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Having a well-crafted plan can save time and money, increase traffic, and help build your brand. A marketing plan is needed in order to successfully market and grow your law firm. Plans need to have certain essential elements.
Budget
You can’t do marketing without budgeting. Be sure to create a realistic budget so that you can get the most bang for your dollar.
12 Month Calendar
Creating a calendar will help you make sure that you are able to get things done but don’t have to get everything done at once.
Value Proposition
To successfully market yourself, you need to know what makes you different from the competition. Does the firm offer specialized services? Are the fees lower than others? What is something you offer that other attorneys don’t? This will be the key to marketing the services.
Elevator Pitch
It helps to be able to concisely talk about services in just a quick, 60-second statement. This comes in handy when you meet someone for the first time or need to make a presentation before a local business. Having this elevator pitch ready helps to get word-of-mouth referrals.
Targeted Audience and Prospect List
Having a list of potential clients and some attorneys who will make referrals to you is an important marketing tool. Whether it’s sending out a newsletter, nudges to your website, or an eblast, you need to keep your name in front of potential clients. These repeat impressions help build your brand, so when your services are needed, clients have you in mind.
Client Intake Tracking System
Tracking your marketing efforts is important so a client intake tracking system is needed. There are plenty of different technology options that will help you track client leads, conversion rates, and phone calls. You may not have a lot of time to do all this manually so streamline the process. A streamlined process will also help you make sure that you don’t let any potential clients get lost.
Measurements
Measuring your marketing efforts will let you know what is working and what isn’t and can help you know where to spend your marketing budget. Useful tools to use include Google Analytics and social media management systems, in order to know who is visiting your website and their engagements.
SMART Goals
Setting goals for marketing will help you work toward something and come up with an even better plan. Goals should be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time bound. Using smart tools will help you keep track of your efforts over time.
What Marketing Should You Do?
Google will be the most popular when it comes to getting your law firm visible. You should include plans for online tools.
Website: In today’s world, there isn’t a substitute for a well-written and user-friendly website. Your website needs to be optimized with SEO techniques in order to make sure that it ranks well. It needs to be mobile friendly, so users are able to find your website, no matter which device they are searching on.
Social Media: Social media may not be the first thing that comes to mind for attorney marketing, but it can be an inexpensive way to market legal services. You are able to communicate with potential clients and help with rankings on social media.
Blog Posts: Blogging is a great way to keep adding fresh content to the website and show your authority and expertise. Writing blogs about informative and topical legal issues provides important information for legal issues and can provide an opportunity for phone calls to your audience.
Legal Directories: These simple marketing tools can help your visibility and authority. It’s worth your time and effort to fill out profiles on SuperLawyers, Avvo, and other similar ones. Also, be sure to complete your LinkedIn profile.
Email Marketing: Email marketing is cost-effective and allows you to stay in front of potential and current clients and provide them with education and newsworthy legal topics. Legal services aren’t needed every day, so you want to be able to keep your brand in the minds of potential clients and legal associates who can remember you when needed.
Google My Business: This is a free service that every attorney should take advantage of. It highlights your contact information, legal services, and your location. Testimonials: Include getting client testimonials as part of your plan. Consumers like to listen to other consumers, and this can go a long way toward helping your marketing efforts.
You may also like: The Top Benefits of Consulting Marketing for Legal Firms
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