Guy Alvarez is the CEO of Good2BSocial, a digital marketing consultancy that helps law firms & companies in the legal industry grow.
getty
Account-based marketing (ABM) can be an effective growth strategy for law firms. ABM involves identifying key accounts and then directing marketing campaigns to key decision-makers at those companies. It’s a multistep process, and in my experience, one of the most important steps is conducting research on your clients.
ABM Overview
The goal of ABM is to grow your firm’s revenue by gearing marketing campaigns to a select group of clients and prospects. First, you need to determine which clients and prospects you would like to target based on your firm’s business objectives. Not all clients are created equal. Certain clients are more lucrative for the firm from a revenue perspective.
An ABM strategy enables you to target your marketing efforts to clients and prospects that align with your growth goals. While ABM can be used to target both new clients and cross-sell your services to existing clients, this article will focus on existing clients.
Researching Clients
Many law firms don’t do enough research on their existing clients. Conducting research—which I’ll dive into more below—is necessary to understand the challenges, problems and opportunities they’re facing. By understanding these issues, you can provide proactive, valuable advice to your clients in addition to selling incremental services that they need or will need in the foreseeable future.
MORE FOR YOU
Creating Added Value
As a law firm, your goal is to be a trusted adviser to your clients and provide them with added value beyond traditional legal services. In order to provide added value, you need to take a deep dive and learn about trends, challenges and opportunities. Researching what’s going on in your client’s business, industry and competitive landscape and understanding how new laws could impact them will position you to provide proactive advice while standing at the ready to offer new services to your client as needed.
Cross-Selling More Services
When servicing their accounts, law firms tend to be reactive rather than proactive. They don’t spend a lot of time talking to clients except for when there is work to be done. But asking clients how they’re doing can provide your firm with valuable information about what’s going on in their business and whether they may be in the market for more of the services you can provide. By understanding the needs of your clients, you can position yourself to provide incremental services as needed.
Client Interviews
A great way to find out what clients think of your firm and the services you provide is to ask them. Some law firms conduct client interviews on a periodic basis. Other firms are afraid to do this since they fear hearing anything negative. But negative feedback can be a great first step in rectifying a situation that could lead to a lost account or hold you back from gaining incremental business.
Client interviews should not just be about how your law firm is doing but how the client is doing. Use these sit-downs to find out what new initiatives clients are embarking on and what problems and challenges they are facing. Ask your clients where they see themselves a year or five years from now. What’s their growth strategy? These are questions that law firms typically do not ask, but they can help you learn valuable information about new ways that you can provide added value and additional services to your clients.
By doing client interviews, you can also find out how the client perceives your firm, which is very important. For instance, large clients that work with several law firms may place them in specific buckets based on their perception of the firms’ strengths and abilities. A client may use your firm strictly for tax work and other law firms for litigation and employment law. The client may perceive your firm as a tax law specialist and not realize you have significant capabilities in other areas where they need help.
Understanding the perception your clients have about your firm is important in developing strategies to not only change your clients’ perceptions but to help you gain more business from that particular client.
Third-Party Research
If you ask clients how you’re doing, they may not answer honestly. Many people struggle with telling a service provider to their face that they are unhappy with their services.
An alternative is engaging and hiring an outside company to conduct client interviews on your behalf. This may enable you to get more honest answers about their perceived deficits of your firm and what you can do to improve your services.
Industry Research
To keep up with trends in your clients’ industries, read in-depth industry reports from research companies and subscribe to trade publications that cover the sector. Joining a trade association or industry-specific bar association and attending the organization’s events is another effective way to keep up with industry trends and learn who the major players are.
Putting It All To Use
Once you have collected information about your clients’ challenges, opportunities and perceptions of your firm, you will be ready to capitalize on that information by developing value propositions.
Say you provide employment law services for an equipment vendor. From your research, you may discover your client recently extended a large order on credit to a customer that has since declared bankruptcy. Through your research, you may also have learned that your client thinks of you as strictly an employment law firm when, in fact, you have several other robust practice areas, including a concentration in bankruptcy and creditors’ rights.
The Takeaway
Many law firms do not conduct research on their clients. But by finding out what challenges and opportunities your clients are facing—as well as how they perceive your law firm—you can seize the chance to provide your clients with added-value advice while marketing additional services to them when they need them.
Forbes Agency Council is an invitation-only community for executives in successful public relations, media strategy, creative and advertising agencies. Do I qualify?
Go to Source
Author: Guy Alvarez, Forbes Councils Member
