Convert prospects into leads in NDAs

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so we've all been there a prospective client calls our firm or comes in for a meeting and is on the fence they're not sure if they're going to hire you to assist with their matter how do you convert that perspective lead to a client in today's Shawnee view three of the top tips I've used over the last 11 years to convert thousands of prospective clients to paying clients for our law firm welcome to the Josh Durban show because law school didn't teach business [Music] hi everybody and welcome to episode 10 of the Josh gurbin show this is the show where we talk about the business side of the practice of law and today I want to talk about how do you convert that potential client for your practice into a paying and engaged client in the 2019 legal marketplace there is simply more competition and more access to attorneys then consumers have ever had before and the argument is this has been great for consumers the access to law the access to good legal advice has been something that has been needed for years and years and years for US attorneys it creates a different problem all of a sudden we have a lot of competitors and there's a lot of different pricing options and a lot of different service options that clients are faced with when deciding on a lawyer so when a prospective client comes to your firm or spends 15 or 20 minutes with you on the phone in an initial conversation how do you convert that lead to a paying client this is a problem across industries but in the legal service industry has a unique solution so I have a unique situation I started our law firm in 2008 and have relied almost exclusively on internet-based leads to build our practice so we have prospective clients that are calling or emailing our firm daily up to 12 to 15 different prospective clients a day and we have to have a way of filtering out those leads to prospective clients that we want to deal with and then taking that subset of leads that we want as potential clients and converting them to clients so there are three things I've done over the years that we have converted thousands of leads to paying clients using these three tips so the first thing we do after talking to any potential lead is send them a follow-up email with our thought leadership information this could be articles we've written videos we've done podcasts we've recorded or even media hits we've gotten about the type of matter that they're inquiring about the second thing you need to do for a prospective client is provide clarity on fees the lawyer that can provide the most clarity on fees is likely to be the lawyer that that client is going to engage and the final thing you have to do is you have to follow up and ask for the sale the biggest mistake that any sales person makes in any industry and lawyers probably make exponentially larger than any other sales person out there is that you forget to ask for the sale hey here's the engagement agreement please sign on the dotted line please give me your retainer check asking the client to do those specific things is a far overlooked item so I want to go back and go through each of these items more specifically the first is following up with your thought leadership information any lawyer that is going to get the prospective client in is likely to give that prospective client some initial feedback on their case some potential strategy the lawyer could employ and you're probably doing the same thing and that's all well and good but the thing that will separate you from other lawyers is if you have thought leadership pieces that you can then send over to the prospective client to show them that you've been here before this is not your first rodeo without actually having to say that so for example our firm has a repository of videos about various different trademark issues ok so whether it's an issue about the ownership of a trademark about whether to file with your logo or not file with your logo all these different things all these different questions that we get from clients that if a client has that question in a consultation I can send a video to and say hey look we actually did a video on this and it's a common question we get and we have a really good answer for it or hey we did a podcast on this type of issue and we thought you'd find it interesting to listen to or finally here's a blog or a column I've written for a publication that discusses the types of things we were talking about our consultation and what these types of thought leadership pieces do is they reassure the potential client that you are the right person for the job because you've been there you've done that and heck you've even put out information about that particular issue there are a lot of lawyers out there that simply do not take the time to produce this type of content or have relationships with media where they can get columns posted or quoted in articles if you take the time and lay that foundation it will come back and help you immeasurably on every potential client that you're trying to convert to a paying client for your practice so this may not be something you can go out and start implementing today as far as what you can send your clients but what you have to do is start laying the groundwork you have to start recording videos you have to start writing articles getting in touch with the media trying to get yourself quoted in in media pieces about your particular subject area and if you lay this groundwork over the course of several years then when you get a prospective client and you're able to push all this information their way and show all the things you've done you're going to stand head and shoulders amongst your peers nobody's going to be able to compete with you because you can't this stuff you actually have to work and produce the content it is very difficult and time-consuming to do and not everybody's going to do it so if you actually do this you are gonna stand out against everybody else that appears to be offering the same type of services and the same type of fee structure that you're trying to offer the client so the second thing you need to do to convert a lead to a paying client for your practice is provide clarity on fees I think that that's the number one complaint that most people have about lawyers in general is that we charge an arm and a leg you never know what the bill is gonna be it's always a surprise if you can provide your client clarity on fees and confidence that you're going to handle their matter in a cost-effective way you are going to develop the trust needed for that client to sign the engagement form now if clarity on fees can come in a number of ways in our firm when it comes to doing a trademark filing or a trademark search we can offer a flat rate to the client for the particular work and the associated consultation time so there's not a you know an egg timer going when we get on the call with a client or there's not you know bill for every