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Category: Conversion, Lead Generation

Never Send a Prospect to a Lawyer

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When you want to return a product, do you want to talk to the marketing department or customer service? You want a direct line to the person most trained to answer your exact questions; the person who will listen and even commiserate with your frustrations about the product; the person who can facilitate returning your misfit item and reimbursing your money in the most efficient way possible.

Well, the same principle applies to taking in new cases at a law firm. Prospective clients don’t want to talk to a busy, preoccupied lawyer who’s deep in the research required to prepare a case. People with problems that feel very real to them—whether the predicaments turn into viable cases or not—want to talk to a qualified legal intake specialist who knows how to empathize. They want a lifeline—a person who quickly acknowledges stress and identifies with overwhelming emotions.

Often attorneys believe that they can handle it all—from intake to marketing to lawyer-ing. But like any other business, in order to effectively service customers and build a successful organization, the experts in each line of work must handle these specialized functions. That means lawyers interpret the law. Intake specialists negotiate the calls. Marketing firms create brand strategy.

Your firm will find the quickest path to success if leadership delegates functions to the right people. Your brand counts on it. If you market your law practice as a dedicated advocate for accident victims, for example, your attorneys better be spending a large majority of their time preparing cases, negotiating settlements and trying cases in court. Not answering the phones. Not trying to qualify a case. Not designing the website. Not writing marketing copy.

After more than three decades of providing advertising expertise to law firms across the country, we know that lawyers who try to do it all or micro-manage other executive functions ultimately fail. Heed our advice. Use it as a catalyst to get the right people in place before it’s too late.

Arming Your Ambassador of First Impressions

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Remember the last time you called customer service? Then got sent to someone overseas? That was irritating. Well, the same applies to the intake administrator for your law firm. Whether you have a large operation or one person sitting at a desk, how you take you call-in leads—and turn them into profit—matters.

If you don’t have a strategy for how you handle random and strategic leads that come by phone, now is a great time to design a plan. For it’s often he or she who answers the questions best who gets the case.

First, consider whether or not your intake ambassador needs a script. For firms that have the luxury of employing someone who knows the business intimately and can conversationally qualify a client, this might not be necessary. For other practices, you might have found a warm and approachable intake expert that’s not quite up to speed on kinds of clients that would make a great fit.

Both scenarios require some oversight. A script or questionnaire can be a helpful aid for a person with the voice but not the knowledge. In this case, sit down to draft a conversational script that will carefully and quickly explain your firm while qualifying the caller—without closing the door too quickly. Sometimes that extra question or two can turn a borderline case into a real client.

Even if your intake person is well versed in how to answer a variety of questions from callers, it can’t hurt to review this process. You never know if you could be getting more business. Consider taping intake conversations or even physically listening in on a regular basis to make sure your ambassador is asking all the questions you would were you taking to a potential client.

Remember, you spend a lot of money pleading with people to call you. Don’t you think they deserve to have their expectations met when they finally do communicate with your firm? It’s your responsibility to connect the dots. After all, the person who makes your firm’s first impression can influence the decisions your clients make. Better hope they’re good ones.

Answering the call!

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What do you spend on advertising versus answering the phone at your law office? Step back for a moment and think about how much time and money you invest in making the most effective TV advertising commercial. The point is to drive traffic and make the phone ring, right?

But what happens when the phone does ring—and all your advertising efforts start to pay off. Do you have the right people in place to make sure that those phone calls convert to cases? There are so many nuances to answering the call, from your intake professionals’ tone of voice to the speed in which your office addresses inquires.

If you’re wondering why your advertising is making the phone ring but cases are not growing at the rate you projected, the missing link might be a greater investment in the speed, accuracy and creativity of your call center. Here are a few questions any firm should consider when making a strategic plan for over-the-phone intake:

  1. How knowledgeable are your call receptionists or call-center specialists about your law firm and its services?
  2. Do they need to read from a script or can they answer on the fly a variety of questions about your legal services?
  3. How fast do your intake professionals return a call? What happens after they’ve left one message for a caller?
  4. Are you accidentally turning away cases because you’re not probing further into a caller’s questions?
  5. How do you handle after-hours calls?

Often the firm that’s the quickest to return a call wins the case. Other cases are won by the intake representatives who are the most creative when examining a caller’s legal needs—ones that might not initially fit into a firm’s “box” of services. Sometimes it’s the offices that have a strict policy about multiple follow-up calls that ultimately win the business.

Remember, intake is not about you. It’s about the caller—a busy person who has a life. And work. And kids. And can’t always carve out the time to return your call within 24 hours. That doesn’t mean your firm should give up trying.

If you want to increase your case load and ensure your advertising efforts have legs, start thinking more strategically about answering the call. You might find that a little fine-tuning can go a long way.

Three Simple Systems to Increase Your Case Load

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bald guy holding cash for intake blog post on network affilates
Often times the concept of “putting a new system in place” seems overwhelming. But, really, what is a system? Systems are consistent processes put in place to bring about efficiency. The advantage of systems from a marketing perspective is their ability to truly test, track and evaluate your programs.

