Unlock the Value of Your Former Clients
Lawyers don’t like to ask. Clients don’t like to BE asked! But your client list is a treasure chest filled with their family, friends, or colleagues ready to be referred for legal advice.
Many law firms ignore the huge value of former clients.
Our Client Referral Plan is a low-cost monthly service to unlock the value of these clients, not only for new instructions, but especially for valuable referrals.
Four powerful psychological principles drive the plan’s success:
1. The “Mere Exposure Effect”
Sometimes called the Familiarity Principle, it explains why we prefer things when we become more familiar with them.
2. The Curve of Forgetting
Because recall weakens over time, your firm needs to be “top-of-mind” with former clients for when they, or someone they know, face a legal problem.
3. Social Proof
Simply put, social proof is the influence imposed by the actions of others.
4. Social Learning
When people observe someone being rewarded for a specific behaviour, they’re more likely to alter their own beliefs and actions, in order to ‘model’ the behaviour.
How does it work?
We’ll maintain an on-going relationship with your past clients, by regularly sending stories to inform and entertain them. (See an example.)
Humans are hardwired to pay attention to stories. Unlike a normal newsletter, stories have astonishing power to connect people and information, reinforced with emotion. People feel good when they read a story. And they look forward to more, which increases open rates.
Every message ends with a reminder to contact you, and then we’ll use one of our gentle, but remarkably effective, methods to prompt referrals.
For example, thanking those who referred friends and associates to you will stimulate social learning, which encourages others to do likewise.
You already send a newsletter?
Some firms send newsletters, with articles discussing recent legislation or case law in your specialization.
But that’s rarely of interest to clients. ‘Open rates’ steadily decline, and clients may often unsubscribe.
The secret is to send relevant, interesting and enjoyable STORIES instead, because your clients will soon look forward to your emails.
HERE’S WHAT YOU GET WITH THE PLAN:
Compelling stories
We’ll send TWO stories every month. Each story is like a magazine article. It’s not a sales pitch and it’s not advertising. In fact, it’s not even really about you – it’s about telling interesting stories your clients will enjoy reading. The true purpose is to make your law firm memorable. Because, in time, ‘memorable’ becomes ‘money.’
Personalization
We’re invisible, because it’s not about us – it’s about you. Every message appears to come from your senior partner, at your email address, and your address appears at the bottom of the page. But you don’t need to lift a finger, because we’ll manage every part of your mailing. (The Plan does NOT impact on your admin team.)
High deliverability rates
There’s no point in sending a message that isn’t delivered. But if you try to use your regular email account for bulk sending, you’re likely to get your account blocked. Luckily, we have long experience of managing deliverability at scale, including sender’s IP address reputation, message design and content, message frequency and relevance, etc.
Database management & compliance
We’ll manage your database subscribes and unsubscribes, as required by legislation, and make sure the mailings comply with Anti-Spam rules. If you don’t have a client list, or you don’t have their email address, we have a simple system to build a ‘permission list’ for you.
Monthly reporting
You’ll never be in the dark about how well your Client Referral Plan is performing. Apart from all the positive comments (and the new client instructions!) we’ll contact you each month with a report on opt-ins, open rates, and unsubscribes.
Join dozens of law firms in three countries
Ready to Get Started?
Click here for answers to the six most common questions.
(Including the price.)