Would You Buy Marketing Insurance for Your Law Firm?

According to financial forecasts, spending within the U.S. legal marketing and advertising industries is estimated to exceed $1 billion in 2020.

Not only is it an insanely expensive, zero-sum game against competing law firms, now thanks to the thousands of tactics available offline and runaway algorithms that can easily change the winds of fate online, marketing feels more and more like a gamble.

Wouldn’t it make sense for advertising lawyers to have some kind of marketing insurance policy?

Think about it: an insurance policy that keeps you afloat if the latest marketing campaign tanked.

If you’ve invested big in marketing your law firm, you would surely want insurance to protect your investments, right?

Well, what if I told you that a law firm marketing insurance policy like this already exists?

Let’s first unpack the differences between insurance and investments, then explore a few ways to ensure the success of your legal marketing investments. Finally, we’ll provide you with tools to take back to your firm and start making enhancements.

Investing in Marketing vs. Marketing Insurance

You may think you have the differences between insurance and investments sorted out.

However, I believe the two terms function very differently on the human brain, especially when that brain is approaching the funding of business development efforts, like marketing.

Let’s do a thought experiment.

Picture a desk. A lawyer sits on one side, and someone who is asking for that lawyer’s money sits on the other side.

In Scenario A, the person suggests the lawyer invest the money. 

In Scenario B, the person suggests the lawyer spend the money on insurance.

In Scenario A, the language and feelings around investing are all very aspirational. Investments are expected to grow, and with the help of a benevolent marketplace, receive many returns! An optimistic version of “what if?”

In Scenario B, the language and emotions around insurance are realistic. Insurance is there to make sure, regardless of the harsh realities of the marketplace, you don’t lose what you’ve worked for. A very grounded version of “what if?”

There is an anxiety to the investor mentality present in Scenario A that is not present with the insurance discussion in Scenario B. It’s this anxiety that I feel impacts the creation of effective marketing strategies.

When it comes to situations of fantastic growth, like in Scenario A, risk-averse humans consider costs upfront, tend to be more conservative with their investments, and put forth the minimum to get the unknown return.

When it comes to insuring yourself against the potential of very realistic loss, like in Scenario B, humans are more likely to put forth the resources required to protect themselves.

Ok – so – where am I going with this?

Marketing Strategy: Your Business Development Insurance Policy

Most legal marketers dream of creating a diverse inflow of lead sources, but they rarely do the real work of creating them. They chase long-term growth through a collection of short-term campaigns. But as we’ve seen in the marketing research of Binet & Field, short-term gains will never equate to long-term success.

As we discuss in our Legal Marketing Nutrition Guide, a healthy marketing strategy, balanced between Brand Growth and Sales Activation initiatives, solves the entire spectrum of business development issues a law firm faces, ranging from intake to disbursement, from click to conversion.

Your law firm’s business development insurance policy is a well-rounded marketing strategy.

How can you turn your marketing investments into marketing insurance?

It’s my hope that legal marketers and shareholders will start viewing their marketing investments as business development insurance policies.

Since the return on investment (ROI) is murky, shareholders seeking to protect themselves from loss in an investment mindset underfund the entire endeavor from the outset, lowering their risk while simultaneously undercutting the size of the reward. The anxiety isn’t worth it!

But in an insurance mindset, the risk of loss is calculated into the coverage, so shareholders are keen to financially ensure that the assets are protected completely. Peace of mind is always worth it.

If you were going to be insured for a house, the checklist of questions they would ask before they gave you the policy would be extensive, correct? Do you have smoke detectors, a proper roof, thickness of walls, drainage, valuation of materials inside, the whole thing!

But when the typical lawyer invests in a marketing campaign, there is no checklist, no standards. Well, what if there were?

Law Firm Marketing Risk Assessment Checklist

We created this Law Firm Marketing Risk Assessment Checklist as a tool to help lawyers looking to build their book of business, a handy way to ensure their investments don’t go to waste!

