Most law firms don’t usually rely on email as a method of maintaining communication – – people consider email marketing as dead. However, it’s more relevant than ever. 

It may come as a surprise, but when it comes to customer acquisition, email marketing is nearly 40 times more effective than social media, meaning law firms can benefit greatly from its use. However, only a few invest their time in creating an effective email marketing plan. This is understandable if you’re not familiar with the concept, so you automatically consider it irrelevant.

This article will help you understand how you can create one and why creating an email marketing plan can be a turning point for your law firm.

Let’s dive in!

The importance of email marketing for law firms

As a successful lawyer or an attorney, you’re probably hesitating to start with email marketing, but the below-listed points will explain why it’s a good decision.

• Maintain positive communication with existing clients, while capturing the attention of new ones. Having great communication with your clients will always pay off. They appreciate being contacted and listened to, even when it comes to legal matters. Nurturing the relationship with existing clients is important as expanding your circle. 
• It’s a cost-effective method. Email marketing is not as pricey as one thinks. You can do it on your own, but there are a lot of email marketing platforms that can take your email marketing campaigns to another level, while at the same time reducing your monthly costs.
• Improve brand awareness. By sending clients weekly newsletters, you’ll remind them of your existence and the services you can provide them. Sometimes, a small reminder is all that’s needed. 
• Increase ROI. Successful email marketing can significantly increase your ROI over time. 

 

How to create an effective email marketing plan

An email marketing plan is the first and most important part of an email marketing strategy. But bear in mind, it’s only effective when carefully planned beforehand. If you’re just starting and are having difficulties, we’ll walk you through a few steps on how to successfully manage this.

Identify your goals and mission

Before you decide the type of content you want to create and to whom you want to send it, don’t forget to set your goals. It’s important to understand what you’re offering, what’s your practice niche and what you want to achieve in the long run.

By doing so, you’ll be more confident in the services you’re offering and therefore be able to present them better. This can help your law firm focus on accomplishing a specific marketing objective, while at the same time convey the right message to your clients. 

 

Identify your target audience

Sure, you can carelessly send thousands of emails, but if the recipients have never shown interest in your services, what’s it worth? It’s about quality, not quantity.

By targeting the right audience, the chances of receiving positive feedback will increase. 

 

For starters, are you offering B2B or B2C services?

 

• B2B services. Think again about the services you’re offering and which industries will they attract. Furthermore, are these large or small businesses? What type of ownership are they?
• B2C services. Yes, it’s important to know the basics like age range and gender, but you have to dig deeper. What is your clients’ occupation and does their income range make any difference to you? Moreover, you can take a look into their hobbies and interests. 

This careful selection helps law firms to attract the right customers and easily meet their needs.

 

 

Determine your current stage of business development

It’s important to be aware of your success and know when it’s time for improvement and change.

If you’re a startup law firm, you probably have a clear vision and are all about expanding your business. Combine your drive with email marketing and you’re in for a treat!

On the other hand, if you’re already experienced, but aren’t satisfied with the number of clients, you’re probably asking yourself ‘’What am I doing wrong and what can I do to improve myself’’? No need to wonder anymore. With the right email marketing plan, you’ll significantly increase the number of clients coming your way.

Review results from past years

In order to know if you’ve gotten better, comparing the new, with results from past years is a must. This gives you a clear picture of your past mistakes and an opportunity to make it right in the future and lead your law firm on the right path.

On top of that, you’ll gather statistics, which give you an overview of your client’s feedback. For example: At what time do clients tend to open emails? What have they shown the most interest in? How many newsletters in a week are enough? etc. 

Choose fitting email types

What is the purpose of your email? Are you making an announcement, trying to promote services, or maybe it’s just a welcome email?

Once you’ve established that, you can easily decide which email type you should go with. 

 

• Newsletters. These types of emails usually include informational content — upcoming events, presenting novelties, or offering helpful advice regarding your services.
• Promotional emails. The name says it all. Promotional emails are best when it comes to attracting customers. 
• Transactional emails. Unlike newsletters, transactional emails don’t require the same level of creativity, instead keeping it professional is enough. They include important information about legal transactions. 
• Survey emails. If you want to gather feedback from clients, sending them survey emails is the best way to do so.
• Welcome emails. Welcoming a client is a great gesture, so never forget it!

 

 

Organize your email calendar

You can always rely on personalized automated emails, but you also play a huge role in this, which means it’s all about your input. Start with adding the most important holidays throughout the year. An email like this can always cheer up a person. Afterward, you can include business events, so you’ll never have to worry if you timely informed everybody.

On the other hand, if you’re not a fan of automated emails, you can still use this to your advantage. By organizing your email calendar, you’ll be prepared beforehand about what type of content you should create. This gives you enough time to come up with ideas in order to captivate your clients. 

 

 

Choose an email marketing platform

The email marketing process is not a complicated task but requires a lot of creativity, patience, and attention to detail. Not every person out there has the time or skills to do it. That’s why choosing an email marketing platform can really ease the process for law firms.

Most businesses don’t want to bother with the decision-making process, so immediately go with ActiveCampaign. Before you do the same, it’s important to take a few things into account. 

ActiveCampaign pros and cons

Besides being one of the most popular email marketing platforms with a lot of advantages, ActiveCampaign has its disadvantages as well. That’s why sometimes it’s important to have other options and be well informed on the ActiveCampaign alternatives pros and cons as well, but for now, bear with me. 

Pros

• User friendly. The platform itself is very easy to use and can be easily learned.
• Inexpensive option. The platform offers amazing features, considering the minimum price is only 9$ a month.
• Visual automation. The automation builder of ActiveCampaign is one of the best out there and is definitely worth the price.

Cons

• CRM. It’s an in-built system and is not comparable to standalone platforms.
• Reporting can be complicated. As I said, it’s a user-friendly platform overall, but when it comes to reporting, it’s very easy to get confused during the process. 

 

Start with email marketing today

As I previously mentioned, law firms aren’t big fans of email marketing. Hopefully, this will change. As digital marketing itself is an inevitable process nowadays, as a subcategory, email marketing is also beneficial. 

Creating engaging email content is essential when it comes to promoting your business and attracting new clients. Email marketing helps law firms build trust with clients and improves their professional reputation. 

When all the advantages of email marketing are taken into account, we can conclude that it’s a method worth investing in. After going through this article, I highly doubt you’ll have second thoughts. 

Think about what’s best for your law firm, start with email marketing today!

Author bio

Makedonka Micajkova is a freelance content writer and translator, always bringing creativity and originality to the table. Being multilingual with professional proficiency in English, German and Spanish, it’s needless to say that languages are her biggest passion in life. She is also a skilled communicator, as a result of having three years of experience as a sales representative. You can find her on Linkedin.