Predictable Estate Planner

Marketing + Sales For Estate Planning Lawyers

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What Is Lead Conversion?

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To understand how we can go about increasing conversions on your law firm’s website we first need to be on the same page about how we delineate what a conversion is.  For the purpose of this video and blog the types of conversions we’re trying to increase are:

  • Prospect clicks on your phone number on your website
  • Submits a contact form
  • Schedules an appointment

So how do we get more of these types of conversions when prospects visit our website?  We do this using one simple strategy.

Blogging.

Why Blogging To Increase Conversions On My Website?

Especially for estate planning attorneys, it’s important to your prospects when they visit your website that you give off the appearance that you are a patient business to work with.

People want to be educated and they want to learn.  Especially as an attorney it’s important that you be willing to educate them and be patient with them.  If prospects that visit your website don’t know that then they are going to be less likely to reach out to you and become a conversion.

A typical law firm website that is using paid ads will attain conversions from 1%-2% of their website traffic.  Over the past 10 years working with estate planning attorneys we’ve identified a trend a correlation between conversion rate and the number of pages and posts on the law firm’s website.

This means simply that the more blog posts and pages you’re creating, the more likely the prospect is to become a lead.

Why We Encourage Blogging

In terms of organic SEO and paid ads when you have more pages and posts on your website it’s going to result in higher conversion rates.  Higher conversion rates mean that the more people you have visiting your website the larger return on investment your law firm is going to see in the long run.

How do I get clients more invested in the interaction with me as an estate planning attorney?

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One decades worth of Internet, analytics, and numerous case studies have shown that the more invested a person is during the “dating stage” with a particular attorney or law firm the more likely they are to become a customer of the law firm. In this blog post, I will break down–in order–how to get your prospective client more invested in the interaction with you–their estate planning attorney. So without further ado..

Number one. Make it easy for them to find you.

Make it easy for them to find you. Most commonly known strategies: organic search ranking, google my business, paid search advertising, social media ads, direct mailers, radio and television. You have to do whatever you have to do in order to get more traffic to your website. Consult your marketing specialist for recommendations.

Number two. Lead, Nurture & Guide them.

Once you have your foot in the door and they are on your website now, it is time to lead, nurture and guide them the way you most enjoy doing it. Show them you’re listening, have a conversation with them and provide answers to their questions. Read more on my top 3 ways to extend more value to your prospective clients.

Number three. What to do after they take initial action.

After they take initial action. At this point, you have their contact information and your website has produced the result you most desire. This is where most attorneys quit, but this is actually where attorneys are generating quality leads with prospective clients–quality leads that know and understand the benefits of a trust over a simple well will–will become live calls and appointments for you. Your objective from number two was simply to get people into the beginning of your funnel. Once you have accomplished that your new objective is to funnel, only the right and best prospects into booking a time to meet and to speak with you the attorney.

You now possess the power once they are in your funnel to weed out people who are not serious about working with you to get their estate plan completed. It is OK to make them work in order to claim a piece of your very precious time. Now that they are in your funnel, you can take appropriate action to get your prospective client to invest more time, more clicks into the interaction with you the attorney.

Need help?

If you are an attorney that wants to write more estate plans and generate more leads online and off-line then I may be able to help you. I build a system that generates live calls and appointments from people in your area that need help with their estate plan. To book a time to speak with me, help me learn more about you and your business by completing the quiz here. The quiz is very short–only 2 to 3 minutes. Make sure you enter your email at the end so I know how to match up your answers with you. From there, you will be able to book a time with me to discuss your marketing strategy.

Complete the quiz ? ?

What are my top 3 ways to extend more value to your prospective clients? (in order)

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Ever study the law of attraction? ?

In a nutshell, the more value you put out into the Universe the more you get back. It works the same with marketing your services as an attorney that specializes in estate planning wills & trusts. The more value you extend your prospective clients the more leads you generate.  Attorneys, in this blog I’ll break down–in order–my top 3 ways to extend more value to your prospective clients.  So without further ado..

1. Listen to them.

Listen to them. Showing that you’re listening gets you on the same page, keeps them present and focused on the interaction.

2. Have a conversation with them.

Have a conversation with them. The purpose of listening is to have a conversation. No one likes being talked at. Too often as attorneys we feel the need to showcase our expertise on a particular topic and thats where you’re likely to lose the person you’re having a conversation with. Practice storytelling.

