Perhaps, just perhaps, we can triple the results of your marketing without any increase in price.
Marketing is expensive. Everybody wants to pay less and get better results, regardless of what they have today. This brings about the hope of a magical, mystical, secret lead source that will produce profitable clients lining up outside your door with no effort on your part.
Back when we started providing leads to attorneys, we had no good way to know how good our leads performed. We asked our clients. Some said they were good leads. Most said they weren’t very good. Some believed they were good, but said they weren’t very good anyway (thinking they could negotiate lower prices). We later realized that most firms had no real idea – they were not equipped to measure their results. They still gave us answers, but the answers were rarely based upon measured results.
Years later, we developed software to help firms convert leads to clients. The great benefit for all of us was that we could get measured results, so long as the firm was relatively diligent in using the software. That’s when the truth began to show. Some firms got conversions at 20%. Others got conversions at 3%. Some firms contacted 80% of the leads. Other firms contacted 25%. Some firms had 4% declines. Others had 40%. All from essentially identical batches of leads.
At last, we had some tools to help our clients. We could identify areas for potential improvement and direct our clients’ attention toward those. As we shared the results and pointed out areas to consider, we started to see very interesting distinctions.
We found that some firms look outward — they consider the success or failure of their marketing to be purely the based on the quality of the marketing. These are the lead-chasers. In their view of the world, it’s all about the leads. Other firms look inward – they consider the success or failure of their marketing to be strongly influenced by their performance. These are the firms that focus their attention on improving their internal performance.
There is a definite distinction that we see as firms tend to gravitate to one of two distinct camps. Some firms look for the perfect leads and some firms look to perfect their processes. The attitudes and beliefs of these two camps are almost completely opposite.
It would make a good story to say that the firms that look to perfect their processes always perform better. However, the world is not that simple and clean. The actual story is more nuanced, but there are some important patterns that appear over and over again.
First, the firms that are looking for the perfect leads (external-looking) usually have the poorest-performing processes. Even if they get very good leads, they can’t take advantage of them, and they conclude, once again, that the leads weren’t good enough. It’s a difficult quest.
Second, the best performing companies tend to focus on their internal processes first and foremost (internal-looking). They realize that the best they can do is to take the best advantage of whatever marketing results they get. They seek to improve the things that are in their control first.
Third, the poor-performing firms that focus on their internal processes have a mixed success ratio. Let’s face it, not everyone is going to be good at the things needed to convert leads.
Fourth, which is the most important in my view, the poor-performing or mid-performing firms that improve also seek to improve the things that are in their control first. They get their improvement by developing their internal processes.
Thus, in marketing and in life, I like to consider the words of the Serenity Prayer:
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, The courage to change the things I can, And the wisdom to know the difference.*
Marketing has changed, not always in ways that make things easier for you. That we cannot change. To put yourself in the category of best performing companies, or at least in the category of companies with improving performance, I suggest that you seek first to look internally and improve what you can. When you can do that, then whatever results you get from your marketing will be much better, perhaps even three times as good with the same costs.
