iStock_000016006182Small“Social media.”

“Content marketing.”

These terms are thrown around willy nilly these days, because in addition to everything else we’re doing in our daily professional lives, the accessibility of LinkedIn, Facebook, blogging platforms, SnapChat, Vimeo, YouTube, etc. has turned us all into social media and content marketing practitioners.

But while social and digital media are inextricably linked with content marketing, it’s important to distinguish them – they are NOT, in fact, the same thing, and shouldn’t be considered interchangeable. In today’s Two for Tuesdays, while it may seem a bit elementary to some of you out there, it’s come to my attention that there’s some confusion around the difference between social media and content marketing. We’re going to look at the difference between the two (I’ll start with the short version, then delve into the long one), and why it’s important not to confuse them.  Continue Reading Content Marketing ≠ Social Media

iStock_000023864354XSmallLast week, I was listening to a podcast with Jabez LeBret, CMO of Get Noticed Get Found – the podcast was on the 5 Things You Should Never Do on LinkedIn, and of course the title got my attention.

You’ll have to listen to the podcast to find out what those are – it’s only about 30 minutes long, so head on over for a listen.

But one of the things that struck me was something Jabez said right at the end. His co-host asked if he had any advice for listeners, and he said that sales training often suggests that you go through your contact list, and call three people every day for a month. Not to sell them anything, but just to check in and see how they’re doing.

So his suggestion is to apply this to LinkedIn. And I love it, so I’m passing it along to you:

Every day, for a month, reach out to three of your connections by email.

Now, there are some rules, here, of course.

  • Before you send them an email, you should first look at their profile and their recent activity to see what they’ve been up to lately. In reaching out to them, you want to make your email about THEM, and not about YOU.
  • Your email is not to pitch them on anything or remind them of services you offer, even if you’re reaching out to a potential client. I know for 99.9% of you reading this, that’s obvious and I don’t even have to say it. But for that 0.1%, I do, so I’m including it.
  • Bonus points if you reach out to people who are in your city and offer to meet up with them for coffee or lunch in the next four weeks too.

We all have a lot of LinkedIn connections these days (it’s really easy to say yes to them!), but how well do we know our connections, and how well are we actually connecting with them? If you’re like me, even if you log into LinkedIn (which I do actually do daily), you’re only scanning through your feed and maybe “liking” a few updates, adding a “congrats!” here and there for an anniversary or new job, and maybe clicking on one or two interesting articles that someone has shared.

So there’s a huge opportunity to amplify my LinkedIn community efforts by better engaging with my network there every day. If I email three of my connections every day for the 31 days in January, that’s 93 people I will have reached out to by the end of the month.

I’m taking the challenge in January to do it. Will you?

twofortueToday’s Two for Tuesday’s post comes to you from high above the clouds, as I’m flying home from a two and a half day trip to London. It will be a bit late because there’s no in-flight wifi this time (a pity, though it does prevent me from doing more work than I probably should anyway), but I will try to keep it short for you, since I hope that in your spare time, you’re working on your 2016 planning!

Our tips today focus again on content marketing, and may be things that you’re already doing as part of your content mix – but in case you’re not, these are two ways that you can freshen things up a bit, and add in some additional opportunities for people to engage with your content. And if one of your content marketing goals is to build relationships with your target audiences, then that’s exactly the type of thing you want to be doing! Continue Reading Inject Your Content Marketing With New Life in 2016

cropped-005-lma-ne-2015-conference-email-banner_emailRather than bringing you our regularly scheduled “Two for Tuesdays” today, I’m continuing the roundup from the LMA New England Conference, with “Creating a WOW Communications Program,” another excellent session I attended.

Whether you’re tasked directly with communications or not, the truth is that we’re all communicators in our firms – we all have messages to deliver, whether it’s as lawyers to clients or as marketers to our lawyers. So there are strong benefits to gain from this session for all of us.  Continue Reading Creating a WOW Communications Program

twofortue
Last week, we took a look at two mistakes that may be impacting your content marketing, giving up too early and not marketing your content. Continuing with our theme, and thanks to Content Marketing Institute for their inspiration, we’re going to look at another two mistakes today.

Mistake Number One: Your Offerings Have Become Passé

This mistake is really about two things – not producing enough new content, and not thinking outside of the box with your existing content offerings. Both can be problematic.

Not Producing Enough New Content

I am a firm believer in quality over quantity when it comes to content. Yes, I write a lot myself, but that doesn’t mean I advocate it for everyone – it’s just what works for me.

But when you’re producing content, it’s all about “what have you done for me lately?” If you’re not reminding people that you’re out there, and providing them with value, they just won’t think about you at all. It’s as simple as that.

