My computer died last weekend.  Problems began with a blank screen and when I tried to reboot, nothing happened.  The “experts” at a computer supply store couldn’t figure it out, but did refer me to a local one-man shop.  He told me in about 15 minutes after some Internet research, and taking the back off the laptop, that it was the motherboard in combination with the graphics card.  With this particular computer model, he said he gave up trying to fix the problem, because he had learned from previous experience (and unhappy customers), the problem was likely to return in six to eight months.  He referred me to someone else. I decided to buy a new computer.

In all he spent about 40-45 minutes with me, and didn’t charge me!!  I said “aw, come on, certainly I owe you for your time,” but he refused.  He suggested I purchase a Gateway (didn’t know they still made them), Toshiba or Dell, since I was insisting on sticking with Windows 7.  Now, do you think I will refer others to him, if I get a chance? Of course!!

Bottom line:  received my new Dell Wednesday, and even though I had a recent backup of my hard drive, who do you think I went to transfer my old hard drive to the Dell? Duh! And I didn’t even ask him what he charges to do that. It’s call trust.

Which brings me to today’s meditation from my old standby 365 Marketing Meditations: Daily Lessons for Marketing & Communications Professionals  by Larry Smith and Richard Levick of Levick Strategic Communications.  It is: “The best client giveaway is information. They’ll value it enough to pay for more.”  Amen.

Those changes are discussed in two posts by Sara Randazzo on The AmLaw Daily (here and here) and include:

• Lesser demand for legal services currently (although Georgetown- Peer Monitor study had demand  increasing slightly by 0.5%;
• “Too many lawyers chasing too little work”;
• Slower increase in billing rates;
• Client pressure for more discounts and alternative fees;
• Forty percent of lateral hires (apparently in attempts to increase market share) are unsuccessful;
• Requirements for increased capital contributions as bank LOCs are less available; and
• “Historic lows” in realization rates (82.5%) in AmLaw 100 firms.

What does all this have to do with marketing, you may ask?  Everything, actually.

Other than the need to get hungry enough to ensure your law firm gets its fair share of the legal business out there, especially in light of the highly competitive marketplace (not just from other law firms I might add), it is more crucial today than ever that firms do a lot of smart marketing.

So, in light of greater client scrutiny over rates, less overall legal work, too many lawyers, and basically just a mature industry, one highlight from the Georgetown-Peer Monitor study by Randazzo says it all in one bullet point in my mind:  “Competition is increasing among firms, meaning that ‘the only way (short of a merger) for a firm to capture market share is to take it from another firm.’”

That takes marketing, and that’s why it is critical that firms demand greater business development efforts from their partners today.

Additionally, I’ve heard many a lawyer say that they are too busy to do marketing.  When delving further, it usually means “don’t want to, ain’t gonna.”  If a lawyer is really busy doing client work that she enjoys for enjoyable clients, then I’ll extend a pass… for this week.  Because no matter what, the pipeline needs to be fed and kept flowing. Furthermore, the “busyness” often complained about involves non-productive time doing things that other lawyers or administrative staff could do more effectively and efficiently.

That is why I got a kick out of a recent discussion on LinkedIn’s Law Practice Management Professionals Group. The question was asked as to whether 20% (or one day per week) of a lawyer’s time spent on business development was too much.  One person responded that “is way too much time;” and proceeded to equate the time (assuming an 8-hour day) to lost revenue of 8 times (let’s say) $250 per hour = $2000 lost.  Of course, it is “silly” (I’m trying to be nice here) to assume that if you aren’t spending “too much” time developing business you would otherwise be billing clients for those same hours.

In the end it is foolish to put a number on what is too little or too much time spent on marketing, client work, admin, recreation and, hopefully, family time.  What is important is to spend all of the time doing all of those things necessary for you to be a successful lawyer in a well-rounded sense, and serve clients well.  If you have client work that needs to be done, do it. But don’t overlook the need to be generating more.  If you don’t have enough work to sustain your life style long term, best to think about how to spend more time – a lot more time – effectively developing business now.

Do I think you might ever spend too much time on marketing? Not a chance!!

As Taylor points out, the old saying “It’s not what you know, but who you know” (1951, G. P. Bush and L. H. Hattery in an article on obtaining federal employment in Science magazine) is not applicable to lawyers, of course.  But don’t downplay the value of who you know, and who you know that can help you get legal work.

It’s what networking is all about. And Taylor’s and Westfahl’s tips can be helpful to any lawyer, since it is not taught as part of the core curriculum in law schools.  So, the networking tips mentioned include:

• Keep in touch with law school classmates (and with college and high schools ones as well – surprising how that little nerd in junior high turned out to be very successful).  You should reach out and touch your contacts on a quarterly or least semi-annual basis to catch up and stay top of mind.  Don’t wait until you need their help with an introduction;
• Identify groups of good contacts, and build those newer, external relationships as well;
• Offer to help them with their goals (based on the idea “give to get”); and
• Use social media as a tool (but don’t forget that networking is personal, and face-to-face meetings are still important).

New lawyers should not overlook the importance of maintaining and developing networks, just because they are busy learning the skills needed to be a good lawyer.  Nor should partners who have not got as effective a network as they would like, since it is not too late to reconnect with those former classmates and other contacts they have ignored for many years.

“All marketing is even more local than politics. Marketing is one person at a time.”

We are in the personal service business, which means that we need to get just that – personal.
And that is done one person at a time.  Whether that is face-to-face or via social media, it is still one person at a time.  Surrogates can’t do it for you in the end.

