The legal sector is undergoing some significant changes, and only the firms adapting to these changes can survive and grow. From companies receiving £5 million in private equity funding after an alternative business structure conversion to SRA rewriting separate rules, making the legal market more competitive and innovative, and legal outsourcing services becoming more popular, a lot is changing in the legal landscape. Businesses that aren’t growing at the same pace must consider themselves finished by the year’s end.
The nature of the forces guiding the legal market is diverse, and understanding them individually and preparing the rightful response is the best defense for any progressive legal firm.
However, the entire landscape is becoming more cumbersome to decode, and legal firms must react fast to save their existence. This post is an attempt to guide legal firms to evolve in the digital age.
Top tips for surviving and growing exponentially in the digital era
Make your online presence stronger and more visible
As digitalization expands, the legal industry has been the slowest amongst all to respond to the changes. Only a handful of legal firms are active in their online business game, which makes them stronger than others. However, there is still scope for improvement as legal firms must adapt modern online business generation expertise from industries that have already decoded the secret to online success.
Companies can best do to grow their business by leveraging the power of the internet. The competitive evolution of the legal sector now makes it compulsory for every business to manage its affairs online. Therefore, boosting visibility and reach must be the prime focus of every legal firm, no matter what legal services you offer. A strategic approach to online visibility can help your firm gain the advantage of attracting the customer first and establishing yourself as a market leader.
The client has direct access to information on the internet where he can research the services/ legal products he requires and businesses that can provide him with the same. Google introduced the term ‘Zero Moment of Truth (ZMOT) in 2011, which refers to a particular phase of the buying cycle where the buyer researches a service/ product. Today, buyers are using the internet exclusively to do such research. While other sectors are already familiar with ZMOT, the legal industry is battling to understand it better and utilize it to maximize benefits.
So, how do you plan on using the internet or boosting your online presence? With mobile and internet usage on the rise, more and more people are searching for a legal service/ product, and this is the opportunity for you to place yourself right in front of their eyes. Getting online and making your SEO game strong is what you must do to ensure you capture the attention of your clients.
Track client touch points meticulously
If you are looking forward to establishing a long-term relationship with your clients, you must deliver value and for that, you first need to understand how your clients communicate with your business, both directly and indirectly. Your client can approach you in several ways, including social media, thought leadership, website, and contact forms.
Client touch point mapping plays a crucial role in tweaking your online presence and making successful client interactions. For long-term digital growth, you must understand the way your client interacts with your business.
Be client-specific when designing things
Whether designing a website or an ad campaign, ensure you understand what your client is looking for in it. Every advertisement will bring you closer to understanding your client’s perspective. There must be SOPs for legal firms to follow to understand better the buyer’s requirements and the challenges they face.
For example, if you are offering legal outsourcing services, you must first understand why companies need a third party to work on their legal documents in the first place. This would give you a better understanding of what to offer when you approach them through an advertisement.
Increase the functionality of your website
A website is your digital address, and your clients would visit it frequently to understand you and your offerings better. Therefore, it is important to maintain a highly functional website that is also easy to navigate. The client is more interested in learning about your company and its reliability, your services, and your customer’s satisfaction rate.
Also, there are hundreds of websites on the internet, and to ensure yours is the one that the customer chooses, you must maintain functionality, user-friendliness, and a fast-loading speed.
Make use of smart technology
Using the right technology can be the turning point for your business. Legal outsourcing services providers are investing in technology that makes their services quicker, more accurate, and more reliable for their target customers. This has helped the sector evolve in great measures.
Similarly, every legal firm battling digital changes must invest in the technology that boosts their online combatting skills and present them as a well-equipped and seasoned contender to win legal service customers. There are endless ways to evolve and grab market attention, from contract drafting tools to legal service outsourcing practices.
Utilize social media
Social media has proved its worth as a marketing tool, but legal companies are still not utilizing it to its full potential. Social media platforms offer diversity and expand the reach of legal firms looking for client engagement. You can directly engage with your target audience, boost brand value, and gain customer recognition.
Maintain a great reputation
Reputation management has become integral to online success and growth. What people say about your business is a key factor that designs your client’s perspective. Client reviews to testimonials, and even comments on your social media posts can significantly affect how the client perceives your business.
Reputation management has great scope and must be performed by a dedicated team or a professional third-party service provider. Building a strong network of positive user reviews and testimonials, engaging with your audience in comments, and offering more and more social proof of your credibility is crucial under online reputation management for legal firms.
Businesses like legal outsourcing services must focus on reputation management more as they are evolving business that demands customer authentication to grow and expand.
Automate: But be wise to choose
When choosing to automate your processes, you must be watchful for personalization in the automation. While automation simplifies your operations significantly, you must understand that it does not follow a one-size-fits-all approach. Instead, you must choose automation tools based on your buyer’s persona, industrial specialization, customer preferences, and more. A personalized approach toward automation would bring you better results, including high conversion rates and better profits.
Offer value
Adding value to your content can increase its reach and effectiveness. You must make use of Webinars, free tools, videos, and other forms of educational content to attract and engage your clients. Additionally, discounts on legal counsel and certain freebie services are recommended to take it to the next level. This also helps you win your clients’ trust and boost your online credibility, which directly affects your online visibility and google ranking.
Outsource legal work
Hard work pays but smart work pays better. To make the best out of the market opportunities, you must focus on your core niche and utilize legal outsourcing services to handle supportive tasks. In addition, you must trust a legal outsourcing service firm with a good reputation and experience to handle the most mundane tasks of your business.
A legal process outsourcing firm can be the right choice when you are struggling with a shortage of resources or perhaps it is too soon to hire a full-time workforce. To ensure you are always open to taking up new clients and your existing workforce is not getting exploited in the process, you must use legal outsourcing services to perform better. The arrangement saves you money and effort while maximizing your revenue from the business.
Final words
In this digital age, law firms must have a hands-on understanding of the internet and the many ways to promote their business online. If you are not competing in the digital race already, you are moving backward. It is time to evolve and adapt to digital expansion’s changes in the legal sector. The quicker you respond to the changing user requirements, the more you will make profits from the opportunities that come along with the digital.
About the Author
Cathrine Troyer writes about legal process outsourcing, technology, and business law. She is passionate about teaching lawyers and legal professionals how to renew their strategies and use technology in their cases and does so regularly for her clients at Cogneesol.