So you may not need to publish a new blog post or produce a new video every week. But you can’t let months go by without offering NEW content of value. And there is SO much that you’re already doing that can be fodder for good content that there’s really no excuse.

  • Sit down and give yourself the writing prompt “I am often asked…” What is it that your clients regularly ask you about the law that you’re always answering for them? Turn that into a blog post or a whitepaper – if a few of your clients are always asking you something, the likelihood is that others who are NOT your clients but are in the industry are wondering the same thing. Why not share your wisdom and expertise with them?
  • When new legislation comes out or cases are decided, do you email some of your clients with the impact that will have on their business? Take the content of those emails and turn it into a general article or blog post that you can use to explain to a generic company in the industry how the same legislation or court decision may impact THEM. It just takes some tweaking and removing of any confidential information to repurpose something you’re already doing.
  • If you’re speaking at conferences on a subject, take your presentations and share them on SlideShare. Turn them into a series of blog posts. Pull out the most salient points and create a short video around them.

Continue Reading 2 [More] Mistakes that Are Killing Your Content Marketing

cropped-005-lma-ne-2015-conference-email-banner_emailAs I’ve mentioned, the LMA NE conference was full of really meaty, thought-provoking content. One of the excellent sessions I attended was “Lead Nurturing Ecosystems – Moving Legal Marketing from an Art to a Science.”

The panelists for the session were:

Continue Reading Lead Nurturing Ecosystems – Moving Legal Marketing from an Art to a Science

cropped-005-lma-ne-2015-conference-email-banner_emailDuring the LMA NE conference, one of the sessions I was most looking forward to was the keynote with Adam Grossman, the Senior Vice President/Marketing & Brand Development, Boston Red Sox & Fenway Sports Management. It may seem like a stretch that legal marketing and baseball marketing have anything in common, but if you’re a regular Zen reader, you’ll know that I love looking outside of our industry for inspiration. 

Grossman actually did an excellent job of tying in sports marketing to what we do – typically these speakers will leave it up to us to make the connections (something that we should be easily able to do, by the way), but he spelled it out for us pretty nicely, in an engaging and entertaining presentation that may have almost converted this non-baseball fan.

Grossman’s mentor is Larry Lucchino, himself a “recovering lawyer,” so he has special insight into what it’s like to work in this profession, and that helped frame his comments. He shared with us a few essential tips for marketing that we could all agree were great takeaways. Continue Reading How Baseball is Like Legal Marketing – A Keynote

LJIZlzHgQ7WPSh5KVTCB_TypewriterRecently, someone said that “content marketing” is a recent phenomenon in law firms. And I almost fell out of my chair.

Content marketing is NOT new to law firms. In fact, law firms are some of the original content marketers – firms have been producing content for years! What IS new is producing strategy around it, and formulating distribution plans that are measured and further refined based on those measurements. We’re getting more strategic, and it’s that strategy that’s new.

But that doesn’t mean that the road isn’t rife with mistakes – it is. The Content Marketing Institute recently published a book with 13 Content Marketing Mistakes, and highlighted a few in a recent blog post – we’ll be taking the next few weeks to look at these in the context of lawyers and law firms. Continue Reading 2 Mistakes that Are Killing Your Content Marketing

FirmoftheMonth1November/December 2015

The ILN is proud to announce our latest firm of the month, Lewis Rice LLC – St. Louis, Missouri!

With more than 150 lawyers practicing in all of the major legal practice areas, Lewis Rice is a leading regional law firm in the Midwest, serving clients coast-to-coast. Continue Reading Firm of the Month – Lewis Rice, St. Louis, Missouri!

cropped-005-lma-ne-2015-conference-email-banner_emailDuring last week’s LMA NE conference, we were treated to quite a lot of high level, meaty content. Over the next few weeks, I’ll share recaps of the various sessions here, and I invite you to participate in the discussion!

First up, we have the crisis communications panel that kicked off the conference on the first evening: Crisis Communications: Out of Great Adversity Comes Great Opportunity! From the program description:

In times of despair, crisis communications must be faster than a speeding bullet, stronger than a locomotive, and able to leap all law firm obstructions. Our team of ‘superhero’ panelists are armed with specific pointers on how to best handle crisis communications matters within and outside of a firm. They’ll offer how-to methods and real-life anecdotes for creating a communications plan, as well as ways to use a crisis as an opportunity to strengthen your firm. Details will be provided on how to work through the knee-jerk ‘no comment’ response law firms and lawyers are known for. Panelists will share best practices for damage control and secrets to learning from past mistakes. Arm yourself and be ready to swing into action!”

Continue Reading What’s Your WOW Factor: Crisis Communications