How lawyers can generate leads on LinkedIn, 5 BD must-know tips for all lawyers & the silent killers that might be affecting your client relationships

Welcome to edition #9 of Trifecta and our second LinkedIn newsletter! The idea behind Trifecta is simple - we bring you three things (more if you're a Trifecta subscriber) that will increase your BD and marketing knowledge, make you better at BD, and help you build sustainable habits to ensure you don’t drown - all packaged neatly into one monthly newsletter.

Interested in hearing insights from industry experts? Each month, we sit down for a chat with leaders in the field, discussing how they've developed their practice, their business development efforts, and the valuable lessons they've gained.

Sign up for the full newsletter here to unlock these golden Q&A sessions, but in the meantime here's a snippet of our chat with Sarah OUIS , a former in-house counsel turned LinkedIn trainer and lead generation expert.

How to stand out and succeed on LinkedIn with Sarah Ouis

Q&A with Sarah Ouis founder of Law but How?

Sarah helps legal professionals build and scale a qualified audience, and show them how to turn them into paid clients through LinkedIn. Sarah's clients have achieved remarkable successes, from landing first clients to industry awards - I (Gemma) should know, Sarah helped me build my pipeline from 0 to becoming fully booked for 6 months. If you're a legal professional ready to leverage LinkedIn effectively, Sarah is your guide to stand out and succeed.

Tell us a bit about what you do and why you’re different to the other LinkedIn experts out there.

I am fortunate to be training associates, partners and law firm owners on moving away from being just a technician of the law to adopting the rainmaking mindset. That is, learning how to generate demand for what they do. I used to be a buyer of legal services when I was a General Counsel and that’s probably my biggest differentiator. I am an ex-practising lawyer and I know that legal professionals need a lot more than ‘tactics & templates’ to be successful. They need to embrace the idea that marketing & BD is not a nice-to-have and divorce from the exceptionalism mindset where a law degree used to suffice. I am committed to deeply transforming their approach to marketing which often consists of dinners, referrals, awards and soul-crushing legal articles.

Should lawyers of all levels be actively using LinkedIn, or is this reserved for senior associates or partners, for example?

I certainly started using LinkedIn when I was an in-house counsel and had no intention of monetising my audience. It expanded my network and gave me incredible opportunities. So I would say that this activity is not reserved for senior practitioners at all. I think what will change is the way it is used across the spectrum. More junior lawyers will probably focus more on finding their own voice and starting a network. Where more senior lawyers will be more intentional about attracting clients and building a pipeline

What are some common mistakes lawyers make on LinkedIn, and how can they avoid them/rectify them?

Where do I start! Here are a few:

• Not leveraging their personal LinkedIn page and relying on their corporate pages / law firm marketing activities. It is a mistake for 2 reasons: The algorithm rewards posts by individuals 5-8x more (I also ran the test myself)People buy from the partners / founders / associates, less so the corporate brand (unless you are one of the big ones that gets hired for high-stakes cases). Case in point, how many clients actually follow the company page updates vs being just connected on LinkedIn with their main point of contact.

• Posting soul-crushing updates. Being “thrilled and delighted” to complete the sale is boring and forgettable. This is a social platform where personal experiences, stories and opinions stand out a lot more than safe updates that do not move the needle.
• Thinking that you do not have to sell. To get, you need to ask. You need to become a go-to for what you do, but this is not enough if you want to land paid enquiries. You need to promote your services, how you help your clients, share war and success stories alike. It is more comfortable to assume that people will just reach out when they need help. But sadly they don’t. Oftentimes, you need a trigger. Talk about your services 20% of the time.

From what we know of LinkedIn there are some golden rules for creating content that resonates with your audience - what would say they are?

• You need to speak to the person you’re trying to attract. And that person cannot be an abstract avatar in the likes of ‘anyone and everyone that may need legal services’. It has to be someone that looks like your ideal client profile. For example, European-based GCs of medtech companies.
• You have to speak about things that are relevant to them. Not any and all legal updates in life sciences for example. But more specifically to the types of challenges they’re having and how you can be a solution.
• Keep a 1 idea / 1 post ratio. Often lawyers have this urge of overdoing and are perfectionists. So they tend to post lengthy, meaty content that is way too overwhelming in a social media context.
• Linked to the previous tip, keep your posts short and actionable. Move them your audience from 0 to 1.

