Effective, Ethical Marketing For Attorneys
Here's the Situation With Our Legal Marketing Super Conference
Category: Marketing Advice
Here's the situation, and one, frankly that we had not anticipated. In the past we have sold seats right up to the morning of the conference. As you can imagine, however, the number of people who have heard about Great Legal Marketing, joined our mastermind and coaching groups, etc has grown exponentially.
For this event we currently have 108 seats alloted. We thought that would be more than enough. In fact, with over a month to go, 74 of those seats are accounted for. It may well be that we sell out even before our next price discount cut off of May 15.
I don't want you to be upset later. If you have been procrastinating, please take a moment to decide to join us. If you have misplace the brochure or order form, links to both are below.
Also, some people have asked "who is coming?" The PRIMARY registrants are on a list and the link to that list is below.
The Conference Brochure is Here (its 19 pages and some have called it an education in and of itself.)
The application for the conference is here.
The list of primary attendees registered so far is here.
Note that the list does not include situations where more than one lawyer is coming from an office or where the marketing director of an office is also attending. As of 3:30 this afternoon, we have 74 total seats taken for.
Remember, if we have any seats after May 15, those are all full price seats.
One Good Reason to Attend The Lawyer Marketing Super Conference
Category: Marketing Advice
People say to me:
"Ben, Give Me One Good Reason To Attend Your Lawyer Marketing Super Conference on June 20-21 in Fairfax, Virginia..."
Here's one:
Ben, no one spent more money to attend your Great Legal Marketing Super Conference last year than Chris and I did. We not only flew cross country but we flew my parents to Virginia and paid for their hotel rooms as well as our so they could watch our kids while we attended the conference.We are doing the same thing again this year AND we've since joined your exclusive Mastermind Group, so we are actually incurring additional costs to meet with the other mastermind members the day before the conference. Why are we coming back? Because we experienced immediate results from implementing the things we learned at the Super Conference.
Here are our results so far:
In the first 90 days since we stepped off the plane back in Seattle, we experienced a 45% increase (vs. the prior year, same quarter) in potential client meetings and a 60% increase in the conversion rate of those meetings to actual clients.
In the next 90 days, when measured against the same quarter the prior year, we experienced a 411% increase in potential client meetings and a 317% increase in conversions of those meetings to personal injury clients.
After listening to Tom Foster and implementing exactly what he revealed to about Internet Marketing for Lawyers, we doubled out website traffic in the last six months of 2007.
We've booked our plane reservation and the hotel rooms. Virginia, here we come.
Mischelle Davis
Davis Law Group
www.injurytriallawyer.com
(206) 727-4000
Note From Ben:
We are 60% sold out already and have had to expand our room block at the hotel once already. No other lawyer marketing conference matches what we offer and we guarantee it all. Think we haven't delivered? We'll gladly refund your money. Mischelle and Chris will be presenting at this year's Super Conference and they'll walk you through exactly what they did.
You have a choice. Keep buying what the yellow page rep, website directory group and other marketing vultures are selling you. Let them do their marketing for you. Or, come try us out. Another order form is enclosed. Please note the deadlines. We are serious about the deadlines and have disappointed a few who can't read a calendar correctly. Fax the enclose form in today. If you need more info, go to www.GLMSuperConference2008.com.
Marketing Teleseminar Replay Available
Category: Marketing Advice
If you've ever felt victimized by a marketing vulture (yellow page rep, internet lawyer directory rep, etc) then you just might want to listen to/download this interview that I did with two of my Great Legal Marketing Mastermind members, Mischelle Davis and Bob Battle.
The link to the lawyer marketing free teleconference is here.
Join Us for an Unusual Marketing Your Law Office Teleseminar Wednesday April 14, 2008
Category: Marketing Advice
Free Legal Marketing Teleseminar Wednesday April 14, 2008
People want to hear more about the Great Legal Marketing Super Conference (Reston, Virginia in June). So we have rounded up two "winners" who have attended our conferences in the past and have dramatically changed their practices and their lives.
On Wednesday April 16 we'll be talking to Richmond, Virginia DUI attorney Bob Battle and to Mischelle Davis, the director of marketing for the Davis Law Group, in Seattle. Both came to a Super Conference, made a list, took action..and are now reaping the benefits of effective, ethical and outside the box marketing for their practices.