This is more critical today.  If you aren’t sure about that, just read Jennifer Smith’s post on WSJ’s Law Blog entitled “Law Firm 3^rd Quarter Checkup” from last week.  The state of the legal business is NOT good.  All the more reason to be undertaking more marketing and business development, and doing so by focusing on one person at a time.  Oh yeah, and since it is hunting season that means focusing with a rifle, rather than a shotgun.

Those are two very good reasons for turning down work, but there is another.  And that is that your time could be better spent developing business with clients you would really like to represent doing the kind of work you have a passion for.

But first, the dangers associated with the first two reasons mentioned:

• Working outside your scope.  Today’s legal world is more complex, and a lawyer simply cannot be competent in all areas.  Screw up and you got a grievance, or worse, a malpractice claim on your hands (and the time it will take to respond to either will be significant); and
• Representing problem clients. They will take too much of your time, energy and generally make you miserable.  Trust your gut, Carter suggests and I agree.  Further, your heart may not be in their matter, and the chances of creating a problem mentioned in the bullet above could result.

Equally important, it takes time from seeking the clients and work you should be looking for. See below several earlier posts of mine emphasizing that your time would be better spent on business development than on incompatible work/clients.

Even if you don’t see the value in turning down (unsuitable work/clients) to free up time to develop the kind of clients and work you do want (to your own detriment in my view), at least give strong consider to Carter’s final thoughts:  “I didn’t change careers to become a lawyer to be miserable, or to set myself up for a bar complaint.”

Neither should you.  At times, it is just nuts to NOT turn down work.

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Don’t Dilute Your Niche In a Down Economy  http://bit.ly/RtKAMz

Be a Better Marketer by Saying “No” Sometimes http://bit.ly/TrF8zX

The comments to her piece included a couple of ways to pose the question as to why the firm lost.   One is to ask what the firm could have done better, and the other is to ask why the other firm won.  I prefer the former approach myself, since the latter comes off more as a challenge to their decision making IMHO.  But, one should use the approach they are most comfortable with.  The important thing is to ask.

As I mentioned in a comment to that discussion, not only should a firm do a post mortem when it loses, but when it wins a competition as well.  The reason is simple.  You may not have won for the reasons you think, and you may not be so lucky the next time.  So, it is important to know why you won (or why the other firm lost).

Back in 2008, I did a blog post relating to such an experience when I was in-house.  We won a competition, but not for the reasons we thought.  We were told that the other firm had a better proposal and why, but they lost because they sent an uninformed attorney to the oral presentation.  Oops.  We were happy and enlightened, but not so cocky after asking.

Here’s a brief synopsis of what it contains:

• Supply and demand is catching up with lawyers.  There are too many lawyers*, new law schools being created (with ABA scrutiny being “less than rigorous”) since they are money-makers for universities, and, most importantly, there aren’t enough jobs.  According to the upcoming book Failing Law Schools by Brian Tamanaha law schools are producing 45,000 new graduates annually, while it is projected that there will only be 25,000 legal jobs available per year through 2018; and
• Technology is changing everything from online non-lawyer documents to virtual law firms.

So, what are smart lawyers to do?  According to Calloway:

1. Pay attention to what is going on in the industry.  There is a new normal, and lawyers need to be tuned-in to trends (and reality I might add);
2. Focus on legal project management and legal process management to be more efficient, and generate legal products/documents from “A to Z” to be at the ready— so lawyer time is spent on what is unique to a matter, rather than the repeatable routine; and
3. Recognize and utilize the digital world in your workflow.  Although the paperless office never did (or will) happen, adopt more computer files on your network and Internet to be accessible to everyone who needs them, and so they are available remotely.

Bottom line: the legal world is changing in many ways, including downward pressure on fees.  Unless lawyers are more efficient (via project and process management), develop better systems to work smarter and in less time, and accept alternative fee structures (e.g., fixed fees) that work for clients and for lawyers, the new normal ain’t going to work so good.

And that’s where marketing comes in.  If lawyers accept the new normal and adapt to it, including with systems, document assembly and greater efficiencies, and let clients/referral sources/prospects know about it, they will be more successful in landing all the work they can handle.

*Sharon Nelson, president-elect, Virginia State Bar interjects that 22% of law students think it’s “a bad idea to be in law school” in light of the climate for jobs.

Jamie Field on her Enlightened Rainmaking blog starts a post on the subject by telling a kindergarten joke to make a point ; to wit:  “Why do you go to bed at night? Because the bed won’t come to you.”  (yes, I did smile, Jamie.)  Her point is that it is important to go where you clients are.

She provides two simple suggestions:

• Online.  Hang out and be social by contributing meaningful content (not just promote yourself, which happens too often on LinkedIn IMHO) on the social networks that your clients are involved in.  Join the right groups and raise your profile by listening and providing value to the discussions; and
• In-Person.  Attend conferences, meetings, etc. that have the greatest potential for running into your clients and others like them (and good referrals sources, I might add).

That way you won’t lose sleep worrying about why your clients don’t come to you!

In either case, a narrow niche is still better, if there is enough work out there for your niche in the first place. Trey Ryder has an article in his recent newsletter that advocates for a narrow niche as well. We both agree that “the more narrow your niche – and the more effective your marketing program – the more your practice will soar.”

He cites the case of a lawyer who represented a city against the manufacturer of faulty plastic pipes used in a water utility system. After he was successful, “another city came to him. Then another and another.” Presumably, he focused on letting other cities know about his practice, and now “attracts clients from all over the country.”

So, even those in smaller markets can have a broader regional, even national, practice with a recognized and specialized niche.