Berbay's Blog: Marketing for law firms, engineers, CPAs, architects and other professional services

I was asked a question in a meeting with a prospective professional services firm yesterday—a question I’ve heard a number of times before, and that always puzzles me: “What trade or professional organizations should our professionals be involved in? Where should they be putting their time and energy to meet the people they need to meet?”

The reason this question perplexes me is, there’s really no mystery there. Finding relevant organizations is not the challenge.  Determining which organizations to actually invest in demands a bit greater—but still not much—of a time commitment (We recommend that you select three to five organizations and go to a couple meetings of each to figure out whether you want to get more involved). No, it isn’t a matter of locating the organizations—it’s whether your professionals will in fact go to the meetings, get involved and invest the time necessary to create visibility, demonstrate their credibility and expertise, and build relationships.

Many times, we have identified organizations for a client, notified them of the time and place of the groups’ next meeting—even offered to accompany their professionals so that they are not as uncomfortable. But if the professionals won’t go to a meeting or put forth the effort to get involved in an organization, then all our support is for naught.

If and when a professional has chosen to participate in one or two organizations, then she faces a real hurdle: Distinguishing herself from the other professionals in the group who are in the same field. For example, there’s probably not a trade or professional organization on Earth that doesn’t already have an attorney who has already claimed the attorney spot. They’ve been involved, visible and created name recognition.  That doesn’t mean, though, that another attorney can’t join the group and offer an alternative; perhaps the new attorney practices in a different area, or maybe some people in the organization don’t especially like the first attorney. Carving out a niche for oneself—not simply finding a group—is the true challenge when it comes to professional organizations.

An article that recently appeared in the Los Angeles Daily Journal, “Coming in out of the Cold: In-house Counsel Say Cold-Calling Is Not Always Best Sell for Firms,” had me re-reflecting on a professional services marketing truism: No marketing strategy is a “silver bullet.” Rather, most marketing strategies can be successful if they’re implemented well.

The article was a summary of a session at the Legal Marketing Technology Conference where a panel of general counsel discussed what is the best way for lawyers to approach them about getting work. Many lawyers “cold-call”—or, more accurately, send “cold letters”—to general counsel at companies whom they know are being sued. The letters typically introduce the attorney or firm and offer their services, touting their experience in the practice area in which the company is facing legal action. The question the general counsel were talking about was: Does that work?

One panel member said it doesn’t—or at least, he had never called a lawyer who sent him a cold letter. Other general counsel, however, said they had called cold-letter-senders—when the letters were executed well. For example, one general counsel said she had replied to cold letters that proposed alternative fee structures. Another said the letters that caught her attention included a thoughtful proposal about the particular litigation the company was facing.

Pitching a custom-made, if brief, legal strategy requires more effort than just sending a form letter. But reading these general counsel’s comments, it seems that’s what it takes.

The question isn’t, “Do cold letters work?”, it’s, “What kind of cold letters work?”

It’s not, “Is this a silver bullet?”, it’s, “How do I shoot this?”

I did something in a meeting yesterday that I had never done before.

I and a Berbay account manager met with a few members of a prospective client firm. At some point in our discussion, one of the prospects mentioned that he was a friend of one of our former clients (I’ll call her Jane Doe), and that he had seen her name on the list of representative clients on our website. He asked me what Jane Doe would say about Berbay if he asked her about us.

Here’s the thing: Our experience with Jane Doe didn’t work out that well. We have many satisfied clients, but naturally, we’ve had some clients for whom we weren’t a good fit (and vice versa). Jane Doe was one of them.

I didn’t get the chance to answer the prospect’s question right when he asked it, but at the end of the meeting, I said, “Listen: I’ve never done this before, but I’ll tell you that if you ask Jane Doe about us, you won’t hear great things. We’ve been around for a long time; we have a lot of happy clients, but not everyone works out. But I would recommend you talk to her and see what she says.”

Like I said, this was a first for me. I didn’t want to sit around after the conversation, worrying about whether the prospect would actually get in touch with Jane Doe, and what she’d say. I wanted (like any good PR pro, I suppose) to take the bull by the horns. Who knows what the prospect actually thought, but he did say he appreciated the honesty.

The entire episode leaves me with two questions:

1. The obvious one: Did I do the right thing to address our experience with Jane Doe head-on?
2. The prospect had seen his friend’s name listed among our representative clients on our website. Should clients that weren’t 100% satisfied with us be listed on our website? We include them because, whether or not our experience with those clients was positive, it was still an experience—we learned from it, and it helps us work better with other clients today.

Readers, what do you think?

I was surprised and heartened to read that Andrew Langhoff, publisher of The Wall Street Journal Europe, had recently resigned after an internal investigation revealed he was closely involved with an ethics breach at the paper.

Allegedly, WSJ Europe’s circulation department made a deal with a Dutch consulting firm to sell the firm discounted papers for distribution to students and others, thus boosting WSJ Europe’s circulation and allowing it to raise its advertising rates. The paper informally agreed to give the firm editorial coverage in return. Two articles featuring the firm were published in the paper, and the internal inquiry found that Langhoff personally pressured reporters to write those stories.

I hate for anybody to lose his or her job. However, what has remained with me since my first journalism class in high school is that there should be a “wall” between a publication’s editorial department and its business departments (including circulation and advertising). Editorial should be independent.  Admittedly, high school is a distant memory and from what I see today, an independent editorial department has pretty much been tossed out the window. Just watch any television news program (particularly a local TV news show), to see examples of the creeping intermingling of news and advertising—in many instances, it’s difficult to tell one from the other.  However, based on WSJ Europe’s actions, it looks like there are still those around who believe this independence should still exist.

WSJ Europe is owned by News Corp., a company that, after this year’s News of the World imbroglio, is likely trying to keep its nose especially clean. Still, this Langhoff incident could probably have been swept under the rug. I was very glad to hear it wasn’t.

In making the rounds of my Saturday errands this morning, I used the products and services of two different business people who understood the importance of the quality of their marketing materials.  We’re still human beings and even in this digital age, can’t get around the fact that touch and feel convey a lot about your business. Not just whether it’s a quality business but whether you believe that it’s a quality business, and whether you believe it’s worth investing in.  These providers conveyed their message not just through their corporate identity – the look and feel of their logo, but also through the firm, solid stock they used for their business cards.

Israel Garcia is a hair stylist and make-up artist at Gavert Atelier salon in Beverly Hills (310-858-7898). Awhile back he developed his own corporate identity and when I took another of his cards this morning, I remarked on the solid stock.  It’s clear he understood the importance of aligning his marketing materials with his positioning in the marketplace.  We extolled the weight and solidity of the paper stock, the fact that the black didn’t show fingerprints, and the spot varnish on his logo. I was impressed that he recognized these points, because most professionals don’t understand the difference factors like this can make.

Then, I happened on the Dana Davis pop-up store in Beverly Hills.  I wasn’t familiar with her line of shoes (www.danadavis.com), which I’ll be a fan of going forward, but again, we ended up talking about marketing material because I commented on the quality and solid stock of her business card.  I also liked her marketing brochure, which to me seemed an adequate weight, but she whipped out one from the previous batch, the way she’d really wanted them done, which was on a heavier stock and very nice.

What does this have to do with marketing your professional service?  How often do I stifle a cringe when a lawyer, wealth manager, or real estate developer—all of whom are targeting high end markets — hand me their business card on paper-thin stock.   Sometimes, they’ve made the investment in developing a firm identify – a key step in branding themselves, but they’ve put it on cheap stock, which belies their positioning.

The business people this morning understood the fact that all of your marketing pieces fit together to reinforce your message to the marketplace.