They'll be sharing some of the GLM marketing strategies they have implemented and how their practices have changed. And they'll answer your questions!
If you are a Yellow Page rep or major law web directory rep, you probably won't like what they have to say, But you can listen in anyway!
This call is free
(if you are one of the 2 people left in America without free long
distance service you'll have to pay for the toll call) and there is no
registration required.
Date: Wednesday, April 16
Time: 3:00 p.m Eastern
Dial In: 419-400-0202 Code 332894#
Notice: Dial in early, we only have 197 lines for this call.
For more information:
www.GLMSuperConference2008.com - More info on the SuperConference
www.bobbattlelaw.com - Check out Bob's website.
www.injurytriallawyer.com - Take a look at Davis Law Group's site.
Lawyer Marketing Conference Highlight Videos
Category: Marketing Advice
As of today we've filled a quarter of the seats we have available to the Super Conference just based on our own 'internal' marketing.
We've now posted some videos to YouTube that will show you a little bit of what goes on at our conferences.
Ben Glass Lawyer Marketing Super Conference Highlight Video
Ben Glass Marketing for Personal Injury Attorneys Video
For more information about this year's conference visit www.GLMSuperConference2008.com
Warning: Blogging Doesn't Work
Category: Marketing Advice
I occasionally hear from folks that their blogging or websites "don't work" to get cases. I hear far more from folks who are enjoying enormous success that comes directly from a marketing plan that includes blogging and a terrific website. (Amazingly, some folks with terrific websites have no "back end." They don't yet have system/database/follow up sequence for managing the leads they are getting. Dumb.)
Legal Marketing Super Conference 2008 Is Now Set
Category: Looking Outside the Box
The Great Legal Marketing Super Conference 2008 is now set for June 20-21, in Reston, Virginia. This years event will feature Great Legal Marketing members who have revolutionized their lives... and they'll tell you exactly how they did it.
If you would like information about the legal marketing event of the year, go to GLMSuperConference2008.com
How a Professional Services Business Can Prioritize Marketing Resources
Category: Marketing Advice
Lots of people teach how to market a business and what tools to use, but rarely do you see advice on how you should allocate your resources of time and money.
In other words: where do I spend my first dollar and my first hour?
Here are some tips:
Continue reading "How a Professional Services Business Can Prioritize Marketing Resources"
Big Mention from Attorney Marketing Center
Category: Marketing Advice
David Ward, at Attorney Marketing Center, gets the BenGlassLaw mailed (not emailed) newsletter. He had some very nice things to say about it in his blog.
What's really cool is that this is what we are teaching lawyers around the country... and they aren't all personal injury attorneys.
If you are in the slightest bit interested in marketing your personal injury law practice in a more ethical, effective way, we are currently offering a Law Firm Marketing CD set for just $4.95.
The yellow page reps and big law firm directory reps probably hate it, because the name of the CD is "Slaying the Marketing Vultures" and yes, its all about them.
30 Day Suspension for Misrepresentation as to Expertise
Category: Ethics and Regulation
Thanks to Jonathan Stein for alerting me to this interesting ethics case from California.
An attorney bought a marketing program from U.S. Tax Marketing Corp. . The marketing program teaches lawyers how to defend people from IRS proceedings, etc. (I've actually reviewed this entire program and it is good...the program was not the problem here.)
As part of an add-on, apparently you can buy a "done for you service" whereby the vendor will use your letterhead and mail letters to a list of people known to be in trouble with the IRS.
The problem, and the reason the lawyer was suspended for 30 days, was that the letter being sent made gross misrepresentations about the experience of the lawyer in doing tax lien defense. She had NO experience in these cases.
Continue reading "30 Day Suspension for Misrepresentation as to Expertise"
Tell the Connecticut Bar to Stuff It
Category: Ethics and Regulation
My good friend Lisa Solomon (QuestionofLaw.net) gave me a heads up on what I believe is a clear infringement of the First Amendment by the Connecticut Bar "web site audit committee." (Lisa helps me a ton by keeping a lookout for interesting lawyer advertising rulings and opinions!)
