Throughout the past month, GNGF has been coming up with different ways to reengage past prospects. Some prospects go as far back as the first CLE Mark and Jabez ever spoke at!
Just like GNGF, law firms should be brainstorming ideas to reengage people who have been in contact with the firm but have never turned into a client. There are many reasons a previous prospect never amounted to a full-fledged client: it could be anything from a budget issue to the fact that the services were not needed at the time.
As the GNGF team explored our options, we wanted to continue our philosophy of always educating people. In the spirit of this philosophy, we decided to hold a webinar. We invited prospects to join the live webinar and learn updates to the information they received at the CLE they attended months or even years ago. To notify people of the webinar, we sent out a series of emails as well as a letter. The letter was a crucial part, as most people get hundreds (if not thousands) of emails a day, and we didn’t want our update to get lost in the shuffle.
When reengaging past prospects, keep your audience in mind. How would they appreciate receiving your information? A letter? Email? Phone call? Or a combination of all of the above?
Sending all of our emails through MailChimp allowed us to track the open rate as well as the number of people who unsubscribed from the mailing list. Tracking the open rate is an essential step; certain days of the week and times of the day will have a better open rate. Your email is probably not going to be seen if it is sent on Sunday morning at 7 a.m.
For attorneys, MailChimp is a great tool to help reengage prospects or even inform current clients. If you are an estate planning attorney, for example, you could send out an email educating prospects about why having a will is so important. This might serve to remind an earlier prospect, who didn’t think of creating a will before, of your services.
After the webinar, we sent a hand-written thank you note to everyone who attended the webinar. Sending a simple thank you note goes a long way in expressing your appreciation. (In today’s digital age—where email and text messages are the norm—a hand-written note is even more impressive.) Mailing a thank you to prospects after meeting or talking on the phone with them is a great way to make your firm stand out from your competition.
Re-engaging prospects does not have to be a painstaking process, but it is an essential one. Don’t abandon prospects that do not immediately become clients: by building and maintaining a relationship with them, your firm stays top of mind, should they ever need your services or know someone who needs legal guidance.