There are simple systems firms can put into place, which will help efficiency and growth. Three simple systems that can increase your case load are: Intake, Email Campaigns and Exit Interviews & Leave-Behinds.

Intake

Intake by nature is a system, but some firms do not treat it as one. Make sure the process to collect COMPLETE information from those who contact your firm (via phone or web) is consistent. Utilize secret shoppers to ensure your intake process is reflective of what you think it is.

Collecting information from former, current and prospective clients in order to remarket to them is just as important as qualifying a lead in a new case. After all, you pay for every lead that comes into your office, so capitalize on that and cultivate each contact for potential future business.

Email Campaigns

Ideally this is done through your advertising agency, which makes it absolutely seamless for your own firm and guarantees that all your marketing efforts are consistent.

If you have the capacity and prefer to do your own email campaigns, create a dozen or so intriguing email articles, establish a consistent communication schedule, utilize a reputable email marketing platform and make sure to review the results/analytics on a regular basis. Reviewing the open and click-through rates gives you an opportunity to evaluate and improve your email marketing campaigns.

Exit Interviews & Leave Behinds

Clients are happiest when they receive their settlement check. Why not take this opportunity to obtain a video exit interview with your client? And create a potential client testimonial that you can use in future marketing pieces? Then follow up with your client with a thank-you packet of goodies. This can be anything from a basket of gourmet cookies – to sporting event tickets – to branded merchandise – or restaurant gift certificates. This is yet another reminder that you appreciate their business.

Do not over-complicate the idea of implementing processes within your firm. Just make sure the systems are being used consistently in order to determine their effectiveness.

What A 2% Improvement in Lead Conversion Will Do For You

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Our job as an attorney marketing agency is to generate leads for our clients. Our clients then convert these leads into cases which produce meaningful fees. So it stands to reason that the more leads generated, the more cases, and subsequently, increased profits.

But, leads aren’t free – and leads are only part of the equation. Conversion is the other key component and conversion costs typically pale in comparison to lead costs. And nearly every law firm can do some simple, inexpensive things to improve their conversion rate.

What, if instead of always focusing on increasing the number of leads coming into your office, you also focus on increasing the conversion percentage of the leads already generated?

On average, most law firms convert only 20% of their leads into cases. That means that 80% of the leads are not getting converted. Granted, there will always be some leads that can’t be converted, but trust us, that number isn’t 80%! So what happens if we try to improve your law firm’s conversion rate by just a few percentage points? Let’s run some numbers.

The Value of Increasing Lead Conversion by 2%

Bob’s Law Firm generates 400 leads per month at $300 average cost per lead and currently converts 20% of those leads into cases, which carry an average case fee of $10,000.

400 leads x 20% = 80 cases

80 cases x $10,000 average case value = $800,000 gross fees per month

$800,000 x 12 Months = $9,600,000 gross fees annually

What happens if we improve the conversion rate by 2%?

400 leads x 22% = 88 cases

88 cases x $10,000 average case value = $880,000 gross fees per month

$880,000 x 12 Months = $10,560,000 gross fees annually

That small 2% improvement generated an additional $960,000 in annual gross revenues with minimal cost. Who wouldn’t want an extra million in gross fees with minimal investment?

What if We Only Focused on Increasing Leads?

Conversely, if you were to focus on increasing the number of LEADS to generate the same additional gross revenue with the same 20% conversion, you’d need to spend an additional $144,000. Let’s do the math.

To generate an additional $960,000 in revenue, you’d need 96 additional cases.

$10,000 average case value x 96 additional cases = $960,000

To get an additional 96 cases while keeping a 20% conversion rate – you’d need 480 additional leads

96 cases / 20% conversion = 480 additional leads needed

Leads aren’t cheap. By needing an additional 480 leads and keeping in mind a $300 average cost per lead – those leads just cost you an additional $144,000.

The bottom line is this – while it’s important to continue to generate leads, it’s EQUALLY important to continually improve your conversion rate. And improving your conversion rate is often times significantly less expensive than chasing new leads.

Once a Client, Always a Client

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A relationship doesn’t end when a cases closes. While this may sound like common sense, but all too often law firms forget that the key to long-term success is not only building relationships during cases, but maintaining them over time.

Attorneys owe it to clients to not only work to achieve the best outcome possible when a case is active, but to follow up, stay in touch and continue the relationship in such as way that the next time that client has any legal needs, the law firm that’s top of mind is yours.

Ignoring relationships is not only poor protocol; it’s also costing your firm money. If they forget you, that’s one easy referral you’re missing out on. We already know referrals are the life blood of any strong law firm, because they cost little or nothing to acquire, they are the most qualified cases, and they are often worth a lot of money. That said, keeping touch with past clients is the most direct path to more referrals. Here are some simple and effective ways to get started:

Customer Relationship Management (CRM): Consider a campaign that uses a mix of complementary CRM arms to connect with a variety of past clients.