It seems that the Connecticut bar routinely does website "audits" to check compliance.
In a recent audit, they had a lawyer change "Mr. Smith limits his practice to XYZ" to Mr. Smith's practice "includes XYZ."
What is the purpose of that? If lawyers are supposed to get quality information to consumers, it is idiotic to prohibit a lawyer from telling the consuming public that he limits his practice to certain areas. It is idiotic for many reasons but think about this. The bar, is, in effect, compelling the lawyer to waste his most precious asset, time, by now having to handle the calls and inquiries from potential clients who have legal matters he does not handle! Frankly, that's a government mandated theft of time!
The bar's reasoning, apparently, was that in saying you "limit" your practice its like saying you are an "expert" and "we don't let people say they are an expert unless they are certified."
To prohibit an attorney from saying he "limits" his practice to certain areas is a clear First Amendment violation and there is no conceivable, let alone, compelling, state interest in this restriction.
Had I been that lawyer I would have told them to stuff it.
Beware When Someone Says You Charge Too Much
Category: Marketing Advice
I always get a chill down my spine when someone looks at someone else's business and complains that the charges are "too high."
My friend, Ed Poll, at LawBiz laments that some neutrals are commanding $12,000 a day to hear cases.
I say, more power to them. As long as there is a free market and no one is required to hire a neutral who charges $12,000 a day, there's nothing wrong. For some businesses, $12,000 is a fair, if not cheap, price to pay to have a case resolved now.
You should never compete on price. You don't want to be the least expensive lawyer in town and, frankly, there's no reason to not be the most expensive lawyer in town. As long as the market is free, and folks are free to go elsewhere, there's absolutely nothing wrong with this picture.
Are You Ready for 2008? Really Ready?
Category: Marketing Advice
What is 2008 and beyond going to look like for your practice?
If it looks exactly like 2007 is that good enough for you?
If you are really done with:
Never having enough time to do the things you have to do much less the things you WANT to do
Spending way too much money on the usual marketing choices: yellow pages, newspaper, billboards, radio, TV, etc. and getting little or no return
Having the months and years slip by while you keep doing the same old things getting the same old results and wondering when its ever going to change
Feeling like you work for your practice instead of building a practice that really works for you...
Free Goal Setting Teleconference For Lawyers on December 19,
Category: Marketing Advice
Have you thought about your 2008 or are you so busy working "in" your business that you haven't even begun to think about 2008?
If 2008 is setting up to look exactly like the results you achieved in 2007 is that good enough for you?
Top Practices' Rem Jackson and Great Legal Marketing's Ben Glass will be co-hosting a wide ranging and totatlly free teleconference on Wednesday, December 19, at 3:00 p.m. to discuss these issues.
We'll be taking you through the things you should be thinking about as you call "time out" and think about just what you want your law practice to look like at the end of 2008. We'll also be talking about our Great Legal Marketing Jump Start 2008 conference being held in Fairfax on January 12, 2008.
Is Anyone Surprised That Yellow Page Sales Down?
Category: Marketing Advice
The Cary, NC based Yellow Page publisher R.H. Donnelley recently announced that its sales were down, dropping its share price.
This should be good news for anyone who still advertises in the Yellow Pages (all media works, it's usually the message that is bad) as bargains are certain to abound.
But does it really surprise anyone that sales are down? How do YOU search for a local business? Does anyone NOT just start with Google?
Why You Need to Look Outside the Box
Category: Marketing Advice
David Ward and Grant Griffiths both commented on the ABA "Marketing" article that completely forgot to mention blogging. Oh well...As long as lawyers keep looking inside the lawyer industry for marketing advice, we'll keep getting lame, boring marketing from lawyers.
Of course its not that blogging is the only thing to do now, but certainly it's can be in the toolbox for most of us, given the low cost and the high "GooglePower" it can generate.
Marketing Jump Start 2008 Conference Announced
Category: Marketing Advice
Attorney Ben Glass and Great Legal Marketing announce that registration is now open, on a first come, first served basis, for the Jump Start 2008 Marketing and Practice Building Conference, to be held in Fairfax, Virginia on January 12, 2008.
This unique conference takes lawyers by the hand and shows them how to build their practices using "effective, ethical and outside the box" methods.
