The Wheel of Engagement
At first glance, online electronic media are rapidly becoming the new seductive tools for approaching clients - not just through websites and blogging, but all the new and constantly expanding social networking innovations. However, such media are "broadcasting" in the purest sense of that now quaint word. They may reach a few potential clients, but they also reach many more people who don't have the slightest interest in the law firm. And the firm is paying for all those disengaged listeners, in terms of the time that consistent online marketing requires. The far better alternative for any firm is to focus on existing clients. Bond with them, serve them in ways that create loyalty, and have these very same clients be your advocates with others. For such clients, you don't need the Internet. You need to visit and talk with them to learn what you can do to expand work with them, and get referrals from them to expand work with new clients.
There is a simple way to visualize this process. Draw two circles, a large one and in the center of it a small one. The center circle is you, the lawyer; the large outer circle is the whole of your client base. From the center circle draw a spoke to the outer circle rim, one spoke for each area of your practice: tax law, family law, real estate matters, whatever the case may be. Finally, on the outside of the bigger circle, draw lines adjacent to each of the practice spokes. On those lines put the names of the clients to whom you provide the given practice services.
This creates a wheel of engagement. These are the people who pay for the services you provide and who support your law firm. The arrangement of spokes and lines illustrates two mutually important concepts. First, it shows you the other practice services that you could be providing to your current clients - attaching their names to other spokes in the wheel. Second, it shows you the people from whom you can seek referrals for new clients who need same practice services - creating new lines attached to the same spoke.
Current clients do not need to be convinced of your or the firm's expertise – otherwise they would not have remained clients. What they want in order to give you more work is to feel comfortable with you as a professional. And that takes ongoing, constant communication with them. What kinds of information might you gather, informal and perhaps even unspoken, that would dramatically expand the work you do for them? Who are your clients' customers or contacts in trade or civic associations, who they might tell about you? A constant communication effort to answer these questions can start you on expanding the wheel of engagement.
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