Brochures & newsletters: Give them something tangible to read—and remember you by. Use these accepted forms of communication to position your attorneys as trusted experts, thought leaders and the go-to firm in your area.

Cards: Birthday, thank you and holiday cards—with atypical messaging and design that make your firm stand out—are also effective in creating an indelible memory point for clients.

Personalized messages: Build stronger relationships by keeping a few key personal notes about each clients and following up with a veteran, for example, on Memorial Day, or a hard-working single mom on Mother’s Day.

eCRM: Save some trees and reach people right in the palms of their hands with electronic customer relationship management. Use the increasingly dynamic digital environment to connect with past clients via email or electronic-based messaging campaigns.

Social Media: This new frontier was tailor-made for keeping in touch with clients and staying top of mind. It can also be a differentiation since social media remains a sector where few law firms are truly active.

Facebook: Design a weekly strategy for reporting important activity at your firm and reaching former (and new) clients through this dominating influencer in the social arena.

Yelp: Leverage social review communities such as Yelp to better position your firm through positive reviews, engage with reviewers and develop more referral-based business.

Blog: Make your existing website more interactive by creating a blog to reach clients online. Write engaging articles, highlight positive testimonials from past clients and post videos with your own attorneys discussing how your law firm can help.

If your firm is not already keeping up with clients, the key is to start small, build a solid foundation and add new marketing efforts over time.

Why Lead Tracking Helps Your Advertising Agency

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It’s rare to find a law firm that truly understands the importance of tracking its advertising. In the legal world, the most successful firms are often times the ones that are meticulous trackers. Law firms that know where their cases come from and what type of case makes them the most money are the ones that can make the best business decisions.

While tracking helps the overall business of law firms, tracking can also help their advertising agencies as well. We’re biased, but we would love to see more law firms track so we can create better advertising campaigns for our clients. Here’s some ways tracking helps law firms.

Where Do We Stand?

Tracking helps agencies understand just how well their advertising strategies and tactics are performing. Ad agencies can make more informed decisions and know when a change in the creative or media mix is necessary to move the needle.

Without tracking, knowing when a change is necessary is all guesswork. Guesswork can lead to making decisions that are not wise and can set back both the firm and the advertising agency as well.

Which Ad Makes “The Needle” Move?

In order to understand what is truly effective in your advertising plan, your firm should be evaluating, testing and recording results. For example, you could test different creative on different stations or select specific day parts to see what works most effectively for your firm. Many firms do this sort of experimentation, but determine the success of these experiments based on their gut instincts rather than on what the numbers tell them.

While your gut is important in making decisions, ignoring the numbers when adjusting your advertising campaign is shortsighted and can lead to missed opportunities. Furthermore, failing to track will make it difficult to conduct these sorts of experiments in the first place and can lead to a stale campaign.

Advertising is an Investment

At the end of the day, your advertising is a significant investment in your law firm. Do you track your 401K or do you just let it run on autopilot? Do you check your bank statements or do you just guess how much money you have in the bank? If you track the success of other areas of your life or firm, then why would you not track your advertising?

Having a polished, well thought out advertising campaign can have a significant impact on your law firm’s success. Failing to track your advertising investment is myopic and doesn’t allow your ad agency to do its job to the best of its abilities.

4 Tracking Tactics You Must Do!

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Do you monitor your 401K? How about your checkbook? Of course, you track money that goes in and out of your life. Then why wouldn’t you track advertising spend—one of your law firm’s most significant investments?

As an ad agency, we are only as effective as our advertising campaigns. And if you don’t have mechanisms in place to track who calls your firm and from where—and whether they become a client or remain a lead—you’ll never know whether what you’re spending is really worth it.

If you don’t know what ad tactics are moving the needle, you’ll never be able to make a truly informed decision about how to adjust your media mix, when to try something new or whether to ditch an unproductive effort altogether.

Here are some simple examples of how we encourage our clients to track leads:

Call tracking: This can be as manual as instituting a policy to document every call that comes into your office, or as automated as installing software to record the source of each call and measure the revenue generated from each lead.

Unique tracking number: Keep track of which calls are coming from what yellow page ads by placing a unique reference number next to each ad.

Traffic analytics: Install Google Analytics or another digital tracking program to monitor how visitors found your website—organic search, online referral source, PPC ad—as well as what keyword they used to search for you, how long they stayed and what pages they hit.

Microsite or PPC campaign: Generate stronger leads by building an exclusive landing page or mini website for a specific mass tort, for example, or another area of your practice you want to grow. Online campaigns are highly trackable often yield near-instant ROI.

Ultimately, advertising translates to paid leads. To see what you’re really spending per lead, simply divide your advertising budget by the number of leads you’ve tracked—in a week, month or year. Compare your expenditures on advertising campaigns and you’ll quickly see what’s working and what needs tweaking.