Firms marketing directly to consumers, such as personal injury, criminal defense and bankruptcy lawyers were the early adopters of search engine optimization (SEO). Some invested in pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns using Google adwords or similar programs; others relied on organic rankings, which places a website near the top of search engine results based on its relevancy to the search term, and many firms implemented both tactics.  The firms that recognized the opportunity early on captured more than their share of qualified leads with an investment in SEO/PPC while their competitors were explaining why SEO wouldn’t work for their firm.  Today, however, with more plaintiffs firms using SEO as an effective marketing tactic, it has become increasingly competitive and costly to achieve top rankings.

Defense firms or those that market to businesses and general counsel still have an opportunity to get into the game before everyone has caught on to search’s effectiveness. Implementing a search initiative right now, does not mean that SEO will be your primary source of leads today, but its role in your business development will continue to grow as more businesses, institutions, entrepreneurs and in-house counsel turn to Google and similar search engines first. By being proactive and positioning yourself to capture top search engine rankings now, whether through PPC or SEO, you can create a solid footing to avoid chasing after other firms later.

1. Is the bulk of your current business the kind of business you really want? Is it profitable? Does it satisfy you professionally? Or, would you prefer a different type of business – more interesting, more lucrative, more rewarding? Would you like to change the mix of your business? Do you wish you had more clients from a specific industry? If you’re currently marketing, are your initiatives aimed at developing more of your preferred work?

2. Marketing is a numbers game. The more you market, the more leads you generate. Having more leads, in turn, increases the potential for more of the type of work you really want. That means you can be more choosy and demand higher professional fees. As your rates go up, some of your leads will of course go elsewhere to “get it cheaper,” but that can be a good thing because it’s going to leave you with a more manageable level of work at a higher hourly rate.

3. If you don’t market, it leaves you vulnerable should business decline, and the last thing you want to be forced to do is to start marketing in a panic mode. To be effective, your marketing has to be consistent at all times – even when you’re busy – to ensure a smooth and full pipeline.

Clearly, you shouldn’t allow yourself to be overwhelmed with so much work that you can’t adequately serve your clients. But don’t let busyness be an escape from taking a hard look at the profitability and potential of the work you’re doing. As long as you have your nose to the grindstone, why not maximize the satisfaction and remuneration you receive in return? Marketing can open up your options.

For instance, in order to avoid liability, professionals often suggest two or three firms to someone who needs a referral rather than recommending just one. If you’re on that list of two or three professional service firms, you don’t want to be the one the prospect has never heard of while he or she is already familiar with your competitors because they’ve done a better job marketing and getting their name out. Your lack of familiarity will put you at a distinct disadvantage. Even if the prospect calls you for a consultation, it’s going to be an uphill battle to sell your legal, accounting, real estate, financial or other professional services.

Although you often can’t draw a direct line between your marketing and PR activities and business coming in the door, the point of these efforts is to “get your name out there” or to make your firm more “user-friendly,” as a prospective client recently called it. What he meant was that he wanted more name recognition so that prospective clients would immediately recognize the firm as experts in the field when they heard the name. Effective marketing and public relations can create that immediate, “of course, I’ve heard of them.” Without marketing and PR, a professional service firm has to work much harder to overcome the resistance of prospective clients who have never heard of them.

The power of publishing – in print or online – comes from leveraging your visibility. In other words, everything depends on what you do with the article after it’s published. If you do nothing, you lose most of your work’s power and shelf-life.

It’s up to you to let your target market know about your recent media coverage, and put that information in front of the right people. You can do this by posting an alert to your website’s News section, mentioning it in a sidebar to your e-newsletter, posting an announcement on LinkedIn or Facebook, tweeting about it, distributing article reprints at conferences, and similar marketing tactics. A few extra steps like these will take you miles further.

The same is true if you’re quoted or featured in a news story or interviewed by Katie Couric. It doesn’t count for anything unless you tell the right people about it. Remember, leverage it or lose it!

When you are evaluating where to spend your advertising dollars,  you usually look at frequency vs. reach—i.e., how often your target market will see your ad vs. how many people will see it. In this case, our client’s ad could potentially reach a large number of people, but they would see it only once, if that.  (i.e., no frequency).

Frequency in advertising is analogous to consistency in marketing.  Small but regular “touches” is what makes for effective marketing.

