This article is written by Shubham Bansal, Team LawSikho.

Introduction

Henry Ford said, “Stopping advertising to save money is like stopping your watch to save time.” What he meant by this quote is that marketing (includes advertising) is very important to reach the mass, attracting more prospective buyers for your services or products and finally enabling sales to happen and earning more revenue. Marketing is an integral part of any business activity; it doesn’t mean other parts of the business aren’t essential or less useful. But try and imagine running a business, especially when you are new in the market, who just managed to build a name for their brand. Reach up to their potential customers, selling services/products to them, and earning revenue out of it and suddenly cutting off the marketing cost by pulling down the ads and doing no business development activity. 

Imagine what the state will be when you can not reach new prospects buyers, especially when there is massive competition in your domain or segment. Too many players struggling to capture the market or where buyers have minimal purchase counts or even the whole purchase cycle is plodding and even low number of referrals. All of this will surely make your revenue fall; you could not meet new targets, can’t expand your business, and continue. 

Okay, so you might be thinking why it is even relevant for us, lawyers, professionals from finance, law firm owners, and that too, in this pandemic? The World Economic Forum’s report suggests that 96% of the global population reads the newspaper and engages in the media. Here is the hidden opportunity for all of us, but only those can benefit who will act in accordance and take the right actions. There are ample of opportunities for us, try to take advantage of it. Because when the rest of the world is cutting on the expense to reach out to the mass, you can utilise the opportunity and lead in your sector or domain. Here is how to proceed, but before we continue, here are some stats by smart insights.

That’s how populated is the digital space, billions of users across the globe, carrying enormous potential and opportunity. Just need to reach the right mass with the right content and at the right time. But what is the right time? Well, now, this pandemic! A report by App Annie suggests that globally people are spending about 20% more time on Apps amid lockdown. And it is entirely understood, being locked in our homes, what other options do we have? The Internet! So, go digital and here are few tips for you.

1. Mark your online presence

a. The first step towards your online presence is undoubtedly creating your firm’s or your website; it acts as a store in the digital market where potential customers can walk into. But creating just a store would be enough? Really not! Consider incorporating the following elements:

1. Experience or years into legal practice, this matters especially to clients who wish to choose the best and look for legal professionals who have experience and can yield fruitful judgments/benefits because some legal matters have a lot on stake, crores of rupees or even life at times!
2. Areas of expertise, as the saying goes, ‘the more, the better,’ clients look up to lawyers and law firms which can take care of various legal issues for them without approaching different people and places as it is convenient for them getting all their work done at one home. However, it doesn’t mean you need to master or expertise in every law practice, two or three would be fine.
3. Your team creates a substantial impact on prospective customers when they see you have a talented bunch of people, experienced in their area of practice. So your clients can directly approach a relevant team member depending upon his/her requirements.
4. Existing/Previous clientele, this further helps to develop a strong trust in your brand. Because people do really look up to the kind of clientele you had or if you have ever catered to a more prominent client. (This works for corporates)
5. Pro Bono, you know when people are most likely to connect with you? When they are emotionally attached to the causes. I’ve seen many people supporting, joining, or even availing services because they had an emotional attachment. 
6. Accreditation/Awards this adds more credibility as it builds a strong repute in the market and in front of your prospective clients. This clearly shows your work is recognised and paid off.

b. If you do not intend to create a full-fledged website, at least ensure to make your social media profiles. Whether you go for: 

1. Google MyBusiness- This is one of the most powerful tools for marketing introduced by google. This helps to boost your local presence in the online space. For example, people looking for a consumer litigator and he searches in google; google will show up the local businesses, even yours, if you have made google my business account, and you live nearby to that area in Delhi. Few tips: 
   1. Upload more photos of your business as it encourages your client to get an insight into your firm, be it a conference, award ceremony, your office, team members, or of a webinar. 
   2. If you make sure you have a decent and most reviews on your business profile, Google will automatically rank you top. 
2. LinkedIn- This is used by most of the professionals across the world with a whopping 690 million users across 200 countries as Linkedin, and if used in the right manner, it can get you a vast number of clients, dream jobs. Few tips:
   1. Reduce your connections and optimise them according to your industry and relevant audience. This will help you to get more engagement on your content that you post on Linkedin.
   2. The LinkedIn algorithm works when there is more engagement on your content; it thinks since the user is interacting, this will be interesting for other people as well, and hence your post views get a higher reach meaning more connection requests and content getting seen by your potential client or your recruiter. 
   3. Consistency plays an important role; please make sure you post your stuff consistently on LinkedIn because it will enable more engagement, more views hence more connection requests and more clients to avail of your services.
   4. Don’t get disheartened if your post gets fewer likes because, on an average, only 10-16% of your audience engages with your content. However, they notice and do give it a read. 
   5. Use relevant hashtags that will enable your potential audience to find your content. But please avoid using 20-30. 4-5 is an ideal number and preferred to be used after the content.
   6. Whenever you send a connection request, please don’t directly pitch about your services, instead engage with your potential clients or recruiter. Imagine proposing a girl or a guy on the first meet? Crazy idea, right? 
   7. Please share your articles, recent case judgments that you got in favour of your client, webinar updates, case analysis, copy of your drafts, and other professional happenings.
3. Instagram Business- Primarily, a platform meant to share images and highly interactive one. You can set up a business account on Instagram, and it is also ideal if you wish to make a personal brand. Also, If you want to attract a younger audience, this is a perfect platform. But why the younger audience? Instagram has the highest number of younger audiences within the age range of 18-34, comprising about 64%. But why the younger audience? Okay, so since global economic growth and the rise of startup culture, what is the age group of the founders and CEO’s venturing into startups? What is the age group of new YouTubers? What is the age group of your prospective interns or associates? Few tips: 
   1. To utilise the Instagram game to its full potential, you need to develop not just content but also better images. 
   2. Stories generally do better because it is automatic and easy with the fingers, and once you get 10,000+ followers, you can directly link your stories to a website or a blog.
   3. For those who have less than 10,000 followers, they can utilise the bio space for writing a call to action text (asking users to sign up, visit, etc.) and putting the link in the website section. Plus, you can mention in the caption text as well, this works well.
   4. The hashtags drive the majority of the content, so you can use as many as you want but be realistic. 
   5. If you’re going to get noticed or collaborate, you can always tag people or shout out to the profiles. This works when collaborating or uploading an informative image and want to get seen.
4. YouTube – the second largest search engine in the world after Google. 