Want more advice on law firm marketing? Sign up for the Consultwebs newsletter, follow us on social media, and subscribe to the LAWsome Podcast.

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The Four Objectives of Effective Law Firm Marketing

Legal services is one of the most competitive industries in the country, so building a law firms book of business with marketing is an easy decision to make. The difficulties arrive when those funding the marketing have to prioritize the activities; what do you do first, in what order?

By focusing on objectives like Attraction, Conversion, Branding, and Delight, legal marketers can segment their activities properly and ensure their strategy covers a spectrum, not just a slice, of what’s required to be successful in marketing.

Let’s explore these legal marketing objectives below and then discover how to bring all this back to your law firm.

Attraction

Attracting new clients is really the raison d’etre for marketing. I don’t know exactly what that means, but I think I used it right, and now, I bet you want raisins. Anyway…

Marketing initiatives like digital advertising, lead gen campaigns, conversion focused legal web design, and an engaged presence on social media, are just a few ways to fulfill the objective of Attraction.

In regards to the other marketing objectives, and in relation to the marketing science supporting our Legal Marketing Nutrition Guide, tactics focused on attracting new clients to your firm and increasing market share, are essential to the law firm interested in growing their business in a reliable, and healthy, fashion.

As we discover later, a legal marketing strategy that focuses a heavier percentage of effort towards attracting new clients, not solely towards creating a loyal customer base, stands a better chance, overtime, of reliably increasing caseloads.

Conversion

While most marketers obsess about driving traffic, few have a solid plan on directing that traffic into meaningful and measurable patterns of conversion.

Intake optimization, establishing & measuring ROI, and creating nurture streams with related content are a few ways to focus marketing efforts and objectives on conversion.

Without a strong foundation on the systems and processes that convert leads, any efforts to build the book of business through sales will be exponentially less effective.

Branding

Dealing in the liminal spaces between promotion and perception, branding is an essential component to any serious legal marketing strategy. Marketing initiatives like client experience optimization, SEO, evergreen content like case studies, and swag are all great ways to achieve the Branding objective.

Your law firm’s brand is more than just unique colors and slogans. Overtime, a brand becomes associated with a level of credibility, quality, and satisfaction in the consumer’s mind. Thus brands help harried consumers in crowded and complex marketplace, by standing for certain benefits and value. 

Interested in discovering your law firm’s brand — Click Here!

Delight/Loyalty

There are a ton of perspectives on marketing initiatives that inspire delight and loyalty in clients. Special partnerships that benefit clients, a focus on client experience, solid service content, client gifts; all of these are fantastic ways to facilitate some delight in your marketing objectives.

A lot of voices in marketing say focus on building loyalty and the new business will show up, and to a certain extent in legal services this is true, lawyers build relationships with clients.

However, marketing science, like the 70+ years of research in Byron Sharp’s “How Brands Grow,” shows brand loyalty as a distinct force of profit or growth for a business is a fiction.

In regards to the other objectives of marketing, and in relation to the main goal of attracting more and more new clients, marketers should focus on Delight/Loyalty once they have a strategy and systems in place to deliver on the first three objectives.

In Conclusion

By focusing your marketing efforts around the objectives you wish to achieve, rather than the tactics you can use, the job of marketing becomes much more simplified and focused.

Rather than wondering if you need to jump on the latest bandwagon, or if you need to blog or podcast, or if you need to be on TikTok, the legal marketer that prioritizes their marketing across a spectrum of objectives, rather than slices of activity, is the one that will end up with the most pie at the end of the meal.

Want more advice on law firm marketing? Sign up for the Consultwebs newsletter, follow us on social media, and subscribe to the LAWsome Podcast.

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8 Website Tips and Tricks to Increase Your Caseload

Do you want to increase the conversion rate of your website? In this post we’ll discuss a few web design best practices that can help improve the chances that your website visitors turn into clients.

