Home | Business News | Browse by Publication | T | Trial

Make yourself the obvious choice: most lawyer ads just 'shout' at prospective clients. Here's how to ensure that yours don't get lost in all the noise.

Article Excerpt
Earl Nightingale, considered one of the world's foremost experts on what makes people successful, had some good advice for lawyers who want to market their practices. He said that if you want to learn a new skill in business, and you have no mentor or guide you can trust, the best approach is to figure out what everyone else is doing and then do the opposite. The majority is, at best, average. So it is with lawyer marketing.

Most lawyers struggle with how to market their practices. The result is a follow-the-pack mentality. Stop reading this article right now and go and pick up the Yellow Pages directory for your area. Look at the attorney ads. What do you see?

Are there any compelling messages that would convince you to call any particular firm first? If you knew no attorneys in your community, could you pick the most qualified one based simply on the Yellow Pages ads? Probably not.

Most attorney advertising does little more than try to "shout" louder than the rest. In advertisements for personal injury firms, the messages--shouted in big print, over multiple pages, and in color-are all basically the same:

* If you've been hurt, call us!

* No fee if no recovery!

* We care for you!

* We are aggressive!

Not very helpful, are they?

Think you can fix this problem with graphics? Not likely. Who cares what your picture looks like, or your building, or your "mascot"? Is anyone still going to use a pit bull in an ad?

Last year, the Florida Supreme Court ruled that a Fort Lauderdale firm's ads featuring a pit bull violated the state's Rules of Professional Conduct. The ads "demean all lawyers and thereby harm both the legal profession and the public's trust and confidence in our system of justice," the court held)Aside from getting you in ethics trouble and hurting the image of the profession, these ads are simply not effective.

Response to your advertising will improve when you improve your advertising. Get out of the "I can...