Lawyer Marketing Fails and What Works Instead
Are you a small business owner, attorney, accountant, or other service provider struggling to attract high-quality clients? You're not alone. Many professionals find themselves unsure where to start when it comes to marketing and business development. The good news: with targeted strategies and consistent effort, you can significantly improve your client base and grow your practice.
In this post, we'll explore practical insights from industry expert Rebecca Wenglinski, founder of Lotus Business Growth Consultants. You'll learn how to identify your ideal clients, leverage relationship-building tactics, utilize digital platforms effectively, and streamline your marketing efforts — even when you're pressed for time. Get ready to boost your visibility and attract the right clients for your practice.
How to Identify and Attract Your Ideal Clients
Understanding who your ideal clients are is the foundation of effective marketing. Rebecca emphasizes that the first step is sitting down and clearly defining your target audience. Ask yourself: Who do I want to serve? Is it specific industries, business sizes, or consumer demographics?
Focus on the target client profile:
Business or consumer?
Knowing this guides your message and marketing channels.
Industry specifics:
What businesses or individuals are most likely to need your services?
Behavioral cues:
What events do your clients attend? What publications read? Do they engage with certain social media platforms?
Once you have clarity, articulate this profile in writing. This helps to focus your marketing efforts on those who are most likely to become clients, saving time and resources.
Example:
If you're a small law firm aiming to serve startups, focus on networking within startup communities, reading industry publications popular among entrepreneurs, and engaging on platforms like LinkedIn.
Building Relationships: The Long Game in Client Acquisition
Rebecca underscores that business development is ultimately about relationship-building. Whether you're an extrovert or introvert, there are tailored approaches:
For Extroverted Professionals:
Attend networking events and trade shows.
Do research beforehand to target potential contacts.
Follow up diligently after events via personalized emails or LinkedIn messages.
Schedule one-on-one meetings like coffees or casual catch-ups.
For Introverted Professionals:
Consider creating content like podcasts or videos to share your expertise.
Utilize platforms like LinkedIn to start conversations in comment sections or direct messages.
Engage in virtual networking — think of LinkedIn as your online 'party' where you can 'show up,' 'say hi,' and 'interact.'
Pro tip:
Make use of LinkedIn’s capability to see mutual connections. When you identify a prospect, ask your mutual contact for an introduction — it’s much warmer than a cold outreach.
Remember:
Relationship-building takes time. Invest consistently in nurturing these connections; over time, they can turn into valuable business opportunities.
Leveraging Digital Platforms Strategically
Digital marketing is vital, but approach it strategically to maximize results. Rebecca highlights two key channels:
1. LinkedIn for B2B Relationships
LinkedIn is a powerhouse for connecting with other businesses:
Regularly share insights, articles, and updates related to your industry.
Engage actively—commenting, liking, and participating in group conversations.
Use the platform to identify and connect with potential referral partners.
Tip:
Use LinkedIn’s advanced search features to find individuals or businesses in your niche. Request introductions through mutual contacts to avoid cold outreach.
2. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) & Paid Ads for Consumer Clients
For consumer-facing practices:
Ensure your website is optimized with keywords your clients search for.
Use Local SEO tactics: keep your Google My Business profile updated, collect reviews, and target local keywords.
Consider Google Ads or paid campaigns to appear at the top of search results when potential clients are actively seeking services.
Bonus:
Keep your website fresh with updated content, testimonials, and thought leadership. This builds trust and keeps you relevant in search rankings.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much of my time should I spend on marketing?
There’s no one-size-fits-all answer. Focus on what aligns with your personality and schedule. Even 15–30 minutes daily, consistently applied, can lead to meaningful results. Prioritize quality interactions over quantity.
What digital platforms are most effective for small practices?
LinkedIn is excellent for B2B relationships and referral partnerships. For consumer clients, a well-optimized website with local SEO and targeted ads often yields the best results.
How important are awards and rankings?
They’re increasingly influential in search results and perception. Recognitions help build credibility, attract talent, and differentiate your practice from competitors.
Should I focus on SEO or paid advertising?
Both are valuable. SEO builds long-term organic visibility, while paid ads can provide immediate visibility, especially for special campaigns or local searches.
What are pitfalls to avoid in marketing?