email they send us and we let them know that in advance so they can feel comfortable communicating with our firm they also know what the price will be before they even begin work and that is something that really lets us have a good relationship with somebody getting things going is there's not this worry about what the bills gonna look like in 30 days now you may say well Josh you know I have a complicated matter it's multiple stages we don't exactly know what the fees going to be because it depends on what the other party does or what the other side does what opposing counsel may force us to do in Discovery and that's all well and good I understand that too you know we handle trademark trial and appeal board matters and that is akin to litigation it's an Administrative Court in the trademark office where if somebody files a complaint you have to file an answer then there's a discovery conference then the parties could engage in discovery requests for documents depositions that type of thing it can get really expensive but the vast majority of those cases are going to settle at some point in early discovery or before so the way we explain the cost structure to clients is look there's going to be this initial cost typically a couple thousand dollars to get through the initial phase of the case so this could be the filing of the opposition the filing of the answer initial settlement discussions discovery conference maybe even preparing the initial discovery requests and then once we get to the next stage this is what the cost would look like it could be five or ten thousand dollars to respond to discovery depending on what it is what the questions are do we need to do a deposition so we can explain to them through the process what the different costs will be but we'll also explain to them where the settlement points are and what is more than likely to happen at each stage in the process so we can't give the client a definitive answer what the whole case could cost we can definitely give them some initial certainty as to what the first few steps will cost and then what the next stages would likely look like and we can revise that quote as we get into them depending on what happens with the case there's not going to be any other lawyer out there that's going to tell the client at least not a scrupulous lawyer that's gonna tell the client oh this case will only cost five thousand dollars from point A to point Z because nobody really knows that but by explaining to the client educating the clients the different stages of the process now the client has a guide that they can trust and they know that look I'm going into this forest I don't know the way but this lawyers been through the forest many times before and knows the way and a different cost along the way and so as we get to different posts in our journey we can stop and explain to the client where we are what the costs are and why this cost exists so coming back to converting this lead when you start at this initial process with a client and can show them very clearly what the first few months our first month will look like fee wise and then what things could get to later on and show them the path you're likely to take you're going to be giving them clarity on fees that they can then use to decide whether or not to engage your services and perhaps most importantly if the client does sign on the dotted line with you you're going to get somebody that's prepared to pay your fees and not somebody that you've lured in with oh just give me a $500,000 retainer and then you really need $20,000 to properly execute so you're going to get a client relationship that is the one you want where you're on the same page about what thick matter will cost and when they engage you you're not going to get a question every 30 days about how you're spending your time so the third point that I've used over the years that I think is vastly overlooked by many salespeople not even lawyers but just salespeople in general and keep in mind I consider all lawyers salespeople if you don't sell and you don't take the idea that you're actually selling your services because you know you're a lawyer new to good for sales you're never going to build a practice you have to think about everything you're doing with a potential client as a sales process and what would a sales professional do and the one thing that they teach you that every sales professional should do is ask for the sale if I have a prospective client and I need to close the deal and I give them some information right as we talked about I give them say hey here's some articles we've done here's some information and then I follow up and I give them clarity on fees and I explaining them what the fees will be the next thing I need to do is I need to say here is our engagement form it's going to cost whatever it is to engage us we always have a retainer to make sure they're serious so the way you engage us is you sign this and you write a check or you give me a credit card and we're off to the races by asking for that sale and showing the client exactly what they have to do to engage you now you've created that point that you're going to convert lead to a pain client and they might not they might not sign on the dotted line the first time you ask and if they don't that doesn't mean you just say oh I'm not gonna pressure that I'm not gonna ask them now we don't want to be emailing them every day calling them hey where's my engagement letter that's not what I'm talking about I'm talking about you determine based on the client should you follow up in two days four days a week but follow I would say hey I know I sent you my engagement form did you want to get started can you sign it and send it back with the check there's no harm in following up and asking somebody to complete the task you need them to complete to become your client if you simply wait around for people to call you and ask you for your engagement letter and how do I get started you're going to convert significantly less leads to paying clients than you would otherwise if you just simply ask for it and followed up appropriately so I hope you enjoyed today's episode I hope I got your creative juices flowing about what types of thought leadership pieces you could start building about how to provide your clients clarity on fees and how to just follow up and close the sale if you'd like to talk to me about things you've done over the years have been helpful and share it with our community please post in the comments below or drop me an email with things that have worked for you so we can have discussions about them on social media you could always find me on instagram Facebook Linkedin all those places we have profiles feel free to get in touch my email address is always Josh at Josh gurbin calm I'm always looking for feedback on these episodes or ideas for future shows we could do thank you so much for watching or listening if you're on our podcast and I look forward to seeing you next time [Music] you [Music]