To our valued members,

In today’s uncertain economy, many businesses are taking stock of their strategies and priorities, including sponsorship and advertising commitments. While the Total Practice Management Association has worked diligently to obtain sponsorship and advertising support for the Association and Conference, we have been unable to secure sufficient support to pursue our goals. At this point, it is not feasible for the Total Practice Management Association to continue operating.

As a result, the following changes will be implemented immediately:

Part of a series - Create Your 2010 Law Firm Marketing Plan in 5 Simple Steps: Step 4.1
Previous entries detailed steps including creating a niche, conducting a SWOT analysis, and creating a Unique Competitive Advantage for your law firm.  This post continues this series.

Here is where you list all of the different law firm internet marketing techniques and legal marketing strategies you will use to identify prospects and land new clients. The good news is that there are only 7 different strategies you can use. Also, depending on: 

•  your practice area
•  your target market
•  your financial resources
•  your geographical location

and other variables, some will invariably be more or less effective for you.  The strategies are ranked in order of more effective to less effective in finding prospects and converting them to clients.

Part of a series - Create Your 2010 Law Firm Marketing Plan in 5 Simple Steps: Step 3.5

A Unique Competitive Advantage (UCA) answers the question, “Why should I hire you?”  With so many competitors and choices today, your law firm marketing strategy must clearly differentiate yourself and your law firm.

Using the information, research and analysis you did for the SWOT sections, outline how you will position yourself and your services.  Here are some good questions to get your legal marketing thought processes started.

As the New Year begins, now is a good time to take stock of where we are, and where we want to be.  Your law firm marketing plan is not exempt from this review process, and I encourage you to take a careful look at all of your legal marketing, including your internet marketing for your law firm.

To that end, I would like to call your attention to an article in the December, 2009 issue of GPSolo, published by the American Bar Association. 

The article, Law Firm Marketing 2.0: Internet Marketing for Rainmakers, is something that I wrote out of a firm conviction that most internet legal marketing plans could use some strengthening in their Search Engine Optimization (SEO) keywords. 

New Year’s Resolutions are a time-honored way of setting goals for the new year.  They often center on personal issues – weight loss, exercise, relationships etc – but let me suggest that you add creating a  solid, well-crafted law firm marketing plan to your New Year’s Resolution list this year.

Your law firm marketing plan should include all of the following components:
Referral sources – who are the people who refer business to you?  Who are the people you would like to refer business to you?
Internet marketing – what does your internet presence look like?  Your website, online-mentions, your page ranks in key search engines?
Blogs – do you have a blog?  Is it current with relevant content?  Is it written with keywords in mind to bring traffic to your site?
Social media – are you actively managing your Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook sites to create the best possible face for your firm?
Public relations – are you creating news releases and stories that point the media to you as an expert?  Cultivating a relationship with the media takes time and expertise.  But it is a worthwhile investment.

Take advantage of the resources you will find here and at The Rainmaker Institute website.  Come to one of our Rainmaker Retreats or invest in some materials from the online store to gather the resources you need for your law firm marketing plan to help make 2010 a  year to remember.
*************************************************************************************
Looking for more Rainmaker Institute wisdom?

Well, it’s been a little over a week since most of us made our New Year’s resolutions, and I’m really wondering how everyone is doing with them. Personally, my resolution was to eat more fruit and do something active for at least ten minutes every day of the week. I’d have to give myself an A for my resolution efforts. While I’ve done something active each day, I haven’t been eating as much fruit as I’d like. I would say I’m eating more than I did before, but I’d still like to improve.

As I posted on the “Work~Life Balance” wall in the PMA community website, I really focus on making positive resolutions. Rather than saying, “don’t eat bad food,” I say, “eat more fruit.” Along similar lines, instead of making a resolution to work out more, I’m being more specific in my goal and asking myself to be active for at least 10 minutes each day. These goals are much easier to measure for me, and I feel more confident attaining them.

So, that’s how I’m doing with my New Year’s goals, or resolutions. How are you doing with yours? Or if you didn’t make any resolutions, I’d love to hear your thoughts on why you feel it’s not necessary.

