Yesterday I was privileged to be one of the speakers at the Suffolk County Women's Business Enterprise Coalition annual business expo and luncheon. For those of you that missed the event, here's a brief synopsis of yesterday's presentation:
Don't know where to start when creating your first marketing plan? Return to the basics - all you really need are 5 Ws and 1 H:
Start with Why – what is the purpose of your marketing?
Think both 'globally' and 'locally': What do you want to accomplish with your marketing plan in the next six months? What do you want to accomplish with each individual marketing activity?
Do you want to increase your client base in a certain practice area, expand into a new practice area, or generate new business from existing clients, etc.?
Think carefully about why you are embarking on a marketing plan. If you’re working in a firm, make sure all of the key players are on board with your purpose. Your marketing purpose must be closely tied to your main business goals for the same time period.
The three sides of Who – You, your competition and your target market
Once you know the Why (purpose) of your marketing, it’s time to move on to ‘Who.’
In order to market effectively, you need to know yourself and your firm and your values. This is particularly important because often, clients are a reflection of you. What are your strengths and weaknesses? What are the individual players’ strengths and weaknesses? Are some people within the firm better suited to specific marketing goals? Are some people a better ‘fit’ for particular clients or types of clients? What kinds of people do you work best with? What kinds of matters are you most skilled at, and what do you like the best?
Next, look at the competition. What is it that the competition isn’t providing to the market? How can you differentiate yourself from the competition? What are their strengths and weaknesses? How do those strengths and weaknesses provide you with potential opportunities?
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, you need to examine your target market. You may have multiple target markets if you have multiple lawyers within your firm, or multiple practice areas. Depending on your purpose, your target audience may include:
* Existing clients
* Referral sources
* Strategic alliances
* New Business/potential clients
What – (And so what?): your core marketing message
Once you’re fully familiar with your target market (or markets) and you know what you want to accomplish, you need to define the client’s problems or challenges. Why is the client seeking legal advice? What is it that they hope to accomplish? What kind of services do they want to receive? What do your strategic alliances or referral sources need?
Second, consider what it is that you offer – again, thinking from the client’s perspective. Instead of talking about the features or services that you provide by focusing on you and your firm, focus on the benefits that the client will receive.
What are the benefits to the client? Your core marketing message is built around your client’s problems and your solution to those problems – the benefits that they will receive as a result of working with you. Your core marketing message – and all of your marketing materials – have to answer the ‘so what?’ test. How will your services help your client solve their problem in a better or more effective way? Why does your audience care about what you're saying?
How – choosing marketing tools and activities
It seems that new marketing tools are developed every day. In addition to writing articles, giving seminars, networking, brochures and websites, now we have blogs, social networking, podcasts and more.
Look at your strengths and weaknesses to determine which tools are right for you and for those in your firm, and which are the best fit for your target market. If you’re a horrible writer and don’t have the patience to write articles but you’re gregarious and are a good speaker, writing articles might not be the right fit for you, but giving seminars, presentations and networking might be more suitable.
Don't forget to consider your budget when choosing marketing tools and activities as well.
Follow up is crucially important to your marketing efforts so be sure to decide how you plan to follow up with new contacts in your marketing plan. Keeping track of contacts and creating a schedule of follow up methods will ensure that you stay ‘top of mind’ when a client or contact has a problem or a referral.
Where – gathering places
In order to be effective, your marketing message actually has to reach your target audience. You’ll need to know where your clients and potential clients gather – whether it’s on the web at certain websites or list serves or at industry meetings. What do they read? What common interests do they have? Where do they go for other advice?
When?
There’s one more thing to consider in your marketing plan – timing. By now, you know who your target audience is, what they need, and where they turn for help. Start looking for patterns in terms of timing as well.
Do most of your clients seek help at a certain time of the year? Is there a specific event that usually or often triggers them to seek help? Do existing clients re-evaluate their legal needs at the end of the fiscal or calendar year? These can be valuable clues about when you should time your marketing and business development efforts.
Timing your efforts also requires you to plan your business development and marketing so that you have consistent cash flow. Too many lawyers market feverishly when they have no work coming in and then ignore marketing entirely once the work starts coming in, creating a feast or famine cycle.
There are many ways that you can create a marketing plan and certainly more detail and more elements that could be discussed. But asking yourself the simple questions Who, What, When, Where, Why and How is a good start.
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