CBA Record July-August 2020

Y O U N G L A W Y E R S J O U R N A L

for example, hop on a Skype or Zoom meeting to “check-in.” • Cross market your clients or your part- ners’ clients to add value. • Obtain quality introductions from your existing clients; for example, use LinkedIn as it was meant to be used. • Leverage your strongest relationships for direct business or quality introductions. • Develop strategic partnerships to refer you more business. • Build your brand on LinkedIn and other social media. • Start writing for a publication. Now you DO have the time! • Get people together for a webinar on a Covid-19-focused legal issue. Step #3. Get educated – fast. Do something, anything, to learn about business development and marketing to ensure you are sustaining and growing your law practice. Here are three things you can do to learn these skills today: 1. Tap a more experienced leader and ask for advice. This could be an easy way to get on the right track. 2. Read, watch, and listen. There are articles, books, blogs, videos and podcasts that are directly talking to you. Research content on the internet to learn about busi- ness development. Set a goal for yourself to read, watch, and listen to one-to-two hours of content a week to improve your effectiveness when developing business. 3. Research and hire a coach. This should be someone who understands the legal industry and has a demonstrated track record of success. This may be tough to find, but it’s worth the investment of time, money, and energy to build a book of business that allows you to control your own destiny. Learning how to market your practice as a business is the best way to ensure longev- ity in one’s law practice. Step #4. Create a list. In step two I shared a variety of ways to drive new business. One of the most important actions you can execute to ensure success is to create an A, B, and C list of your contacts. Statistically, we all

have between 250 and 500 people that we know. It is of critical importance to scrub your Outlook, Gmail, or LinkedIn connections to determine who is at the top or bottom of that list as it relates to direct business, or connectivity to direct business. It also might help to clearly define what makes up an A, B, or C relationship. For example, if your close friend is the General Counsel of a large pharmaceutical com- pany, she might be an “A.” Or if you have a cousin who is in the IT security space and works with mid-market software compa- nies, he might be a “B.” On the other hand, someone who does not necessarily work in the same field might be considered a “C” or even a “D.” By taking an hour or so to pull up, review, and define your contact list, you will now have some direction of whom to call/ email and why. Then commit one morning a week to email or call two-to-five of these folks to schedule a call or video conference. Step #5. Enhance your social media skills today. It doesn’t matter if you are a big firm lawyer or a solo practitioner, you are either play- ing the game or being rolled over by your competition. Right now it’s a double-edged sword. More lawyers are using social media now than ever before, so you may think your efforts to post content are point- less. At the same time, the people you are trying to reach have more time to spend on reading social media posts, so posting your content becomes more important to building and keeping your client book. Start browsing your competition. What are they posting? Is it on-target or way off base? What could you be saying that’s better or more insightful? On LinkedIn, for example, you can post new content or repost relevant content. You can like, comment, and share others posts to get your name in front of new people. It’s also advisable to use LinkedIn to look through your contacts’ contacts to identify new people they can introduce you to. There has never been a better time to learn about and execute on social media, but it’s important to do it right. Invest some time learning the keys to the

successful use of social media and get in the game now. To recap, you must focus on business development activities that you can learn and execute today. There’s little value in waiting for business to improve or living in hope that it will. Every lawyer needs to make a personal choice either to take action or to let the cards fall as they will. I hope you decide to take action and that you come out the other side better than before.

Steve Fretzin is a business coach, trainer, and speaker on business development and marketing for attorneys. Learn more about Steve at www.fretzin.com.

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36 July/August 2020