Want more info on how to nail LinkedIn? Sign up for the full interview with Sarah here (it's jam-packed with value!): Sign up to Trifecta.

5 BD essentials every lawyer should know

If you're serious about getting into BD and doing more with less then these concepts are non-negotiable.

1. Marketing works when it demonstrates, not when it asserts.

The best type of marketing is based on demonstrating the value or benefits of what you do, rather than simply making claims or assertions about it. Cut back on the advertising (and perhaps ease off on the self-congratulatory LinkedIn posts!), and use case studies and testimonials to demonstrate how you’ve helped clients instead. Or better yet, give away some content of real value. Trust me, your leads and prospects will thank you.

2. The ‘raspberry jam rule’ - the wider you spread it, the thinner it gets.

If you're dipping your toe in every type of marketing and BD activity, the chances are you're a) spreading yourself too thinly, b) never quite seeing anything through to the end, and c) you're not seeing any results. Hone in on what you enjoy, what you're good at or what's delivered results in the past and stick with it. Get better at it. Get faster at it.

Quality over quantity. every. single. time.

3. When you speak to everyone, you speak to no one.

It’s all about the niche - focus on a specific target audience to achieve a stronger impact. The raspberry jam analogy applies here too - the broader your audience the weaker the impact of your message. The more alternatives there are to you or your firm, the harder you'll have to compete to be seen and heard (let alone considered a specialist) and the less power you'll have to command a premium. Establish yourself as the go-to person for that particular field, go deeper with your industry knowledge, and stand yourself out from the crowd.

4. Business development is not about closing a sale, but opening a relationship.

It's not your job to convince or persuade a prospective client to hire you. Selling is about determining a fit between the buyer's need and the seller's supply (aka you and your services). The sooner you move away from the idea of stereotypical 'selling' and think of it as building a genuine relationship, and being able to solve a problem or address a need, the more likely someone is to buy from you.

5. You cannot be in business without embracing selling.

This isn't really a concept as such, but it needed to be said: Your services alone will not sell themselves. Don't make the mistake of thinking 'if you build it they will come'. You could be waiting a long time. As unnatural as it may feel, without making sales and revenue growth a priority, you will not be able to build a practice successfully.

Bonus: If you want a profile, then focus on Marketing; if you want more clients then focus on BD. (if you want more on this we wrote a whole essay here! It's an important one).

3 'silent killers' in client relationships

Managing client relationships isn’t easy if you’re a lawyer. You train for years to become a technician of the law (as Sarah so aptly puts it!), and then suddenly, you’re given a handful of client relationships to manage, with little training, and you’re expected to:

• Keep the client happy
• Cross-sell them into the rest of the business, and
• Increase your own practice area’s fees at the same time.

For multiple clients.

Throw into the mix difficult clients, the ever-changing legal landscape and something which very few lawyers talk about:

Fear of getting it wrong and an overwhelming need for perfection.

It’s a recipe for disaster.

Here are three 'silent killers' in client relationships that, if you let creep in, could signal the end of a relationship.

1. That top-drawer client service you’ve been lavishing your client with is only applicable during transactions

If you take your foot off the gas the moment the transaction is done and let the relationship languish, you're headed for trouble. Build relationships where there isn't a business need and you'll reap rewards.

2. You’ve never put the client through any form of client listening exercise or programme

If you don't know what your client thinks about the service you're offering, you're putting yourself at risk. Feel the fear and do it anyway - not addressing any potential issues just builds resentment.

3. You’re not able to anticipate your client’s needs because you don’t know them well enough

In today's era clients want a hyper-personalised service - they want you to be proactive, do their future gazing for them, and be able to provide them with value that they didn't realise they needed. This is only possible through a deep understanding of your clients and their business objectives.

We've got plenty more where that came from:

Would you like a free client relationship checklist?

We're thinking about creating a sustainable client relationship checklist: What to do and when so opportunities aren't missed, and more importantly, the warning signs that your relationship is in trouble.

If you're a lawyer managing client relationships and want to grow them sustainably, send Gemma Francis a DM saying YES.

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