8 Steps IP Lawyers Should Take To Improve Their Email Marketing And Attract Clients

By Eria Odhuba
If you are an Intellectual Property legal services professional whose email marketing campaigns have failed miserably in the past, then this article will show you what you need to work on in order to be more successful.

You should not abandon email marketing campaigns altogether, but improve them in order to attract and retain clients.

When IP legal services professionals use emails effectively during marketing campaigns, they should:

1. Educate prospects, and not simple list the services they provide.
2. Point prospects and clients towards resources that answer questions they may have. This could be reports, articles, webinars, seminars or presentations.
3. Show prospects and clients how to achieve desired outcomes. Great examples of this are step-by-step guides prospects can download or order, and which give some sort of road map that would need to be followedto reach a certain conclusion.
4. Form part of a well-planned sequence of online and offline communications to prospects that helps build trust and stops IP legal services professionals being perceived simply as intrusive salespeople.

Some of the key mistakes IP legal services professionals make that result in poor email marketing campaigns include:

1. Email headers that get emails more likely to be captured by SPAM filters.
2. The lack of personalisation, which means readers are less likely to feel the email is important to them.
3. Emails that do NOT have any information that is of value to readers - just stuff about the company or IP legal services professional(s), types of services provided, length of time principle players have been in practice, qualifications, etc.
4. Emails with no call to action - i.e. with nothing that would get readers to respond with a specific action within a given time or to take advantage of an extremely good offer.

Given the above, here are a few things IP legal services professionals should do to make sure their email marketing campaigns are affective and, more importantly, produce measurable results that can be monitored:

1. Think about a specific end-goal for each email. What actions do you want the reader to take after the reading the email? Keep the desired response simple. For example, do not try and get prospects to download a free report AND call you to book a free consultation at the same time. Try to aim for one or the other.
2. Learn how to write effective headlines. If you don't capture a reader's attention with the headline, they will lose interest immediately.
3. What resources do you have that your readers are dying to get hold of, and which the email is promoting? Do you have reports, webinars, interviews or demonstrations that address your readers' fears and frustrations? If your answer is yes, then your email should explain how the information you have will give readers the end result they are looking for or need. If necessary, get a copywriter to draft your emails if you don't have the time to learn how to write powerful emails yourself.
4. Do you have a call to action that increases the sense of urgency for readers and gets them to respond within a given time to your marketing campaign? If not, you better think of one.
5. Are you selling your services directly in the emails you send out? If so, how about stopping and focusing on the information you have available for prospects and clients. If you are as good as you say you are, the prospects you want to attract will come to you. You don't want to do the written version of picking up the phone and cold calling. The results are the same the and the feeling you get is no different...sick!
6. Have you prepared a sequence of emails to your target niche in order to keep them updated on the information you have available, or webinars/seminars you are running to show them how to solve their problems? On average, it takes 7 touch points before prospects buy anything. Plan for this, but make sure the email sequence is logical and moves prospects down a sales funnel.
7. Use autoresponders to capture your prospects details and systemise your email communications. I use AWeber, but there are other companies out there that have great tools you can explore as well.
8. Think about the timing of emails you send out - readers are less likely to act on marketing emails sent at 9.30 am on a Monday compared to 2 pm on a Wednesday as they recover from weekends and are making plans for the week ahead. Tuesday, Wednesday and, to a lesser extent, Thursday are the best days to send emails out to prospects.

If you want to create a position of authority within a target niche as an IP legal services professional, and get prospects contacting you for your services, you need to think carefully about how you craft your emails and plan your email marketing campaigns. Getting your readers' attention is absolutely vital if you want to prevent your emails being deleted, getting caught by SPAM or simply ignored...not the kinds of thing you what happening when trying to attract new clients.

Eria works with IP legal services clients to correct one of the biggest mistakes made today...trying to sell services to cold lists.

With a detailed focus on understanding what prospects really need, and developing platforms to provide information that addresses those needs, Eria helps IP legal services professionals build a position of authority and trust within target niches. The end result is closer relationships with prospects, who then make the decision themselves to ask for your services instead of feeling hassled by sales people.

Eria knows the value of making sure your IP legal services work fits in with the goals and lifestyle you want. But you don't get that if you can't generate leads, grow your business and get the kind of clients you really want to work with.