GROW YOUR LAW FIRM IN 2018
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ANSWERING THE PHONE: 10 POTENTIAL CLIENTS A MONTH?
My wife and I were in Austin and wanted some Texas pizza.
But the first company I called didn’t even answer the phone. Instead, I got an ice-cold voicemail: “This is ABC pizza. We don’t deliver. If you want to order pizza, go download our app.” I hung up and laughed out loud. Because that’s the equivalent of saying, “Hey, if you want pizza, then kiss my ass and beg for it.” How can you run a business like that?
So, did we order the pizza with an app in Austin? Nope. We immediately called another company and talked to a helpful human. And that’s precisely what potentials do. I recorded a short audio for you that explains how to answer the phone correctly. After listening to my battle-tested recommendations, I highly recommend calling your own firm (or having us do it for you) to see if you need to make some changes. What you’ll hear could quite literally help you recover thousands of dollars in revenue every month.
shopping service, most attorneys we helped had no idea how much business they were potentially losing and were horrified when we presented them with the recordings.
You can’t.
I’ve said it before, and I’ll repeat it many times:
My point is this:
A potential client calling you or your firm is a precious thing. How your phone is answered could make or break the deal right then and there. After all, you spent good money on marketing and advertising to get people to call. If how employees answer the phone is treated as an afterthought, you could be bleeding cash and never realize it. Answering the phone correctly is a lost art, and I’d like to give you several examples and tips to help you, your secretary, or your answering service take calls in a way that actually increases business rather than driving it away.
The way you, your admins, your secretary, or your answering service answers the phone is crucial. It’s an essential part of your overall marketing strategy. Done incorrectly, it can actually cost you two, three, or even 10 cases a month. Now, I’m not saying you or your firm resembles that disaster of a pizza joint. But as part of our marketing services, we mystery shop attorneys — and we routinely hear some real head- slappers. You may think, “Oh, we’re fine. We’re the exception to the rule. We handle the phones just fine.” But I promise you that in all the years we’ve been doing this mystery
Listen in over here or download for later:
–Richard Jacobs WWW.SPEAKEASYMARKETINGINC.COM | 1 http://speakeasy.marketing/phone
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THE PERILS OF THE ‘OVERPROMISE, UNDERDELIVER’ MENTALITY Don’t Set Your Team Up for Failure
from small companies. This threat of losing employees causes many small-business owners to overpromise and underdeliver in their internal communications. Making promises you can’t keep to employees results in a high turnover rate, low morale, and lack of trust. RECRUITING The competitive job market has led to aggressive headhunting for top candidates. But in some cases, aggressive recruiters promise grandiose perks and unsustainable work environments. Just as with a sales client, overpromising and underdelivering is a sure way to set new employees up for failure. When you perpetuate a facade of what your company can actually provide, you open the door for disappointment and regret. The consequences become evident when employees leave or cultivate negativity within your team.
While trying to woo your next big client, it can be easy to get caught up in doing whatever it takes to close a sale. What starts as a simple pitch can quickly turn into promising the moon if you let it. Starting down this slippery slope creates unreasonable expectations and sets your relationship with your prospect up for failure. When you overpromise and underdeliver, you develop a system of dysfunction that fosters lukewarm clients you won’t retain. But lost sales won’t be the only consequence; you’ll also form a culture of dysfunction within your team. RETENTION Employee retention should be at the top of every business owner’s mind. Depending on your industry, a new hire can cost thousands — even tens of thousands — of dollars. In light of today’s strong economy and low unemployment rate, many large businesses have shifted their hiring strategies to poach talent
So how do you avoid these pitfalls? The best place to start is by bonding the actions of your company and its teams to the values that make your business successful. Another key is to have confidence in the culture of your company. Many leaders succumb to the idea of overpromising and underdelivering out of fear. If you’ve created a dynamic that breeds creativity, accomplishment, and growth, you’ll never have to make promises in the first place.
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Either way, it’s critical intel.
In Episode 58 of my Speakeasy Marketing podcast, I shared some free tools that you can use to quickly figure out if your webmaster isn’t up to snuff, and I’ll tell you what you can do if Google penalized your site.
Your link should appear on the first page of Google. If not, it’s time to do a little more digging. And there are some great tools for that. I’ll tell you about those in a moment.
Head over to Google and type the following phrase into the search bar using your website name:
Follow the link below to listen:
speakeasymarketinginc.com/ podcast/episode-58-how-to-figure- out-if-your-site-has-been-penalized- by-google
site:www.yourwebsite.com
Why is this so important?
Google will then display all the results for your site. If the command returns no results, then you know Google either can’t see your site at all or you’ve been penalized.
Two reasons.
First, if Google isn’t indexing your site correctly, you’re not tapping into the most significant and most critical source of internet search traffic. Second, if someone else is managing your website for you, then you’ll know if they’re dropping the ball.
Here’s another way to find out:
Type your name (or your firm’s name) into Google and include your geographical location.
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RADIO ADVERTISING IS DEAD (OR IS IT?)
