Just off the phone from Keith … a smart and nice-personality lawyer (those two characteristics do not always co-exist within the one lawyer body).
We recently re-activated some of his clients through a simple direct mail campaign.
Keith asked if he should include a PS requesting referrals in the post-service thank you letter. After some chatting I said yes.
Here’s why:
The chances of a client responding to that form of referral request is not great. Perhaps one a month or one every three months.
However it’s impossible to tell how much business might come from the one response.
Case in point: last year my good friend and Time Queen Robyn Pearce referred me to a potential Joint Venture partner. The potential JV partner politely said “no, I don’t do that sort of thing” but referred me to a second potential JV partner who said “you bet, let’s do it!).
I ran an event for her (we’ll call her “Sue”) and got no new clients. “Ah well. Ding! Next please …” I thought.
Then Sue was called by an international conference organizer who was looking for a speaker and she put my name forward.
Short version: I gained extra market place credibility by speaking on the same platform as some truly great international experts and gained 10 new clients.
I then ran another event for Sue and gained another 5 new clients.
Two of those clients have without prompting introduced me to other JV partners one of which has already agreed to proceed.
“What’s the point?” you ask.
It’s this: 15 new clients and ongoing sales and referrals from the same, 2 successful J.V. relationships which I can go back to every year to attract more clients and referrals, plus 1 more J.V. ready to go and 1 more in the waiting … all from 1 referral who said “no”.
Morale of the story: NOTHING beats marketing activity. Even if you stink at it, NOTHING beats you being active in the market place.
You’ve got to be in to win.