There are so many types of marketing available for your personal injury firm – from traditional marketing to digital marketing. However, some businesses may overlook an excellent marketing source. Before TV, radio or the internet (yes, there was such a time), the best advertising was word of mouth, and it still is.
Marketing today is largely based on “cold” lead generation, with the “coolest” being digital advertising. Marketing through word of mouth is based on leveraging relationships; that is, communicating with flesh and blood and warm bodies. These relationships can and often do lead to referrals.
As personal injury attorneys, you have relationships you can leverage – family, friends, past and current clients, colleagues and a community with which you are involved. These people are valuable and hold the potential for significant business growth. It’s important to maximize your existing relationships to drive referrals.
Why referred clients make the best clients
Referred clients make the best clients for your personal injury law firm for the following reasons.
- Cost-per-referred client is low: A referred client doesn’t cost you anything near what it costs to attract new clients through other means. Other than the referrals that are totally free, the only other types of costs involved are referral-generating tools like email blasts, email newsletters and social networking.
- A reputation of trust: You can spend years building a reputation of trust and honesty on the internet, but when you build your law practice through referrals, you don’t have to worry about this very much. The word is already out, if someone is referring potential clients to you. Your friends, family, colleagues, past and present clients have already done the work for you. They are transferring their own trust of you to a referral. Marketers report that the conversion rate for referrals is approximately 70%, as compared to 25% based on other marketing outcomes.
- A pre-existing relationship exists: You’ve no doubt dealt with difficult clients before who have unrealistic expectations of the outcome of a personal injury case. However, when you sign up a referred client, this is rarely the case. That’s because a pre-existing relationship with the referred client already exists through the person who made the referral. This creates a mutual respect from the get-go.
- A source of future referrals: A happy client is the best advertisement you can have. Those clients that have been referred to you are usually the happiest with their outcome, or at least understand and accept the outcome. These are the people who create a chain of future referrals that can continue on for a long time to come.
We believe a combination of traditional and digital marketing and relationship leveraging is the best possible formula for your personal injury firm’s advertising. For maximum effect, you have to spend some money where you can on each of these areas to have the most successful marketing plan.
You don’t have to do it alone. Just give us a call and our experts and long-time professionals can help you create the best equation for your individual business.
Group Matrix Blog – May 16, 2018 – by Sharon Bowles
