It’s a privilege and an honour to receive an award or be featured in a prestigious list like Australia’s Best Lawyers and Lawyer of the Year list. These accolades are often peer-reviewed, which means your peers and colleagues all recognise and acknowledge the work that you do. But how do you ensure your clients and potential new clients know that you’re at the top of your field?
Your marketing or BDM team has probably already given you a pat on the back by sending out a tweet and posting on your firm’s LinkedIn page. But this will probably not really do much to attract new clients or endear your existing ones. While some may like the post or congratulate you, no one’s necessarily going to give you call to help them out with their next issue because they saw that message on social media, after all, would you?
To really make the most of this recognition, here are four things you could do (of course, I know you don’t have endless resources so you don’t need to do all of them, just pick one or two that best suits your client base and your resources).
1. Update your personal LinkedIn profile
This is by far the easiest and most cost-effective way to promote your award. It’s also one of the hardest to do because no one likes to appear pushy or boastful, but there’s nothing wrong with keeping your LinkedIn profile updated.
LinkedIn is the largest professional social media networking site in the world. It’s the first point of call for many people when verifying a professional’s services or seeking out a professional. LinkedIn’s search function picks up on words in your profile, so if someone is searching for the name of the award, like Australia’s Best Lawyers, they’ll find you from the search. Even if they don’t search that term, but they happen to come across your profile, and it mentions the award, then it verifies for the potential client that you’re an expert in your field.
How do I do it: Go to your personal LinkedIn profile and add a line stating the awards you have won. You could add this in several places, depending on how prominently you want it to appear:
- Put it in your Headline, after all this is the first thing people will see when they come across your name; and/or
- Add it to the Summary that appears right after your name and position. Preferably put it in the first 3-4 lines so that people don’t need to click on “see more” before they see it; and/or
- Add it to the Accomplishments section further down the page. Even if you do one or both of the above, you should add it here too and keep it there for posterity.
How do I do it: There are several ways to feature a client testimonial and each requires a different level of involvement from your client. So before you ask a client, it’s best to determine where you want to feature your testimonial. The options can include:
- A short video or audio grab with the client explaining what was so great about working with you. This can be used across social media platforms and/or on your firm’s website; and/or
- A short direct quote (this could even be taken from a video or audio) from a client describing why they recommend your services. This can then be used on social media and on your firm’s website. It could even be used in advertising (obviously subject to legal restrictions).
- If you worked on a huge deal, explain how you did this and what challenges did you overcome. This lends itself best to either a post or video; or
- Interview a client and get them talk about how you worked together. This works best in a podcast or even webinar format. If you do a live webinar people who are listening live can ask questions of you and your client, and others can listen to it in their own time later.
- Add a mention of this in your next newsletter, whenever it’s due to come out. You’re featured for the year, so it won’t become outdated news too quickly; or
- If you create a success story you can send this out in a newsletter to your clients. This does add value by showing them how you put your expertise into practice. It also has the additional benefit of letting them know that you received recognition.
I know there are not enough hours in the day to do all of these things, but you can pick and choose the ones that best suit your time, budget and most importantly target audience. And if you would like to do some but just don’t have the time, feel free to get in touch, I’m always happy to lend a pair of helping hands to help you promote and build your practice.