3. Educate them.

Educate them. The purpose of the conversation is to help them. This is one of the 2 most important factors (specifically for estate planning attorneys) for generating more leads via your website. This should be the part that you as the attorney enjoy doing the most. It’s the reason you got into estate planning in the first place–to give people peace of mind about their estate.

Need help?

If you are an attorney that wants to write more estate plans and generate more leads online and off-line then I may be able to help you. I build a system that generates live calls and appointments from people in your area that need help with their estate plan. To book a time to speak with me, help me learn more about you and your business by completing the quiz here. The quiz is very short–only 2 to 3 minutes. Make sure you enter your email at the end so I know how to match up your answers with you. From there, you will be able to book a time with me to discuss your marketing strategy.

Complete the quiz ? ?

The Difference Between A Virtual Estate Planner And Mobile Estate Planner

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I love this topic, because for an estate planning attorney the way you market yourself makes a huge difference in whether or not a prospective client becomes a lead for your business.  The way people can work with you tells a huge story about whether or not you’ll have success in growing your law firm, and growing it through your digital marketing efforts.  In this blog I’ll do my best to compare and contrast the two, from a marketers perspective.

 

Mobile Estate Planners Have It Made…. Sort Of

First off, what the heck is a mobile estate planner?  For the purposes of this blog, an estate planner is a licensed and practicing attorney that writes estate plans, wills, trusts, powers of attorney and all the necessary estate planning documents anyone requires in preparation for their demise.  A mobile estate planner is an estate planner that will travel to meet with clients where they are be that in a residential home, nursing or senior-living home, hospital or coffee shop.  A mobile estate planner is not limited by their physical location within the metro area or city they reside and practice in.

As you can probably tell from my description of a mobile estate planner that by marketing yourself as mobile you give yourself a leg-up on your competition as an estate planning attorney.  Not only that, there are several things you can do, depending on your metro area, to gain an organic search advantage through the use of multiple mailing address or offices where you can meet with clients at.

Why is this important? 

Because people like to support local, and with something as personal as managing their estate after their passing they like to know that the person [the attorney] they choose to work with for their estate plan is local, and can be contacted in the event they need to make a change or someone they name in their plan has a question for them.

On the downside, most people don’t know that an attorney that is licensed in the state can write an estate plan for them no matter how far away they live from them. Writing and publishing blogs and making your messaging clear on your website are great ways to overcome this.

Additionally, most people think their county has specific laws and rules that an estate planner that lives outside of their territory will not understand, and therefore something could be missing in their estate plan.  Blogs and great messaging again are the answer here.

 

Virtual Estate Planners Have More Disadvantages Than You May Think

A virtual estate planner is an estate planner that does not meet with clients in-person, ever.  They only meet over the phone, audio and video conferencing.  This can be a big factor in whether or not a prospective client will choose to reach out to you and become a new lead through your digital marketing efforts.  People want to meet in person, they want to know you live near them and understand the lay of the land as it pertains to their estate.

On the upside, if you are solely a virtual estate planner for your metro area or city you practice in, but you also live in that area, you need to make that clear in your messaging or else you could miss out on a lot of business that would convert into a lead through your website and digital marketing efforts.

If you choose to practice estate planning as an attorney in a city you don’t live, you might consider setting up a mailing address within that city, and connecting that with a Google My Business profile.  That will give you an element of trust with prospects that live there, even though you don’t.

Lastly, through your digital marketing I encourage you to make the fact that you’re a virtual estate planner clear up front.  One of the first things your prospects are looking for is a yes or no answer to “are they local?”  If you can answer that question, along with questions like “are they an estate planning attorney” then you’ll be well on your way to converting that website prospect into a lead.

 

Virtual Estate Planning Vs. Mobile Estate Planning: Which One Is Best?

Wrapping up it really depends on how you like to practice law and what your process is.  After converting a prospect into a lead, a lead generation company’s role with your company is not to create the process for you, rather it is to help automate it and free up your time for you.  Depending on what your law firm’s digital footprint looks like currently will determine the best way to go about marketing yourself more effectively as a virtual or mobile estate planner.  If a conversation about that is warranted, I invite you to schedule a call with me now.

? Onward and ? Upward,
Heath Rost

Attorneys: How To Get More Qualified Leads Through Your Website

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What marketing strategy can law firms can use to increase the quality of leads they attract through their website as well as increase the quantity through their legal marketing efforts?  In this video I broke down three huge topics which I’ll do my best to unpack in future blogs and videos.  This was a very high-level question to answer.

