From the Los Angeles Daily Journal
This is no time to be coy — attorneys should tap all of their contacts in order to bring in continued business in this economy.
Posted with the permission of Daily Journal Corp (2009).
By Tracy Olmstead Williams
Olmstead Williams Communications
In today’s environment, everyone needs to be responsible for generating revenues for themselves and their clients. Traditionally, public relations helps attorneys get quoted in newspapers and legal trade publications, and secures them an NPR interview or a spot on CNBC. PR helps identify and set up speaking opportunities to raise the profile of the firm and its individual attorneys spotlighting their successes and expertise. But in the current economy, the best strategy is less about building an image or branding a firm and more about creating relationships between clients and contacts.
Attorneys typically do not want introductions and meetings to be too transactional. They like to keep the marketing at arm’s length. Those days have passed. The present demands a new straight-forwardness.
This is not a time to be coy. It’s time to call all of your contacts, meet people for breakfast, lunch, coffee, drinks, dinner and host events, join networking groups and be out in the world meeting the other people still doing business in the current downturn. It’s also time to get everyone in your firm to engage in this effort. It should be transparent to them, but first you have to make it transparent to yourself by clearly identifying who refers business to you, what business they’ve referred and most importantly, how you met. This forms the Venn diagram of your referral network, a roadmap for business development.
