Published:

08/10/2013 01:10am

Is Your Law Practice Website a Lead Generating Machine or a Pretty Brochure With No ROI?

Are you currently generating leads online? Would you like to be? (Of course you would.)

Back in 2006, when I began first hearing about the idea of marketing on auto-pilot, I spent loads of time and money to figure out what it actually meant and how I could do it in my own practice.

While I loved to get out there and speak to educate my community, I really loved the idea that I could be building my law practice while I slept. So, I decided to learn how it was done.

What I discovered is that it all comes down to generating a steady stream of new leads online that I could then develop a relationship with over time. That didn't just mean putting up a website with a contact form on it and hoping people would contact me for legal services. And it definitely didn't mean building a pretty "brochure" site like so many lawyers have.

It meant creating something that would give my ideal prospects tremendous value so they would happily give me their contact information so I could build a relationship with them and over time they would get to know me, like me, trust me and eventually hire me or refer me to their friends and family.

Most lawyers are screwing this up. You are either not giving away anything of value on your website OR you are, but then you aren't building a relationship with the people who come there and give you their contact information.

I wanted something that would always be on, collecting fresh leads, even when I was on vacation, sleeping or hanging out with my kids.

So I set out to create these 'magical' auto-pilot lead generation websites for my practice. But... what could I offer on these websites that would be so enticing to families and small business owners that they would readily give me their name & email?

I invested more than $30,000 to figure that out. Here's what I came up with:

www.KidsProtectionPlan.com - a site for parents to sign in and name legal guardians for their kids at no charge.

www.TaketheBizQuizOnline.com - a site for entrepreneurs to determine where they are in their business and what they need to grow to the next stage.

Wow, did they (and do they still) work AWESOME! Each day these sites generate new leads for the lawyers who are using them. (Lawyers in our Personal Family Lawyer and Creative Business Lawyer programs are licensed their own versions of these sites.)

But here's the most important part, the site itself must offer something extremely valuable to your prospects AND THEN you must create a follow up sequence to stay in touch.

So, after opting in on any one of our sites (we have a few other sites in addition to these), the prospect receives a 7 to 15 step follow up sequence of emails that provide additional value and then the prospect continues to receive a weekly email newsletter.

When I did this in my practice, I had clients show up years after getting onto my mailing list with a folder that had several of my newsletters printed out.

They would say to me "Alexis, I feel as if I know you because I've been hearing from you every week for the past three years." Then, they would write me a check for a few thousand dollars to handle the planning for their family or small business.

Had I not sent them all those emails, they would have hired the lawyer down the street instead of me.

You've got to stop marketing for your competition and make sure your website (or at least landing pages off your website, like the ones I showed you above) are capturing leads and then you are following up and building a relationship over time.

Alexis Neely graduated first in her law school class from Georgetown in 1999, and after clerking on the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, began her career at Munger, Tolles & Olson and left to start her own firm in 2003. Within just three years, she had built her solo practice into a million dollar a year revenue generating business by implementing a new law business model she created. She now teaches that model to lawyers throughout the US and Canada as a Law Business Mentor. Learn how Alexis built her law pract