How to get more qualified leads through my law firm’s website

1-You MAKE them qualified

The way you communicate with your prospects after they become a lead is how you warm leads up to working with you.  The closer they feel to you and your process the more likely they will be to not shop around for attorneys, as well as to actually signing to work with you.

2-Great website copy & design

This is where you make your true first impression with your prospects.  Saying things the right way is vitally important in order to achieve conversions through your website.

3-Answering your customers questions

The more your prospects are educated and you are the one educating them the more they will know like and trust you.

How To Say Just Enough On Your Website To Get More Leads

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What attorneys should not to say on their website

Worst thing you can do: treat your website like its a filing system where you keep track of what services you provide.

What attorneys should say on their website

  • Pamphlet example
    • Your mindset for what to add to your website so it’s “just enough” to achieve the outcome you want is to design it like a physical pamphlet.
  • Cold Email by Eric Finnigan (building a foundation to start from before you scale).
    • Do the work to personalize each cold email.
    • You would never scale that cold email until you have a solution that you know works.

Call to action

  • I encourage you to take a look at your website and see where you can say more by saying less.
  • Pull out a notepad and hand-write what each section of your homepage and each page on your website is supposed to do, and how it feeds into the overall end result you hope the page will achieve.

How we can do it for you:

This is where the value of a great copywriter and a great website designer can play a huge role for you.

At EPLP we’ve already done that, we have the perfect formula already for estate planning attorneys to write more estate plans. We start everyone from a single landing page that converts, and we make sure its completely separate from your existing website so you don’t have to lift a finger to get started working with us.

Top 3 Mistakes Of Estate Planning Online Marketing

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Whether you’re a solo attorney or a law firm looking to grow, there are certain mistakes most attorneys make when trying to generate more leads through their online marketing efforts.  In this blog I will cover the top 3 most glaring mistakes they are making.

Mistake #1: Sending traffic to your law firm website

The conversion rates on your law firm website will not be anything close to a tested and highly focused page stating clearly what you offer and what the next steps are.

Mistake #2: Not having automated follow ups

Often a potential client has found your page and is busy at work, or with their family or other activities. Tasteful automated follow up will continue the process of connecting and educating your new clients so you’re there when the time is right.

Mistake #3: Working with a “generic” agency

Winning with online marketing requires a great deal of understanding of your legal niche. Generic agency’s that work with multiple legal niches typically don’t have the focused energy to get you the best possible results.

EP Attorneys: 3 Things Your Digital Marketing Needs Today

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Estate Planning Lead Pros started in 2019 after seven years of running my website company, Personable Media.  One of our very first clients was for an estate planning attorney, whom we worked with to build, host and maintain their website and for just $35 per month.  After nearly 10 years and over 100 blog posts later that client is still with us, and his website generates anywhere from 100 to 200 leads every month for estate planning.  When we saw the success we were able to obtain for this client we decided it was due time for our beloved website company to rebrand and focus our energy on working with estate planning attorneys and their marketing.

As we approach the final quarter of 2021 our company has grown leaps in the past year.  I’ve seen all the struggles estate planning attorneys go through when attempting to do their own marketing, so through this blog (and the blogs to follow) I hope to shed some light and inspire estate planning attorneys how to realign their focus with their digital marketing.  In today’s blog I’m going to discuss the top 3 high-level components to any marketing strategy that estate planning attorneys need to know.  The first one is about attorney websites, and the feeling that prospects have when they’re on your website. 

 

1) Website user experience that takes users on a journey

Imagine the satisfaction your website brings to your prospects when the next page they click to looks and feels exactly as they expect it to be. ?

This establishes a strong relationship with your prospect, right from the git-go. You have to get your prospect used to the way you communicate, and that starts with the way you communicate with them through the experience they have of you on your website. Your website should not only feel conversational, when your customer clicks on a button to navigate to a new page, they should see exactly what they expect to see. Psychologically you begin to train your prospect how to work with you and communicate with you. Implementing this principle throughout your website and web design will lead to more conversions and ultimately more business and grow your bottom line.

Great website design isn’t something you can achieve through choosing a template and hoping for the best.  There are even companies out there that lay claims to specialize in building websites for attorneys.  From what I’ve gathered from these [nameless] companies is that they do their best to provide the back-end interface that suits the needs of attorneys.  The thing these attorney website companies are missing though is the look and feel of the website from the prospects perspective.  It’s great that they’ve built a tool that is somewhat easy for an attorney or law office to adapt to, but the experience of building a high-converting website with great copywriting is something left to be desired.  Your best bet is to find a company with proven success in driving conversions through the website they’ve previously built for a solo attorney or law firm.  If you want to take it a step further, study the website and why it converted so well!

