Show Them What You ve Got Tips on Marketing Presentation to the Women Lawyers Symposium: Partner, Ogilvy Renault LLP, Ottawa, Ontario February 2010

Transcription

1 Show Them What You ve Got Tips on Marketing Presentation to the Women Lawyers Symposium: Fostering and Celebrating Success Martha A Heale Martha A. Healey Partner, Ogilvy Renault LLP, Ottawa, Ontario February 2010

2 A market is never saturated with a good product, but it is very quickly saturated with a bad one. Henry Ford This may seem simple, but you need to give customers what they want, not what you think they want. And, if you do this, people will keep coming back. John Ilham 2

3 Ten Marketing Tips 1. Know your clients, visit them and communicate with them 2. Be aware of your clients concerns 3. Market internally and externally and recognize valuable resources and connections 4. Be a discriminating joiner, get involved and develop networks 5. Not everything should cost consider value added services 6. Focus your marketing efforts 7. Create marketing opportunities 8. Don t limit your market 9. Seek out and listen to feedback 10. Take advantage of technology 3

4 Know Your Clients Interact with your clients professionally and socially Maximize the opportunities to meet with your clients face to face in their offices Avoid the temptation to communicate only via electronic means Structure of the client operations on a broad corporate scale Key client policies i.e. chain of command, hospitality Learn about the industry in which they conduct business Who are their key competitors? Key customers? Learn the vocabulary of their industry What are the regulatory challenges that they face? 4

5 Be Aware Of Your Clients Concerns What keeps your clients up at night? Do you know? Industry developments? Client developments? How can you help them? 5

6 Market Internally And Externally The cardinal rule: Excellent service is the minimum standard! News spreads of both good and bad work/service Whether you work as a sole practitioner or in a small, medium or large firm, consider your colleagues and your contacts and business and social networks as potential sources of work referrals Remember your own personal contacts today s friend or colleague could be tomorrow s client Keep in touch with contacts from social groups, university days, law school colleagues in other parts of the country could be a good source of referral work If possible, give back to those who refer work to you Recognize valuable resources do you have a marketing group within your office? If so, get to know them! Investigate opportunities to obtain formal recommendations and further credentials 6

7 Be a Discriminating Joiner Make careful decisions about the organizations and groups that you join If you join a group, commit to being involved As a priority, join the groups most linked to your target client group Develop networks and networking opportunities Investigate opportunities to obtain formal recommendations and further credentials 7

8 Value Added Services Not everything should cost Clients are looking for that something extra the X factor Keep an eye open for industry/legislative/governmental policy developments it could help to understand your client What can you add for your client? This will take time it is an investment t you are making in your clients and in your practice Sample value added services: client bulletins, telephone calls to advise of new developments, client summaries of work in progress (some of this may be billable) and to provide status review of work, client education seminars and lessons learned meetings 8

9 Not All Marketing Opportunities Are Created Equal Once you start looking, marketing opportunities abound Be selective! Be careful not to spread yourself too thin a superficial effort will be noticed Quantity is not necessarily equivalent to quality Decide where you want to spend your marketing time and develop your marketing opportunities accordingly Targeted client development in a particular sector or industry? Broad based exposure for general services? Avoid trying to be all things to all clients 9

10 Create Marketing Opportunities Media opportunities is there a particular reporter who covers your area? Investigate industry associations, meetings and conferences Investigate industry/sector focussed publications Charitable events 10

11 Don t Limit Your Market Consider the entire scope of your practice is it local, l national, international? ti Keep that range in mind when assessing marketing opportunities and stay open to marketing opportunities outside the local area Pay to play publications assess whether they worth the investment 11

12 Seek Out And Listen To Feedback Follow up with your clients and ensure they received the service and work they needed don t wait until you suspect there is a problem You may not know there is a problem/issue unless you ask Where possible, may be useful to have someone else interview the client Some problems can be fixed very easily others, if left unresolved, will cause the loss of a client News of good/poor service will spread! (A client tells two other contacts, and they tell two contacts and so on and so on and so on ) If there is a problem try to resolve it quickly a face to face meeting may be the best way to address an issue 12

13 Take Advantage Of Technology Computer as a general source of information Invest in security to safeguard/secure electronic communications Social media what is it and who is using it? Blogs Social networks LinkedIn Twitter Who s s tweeting? Facebook 13