Avoid random acts of sponsorship, neglecting your website, and relying solely on SEO magic. Instead, aim for strategic activities that foster genuine relationships and showcase your expertise.
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Andrew Colsky (00:12)
Welcome to the Be Picked podcast. I'm your host, Andrew Colsky, and we are talking with professional service providers, mostly small professional service providers, about marketing, growing your practice, mistakes not to make, things that you should do. And today we're going to be talking with Rebecca Wenglinski. She is the founder and CEO of Lotus Business Growth Consultants. So Rebecca, welcome to the show.
Thank you for having me, Andrew. I'm excited to be here today. Well, we have a lot to talk about because I know you do a lot of great work. And I'm going to start us off with a basic question. You get someone, let's say a sole practitioner attorney or maybe a small firm practice, and they come to you and they say, we are not getting the number of clients that we need or we're not getting the quality of inquiries that we want to be getting.
And we have never really focused on any sort of marketing strategy or anything, and we don't even know where to start. What would you tell someone like that? mean, someone like that, first and foremost, it's just sitting down and having them kind of talk out who their target is. So who is their target client?
getting them to focus on where that target client may be at. Are there specific events? Is there a specific social media stream? So even knowing if it's a sole practitioner or a small firm, are they trying to reach out to consumers? Are they trying to reach out to other businesses? And then once having that in place, you're able to really kind of start to direct them on the next steps.
So whether that's consumer versus business, even kind of tells you which social media stream you need to be on. But a lot of it then comes down to once they know that information, even though they may think they know it, they don't know it until they really start to voice it and put it on paper or type it out, is figuring out how they can start building more relationships. That's the biggest key to getting business is to building those relationships.
So once you start to do that, understanding that it does take time, but when it says, when I hear the name or the terms quality or right client, I want them to define what that is. So is that a particular business? What size business is it? What is the industry that they're in? And then boiling that down, getting even more specific of what are the people like in that business? What events do you think that they're going to?
What publications may they be reading? Really honing in on that. And maybe they're not reading publications. I do work with firms who their clients don't read industry publications. So the best thing for them is to get right in front of them, email newsletters. So it's really having all of those specific details to be able to point them in a direction that they should be going with their marketing and BD. Right. Right. Okay. All right. So there's, there's sort of two clear audiences here.
that I'd like to kind of separate them out, talk about one and then we'll talk about the other. And what I mean by that is first we're talking about the B2B type of work. We're trying to work with other businesses. So in those areas, as you were just describing, industry journals and all these things, I would assume that LinkedIn is probably an important part for that type of relationship as a piece of it. Probably, you know, networking events.
for that particular industry, whatever it is that it is, writing articles for the trade magazine that those people may read. What other types of things should they be thinking about for continuous long-term keeping their name in front of business partners? So there's a few things, and this is one where I like to meet people where they're at.
So if someone tends to be a little bit more extroverted, then I really push them to do networking events. And, but with that, it isn't just go to the event. It's do some research before the event, figure out who's probably going to be there, outreach to people and ask them, Hey, are you going to be going to this event? It would be great to catch up. And even if they're not going, you've just made a touch with them. So you've showed that they are top of mind. So it's still maintaining that relationship.
After the networking event, it's making sure you block out time on your calendar to follow up with everyone from that event. So all of that work and time isn't just wasted. It's also, if they tend to be more extroverted, it's meeting up with people one-on-one, scheduling those coffees, scheduling the drinks. And again, the invitations mean a lot. Even if people can't come, they welcome the fact that you thought of them enough to invite them to meet up. For more introverted people,
do a podcast. I think this is great. It's one of the ways where they can just talk one on one and get their information out. They can even get their thought leadership out there and then they can share that on LinkedIn. So it's having some information like that. Really utilizing LinkedIn, not just for posting, but for having conversations. I always like to look at LinkedIn as like its own networking event. It's a virtual networking event. So you are showing up.
you know, just by being on LinkedIn, you're at the party. By liking, you're saying hi to somebody. By commenting, you're kind of interjecting yourself in a group conversation. And then by sending them a direct message, you're starting to pull that conversation off into the corner. So it's one of those things where if you look at it like that, it's a little bit more, it's a little easier for somebody who tends to be more introverted by just starting to build and foster those relationships there.
