South Carolina Trial Law Blog

Tom Kane is a marketing consultant and the author of the ABA book Letters for Lawyers: Essential Communications for Clients, Prospects, and Others and is also a contributing author on The ABA Guide to Legal Marketing: A Collection of the Best Ideas, Approaches, and Success Stories . Tom also has great advice at his weblog The Legal Marketing Blog.

1. TV/Radio Advertising – TV ads are expensive, but effective if you spend enough.. How much? More than your competitors, or at least enough to get your name known, remembered and the phone ringing. Radio ads are less expensive, but also less effective. However, they can work if you place enough ads on stations that your target audience listens to.
2. Networking with Lawyers – Good source of plaintiff’s work is referrals from other lawyers that do not take plaintiff’s work, or don’t handle litigation at all. Such networking should include involvement in local and state bar associations. Being active in ATLA is also effective if you seek a leadership position and become known as a player, so that you get referrals from your counterparts in other states. The key to involvement in any organization is to be a doer, not just a joiner. You should seek a leadership position and volunteer often on committees. Otherwise spend your time elsewhere.
3. Make Friends with Media – Get to know newspaper, and radio/TV reporters by taking them to breakfast or lunch. If they know what you do, and get to know you personally, they are more likely to call you when they want to get a lawyer’s perspective on a story they are working on. Remember that they are usually under a tight deadline, so you will need to be very responsive by calling them back immediately, if not sooner.
4. Community Involvement – Join key, visible community organizations where you can make a difference. Again, you need to be very active and known as contributor or it will not work. You could also sponsor a community project. For example, give free T-shirts (or whatever) to all high school seniors who take a pledge not to drink on prom night, or some other high profile community involvement.
5. Yellow Page Ads – Yellow page ads can be expensive also, and they are less effective than TV/Radio ads. Moreover, there are just too many of them. It is harder to stand out among the crowd. So, if you do pay for one ad or more, make your ad(s) stand out as different. Narrow your niche(s), e.g., dental malpractice vs. general medical malpractice. You can’t be all things to all potential plaintiffs, if you expect to stand out among the 100 or so pages of lawyer ads. Subject to bar ethics rules, do something different to have your ad stand out. Include a picture of your dog, your out-house, or whatever you deem appropriate to set your ad apart.