And, speaking of consistency, I met with a prospective client who told me that, yes, his firm does send out e-newsletters to clients, prospective clients and referral sources. When I asked how often, he said about once each year. A marketing activity on an annual basis is consistent, but in this instance, greater frequency would improve its effectiveness.

Before automatically looking for the redesign, consider what you are trying to get out of the new look. If you are looking to recreate your brand, expand into a new market, or exponentially grow in a rapid fashion, a redesign may be in order. But if you’re just bored of your look or wish it was easier to work with, you may want to consider other alternatives. Refreshing your logo could make you unrecognizable to your clients and could create a reverse of what you are aiming for.

We saw this situation occur this week, when Seattle’s Best Coffee revealed its redesigned logo. The complex and recognizable logo has been “dumbed-down” and streamlined, presumably to make it easier to use on future marketing materials. Initial critics politely say the simplified design is rather generic and makes the coffee brand undistinguishable from other brands.

Seattle’s Best is looking to expand to more than 30,000 locations by the end of the fiscal year, and a spokesperson from the company is quoted as saying the company “want(s) (the new logo) to be a universal sign for good coffee someday.” Can Seattle’s Best pull this off? It will be interesting to see how it plays out, because, as we’ve told our clients…it’s not necessarily about the look, but rather what you do with it.

Although this surgery center has been in business for a while, and located in a neighborhood where you take it for granted that the doctors will know what they are doing, the signage gave me pause concerning the quality of the doctors and the care.

The person I was with didn’t notice anything amiss, and maybe as a marketer I’m more sensitive to things like this.  It was a good reminder about the difference small details can make in a first impression you create. Even seemingly minor things can make a huge difference between appearing to be merely good and looking like the best!

The other professional commented that I was “tough.” He meant that I didn’t roll over and go along with what a professional says just because he’s a prospect. I took it as a compliment.

Because I’ve never considered myself to be a particularly “tough” person, I gave some more thought to this professional’s assessment of me. I realized that what made me come across as tough in his eyes was really my confidence and experience when it comes to marketing and public relations. In other words, don’t tell me that a tactic doesn’t work when I know from experience that it can work very well provided it’s executed the right way. It’s this expertise and experience that gives our clients confidence in us.

So how do you do it? You’ll need specific strategies to market to these groups. Start by defining the parameters. For example, what does “high net worth” mean to you? For some wealth managers, it means the individual has assets of at least $10 million to invest. For others, $1-2 million will do. An effective strategy to reach this group is to work through referral sources – CPAs, attorneys or wealth managers – who then become your target market.

Then, decide what geographic area you can realistically target. Even if you can work with clients anywhere in the country, narrowing down your choices will help you use your marketing dollars more effectively. For instance, you can focus on Southern California, all of California, or even the West.

Similar questions will help you target entrepreneurs and corporate counsel. In addition to geography, another effective way to “dissect” these groups is by industry, and within an industry, by size of company in terms of revenue or number of employees, and by location. There are not very many places where entrepreneurs hang out, but they tend to congregate at industry trade shows and conferences, or participate in industry-related social networking groups, such as LinkedIn. The same might be said for corporate counsel. There are conferences and meetings just for corporate counsel, and lawyers in private practice can pay to access them through sponsorship. While open access to such exclusive events may not be possible, you may be able to find corporate council at other venues, such as industry trade shows, provided you narrow your focus by industry.

Here’s an example he provided. The day after he met with a prospective client who sought a joint venture partner, he got right to work and began contacting potential partners and referral sources throughout California. Within 24 hours, he was ready for his second meeting with the prospective client to outline the options he’d come up with.

From a marketing and business development perspective, what struck me about this rainmaker’s response was that it was very specific. We often ask our clients—attorneys, CPAs and other professional services providers—what differentiates them from other firms. The response is usually that “we provide good service” or “we care about our clients,” or even that “we’re responsive.” While some of this consultant’s competitors may couch their points of differentiation in generic terms, our client expressed his responsiveness clearly and provided specific examples. I’d bet that this clear articulation contributed to his success as much as what he actually did.

His response was a terrific reminder not only of the need to provide responsive service, but that it’s critical to dig beneath the surface of “good service” or “caring about clients.” When working with professional service firms on enhancing their marketing, we dig deeper when we get these vague responses. What specifically do you do that shows you’re responsive? What specific actions do you take that demonstrate caring? It’s the answers to questions like these that enable firms to communicate their differentiation.