And then even taking it to another step on LinkedIn of utilizing it for seeing who people you're connected with, who they might be connected with and asking them for a connection. That's one of the things I absolutely love because then it's not just a cold call. It's somebody that you know and trust you with another person that they trust and they're just helping each other out by bridging that gap. Right. Right. Yeah. That's, you know, one of the
beneficial, interesting things about LinkedIn is if I link to you and now we're connected and we know each other and so on and so forth, the fact that I do that, now I become a second level link to all of your connections. So if I reach out to someone else, they see that, he knows someone that I know. that's- they're also seeing your posts and reactions too, because if that person is in your feed,
And then they see that you're liking stuff. They're like, oh, you know, I didn't know that person, but oh, maybe I should know that person because they just liked their post. Right. Yeah. So, okay. So, so let's talk about the second part of the equation here, which is my clients are consumers. So maybe I'm an accountant or maybe I'm a PI attorney or whatever it may be. LinkedIn.
Is it any good for that for me or should I be focusing on some other strategy? LinkedIn is good. mean, Facebook is where a lot of... It depends on the age range of your target consumer. Facebook, Instagram, for them, I would say Google. Google Ads is gonna be dominant in that area. So really showcasing the firm and having a lot of the SEO, the search engine optimization, having a lot of the GEO.
the generative engine optimization. So for those who don't know, that's where the AI searches pop up now. First, when you start to Google something, you get that little AI paragraph. So it's knowing how to work that and getting your name up into those. Those are really, really key for the consumer touches because the consumers do still Google stuff. I do think it's really important to still have strong referral partners because consumers do ask their trusted partners.
for information for attorneys and who, like recommendations for attorneys for anybody that is going to have sensitive data that they're going to be dealing with and sharing. And it's usually with a significant matter of their life. So they want a trusted individual for that. So they will be going to other partners, other service providers that they may already work with for recommendations. So having those referral partners is still strong too. Right, right, great.
Yeah. know, one of the things that I'm waiting for the day that the industry comes to consensus on what do call AI search? Because I've been seeing a lot of answer engine optimization. You've got generative engine optimization. There's still a lot of different terms and they haven't, you know, come to a consensus on what are we going to call this stuff? Right.
I mean, half the time I call it AI SEO. Right, right. It's that OI. And then I started using the answer engine optimization because it was easier to remember AEO. So you got SEO and AEO, but I don't know what the industry is going to come up with. Well, we'll figure it out at some point. Right, right. So let me break down some of the things you shared and kind of set the stage so that we can get into our next part of the discussion.
When I'm talking with people about this whole concept of getting themselves out there and making themselves attractive to clients and how do you find them and all those things, I talk about three things. I say, number one, you can buy clients. And when I say buy, what I mean is you're buying advertising to get in front of the client base that you want. The pros are you quickly get in front of those clients, assuming your ad is attractive to them, whatever.
Soon as you stop paying, you stop getting clients and it's kind of like putting money in a slot machine because you're going to pay for the ad. You don't know if it's going to pay off or not. So there's that part of it. So that's the buying. Then there's the borrowing. And the borrowing is sort of borrowing someone else's credibility. So if you get someone else to refer someone to you, that comes with this stamp of credibility because they already trust the person who's referring.
higher level of connection. But again, you got to maintain those relationships because all of that is still owned by the other person and they can take it away at any time. Not that they will, but you got to keep the relationships going and all that and it's still their credibility, not yours. And then the final step is to build where you build your own credibility. And that's where you got to be doing things like your...
your newsletters, your blog posts, your LinkedIn posts, your YouTube videos, et cetera, et cetera. So people learn about you and they want to come to you, not because they saw an ad. So laying the groundwork with that, tell us more about what you do if someone came to you, an accountant, a lawyer, someone like that, and they wanted your help. What does a professional like yourself do for them? So we at Lotus...
We do all three of those, but it depends on again, where the client is at. So let's say it's tax season. So let's talk about an accounting firm first. It's tax season right now. Let's do some ads. They might get some new clients that had no idea that are just kind of Googling to see, my gosh, I got to get my taxes in who comes up and they start seeing ads and things like that. That can work for a specific campaign, a specific area.
