The Client: The Heart Of Successful Marketing

By Syndie Eardly, Features Editor, Ohio Lawyers Weekly

Reprinted with permission by the LawMarketing Portal.

Great lawyers are also great rainmakers, according to Jim Durham of Dedham, MA, because they always put the client first.

"The loudest voice in your law firm should be the voice of your client," Durham told an audience of associates, partners and law firm marketers at a seminar hosted by the Northeast Ohio Legal Marketing Association in Cleveland.

Durham, whose company assists firms in developing client relationship strategies and business development, told the group that after interviewing hundreds of successful rainmakers he distilled much of their feedback down to the overall importance of developing a good relationship with the client.

"The highest quality of a successful partner is his or her ability to manage client work effectively and to manage relationship," said Durham.

More Than Schmoozing

According to Durham, many lawyers think that the way to become a successful lawyer is to become a successful schmoozer. But Durham said that just doesn't work for everyone. "Being a schmoozer is so personality specific, and it is not what will make lawyers ultimately successful," Durham said.

Durham said that the important thing to focus on is being a great lawyer. That alone, he suggested, will ultimately bring in new business, as well as help in retaining business. Durham said that being a great lawyer is what lawyers want to focus on because they are comfortable with that, but they are not comfortable being a great marketer.

"Lawyers are not comfortable with being told that they must be a great schmoozer," Durham said. "This is not about how to work a cocktail party."

Ultimately, Durham said, the most successful businesses outside of law firms know that to have a successful marketing strategy, you have to know what to pitch. And to know that, you have to know what is in the mind of the client.

According to Durham, there are only three kinds of legal work in the client's mind: commodity business, bet-the-farm business and truly important business. Approximately 30-40 percent of legal work is in the commodity range with clients purchasing basic legal services at the cheapest price. Only about 5-10 percent is in the bet-the-farm category, which is when a client is truly looking for the lawyer who is the best in the field. Typically, lawyers are hired in the latter category when the client has to win at all costs, and price is no object.

But the largest field of work, according to Durham, is in the "truly important" area, and in this area it all comes down to relationships. "All else being equal, the client asks, 'Whom do I want to work with?'"

It is in this third area that Durham encourages attorneys to focus their efforts, but he says that often, lawyers don't view their work from this perspective.

"Most of the lawyers I know have worked with the idea that they have to be the smartest among the smartest and they have to be right," Durham said. But, he noted, after interviewing many clients, he learned that the choice of the lawyer is much more subjective and relational, that is, based more on chemistry and attitude then strictly on expertise.

"That has to be what drives your practice," Durham said. "You have to be the best person for them to work with."

Fundamental Attitudes

What singles out a particular lawyer as the best person to work with? Durham said after interviewing successful rainmakers he was impressed that their success was based less on technique and more on fundamental attitudes towards their client that were pervasive.

The most important area of focus for successful rainmakers, according to Durham, was in the area of communications.

"The two things that matter most," said Durham, "are responsiveness and initiating contact even when you are not working on a matter."

Durham said that most lawyers are good at being responsive, but many are not good at initiating, noting that conventional wisdom indicates that people need seven impressions a year to maintain recognition. He said that those impressions can come through phone calls, face-to-face contact or written communications.

One client Durham interviewed said that he had once had a casual conversation with his attorney about sailing. A month later, he got a letter from the firm and inside was an article ripped out of a flight magazine about sailing with a note penned on it from his attorney. "Knew you loved sailing. Thought you might be interested in this article"

Durham said the client was very impressed. "Rainmakers know that to personalize it to that degree is very valuable," Durham said.

That kind of effort is important because it builds a relationship that goes beyond the work at hand, according to Durham.

Personal Connection

"You don't have to be friends with your client. The rainmakers know that, but they also know that you must get past just delivering the legal product," Durham said. "You must have some personal connection with them over and above the work. It can be nothing more than knowing that they happen to like the opera more than sports."

Durham once interviewed a client who told him that his lawyer kept offering him tickets to sporting events, but he rarely took him up on it. The client wanted to spend his evenings with his kids instead. The client said he wished the lawyer would offer him the tickets so he could take his kids to the game.

"That lawyer does half million dollars worth of business with this guy and he doesn't know enough to offer that," Durham said.

Work habits are critically important too, Durham noted.

In two words, Durham summed up what he considers to be the most important aspect of rainmaker work habits - they deliver.

"These people are never guilty of not delivering what they say will, on time, without at least a phone call," Durham said. "These are the people who don't think its OK to say it will be there at noon on Wednesday and deliver it at 6 p.m. They do what they say they will do, when they say they will do it."

The attitude and presence of a lawyer can also have a big impact on client confidence, Durham said. If a lawyer doesn't project self-confidence, the client will find himself doubting the lawyers ability. Durham explained that if a lawyer doesn't possess a natural aura of self-confidence, that there are plenty of books and self-help tapes designed to teach how to build and project self-confidence.

While all of these efforts take time - and Durham acknowledges that it does require a great time investment - the efforts will help lawyers reach their ultimate goal of building a prosperous practice with loyal clients.

"Client's want to be able to trust," Durham said. "Trust is the single greatest issue. If you do all of the other stuff, you will get trust and it will generate loyalty. That loyalty is powerful!"