The conference offers a "double your money back" guarantee.
For more information, visit the Great Legal Marketing Jump Start 2008 webpage.
Effective Web Marketing
Category: Marketing Advice
David Ward has a great post over at the Attorney Marketing Center about supplementing your SEO work with off-line marketing.
Let me just comment about buying domain names. We love GoDaddy and own dozens of domains. The key is to buy phrases that are (1) easy to spell and (2) memorable. (i.e. TheAccidentBook.com; TheMalpracticeBook.com)
And don't think all the good domains are taken. You can often be very creative (and effective) by incorporating your location (ie. FairfaxLawFirm.com; TheFairfaxAccidentLawyer.com.
Think: "If they heard it on the radio, would they be able to find me?"
Another Reason to Blog
Category: Marketing Advice
As Kevin O'Keefe points out this morning, we've noticed that Google indexes blogs were quickly. We've been noticing this for a while with our InjuryBoard posts.
In the fight for the most valuable real estate on the Internet, the first page of Google for search terms applicable to your practice area, a blog that is properly "set up" and recognized as authoritative by Google can give you a tremendous advantage over your competition.
Its almost like the ability to have instant press releases published on page one.
Book Writing for Referals
David Ward has a great post today over at the Attorney Marketing Center about becoming an author to promote yourself.
He suggests having others sell your book for you and you giving them a commission for doing so. My suggestion would be to let them keep 100% of the selling price! You don't care about the commission. You want your book distributed far and wide.
He also suggests putting your book on Amazon.com.
We've done this with The Truth About Lawyer Advertising and a number of our other books. It works.
Tell a More Complete Story Through Information Marketing
Category: Marketing Advice
When you write books and special reports, you can tell a much more complete story than you can in a one page yellow page ad. Here's what happens when you begin to think of marketing this way:
You can have the mailman bring them a whole big box of stuff. (No one else in your marketing is likely doing this.)
You are not limited to a full page phone book ad or a 30 second TV spot
They will read it because they requested it and gave you permission to mail it (you
are a "guest" not a "pest").
Continue reading "Tell a More Complete Story Through Information Marketing"
Writing to Establish Yourself as the Expert
Category: Marketing Advice
Last time we talked about writing books as a way of establishing your expertise and providing information to prospective clients.
Not ready for a book?
Here are some "whitepapers" you could write.
Why a respected local judge called a chiropractor a hired gun
Why you must be brutally honest with your lawyer
Why your health insurance company may demand ALL of your settlement money
Or record an audio CDs--The Truth About the American Justice System
HOW DO WE DO THIS?
Category: Marketing Advice
Just how can we make our law firm marketing stand out from all of those other lawyer ads out there?
Here are some tips:
Shout a different message:
Look at the ads you are running today and the other ads currently in your market. Would your ad provoke a client who is actively looking for an attorney to start a conversation with you as opposed to starting that conversation with somebody else or as opposed to doing nothing? The first thing I did when I started learning from Dan Kennedy was to go to the library and study all of the lawyer ads in the yellow pages. Dan was right. They all say the same thing!
Here's what you are looking for:
Skip the Website, Go Directly to Blog?
The New York Times has an interesting article on the power of blogging in today's Web 2.0 world. John Patrick, a former I.B.M. vice president for Internet technology, was quoted as saying:
Marketing to People Looking For An Attorney Now
Here are the things to think about in getting your marketing message out to folks who are looking for you now.
a) They have a need but they don't know an attorney and don't know anyone who knows an attorney.
b) Make sure they find you and start a conversation with you and you alone no matter what media they are using.
c) The major mistakes most lawyers make with their marketing are (Mindset):
i) Try to be all things to all people,
ii) Try to make the "sale" in their advertising.
d) The only goal of your initial marketing (that is, what they 'see' when they start looking) is to provoke them to raise their hands and say "I'm interested in hearing from you." (Seth Godin, Permission Marketing)
e) Once the conversation has 'started' then you can:
i) Overwhelm them with proof that you are the obvious choice,
ii) Create demand for your services,
iii) Screen out the cases you don't want in a way that keeps the declined potential client interested in you and your marketing message (for the next time!).