TELL THE TRUTH

On a business development meeting, yours truly was in a conversation with the client and she said something along the following lines 'most law firm advertising pitches as seen on their websites are empty meaningless statements'. Blurbs was one of the specific words that she used.

This brings us to the question, how can you pitch your law firm's services? The idea behind this question is that you actually expect a potential client to read your services offering, blog, brochure, website and pick up the phone to call you and ask about your legal services then you can pick it up from there.

If you were a product company you could claim you had the fastest internet service on a sub-sea cable in the country or your product would last for one year with a no-questions-asked money back guarantee.
But you cannot say we are the smartest law firm in Mergers and Acquisitions and everyone knows it.
Or we write better briefs. Really. What is a better brief? One in which you wax lyrical or poetic, one which impresses the client, one which 'wins' the case?

We strongly suggest that the only reasonable marketing pitch is to tell the truth, to stick to the facts. This is good news bad news. The good news is that clients know what to expect and you know what your law firm is truly like. The bad news is that the truth may put you in a bad light for marketing purposes or you find out you are a me-too law firm with commodity status. Ouch.

The next move is to actually say what you can do in terms of 'We deal with litigation with more than lawyers, we have field researchers,working relationships with cutting edge companies in aeronautics to support our work'. This is a factual description of how you work and will pass legal advertising rules with flying colours.

You also need to make a list for presentation, of your achievements with your clients, both big and small because they show what you have done on the competing and cooperating side plus the application of your mental capacity and innovation on all types of matters NOT just the marquee, six figure ones.

In closing, when your firm says it 'advised' on the General Electric Company sub-listing and leaves it just at that, you are leaving some value on the table. You can go further to complete the sentence by stating the effect of your presence as advisor in tangible terms such as cost or time savings you made

It is no good saying you are the best thing since sliced bread unless you really are. Just stick to the facts and you'll be just fine.