Estate planning clients must be wooed. They’re not coming to you in need of immediate assistance— instead, they have the time to take their time as they consider whether or not they want to work
When it comes to capturing leads from a website, there is a special level of strategy that must be constructed beforehand. Many law firms will make it extremely easy for potential clients to contact them… but are not always successful in following up with them in a timely manner. This means that they are constantly at risk to lose meaningful, substantial prospects and it makes that much harder to land clients.
The differentiating factor with successful law firms? It is all about timing. Leads that enter from your website are incredibly valuable, but only if you reach them in time.
In an ideal world, you should be able to follow up with an online lead with some form of contact, whether a phone call or text, within the first 15 minutes that they contact you from the site.
But why does that even matter? Does timing really make that much of a difference?
Yes, yes it does.
Consider these statistics: 50% of consumers choose service providers that respond first, and 47% of your competition is failing to respond at all.
That means you have the advantage in that market share to act first and reap the rewards of clients you can build mutually beneficial business relationships with. But how do you accomplish this?
1) Make it easy to contact you – and for you to contact them
The first step is ensuring that your website is optimized to not only provide contact information for you but also that you are able to obtain some sort of contact information for the lead. Make your contact pages easy and fast, and construct them in a way where you are easily able to see methods to contact them.
Often, law firms struggle with contacting leads back and that bottleneck leads to losing out. Yes, they sent you an email, but how do you access that information? Are you able to see this information in real-time at all? Think of ways that make obtaining lead information faster for your firm, and that will greatly help speed up the process.
2) All hands on deck might help
It might be tempting to only look at lead information once or twice a day, especially as cases pile up and there are hours to bill – resist that temptation.
If your workday gets too hectic, enlist an all hands on deck approach to ensure potential clients are getting the attention they deserve.
Work with members of your team, or perhaps look at ways to outsource these calls so that there is always someone available. If you decide to work with members of your team or hire someone full-time, think of ways to make it efficient for them.
Maybe you can schedule weekly check-ins to assess call time and response, see what times experience the most calls and optimize processes accordingly.
3) Personalize and follow up
Okay, so you have their contact information and you have the time to respond – now what? Yes, they have come to you but now it is up to you to capture their attention and nurture that lead.
Your responses must be personalized and if possible, always try to call or text them first before emailing.
But that also entails a level of persistence that must be present – without seeming pushy or overbearing. If you call them and they do not answer, follow up with a personalized email. After a few days, comb through your website leads and track how you reached out to them, if there was a follow-up, and whether or not it was successful.
The legal industry is vast, and so are the leads and customers. An expungement attorney has a different clientele than an estate planning attorney. Log every form of follow up and over time you’ll be able to track and see what works best for your clients.
This will help you build better strategies in the future that are tailored towards your unique lead volume, and help you improve your overall business. Attracting leads is one just facet of marketing strategy, law firms that are successful are the ones that capitalize on their leads right away and establish meaningful connections with them.
To learn more about how to make the most of legal leads from your website, please contact us.