Do I really have to throw out all of my old marketing materials? Some of them were expensive!
If you want to continue using brochures, keychains, or other printed materials that you have boxes and boxes of in your office, you can. Handing them out will give you more exposure than throwing them away, so feel free to use them until they’re gone. But when they’re gone, don’t reprint them—replace them with something better.Think of it this way: when you graduated from law school, did you receive a clock, pen, or nameplate with the scales of justice printed on it? You may still get these presents every year from well-meaning family members. The problem is, they’re stereotypical and hackneyed images of the law profession—and if everyone uses them, it means everyone is the same.
Take a look at your old brochures. Is your name the only thing original about them? Are you talking about your qualifications and case results rather than addressing your customer’s problems? Are the only incentives to call you a phone number and firm email address?
The key to great marketing for personal injury lawyers is to subvert your customers’ expectations. You don’t want to do what every other lawyer is doing; you want to distinguish yourself in your field. This means providing a lot of information for free, having the patience for a low-pressure sale, and pointing all of your marketing toward getting the customer to contact you rather than hire you.
The good news is, you already have the information you need to change your marketing. You know what clients tell you when they first walk in your door: their fears, their questions, and their concerns. Imagine you needed help, and someone provided the answers before you even asked your questions. That’s the person you want to be.
Ben is a nationally recognized expert in attorney marketing and the owner of Great Legal Marketing.
Most attorneys start their firms assuming that being a really, really good attorney should, in and of itself, be a marketing advantage. Those attorneys believe that joining a whole bunch of committees and putting their name in lawyer directories is “marketing,” and they never bother to ask if there is a better way.
Attorneys are catching on, however, and those who succeed learn to leverage their current resources to create effective (and ethical) marketing. What they discover isn’t a magic pill or silver bullet but a different approach to marketing that your competitors haven’t considered.
If you want a peek at what successful attorneys use to market their practice, the HERO Starter Kit is your logical next step.
We’ve put together a FREE (and potentially life-changing) kit for solo and small firm attorneys that will show you a better way to reach potential clients and get them excited to call your firm. Request your HERO Starter Kit from Great Legal Marketing!
Starting over can be scary, but it can also be exciting, revitalizing, and motivating. That’s why many people daydream about what they would do if they could “start over.”
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