A Model for Marketing Professional Services from Jim Logan
This advice comes from Jim Logan, the author of JSLogan Blog. Jim’s been in marketing for over 20 years and is the founder of Accelerate Business Group. In addition to all of the wonderful advice on his blog, Jim has an interesting approach to billing. On with Jim’s advice on marketing for Plaintiff’s Lawyers:
Instead of giving 5 Tips, I'd like to share my thoughts on what I believe is far more valuable: a model for marketing professional services.
I believe plaintiff’s attorneys can best market their services by keeping at the forefront of their thoughts that everything they do is about their client. Their client is seeking "justice" to right a wrong that has fallen upon them. Keeping their client’s perspective at the forefront of their thoughts, they should address three things in their marketing effort: benefits, difference, and reason to believe – solely from their client’s perspective.
Client’s seeking professional services of any sorts review and choose service providers, professionals, and representation by consciously or sub-consciously evaluating their choices by weighing the expected benefit, difference, and reason to believe in the professional’s offering.
Benefits – If you’re a client seeking a plaintiff’s attorney: What benefits do I get as a result of selecting you or your firm? What do you offer me? What am I getting out of the deal if I select you or your firm to represent me?
Difference – As a client seeking services: Why should I select you or your firm instead of the plaintiff’s attorney or firm down the street? What makes you different? Assuming all plaintiff’s attorneys have equal skill, what extra do I get with you?
Reason to Believe – Why should I believe you can deliver the benefits and difference you claim?
Of the three points above (benefits, difference, and reason to believe), I believe difference and reason to believe are areas where the most opportunity are found:
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Do you or can you offer a unique difference in the way you approach a client interaction or matter management? Milestones, routine updates with client, etc.
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Do you or can you bill for activities differently than your competitors? For instance, don’t bill for administrative costs and activities.
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Can you offer guaranteed response times? Returned calls, correspondence, etc.? This addresses a concern of the client that the matter is as important to you as it is to them.
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Offer testimonials and references, not just on satisfaction with outcome, but satisfaction with attention, responsiveness, creativity, dedication, etc. This is critical to addressing reason to believe.
Benefits, difference, and reason to believe need to be integrated into everything the solo practitioner or firm does - web and print customer communications, every interaction with client while earning their representation, establishing their business practices, pricing, etc.
When you look at marketing materials of most firms, you see everything about how wonderful the firm is: pedigree of attorney's, success rate of the firm, etc. Rarely have I seen how important the client is. This is a great mistake. I believe the marketing effort should always be about the client - their benefits, their success, the value they enjoy from doing business with you or your firm.
This perspective sets the tone for the tactics used to market your services.