 

2) Get your website in front of the right people

Do you know we are entering the largest transfer of wealth in our nation’s history? Estate planning has never been a bigger industry, and with the Covid-19 pandemic the morbidity of your customers has never been more prevalent to them. Do you know how your customers try to find you? A general rule to follow is the more places they can find you, the better!

Search engines are a great place to start.  The places you can advertise your estate planning practice in 2021 include (in no intentional order) Google, Yahoo, Bing, Youtube, Amazon and Yandex. Setting up a new advertising account and directing traffic to your website through any of these mediums is a great idea to help you get the right eyes on your website. Some networks have more daily searches than others.  Consult your ad specialist before making a decision.

Social media is another great place to start. The places you can advertise your estate planning practice in 2021 include (in no intentional order) Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, TicToc, LinkedIn and Pinterest.  Like search engine advertising some of these social networks don’t have many of the types of customers you are looking for.  For example, the age demographic for TicToc is teenagers to early 20-somethings.  These type of people aren’t looking for estate planning.  Again, consult your ad specialist before making a decision.

 

3) Set up drip campaigns that nurture your prospects

A proper drip campaign is a fancy way of saying automated follow up. Once your website is getting in front of the right people and it’s converting leads you are doing great, but your work doesn’t stop there. Failure to have a proper drip campaign can and will absolutely result in higher no-show rates on your appointments. Not only that, it can drastically effect the way your prospect communicates with and works with you.

The only thing worst than having no automated follow up is having bad follow up. There is a right way to do automated follow up as an attorney. Great drip campaigns when executed correctly will result in lower appointment no-shows, cancellations and reschedules. Great drip campaigns will change the way your prospects communicate with you, and strengthen your relationship with them. Who knows, it may even change a prospects mind to work with you if they were shopping or on the fence.

 

Where to find estate planning attorney marketing that works?

Finding the right marketing company to work with your law firm doesn’t have to be a trying process. If you value results and transparency and you want to grow your practice now, schedule a call with me by clicking below.

Great Expectations: Managing Google Ads For Law Firms

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Has your law firm tried Google Ads before without success?  Well the truth is if every law firm that ever attempted Google Ads to drive new leads was successful with it there would be no advertising agencies out there to help them.  Over the last 10 years working in attorney and law firm marketing I know what expectations are necessary to agree to prior to beginning a new working relationship with any search advertising specialist, and that’s what I will cover in today’s blog.

My hope is that reading this will save you time and money as you seek out the right marketer for you and your firm.

 

Expectation #1 : You want to hire an expert

This is the most basic expectation, it might seem elementary to even say, but you would be surprised at some of the inquires I get!

I once had a prospective client that told me they wanted one thing, which I can help with, but after the second conversation we had I learned that they weren’t actually in alignment with that they were saying they wanted.  This business owner said they wanted to grow their business, but they just did not have the right mindset when it comes to business to be able to work with us.  Let me explain.

The business owner believed that the first thing they needed was a unique legal service they can offer.  This seems pretty logical, however its important to get specific about what you really need to grow your business.  What any business needs first is customers that are interested in your service.  Just because you have a service doesn’t mean anyone wants it, that there is a market for it.  I can crumple up 5 pieces of paper into a ball and put on a website the service I provide, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to get a plethora of customers reaching out to me about my services.

It’s basic supply and demand.

Have you ever seen the movie “The Wolf of Wall Street?”  In the movie Jordan Belford asks a colleague to sell him this pen to teach his team a lesson about supply and demand.  The first person turns down his offer to avoid looking foolish, and the second colleague says sure I’ll sell you that pen.  He takes the pen from Jordan as as he does he turns and asks him, “hey can you do me a favor and write your name on that napkin?”  Jordan responds “I don’t have a pen.”

The takeaway here is you should be absolutely clear about what your product or service is.  When Estate Planning Lead Pros meets with a new prospective client the expectation is they are there because they want to hire an expert.  They want to work with someone they can trust and can provide them the best advice and execution on their marketing campaign.

 

Expectation #2 : You want to grow a longterm relationship with your marketer

As long as I’ve worked with law firms I can tell you that Google Ads are a great place to start.  That said, there is more to running a campaign than just setup and forget.  It needs to evolve to what works best and needs to be measured because what gets measured gets managed.

