INSIGHTS + GUIDANCE ON
THOUGHT-LEADERSHIP PR FOR LAW FIRMS
Positioning yourself as an expert in a narrow domain who can solve specific problems for specific clients requires less not more. In particular, it requires careful discernment and a tight, disciplined focus on one’s greatest strengths. In other words, it’s not about what can be added to one’s professional portfolio, but rather about what can be taken away.
Attending a conference without a well-defined plan is like setting sail without a compass. Every year, countless lawyers flock to various conferences, only to return with a handful of business cards they’ll never use and a vague sense of missed opportunities. This scenario is all too common and a clear indication of a crucial oversight: the lack of strategic preparation.
The study identifies five distinct profiles that define how professional services partners approach business development. Four of the five are negatively correlated with performance. Only the Activator shows a positive impact on performance and revenue (and it’s a significant impact). The Activator does the following: commits to business development, connects with clients and colleagues, and creates value in relationships.
Clients buy legal services from lawyers, not law firms. Firms invest heavily in their brands, but primarily for the purpose of empowering their attorneys to develop business themselves. Law firms lay the foundation. Individual lawyers need to build.
Selling legal services is relational not transactional. It takes time. It requires consistency. Unless you’re selling a commodity, which means you’re competing on price, you need to invest in relationships to attract and keep clients.
In their book, The Go-Giver, Bob Burg and John David Mann explain that, “All things being equal people will do business with, and refer business to, those people they know, like, and trust.”
A law firm website should be, or at least it can be, an exciting place for clients to learn new things. It should inspire action toward goals and be the first stop on a prospective client’s buyer’s journey. Done right, a law firm website can be the engine that drives a law firm’s growth.
Unfortunately, few law firms realize these benefits.
Lawyers need to be strategic in their approach on LinkedIn. And one of the most important strategic priorities is to create and share content that reaches the right audience. Indeed, the only way to make a really big impact as a lawyer on LinkedIn is to put your best content front and center.
Want to create viral content on LinkedIn that spreads beyond your immediate network and positions you as a thought leader in your space? Yes, of course, but the real question is: How?
In this post I dive deep into the issues of: (1) how to create compelling content, (2) how the LinkedIn algorithm works, and (3) in light of the way content spreads on LinkedIn, how lawyers can craft a smart content strategy to make their thought leadership reach a big audience.
According to the 2016 ABA Legal Technology Survey report, more than 93% of lawyers surveyed now use LinkedIn, with large firm attorneys using it the most. There’s a good reason for this—LinkedIn has almost 600 million members and is easily the most “target rich” social media platform for a lawyer with a business-oriented practice. LinkedIn is a professional network, which means that people are spending time there for the purpose of doing business. There is no doubt that LinkedIn is the best place online for lawyers looking to grow their networks and their practices.
The problem, however, is that too many lawyers use LinkedIn as a place to connect and scroll through other people’s posts, rather than as a tool to aid in business development. LinkedIn has everything a lawyer might need to establish relationships that lead to new business. It’s just a matter of leveraging the tools to best effect.