If I love the borrowing because when you borrow, yes, at first you're relying on that other person's credibility, but the more you start to work with that person, it becomes building. So the borrowing turns into building. And those are fantastic because they already have a trusted relationship. It's a little bit easier and sometimes quicker to start fostering some of the work through the borrowing.
So we'll work with clients on telling them, kind of just going through of who could be a good referral source. So who do they have in their network that could help them borrow some of that work. And then the build, the build is my favorite because that's, I've been in BD world for quite some time. The build is where you get to get creative with it. That's where you really get to hone in and we really get to talk through of where should you be.
to be building these relationships? Who do you already have within your network to be building these relationships? Could it be from a previous firm that you were at? Could it be from a previous company if you were at a company before you went into law? Could it be if you're an associate reaching back to your law school friends and even your undergrad friends to see where did they land? Where are they at now? Keeping up on those relationships.
And it doesn't mean even if a relationship has kind of waned over 10 years. If you had a good relationship 10 years ago, still reach out. People still love to hear from you. And it's just rebuilding that relationship that you had then. It again, takes a little bit longer. I always say business development is a long game. It's not going to happen overnight because you do have to build it. So the borrowing can happen faster.
I mean, the buying, still takes time. You need to enlist a marketing person or firm to help you create those ads and distribute those ads. mean, all of the social media streams and the search engines change algorithms and formats constantly. So you need to kind of be abreast as to what is actually taking place and have somebody to help you with that. Yeah, absolutely. Okay. So, so one thing that
I'm thinking about here is when I'm trying to run my practice and I'm trying to think of all the things that I need to do and all the balls I got to keep in the air, I wonder what percentage of my time should I be spending for marketing? So when I'm asked that question, I feel it's different per person. So I don't feel that there is a set answer. So if you're
a practitioner and you're younger and you have younger children, you're not going to have as much time to put towards marketing and other things. Same with if you're a practitioner and you have teenagers. You think you have more time, you really don't. I know from experience that it factors in as to how much you're able to put towards marketing and business development. Now, let's say you've been a practitioner who's been in-house or at a firm for quite some time and you go out on your own.
and you know, kids are fully grown or you don't have kids, you've got more time to add to it. So there isn't a set percentage or number. What I do like to tell people is to kind of factor in again on that target of where are you comfortable spending time? So is it on LinkedIn? Is it in in person? Like where is your audience and where are you comfortable? Because it's going to be really hard for you to commit to doing something if you don't want to do it.
So it would be if somebody tends to be more introverted and telling them you got to go to networking events, that's where you got to build these relationships, they're not going to do it. Or telling them, hey, be on LinkedIn and let's set up a plan for maybe 15 minutes a day, you're going to be on LinkedIn, this is what you're going to do. Maybe at the end of the week when you have some extra time, you can do some more research so you can plug an hour in.
But showing up at least consistently a little bit at a time is better than plugging it down once on your calendar and then just punting it down to the next week, to the next week. So really having those habits. I love James Clear and his Atomic Habits book where it says the habit stacking. So if you're already drinking your cup of coffee in the morning or tea, go on to LinkedIn. Spend 15 minutes there while you're having your beverage.
and just start replying to people on LinkedIn, building relationships on LinkedIn, or if that's not your thing, coming up with three people that you wanna reach out to to start scheduling up coffees or drinks with and sending those emails out while you're having your coffee. But stacking it together with that will help you build that consistency up. So again, it's not necessarily a specific percentage that I coach people on or tell people about.
It's just kind of honing in on where they're at in their life and how much time that they even have to give towards it. Yeah. Yeah. And that makes sense because you're right about the fact that, you know, you're not operating your business in a vacuum. You've got kids, you got family matters, you got other issues. And sometimes, you know, life takes its own direction and you got to go with that too. So it can be hard. So
You know, in your experience with the people that you've worked with over the years, is there one or maybe a couple things that you can point out where they've come to you and you look at everything they're doing and you say, okay, here's some things that people really need to be aware of in terms of here's some things that really don't work so well and here's some things that you really should be doing that do work really well.