It is already January 6, so it might seem a bit late to talk about New Years Resolutions, but something I ran across on my Twitter feed today made a great point: Winter is the time to start making your goals, but it is not usually a good time to complete your goals. Right now, if you take a look at the gym in the basement of our office building, you would see a crowd of people eagerly trying to reach their 2010 goals, but what will happen when a snow blizzard hits that makes it difficult for people to get to the gym? For whatever reason, no matter where we live, winter can be a tough time for most people and simple things like shorter days, bad weather, and busy times at work can take a toll on personal goals. 

 We often talk about recession-proofing our businesses, but what can we do to winter-proof our personal goals for the New Year? Here are a few ways to create resolutions that will be a success rather than a disappointment when the silver ball drops on 2011 next year: 

Start with planning; then, move on to action. Most people choose their New Years resolutions and start working on those goals on the first day of the year. Instead of jumping right in to your 2010 goals, however, start the year with the planning process. During the months of January and February really dig in and reflect on the lessons you learned last year. Think hard about which goals matter most, and prepare a plan of action that you can stick to when energy picks up in the spring. This will help prevent burnout, and it will give you a chance to make a well-educated decision about which goals matter the most this year. 

"The world is shrinking" has long been a catch phrase to describe how accessible the world has become; however it should also remind us of the proximity to danger. For anyone whose business and pleasure activities take them across the globe, that means leaving nothing to chance when it comes to ensuring their safety. The risks facing today's travelers include kidnapping, hijacking, terrorism, and crime. Advisers to affluent clients who travel for business or pleasure need to think through everything from managing petty theft and lost passports, to kidnapping, to accessing emergency medical care in a remote location.

Kidnapping and ransom are nothing new, but the bold tactics today's pirates, extortionists, and cyber-criminals have executives and families that travel overseas thinking about insurance protection that seemed unnecessary a generation ago. Technology and global economics are reinforcing a greater need for the types of coverages offfered by a Kidnap & Ransom (K&R) policy.

Insurers today offer a plethora of resources, experts and products to reduce the risks facing affluent individuals when they travel. The right insurance, security advice and partners can mitigate the risks, but only if the individual takes full advantage of the counsel they receive and exercises round-the-clock vigilance.

Check out this white paper  that covers in detail the importance of proper planning and understanding the basics of personal safety when in an unfamiliar environment. It includes a checklist of common sense safety tips to reduce the primary risk of being the victim of a crime while traveling in a foreign country.

For more information and answers to your questions, contact Sandy Leon, a HUB International Private Client Advisor, at (312) 279-4648 or sandra.leon@hubinternational.com.

Christmas is in just a few days, which has started to make me think of all the fun traditions my family has for this time of year. Sure some of them have changed a bit since we've grown older, but they all make us feel like kids again no matter our age.

Our first two traditions always begin on Christmas Eve. We all get to open one gift, and that gift is always a set of matching pajamas. All the women in the family get the exact same pair of pajamas, and all the men get their own set of matching pajamas. We all put them on, take some silly pictures in front of the fire place, then settle in for our next tradition...Just before we're about to go to bed my dad reads ­‘Twas the Night Before Christmas. It's so comforting to sit around the fire and listen to him read this great story. It puts everyone is such a festive mood, and then we go off and dream of sugar plums dancing in our heads.

The next tradition happens on Christmas morning. While it happens a little later in the morning now that we're older and appreciate our sleep and coffee, my dad always has to make sure that Santa has left the house. We certainly wouldn't want to scare him away and not give him enough time to place our gifts in those perfect little piles. Each year we eagerly wait to be allowed into the living room, and then it's time to open all gifts.

Here are 4 examples of Ideal Target Markets:

Business Attorney for Small, Privately Held Business Owners

• CEOs, Presidents, VPs, General Managers
• $2M—$100M in annual revenues
• Privately held companies with 20—1,000 employees
• In the hi-tech, telecommunications or software development industry
• Are headquartered within 20 miles of my office
• Are challenged with protecting their IP, want to grow nationally or internationally, looking to joint venture with or license their IP to larger companies

Commercial Real Estate Purchase & Development