The time is right for your firm to expand its lead sources. You know you are too heavily reliant on a particular lead source and it is time to test and invest in another means of gathering leads for your law firm.
Let’s assume you are already running some campaigns on Google or Yahoo and you are working at your referral system and building professional AND client referrals. The bulk of your leads come from one seminar you hold monthly and you advertise for guests with an insert invitation to attend in a small monthly tab newsletter distributed in your community.
What’s left for you?
There are hundreds of ideas, no, thousands of lead generating ideas. Knowing which idea will yield the highest number of leads at the lowest dollar amount per lead as possible assuring the quality of the leads is a mystery that confounds every business owner. Let’s go over a few of the most commonly used lead gathering tactics.
Direct Mail-Within this category are several smaller ones. The way to do this well is to use a reputable marketing company who has access to demographic data for a very targeted selection of prospects. Cost is more than moderate, yet it may often yield precisely who you are looking for because of the sophistication of the lists.
TV Pay for Play Segments-Back in the day, a small business could weasel its way on to the morning shows by offering value in content and tips for a holiday or a season. Today, in many markets, there are morning shows who are happy to interview you and ask you provocative questions that really “sell” your services. For a price. These can be great sales tools depending upon who your market is. If you learn that your average prospect matches their viewership, it is a cheap way to market for a seminar or consultation, thus low per lead costs.
Social Media-improving options for Facebook campaigns make social media a growing choice to field curiosity. Again, depending who you are targeting, Facebook is a powerhouse with a billion users worldwide. Figuring out which type of ad is probably the biggest challenge for this emerging platform.
Education-Seminars are a popular way to connect with your leads. You are offering value by giving your time for free to educate them. They are “obligated” to agree to meet with you. This differs from the direct response options of having folks from the public directly agree to make an appointment by adding another step, the seminar. The idea is by the time they meet with you, they are ready to buy because they have been conditioned to do so.
As you weigh your decisions of which strategy to start next, you must keep a few things in mind.
- Assure that a system of tracking incidence of play and global costs is in place. Without this, you will find yourself in the same spot of not knowing what isn’t performing and what
- Measure your new source’s ROI. If you are aiming for a 4X ROI, keep in mind what your average client is worth, what your expenses are in full and study the results to determine what that ROI number is and whether you can reach it.
- Test Test Test. When you track, analyze and then become unhappy with the results, know it may not be the new source that is not working for you. It could be the message, the colors, the call to action or any number of other issues. Tweaking and retesting is the way to determine if you can make the new source work with different messaging or other changes, or if it should be abandoned for now.
- Naturally, with those leads that do not schedule right away, you will want to use the five senses of communication on them because “NO” today could mean “Not now” or “I need more convincing”. Be sure these leads are nurtured and followed up with just as any of your other leads that have yet to convert.
- Combine strategies. Sometimes your seminar strategy will work better with direct mail than it will with social media invitations. Sometimes your social media strategy will work to offer a book that will lead to an appointment when followed up.
Making the phone ring can be tricky. Yet, for your market and your practice area, you have a wide playing field to try new things. Creative thinking can pay off, but always, always, always, be sure to track, analyze, test, retest, follow up and repeat to gain the results you are seeking.
