With over 1.3 million lawyers in the United States alone (as reported by the American Bar Association), lawyers are often looking for ways to stand out from the crowd. And they need to if they want to be able to get some sliver of the market.
Email marketing is one of the most affordable and effective ways to market legal services. With an average return on investment of 122%, email marketing puts your message in front of the people you want to receive it. However, not all email campaigns are equal or as effective. Email marketing for law firms needs to be much more targeted than for most companies, so here are some tips to help you launch a successful email marketing campaign for your law firm.
Research Your Potential Clients
When you are first getting in touch with potential clients, it is important that you curate your message for that specific person or organisation. Not every potential client has the same wants, needs, or opinions about legal services. Therefore, it is important that you focus on your intended audience – who will be more likely to respond to the tailored email message you send.
You can use different reverse lookup services to learn more about potential clients so that you can customize your marketing message to them. You can also use public records for email marketing, which are a great source of publicly available information.
When you know more about your audience, you can better customize your marketing message and deliver content that is more meaningful to them. This strategy helps make your audience feel more special and gives you the benefit of being less likely to wind up in a spam folder.
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Segment Your List of Recipients to Send Personalized Emails
You should currently be collecting visitors’ and new clients’ email addresses as standard. However, you do not want to simply put all of these names and email addresses on a single email blast and send them all the same type of message.
Instead, you need to segment your list of recipients so that you can send personalized emails to groups such as:
- New clients – New clients should feel like they are part of your circle of trust and confidence. You may want to include information about you or your firm that helps them get to know you better and feel closer to you. You may also want to share information about your experience or how you handled a similar issue to the one they are confronting. Be competitive and include an automatic “onboarding” email to new clients (something that only 14% of lawyers are currently doing).
- Professional contacts – You may have additional contacts through professional organizations, LinkedIn, or other sources. These individuals may want to know your opinion about a recently released court decision or how you can complement their services. Use your emails to these contacts to reinforce the idea that you are an expert, so they will think of you when they need to refer clients to someone.
- Recent clients – Your marketing message to recent clients can focus on thanking them for choosing you and expressing that you are there in case they need more help in the future. You can also ask them to leave a review or to refer friends and family to your firm.
- Long-Standing clients – These individuals may want to learn more about changes in your law firm or new offerings. You can also include notifications about upcoming client appreciation days or other events. You may also want to include information about when clients should have their documents reviewed or some other information about recent developments so that they come to you for additional legal services.
Track Your Results & Optimize Your Emails
With today’s email marketing management systems, you can easily learn important information about your emails, including how often they were opened, whether the recipient clicked on something in the message, and how many resulted in obtaining a new client.
Since 61.9% of all emails are read over mobile devices, it makes sense to optimize your email for them. Nothing will turn off a potential client more than opening a message only to see that they cannot easily read it. People want what is easy, so do not make It harder for them to access your relevant content and marketing information.
You can also take advantage of the latest technology by sending your marketing messages at the optimal time of day and day of the week that is more likely to result in engagement.
Look at your reports, and make adjustments to your marketing campaign based on what is and is not working.
Conclusion
So, there you have it. A few simple steps that you can take to market your legal services and stand apart from the crowd. Using these tips can help you maximize your investment in email marketing.