Legal Marketing & PR

Lesson 5 - Follow Up and Educate

By Michael

Jack was already getting leads. He was surprised to already be receiving e-mails from prospective clients that had found his blog on the search engines. Additionally, his referral system had already paid dividends when one of strategic alliance partners (a marriage counselor) sent him a referral. He was happy that things were already starting to happen. I assured him that this was only the beginning and that we needed to get follow up systems in place to take maximum advantage of each lead he received from his lead generation activities.

I explained to Jack that the next step was to put in place a systematic follow up system to stay in touch with those that contacted him as well as with his referral sources. I grabbed my Levenger legal pad and made a list of some of the different ways he might consider for keeping in touch with his prospects, clients and referral sources. They included the following:

1. Hand written thank you notes
2. Typed follow up letters
3. Personal phone calls
4. Printed (offline newsletter)
5. E-mail newsletter (e-zine)
6. E-mail courses
7. His blog’s RSS feed

As we began discussing these methods, Jack began to get a concerned look on his face. He finally admitted that he thought this sounded like a lot of work. I told him that some of them took more time than others, but that the return on investment of that time would be tremendous. I also pointed out that much of it could (and should) be automated, outsourced and/or delegated.

He was game. After we discussed the various ideas, he decided he would utilize his blog for constant communication with prospects (and to boost his search engine rankings). Additionally, he would offer an eCourse on his blog to capture prospects’ contact information and get their permission to market to them (by sending educational information on an ongoing basis). Because his is a divorce practice, he was concerned about his prospective clients’ spouse’s finding out about them communicating with him. We were able to work around that by writing some copy that would pop up on the site before they were able to request the eCourse which explained the importance of a “spouse proof” communication channel.

Additionally, we mapped out a monthly keep in touch program for his current and former clients which included a quarterly direct response newsletter, some holiday cards, and an occasional mailing of educational material. In all, the clients would receive something from him every month. Finally, he also decided to mail a separate monthly newsletter to his primary referral sources.

Note: Jack outsources his monthly mailings to his clients and his referral sources (including both newsletters) through Lawyer Profit Systems. We set up the eCourse on an autoresponder. Once it was all in place, his actual time involved would be supervisory except for an occasional personal note.

The fact that he would be in constant contact with his prospects, clients (both current and past), and his referral sources would give him top of mind awareness as well as a distinct advantage over his competition.

Links to the other articles in this series can be found at the Lawyer Marketing 101, et. seq. post.

Full post as published by Law for Profit on October 15, 2007 (boomark / email).