Can you give us a sense of what you've come across? One thing that stands out that happens a lot is sponsoring everything. So firms that just throw their name out there thinking they're getting brand recognition, just sponsoring all these things. There's no strategy to it whatsoever. When you actually come in and see how much money they're spending on those, their mind is blown because they come in very randomly like, let's sponsor this event. this one's coming up.
this one, but they don't look at the full picture of how much is actually going out the door for that. And they're not attending the events that they sponsored. So they're losing out on so much value of that sponsorship by making an easier connection when somebody sees the name and then they meet you and they talk to you like, yeah, I saw your name. What does your firm do? It opens up for a much easier networking opportunity.
So that's first and foremost something I see often. Other things are just honestly not being strategic, just doing random acts of marketing, like just, we have to do this post. we have to do this because everybody else is doing it. Not just stepping back and saying, okay, what do we want to do as a firm? What is our brand? What do we want to portray? Who do we want to reach and talk to? And where are they at?
So those are two key factors. The other thing that I see people missing out on a lot, which has become really key with whatever we want to call AI searches, is awards and rankings. So those are really, really important. They do take some time, which is why it is beneficial to have support, either internally or externally, to help you with those. nominating and submitting for awards
the more that you can do, the better because that is how AI is now picking up in searches. So that is really key for moving forward. So missing out on that. Plus, if you are looking to grow your firm, others are looking to see what rankings and nominations have been received by the firm to see if they want to work there. So it's also for talent recruitment. Excellent. Excellent. I hadn't heard the bit before about the awards and those types of things.
You know, one of the things that I hear for people who are, when I say just starting out, they could have been working for a firm and now they're starting their own, but someone's starting their practice. It's like, oh, you you need to get onto all the free directories and the free this and the free that. Pro, con? I'm not a big directory person. So I don't recommend a lot of those. I would say get a website.
because when you are Googled, the first thing that pops up when somebody searches you is going to be your website bio. And the second is going to be your LinkedIn. So definitely having your LinkedIn profile, updated, having a website. And again, it's just being more targeted. So knowing where your clients are going to be in focusing on those areas, as opposed to being listed in all of these directories. Now, yes, AI is pulling from some directories, but
It tends to be more of the award ones. But I don't advise people on paying for a lot of the directory stuff. Right. Right. Okay. And then the website part, you know, I try to follow where people are asking questions about these things. So, for example, I go onto Reddit and I follow the lawyers groups about lawyer advertising and things. And I consistently see...
You know, these types of questions come up and the answers come across as, it's all about SEO, SEO, SEO, SEO, SEO, SEO. And okay, true, SEO is important, but it's presented in a way where, man, you do this magic thing and get great SEO and the world is gonna beat a path to your door. What's the truth?
There's no magic anything when it comes to marketing and business development. mean, getting business is relationship building. The marketing is getting the brand and that recognition out there. So yes, SEO is important. You want to have keywords, but I think what's even more important as opposed to those keywords is really having something that the clients, when they go to your website, it talks to their pain points.
And it speaks their language, not legalese, not the professional speak. It's really hitting what they need and will understand and showcasing a little bit more of your personality through things. So it shows that they want to work with you, that they can trust you. Yes, you need to showcase your skillset and your knowledge in areas, but in a way that's going to want somebody to work with you. Right.
Exactly. And that's something that I think is a misperception a lot of times where it's like, well, you if I just go to this audience of my perfect client and I tell them what law school I went to and what my grades were and what my degrees are and how wonderful I am and what case I was in that they're going to hire me versus this bozo next to me who went to some law school nowhere near as good of mine and...
His grades were horrible, but he's talking to them about solving their pain points. Guess who they're going to hire? Yep. 100%. So, yeah, it's super, super important to anticipate what questions and what pain points do your clients have, and then provide them answers to that information. They don't really care that you were on Law Review. Great. Good for you. Fantastic. But it's not going to get you a client. Now, unless you're with businesses and...
You know, people who are looking for that. but the other thing I think that's important to talk about here is that, so you go and you, you do create a wonderful website. It looks fantastic. It's got all this great stuff, all sorts of wonderful keywords. You're answering the client's questions. Great. But if you just put it under wraps at that point and just leave it alone and never.
care and nurture it, never feed it, never water it, never add blog posts and other types of things. What happens to those websites that are just static? I've worked with clients with those websites and I tell them that they need to do a website refresh and they don't understand why they need to do a website refresh. So I understand that. It can be a huge hurdle.