14 What s all the fuss about social media? 14

15 Social Media Blogs are now commonplace and widely used and accepted Linkedin has 50 million users (Oct 2009) and is business oriented Twitter is the fastest growing social network in the world Youtube is now the second leading search engine, is bigger than Yahoo and accounts for 25% of all Google searches 15

16 Social Media - Forms Blogs Social Networks (LinkedIn, Facebook, MySpace, etc.) Micro-blogging (Twitter) Collaboration (Wikis, social bookmarking, social news, opinion sites) Media sharing (YouTube, Flickr, Last.fm, Justin.tv) Virtual worlds (Second Life) 16

17 Blogs Demonstrate thought leadership Rank higher in web search than traditional websites Are widely accepted Many lawyers have blogs focusing on a specific area (i.e. employment law, IP, corporate, etc.) Not for everyone though High level of passion/engagement on the part of the owner Must make time to post regularly Have something to contribute 17 Must be accurate!

18 Cross-Border Biotech Blog Jeremy Grushcow of OR 18

19 Canadian Securities Law Online Stikeman Elliott 19

20 Cleantech in Canada Microsite Seminar series developed by Ogilvy Renault, Deloitte and MaRS 20

21 Online Social Networks Linkedin Facebook Plaxo Legal OnRamp MHConnect JDSupra 21

22 LinkedIn: What s the buzz about? Over 50 million registered users Business focus As closed or wide a network as you want it to be More and more business people are using their networks to find people Well suited for professional services Find and join (or create!) groups relevant to your areas of practice/interest 22

23 Linkedin Functionality of Interest Status 23

24 Linkedin Functionality of Interest Slideshare 24

25 Twitter: what is it good for? 25

26 Twitter 6 million + users Over 27.3 million Twitter messages (Tweets) per day (this was 3M last year) Fastest growing social media tool US government asks Twitter to postpone p maintenance to gather intelligence on Iran protests Brief text messages of 140 characters ac or less Send tweets via Twitter website, your mobile phone (by app or SMS) or by 26

27 Twitter in the News If people you wish to influence are using Twitter, then your business should be there too. It s as simple as that. You go where your market is. 27

28 Law firms are tweeting! 28

29 See also Gowling Lafleur Henderson LLP McCarthys Stikeman Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP Torys LLP Faskens Davis LLP Burke Roperston LLP Hicks Morley Wildeboer Dellelce LLP 29

30 How you can use Twitter Research tool Marketing 30 A great source of info on what the firm is doing

31 But What About Facebook??? 31 Great for personal use but don t recommend for corporate purposes. However, this might change as things evolve.

32 Take-aways Much of the business world is moving into these forums quickly It is not for everyone BUT everyone should be aware of what it is Can be powerful marketing tools if used correctly Becomes part of your thinking and your lifestyle l Destination websites are evolving. Most search will likely converge through Google and Twitter Lawyers and law firms cannot ignore these tools 32

33 Take-aways Social media does not replace standard methods of developing business speaking at conferences and seminars, building referral sources, writing articles, etc. But it can help in enhancing what you are already doing. If you are going to blog or tweet, t be professional about what you say. Keep in mind that you are representing the firm. Twitter is a micro-blogging platform in its essence. If you don t have the time to commit to a blog, Twitter might be that compromise that allows you to have an effective online presence. 33

34 Should we start blogging or Twittering right away? Not necessarily Requires commitment t Need to have an interest/passion for it Definitely not for everyone But you should be aware of it and whether it may be useful to your practice. Every tool has the potential for good or for bad. Social media is no exception. 34

35 RESOURCES Kevin O'Keefe's blog former lawyer who started a company advising law firms on web and social media. Doug Jasinski's blog - Tom Kane: - A Blog Dedicated to Lawyer Marketing in any Size Firm LawPRO Social Media Issue Volume 8, Issue 4, December 2009 CNW Report on Social Media and Canadian Law Firms NW_LawFirms_SM.pdf 35

36 QUESTIONS? Martha Healey Ogilvy Renault LLP Ottawa, Ontario The author acknowledges, with gratitude, the invaluable advice and input of Lisa Azzuolo and Sameer Dhargalkar, Ogilvy Renault, Marketing. 36