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Getting Clients with No Marketing Budget

I’m a lawyer so I’m going to be talking about it as a lawyer. I have not tried this. I’m adapting from other business.

  1. Select your service. Be clear on the service you provide.
  2. Choose a niche within your service. It doesn’t mean that you turn down other niches. It only means you focus on one niche. It helps you better sell your services.
    1. Gov Claims
    2. Slip and Falls
    3. Uber
    4. what cases to other law firms not want to handle – fed tort claims
    5. unusual PI cases
    6. med mal
    7. elder abuse
    8. What groups of people can I target:
    9. ride share
    10. kids
    11. mentally handicapped
    12. crime victims
    13. small claims cases (not a good one)
    14. workers comp
    15. employment attorneys
    16. criminal defense attorneys
    17. medical providers
    18. could be by location also, or associations
    19. looking at associations is one way to find niches
  3. Use Linkedin (sales navigator)
    1. try the free trial
  4. optimize your linkedin profile
    1. with a headline that shows the benefit driven to your niche
    2. about section is long form sales copy
    3. testimony in the featured section
  5. scrape a list
    1. target deciison makers in your list
    2. targete people with less htan 50 employees and posted in the last 30 days
    3. export the list and make sure at least 80% are people you want to connect to
  6. message the list
    1. use Ulinc – automates linked in message
    2. focus on landing the connection – then warming them up to a phone call
    3. aim for connection rate of 20% and connect to 2500 people per month
    4. second messages go out 24 hours after first connection is made
    5. 3-4 msgs over hte next 21 days
  7. sales
    1. 15 min initial call
    2. act like a doctor
    3. ask about their stats to see if a good fit for you
    4. (notably for lead gen he recommends 2500 per month or 5k per month)
    5. use a pitch deck
  8. Zapier
    1. use zapier to add new connections to a google sheet and CRM
    2. also add connections emails to a custom audience and facebook and adroll

Anyway – that was from someone on twitter. What it tells you is the basic way to get clients using twitter and some automation. I think the core of the strategy is to find a niche, focus your message to that niche, then contact that niche. It can be done with personal injury like any other one. You have to add value to that niche. Like giving a talk, white paper, some educational info, joining a board. The problem with certain activities is the time commitment.

It does seem like targeting a niche is a better way to get some clients. Also cold calling, which this essentially is, is a good way to get in front of people when you don’t have money.

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Generating Content

The crazy thing about generating content is that you don’t know where it will lead.

When I was in law school someone told me to write an article and get it published once a year. This was before social media was as popular as it is now.

The idea with writing an article is that it shows competency and credibility. Also it leverages the publications audience. It is a tried and true method like public speaking. In fact I think that speaking and writing are the two greatest leverages of talent ever. It allows you to get in front of an audience and demonstrate competency. The alternative is to buy leads.

Even if you are working on building a network you need to generate content to demonstrate competency.

I suppose another way to demonstrate competency is to have accomplishments. But shouting accomplishments are a dime a dozen. In my field many lawyers claim big settlements and verdicts. Some have accomplished a lot. But how do you distinguish yourselves from that crowd. You are unique in your own way. Your personality will click some some people and rub others the wrong way. You need to find your tribe.

Anyway, I followed that plan that was told to me as best I could. I wrote articles and was published in local legal magazines.

The first article I wrote was about distinguishing similar causes of action. The difference between a medical malpractice case and elder abuse complaint is a few words. Those words mean the difference between having damages capped versus getting attorneys fees.

So I put it out into the universe, and low and behold someone calls me up. They had a case. I pitched it to the firm I was at and they didn’t want it. I pitched it to the firm I later joined and they agreed to take it. I worked it up and handled a lot of the case. The partners took the depositions and did work on the case. It eventually settled for a good amount of money and I got a piece of it. I used that to pay down student loans right away.

The article demonstrated my competence. I leveraged an audience. I got a lead. I did it again with a blog post I wrote for a networking group.

To get leads, you need to get in front of an audience and have them trust you. Get in front of an audience by various methods: cold calling, ads, leveraging an audience. Develop trust by demonstrating competency, acting like a normal person in social settings, show consistency, etc. You then need to maintain the relationship. Provide something of value. Information, access to your networking, something like that.

What I like about content generation is that it lives a long time and can be repurposed. It also helps crystalize thoughts. I have a lot of knowledge from practicing law over 13 years. That’s a long time. I’ve handled crazy cases. I’ve done some hard stuff. Kids on the internet leverage 6 months of knowledge to build education empires. They dropship garbage. I don’t want to be a pure businessman selling tshirts or trinkets. It is like a super powered salesperson at a tourist trap. Educational products are interesting. Look at the doctors and lawyers who are most successful. Either you develop a tool or system that you can sell, you develop a business, or you develop a skill into something highly technical. The problem with the highly technical side is that you lack the business side and then need to partner with a business person. Also with the highly technical side it all rests with you. When you stop working, it all stops working. You can develop tools and systems while creating the business. You can create educational products as an offshoot of creating training. You can still become highly specialized while creating the business. That is what makes most sense.