Our second expectation we encourage you to consider is don’t expect working with a Google Ads expert to be a sprint.  Getting a streamlined ad campaign running for any business requires patience, conditioning and a plan to get there.  It’s truly a marathon, and should be treated as such when you commit to working with your expert. Regardless of who you choose to work with, if you don’t allow for at least a couple months for your campaign to fully optimize you aren’t measuring anything.  And therefore, have nothing to manage.

Lastly it’s important to note that bringing traffic to your law firm’s website is only one piece of the puzzle to a winning Google Ads campaign.  Your law firm’s website design, look and feel need to be easy to use, easy to understand, and your website’s user experience should take your prospects on a journey.

To achieve a great long-term working relationship with your Google Ads expert for your law firm you should keep in mind that your website that could be fundamentally flawed.  That would be a great question to ask by the way!  What can you do to make my existing website convert better, and do we need to start over?  I promise being open to a fresh start by the expert managing your law firm’s Google Ads will pay dividends in the long run.

 

Expectation #3 : If something isn’t working, you communicate

If something isn’t working the way you want then the expectation you should have for yourself is to communicate issues with your expert. Common issues like maybe the last call you received was outside of your service area, or the last 3 prospects were just shopping or didn’t have any money.  These are great things to communicate.

Google Ads for law firms is a great place to start, but it’s important you approach hiring a Google Ads expert with the right expectations ahead of time.

Fulfilling Potential For Your Estate Planning Law Firm

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“Changes that seem small and unimportant at first will compound into remarkable results, if you’re willing to stick with them for years. We all deal with setbacks, in the long run, the quality of our lives depend on the quality of our habits. With the same habits you’ll end up with the same results, but with better habits anything is possible.” James Clear, author of Atomic Habits

I attended a conference recently where the keynote speaker was talking about marketing for the industry he specialized in: law firms. Everything the speaker had shared up to this point in his talk I was really on board with. They were all strategies I’d implemented myself and found success doing: Google my business, phone tracking numbers, mobile websites. But then he started talking about his experience publishing content on his website, and the websites of people who worked with him. It was at this point in his talk though I felt despair.

Blogging Consistently = “Welcome to the matrix”

“Google says if you publish great content people are just going to magically link back to you. That doesn’t work because we don’t live in the matrix” said the speaker, and the crowd responded by laughing.

Myself and other A-listers in content marketing will tell you if you publish great content people will link back to you. I know this because I’ve edited blog posts that have received hundreds of thousands of views in the first month it was published. I’m able to do this because I help people organize and condense their message and story into an easy to read, and easy to consume format. Almost more importantly though, I help them get clicks to it.

The truth is that the only way to publish great content is to be consistent with it. Without having written a good ten blogs already and received feedback on them it’s hard to know if what you’re doing is actually working and what you can improve upon. Your best writing and publishing comes from experience with actually doing it and being consistent about it.  When you become consistent you enter a new matrix, a new reality.

 

Would you rather grind for a day to produce couple Good links, or consistently produce Great links?

The speaker then went on to say “Focus on a couple good links, those are so much more valuable.”

This might be true for the law industry in general, but this conference was specific to estate planning attorneys. Because of this I couldn’t disagree more with that statement. As you’ll hear me talk about on my Facebook Live on Tuesday people are more uneducated about estate planning than any other area of law. And not only that they want to learn.

If you’ve ever watched the movie “Yes Man” with Jim Carry in the movie Jim’s character Carl has to say “Yes” to everything and hilarity ensues. As a loan officer of a bank he has to approve or deny loans every day. When word gets around that Carl is approving everyone’s loans no matter how small they are a long line forms at his desk. Weeks later someone from the corporate office shows up to congratulate Carl for his work. Why? Because people were so appreciative to have their needs met, they were actually paying back on their loans, and the bank was making a lot of money.

I understand this was a movie, but the principle applies really well here. The more people are able have their questions answered the more appreciative they are to have their needs met. When people with estate planning needs have their needs met, and your law firm does that they’re more likely to choose you as their attorney to work with.

A couple good links will help people near you to find your website, but a couple great links not only do a better job of helping people find you, they help convert them into estate planning leads as well.

 

Creating better habits

“If you want better results, forget about setting goals, focus on your systems instead. You do not rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems.” James Clear

Are you ready to develop the right habits and systems to grow your estate planning law firm? Set up a call with me today.