You can upload your videos, webinar, and other video content on it. A great thumbnail always works, as it makes a user highly likely to click on the video. It is coupled with an additional step i.e., to add 50-60 words in the description, which describes the content to the view and makes it more likely to click on it. You can utilise further description boxes to give more details about the video and add links along with emoticons. Also, don’t forget to add tags as it helps a user to find your video and avoid using unnecessary cards in your videos for an exam you made a video on titled ‘Copyright Law: All you need to know’ so you can use tags like copyright laws, copyright, lecture on copyrights, etc. depending on your content.

(Digital space is the right destination for almost everything! Want to check on temperature? Google. Find the cure for Corona? Google. Check for a review about a product or service? You know what I’m trying to say!)

2. Showcase your knowledge and expertise

1. 1. Social networks are primarily to network with like-minded individuals and share stuff that is relevant and useful for the members in your network. Also, make sure the content you share showcases your skills and expertise in your work niche.
   2. Being social means, you need to be present at the party every day, every day. You cannot be a “blue moon” appearing once in a while and ghosting it the rest of the time. 
   3. Every platform comes with its unique set of audience and works best for a particular content format. For example, while LinkedIn is preferred mostly by professionals, Instagram is crowded by younger audiences sharing their pictures and videos. 
   4. Share what’s shareworthy. Post answers to common legal questions, share your opinions to hot topics of the time, repost content by legal luminaries, and, if possible, make your shares graphical. You can even upload your recorded videos, be it judgment analysis, opinion, or revolving around a hot legal topic. Say force majeure.
   5. Write informative and exhaustive articles; get them published on blogs, journals, etc.
   6. Go for writing a book, yes a book, and even sell it on a platform like Amazon, it gives a great exposure.
   7. Opt for videos, because they tend to have more retention, platforms like Tiktok can lend you many followers within a short period. You can even opt to make a Youtube channel, uploading your informative videos, covering topics and questions that are in trend or within your specialising.

(The more you showcase your talent and your knowledge, more likely you’ll attract your prospect clients, employees, interns and people who look up to you as an inspiration)

3. Collaborate, this works for both

1. 1. For this try reaching out to your alma mater, they’ll be happy to take webinars, and you address your juniors who can look up to their seniors addressing their queries and concerns.
   2. Approach other online organisations, specific to your area of practice, or even general platforms, there are many in the market.
   3. Approach your seniors at a law firm or maybe teaching at an institution. Collaborate along with your colleagues, or even your college friends.

(This helps a lot because, through collaborations, you could easily reach to a bigger audience, opens whole new opportunities)

4. Upgrading your knowledge

1. 1. Digital space houses a complete stack of resources; you don’t have to move out of your comfort zone; everything clicks away to enhance your understanding.
   2. Invest in courses you wish to grow your practice in or help you grow your practice like this course.
   3. The more you upgrade your experience, the more likely you’ll be ripening the benefits out of it later. (These days, we spent thousands of rupees on buying fashion apparels which will become outdated in next spring or fall, purchasing the subscription of online entertainment which is just for fun instead investing in knowledge which stays with you throughout your life)

5. Invest in digital marketing

1. 1. Digital marketing is a relatively new concept than traditional business development. This includes running paid Ads on social media, doing SEO, content marketing, sending emails, etc.
   2. Let’s give you an awesome hack, create content, split it into four parts, email, a blog post, a video, and even your social media posts. One-shot for all! 
   3. Once done, boost your Facebook post on Facebook/Instagram, run Google ads around it, publish your articles on the top blogs.
   4. Get your website SEO done, this will improve your website ranking on Google, and the better the ranking, the more likely people will visit your social media. If you don’t have a website, make sure to use the right keywords and exhaustive content for blogs and social media posts. A pro tip, use the Alt-Text feature to publish your content on social media; this enables Google to search for related images whenever specific keywords are searched for.

(Digital marketing is the next big game-changer in the legal space while major players have opted in, there is much scope in it to reach your audience and gain brand recognition. We’re also working to bring a course for you to master in this space)

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