But it's one of those things where just isn't everything. Think about how quickly technology has changed just within five years. We have AI now. Were we really using AI heavily back five years ago? No. I mean, it was in some regards that we didn't even know we were using it. But still, things change. We have to adapt to those changes. And that includes adapting your website to that stuff. So having a fresh look and feel to the website
updating content with thought leadership consistently. One of the biggest is updating headshots. You don't look the same as you did five years ago. So when somebody goes to the website and they see that you look drastically different and then they meet you in person or virtually and they see that they might even kind of be taken aback like am I talking to the same person? So it's having that stuff refreshed on a regular basis that really matters because
Sometimes the website is the first touch point with a client or potential client. So it's really showcasing your best self on it. And if you're showcasing yourself from 20 years ago, it's not your best self. Even when I tell people, again, with the headshot thing, that's because I'm really, I'm a stickler on that one. So many people are like, but I look so much older now. Good.
That means you have more experience to give and showcase them. It's not a bad thing. So it's definitely just kind of approaching it and telling them why it matters and that it does matter to clients. If they see something dated, they don't think that they're going to be getting the information that they need now on the matter that's taking place today in today's world, not in the world that was 10, 15 years ago. Right. Right. I just, I keep thinking of the, you know, the dating sites.
and having a headshot of what you look like in high school and now you're 55 years old. you really think that even if you do make a connection that when the person meets you and sees you that, I'm not so sure how that's going to work out. No, no, there's terms for that. All right. So then let's ask this.
because as we start to wrap up here, what I want to get to is, somebody recognizes that they need to be better about their marketing, their outreach. And we've talked about a lot of things that they can do personally, time on LinkedIn, going to events, all those types of things that we talked about. But they're very concerned about the fact they don't have a lot of time because they have a new baby at home and they got a...
do this and they got to do that and they got to be in court and all these things. When they hire someone like yourself to handle marketing and business growth for them, how much of that can someone like you do and how much do they still have to do on their own? always tell firms and lawyers and accountants that we work with is we want to take as much of that off their plate as possible because their job is to service their clients.
So, that first and foremost, that's what they went to school for. That's what they want to do. That's what they should be doing. So as much as we can take off, we try to. In terms of marketing, it's pretty much all of it, depending on how much oversight they want. So as you're aware with professional service people, some people like control over things. So some people want to have review before any posts go out and that's fine, but we can do all of the creative.
all of the content, the copy, anything for those posts for that final review. For awards, we can do a quick interview and after we've worked with the firm for a while, we kind of understand people and can just start writing stuff on our own for award nominations to just have them review, make any edits, and we can submit. For email newsletters, same situation. We can put all of that content together.
if they want to review it in advance before we push it out, but we push it out. We can handle all that stuff. We even do ideation for ghost writing of blogs. So what I specify that it's ideation because we are not subject matter experts, but it's better to give them something to start off of as opposed to just a blank page. any type of marketing, same with ads, all that other stuff. We can put all that together. We can come up with promo items. We can come up with speaking opportunities for them.
All of the stuff, it's just how much review and oversight that they want for it. Business development, they're going to have to do more because that's them building relationships. So we can help them with planning. We can help them with coaching. We can help them stay accountable. We can give them tips on stuff, but that they are going to have to go out and do. Right. Fantastic. Well, it sounds, you know, there's at least a degree of relief that there is a
you know, professional competent person who can handle at least a good part of this stuff. because you just can't do everything in every aspect of your life. So, all right. Well, we, we are unfortunately at the end of our time here. So I appreciate all the information that you've shared. hopefully, the listeners are able to take away some points that they can put into place.
if you're interested in getting in touch with Rebecca, she's at Lotus Business Growth Consultants. Do you have a website? I do. So it is lotusbizgrowth.com and that is B-I-Z. So lotusbizgrowth.com. We've got a lot of videos and blogs and just some great information there too. Great. Great. All right. Well, Rebecca, thank you so much for your time and hopefully we can have you back again and you can update us on some wonderful.
things that you've been doing, but we appreciate the work that you do. I'm sure your clients very much appreciate the work that you do. And we will see you all on the next episode of the Be Picked podcast. Thanks, Andrew. It was great being here. Thank you.