Here are a few design tips to follow:

1. Simplify Your Design

The more elements, images, copy blocks, menus and CTAs you add to a design, the more things start competing for the user’s attention. Cluttered and unnecessarily complex designs can get in the way of conversions, especially when you really just want the user to pick up the phone or fill out your contact form.

Of course you will still need content that speaks to the services you offer and your unique value proposition, but these elements should not take away from your phone number, contact buttons and contact forms. These are direct lines of contact with your users and are critical to conversions.

2. Use White Space to Focus Users’ Attention

Don’t feel the need to fill every space with a photo or block of copy. White space (also known as negative space) can help move the user through your pages and focus them on important calls to action (CTA). Also, using white space in a design is an easy way to make the design feel much more professional and trustworthy.

3. Add Your Unique Value Proposition to Your Homepage

Your unique value proposition or UVP is a statement that describes what you offer, how you solve your customer’s needs, and what sets you apart from the competition. Visitors should clearly see this at the top of your homepage. Keep it as short as possible and in plain language so everyone can understand the value your firm brings to the table.

4. Consider Adding Live Chat

Live chat functionality can be a great way to boost conversions. This will not replace your contact page or phone number, but live chat may attract people who wouldn’t usually contact you. Read our post Top 4 Benefits Live Chat Provides to Law Firms to learn more.

5. Optimize Contact Forms

It’s pretty straightforward. The fewer form fields you have, the more likely it is that users will complete them. Stick to the basics like name, phone number, email address and a brief message.

Also, think about including your contact form in the sidebar of interior pages rather than forcing users to click a “Contact” link. When a visitor decides to get in touch, no matter where they are on your site, it’s best if they don’t have to search for a contact button or contact form.

6. Add Trust Elements

Adding awards, guarantees and professional associations you belong to all help to prove that you will do what you promise and are experienced in your practice area. Also, if your firm has been featured in the news or on industry-leading websites, make sure you include their logos on your site to build authority.

You may also consider adding “No Win, No Fee” or “Money Back” guarantees. This can put visitors’ minds at ease if they’re price sensitive and hesitant to contact your firm because of cost. However, don’t make promises you can’t keep. Only advertise “No Fee” or “Money Back” guarantees if it makes 100% sense for your firm.

Learn more about designing for trust in our blog post 5 Key Factors of Trustworthiness in Web Design.

7. Include Client Testimonials

When a visitor has never heard of your law firm and visits your website for the first time, two things may come to mind: 1. “Can I trust this firm?” and 2. “Can they help me as promised?”

When visitors read client reviews, they can be reassured that you’re a reputable, trusted law firm, and that you are the right firm to work with when they need legal matters resolved. Online reviews have a great impact on your marketing efforts and have the ability to encourage would-be clients to click on particular search results as opposed to others. We have many blog posts related to the importance online reviews. In this post we offer a reviews resource bundle.

8. Simplify Your Mobile Experience

Mobile devices are now used more often to surf the web than desktop computers. You should make sure that your website works well across all platforms (e.g. mobile, tablets, desktop). If it doesn’t, you may lose a lot of clients.

Simplifying your design and keeping content short and to the point is critical on mobile websites. Make it as easy as possible for mobile users to find what they’re looking for quickly. That means phone numbers, maps, directions, office hours and tap-to-call buttons that put them in contact with your firm.

Size matters on mobile. Make sure your font size is large enough so even visitors with poor eyesight won’t have to zoom in for legibility. Also, buttons need to be large and easy to press. Apple suggests that button sizes should be at least 44px by 44px to increase conversions and maximize user experience.

Conclusion

Many of the tips listed above are about trust and how design can influence users’ first impressions. On average, visitors spend less than 15 seconds on a website. This means that getting these elements right and making a great first impression is critical.

Simplicity in web design, especially simplicity in mobile web design, will make it easier for visitors to access content that is pertinent to them. The result of this is that potential clients are much more likely to contact you.

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