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When you write them the way I’m going to tell you to, they don’t sound like typical ads at all. They’re intriguing. They’re compelling. And they stand out from all the noise. So when your ad plays, potentials will actually stop, listen, and take action instead of turning the channel. Without exaggeration, my advice transforms radio ads from a waste of time and money into client-attracting cash cows. If you’re running radio ads now or considering it, this podcast episode could be the most profitable four minutes you’ll invest this week.
So then, do radio ads even work? Are they, in fact, a dead advertising strategy?
In the business classic “How to Win Friends and Influence People,” Dale Carnegie showed us that the secret to sales success builds on showing a genuine interest in other people and rests in the relationship that develops from there. The concept may not be much of a secret anymore, but it’s as important as ever in the sales cycle — and too many people aren’t following through on it. It turns out that Carnegie was onto something. Did you know that just 2 percent of sales happen during the first touch? 2 percent. Let that sink in. That means 98 percent of sales happen sometime after that first touch. In fact, ample research supports that 80 percent of sales happen after the fifth follow-up. If your sales team isn’t following up past that first touch with a prospect, there’s a slim chance they’ll convert. With the direct correlation between touches and conversion, it’s clear how important it is to follow up and nurture relationships with leads. We can look back to our good friend Dale Carnegie and thank him for sharing his wisdom about relationships. If you want to nurture and convert your leads, you’ll want to instill Carnegie’s principles into your sales team. Considering how many quality leads get away, there’s always room for improvement in developing relationships. How can you start building that lead relationship today? FOLLOW-UP, FOLLOW-UP, FOLLOW-UP It’s all about the follow-up — or lack of follow-up, if you’re wondering why your leads aren’t converting. You’ve probably experienced it yourself: You have a great interaction with a company and express interest in their product, but then you never hear from them again. That company just lost you, a hot lead. You can’t buy if you’re not presented with the opportunity to do so. Make it easy on your consumer base by implementing a follow-up system. IMPLEMENT A SYSTEM The habit of nurturing leads stems partly from company culture and partly from systems and processes — it’s something of a chicken/egg situation. If you don’t have systems in place to make follow-up part of your sales process, it’s not going to be a priority for your team. And if you don’t have a culture of determination and relationship- building in place, the systems and processes don’t matter. Entrepreneur and business transformer Robert Clay recommends a five-no strategy — follow up with a lead until you’ve heard no at least five times. THE SECRET TO LEAD CONVERSION It’s All About the Relationship
Not by a long shot.
Radio ads — done correctly — are not only alive and well, but for many of my clients, they’ve proven to be a virtually untapped client- producing gold mine. If you’re not running radio ads, I highly suggest you consider starting now as part of your overall marketing strategy. In a recent podcast, I reveal a few word-for-word examples that you can copy and deploy. Just modify the specifics to fit your firm. Want specific examples?
Listen in over here or download for later:
speakeasymarketinginc.com/ podcast/episode-47-radio- advertising-for-attorneys- does-it-work
‘REAL SECRETS OF ATTORNEY MARKETING LAW SCHOOL DARES NOT TEACH’
2nd Edition
• Five new chapters, live chat, what’s changing for personal injury attorneys marketing-wise in 2018, and more • Completely revised and updated for 2018 • Complimentary copy mailed or emailed upon request
Available on Amazon Kindle or by emailing rj@speakeasymarketinginc.com.
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ANSWERING THE PHONE: 10 POTENTIAL CLIENTS A MONTH? THE PERILS OF THE ‘OVERPROMISE, UNDERDELIVER’ MENTALITY THE SECRET TO LEAD CONVERSION HAS YOUR WEBSITE BEEN PENALIZED BY GOOGLE? RADIO ADVERTISING IS DEAD (OR IS IT?)
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RADIO ADVERTISING IS DEAD (OR IS IT?) A typical, ineffective, money- wasting attorney radio ad: that. The radio is flooded with me-too marketers who all copy each other’s ads.
HAS YOUR WEBSITE BEEN PENALIZED BY GOOGLE? I get a lot of calls from nervous attorneys who think Google might have penalized their website. This could be because, all of a sudden, their phones have gone silent or they’re getting fewer calls. Perhaps they’ve noticed their site isn’t ranking for the right keywords on Google.
Have you been arrested for a DUI? If so, contact the law firm of A, B & C! We’re experienced DUI attorneys who will fight for your rights and get you the results that you need. Call 555-1212 now and speak to an attorney at A, B & C Law Firm. We’re the best. In my experience, that’s useless junk that will fail miserably.
Everyone has heard that kind of self-aggrandizing propaganda so many times, for so many years that it’s now just static. It’s background noise. For any potential clients listening to the radio, it’s their cue to either tune out until the music kicks back in or change the channel immediately.
So now they’re terrified that Google has it out for them, and they aren’t sure how to find out or what to do.
Why?
Well, the first test is simple, and you can do it for your website right now.
For starters, every other attorney’s ad sounds just like
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