in the future. What can you do to expand your relationship and start the files coming your way once again?

Ask how you are doing. Take the time to talk with your client at the conclusion of each matter/case and debrief to hear the client's perspective on the outcome, as well as how well they liked working with you and your firm. If they are highly satisfied, they will surely tell you. If not, you should ask questions to draw out their opinions and find out how you and the firm can improve your services. Asking their opinion goes a long way to building a trusting, open relationship for the future. In addition, clients appreciate being asked their opinion and may be motivated to use the firm for additional services. According to a Bain & Company survey, approximately 66% of the time professional services firm clients who are surveyed will begin using the firm for additional services.

Show clients your appreciation. Thank clients for their business. Many firms send a holiday card or year end gift. I prefer the lawyer to call their clients and say thank you. Perhaps take your client to lunch or a special dinner. Send your client a special gift that recognizes one of their hobbies or special interest. Say "thank you" to their staff by sending a custom basket of fruits, cookies or other treats that can be shared.

Develop a list of your good referral sources. Contact each referral source and set up a time to get together. Remember to thank them for specific clients they have sent your way - or attempted to send your way in recent months. Have you reciprocated with a referral recently? Reciprocal referrals are important components of many such relationships. A good referral relationship is a two way street. If your practice does not lend itself to generate referrals their way, find other ways that you can say thank you for their thoughtfulness.

For assistance with client satisfaction surveys or other marketing and business development initiatives, contact Donna Erickson at 612-669-5548 or Donna@EricksonMarketingInc.com