New Business Pitches: 9 Common Mistakes

Avoid these 9 common mistakes most people make when pitching a new client or pitching new business:

1. You don’t prepare and send an agenda for the meeting ahead of time. Instead, you just show up.
2. You assume or presume that you already know just about everything there is to know about the potential client.
3. You spend less than one hour preparing for the pitch/meeting.
4. You prepare a lengthy slide deck with lots of words and text on most slides.
5. When presenting in person, you tend to look directly at the screen and read the content of your slides out to the audience verbatim. 
6. When presenting on video, you do not look directly at the camera.
7. You fill all the available time by TALKING (mostly about your firm and yourself) and often run over time.
8. You do not anticipate Q&A ahead of time, nor do you plan to ask questions or ask your audience for questions.
9. Your follow-up is not pre-planned, well thought out, or scheduled appropriately.

To avoid making these common mistakes, check out the 10 key tips on the attached video.

For more information, email Julie Savarino, julie@busdevinc.com.

 

Want to optimize your practice in 2023? Here are four articles which contain 25+ best practices in business development and #legalmarketing for #lawyers to consider implementing in 2023!

1.         How To Optimize Your Practice in the New Year - https://attorneyatlawmagazine.com/11-keys-to-optmizing-your-law-practice-2021

2.         Best Year-End Business Development Planning Tips for Lawyers - https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/checklist-best-year-end-business-29484/

3.         Three Business Development Tips for Law Firms and Lawyers - https://www.linkedin.com/posts/juliesavarino_businessdevelopment-lawyers-lawfirms-activity-7006700228166791168-JEBI?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop

4.         Two Easy Ways to Make Business Development a Habit in the New Year - https://www.attorneyatwork.com/two-easy-ways-to-make-business-and-client-development-a-habit/?ct=t(005-011022-Savarino

Happy New Year!

Lawyers: Do you want to excel at client service and market less? If so, consider upgrading your new client intake process by asking your clients key questions about their communication preferences and expectations.

Why? For at least these three reasons:

1.    Clients of all types stop using certain firms and lawyers mainly due to:

        1) a lack of responsiveness, 

        2) a lack of perceived quality of the work/results obtained, and/or 

        3) the perception that the total costs they are paying are too high for what is received.

2.    Attorneys and law firms are rarely told “you’re fired” in a formal manner. Instead, clients simply stop sending their work to any firm or lawyer they are not satisfied with and start sending work to a new firm or lawyer. The prior firm receives a letter requesting that files be transferred.

3.    Eighty percent of law firm clients expect a response to a text or email “immediately” –which most clients define as two hours. But attorneys tend to think in four- and eight-hour blocks as responsive. Between all their commitments, court dates, filing deadlines and a consistent stream of client inquiries, most lawyers think that responding within four to eight hours (or even 24 hours) is appropriate – TWICE what most clients expect. So, attorneys’ definition of “immediate” is TWICE as long as their client’s definition of “immediate.” These are bona fide statistics based on decades of client interviews conducted by Michael Rynowecer of the BTI Consulting Group.

Interestingly, the New Jersey Rules of Professional Conduct requires lawyers to “fully inform a prospective client of how, when and where the client may communicate with the lawyer.”

If every lawyer initiated this type of conversation before starting work for a new client, and if every state bar’s rules had this requirement, client satisfaction would increase, and malpractice cases based on lack of responsiveness would likely decrease. Plus, outside lawyers would receive more referrals and positive word-of-mouth, and – as a result - would have less need to market their services.

 Here are some additional resources:

• Is Your Level of Responsiveness Up to Par These Days? https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/is-your-level-of-responsiveness-up-to-9008654/
• Why Attorneys Are Never Responsive Enough - https://bticonsulting.com/themadclientist/separating-fact-from-fiction-why-attorneys-are-never-responsive-enough
• How To Be A Responsive Lawyer - https://www.inhouseblog.com/responsive-lawyer/
• 3 Ways Law Firms Can Respond to Potential Clients Faster - https://www.clio.com/blog/law-firms-respond-faster/
• Survive & Thrive Post-Pandemic: A Guidebook for Legal Professionals – https://amzn.to/3LNRSiz

 

 

 

Over 1,100 professionals have already read my latest article on JD Supra, “Two Checklists to Optimize Your Professional Practice Now and In 2022.”

If you missed it, it can be found here (along with my other articles on JD Supra) - https://www.jdsupra.com/authors/julie-savarino/

Wishing everyone a safe, healthy, and prosperous 2022!

 

Tools to Help You Succeed in 2022!

In this (still mainly) remote-communications world we all live in, we should all take the time to maximize our online positioning and virtual business communications skills. Here are two checklists for you, the lawyers in your firm, and your team:

1.    A Year-End Checklist, and

2.    A Checklist to Optimize Virtual Coffees

Both checklists can be found here --- https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/two-checklists-to-optimize-your-2593206/

Wishing everyone a wonderful and safe holiday season! Julie Savarino

 

Don’t miss this webinar being held next week! “Perfect Your Post-Pandemic Pitching & Selling Skills” being held Thursday, May 27, 2021 from 1 to 2 p.m. ET. 

The content of this webinar is sourced from hundreds of interviews Julie Savarino has conducted, and comments and suggestions from a multitude of actual clients of law firms and other professional services firms about how they prefer to be approached, pitched, and buy outside #legal and other professional services, including what irritates them most and how to avoid common pet peeves.

To read some of the rave reviews Julie Savarino’s webinars receive, click here – https://busdevinc.com/clients_say.html.

Each registrant will receive this checklist, "How to Optimize Your Online Presence," and is eligible to receive a free Kindle copy of one of my acclaimed books, “Perfect Your Pitch for Lawyers: Top 10 Mistakes to Avoid When Pitching New Outside Legal Work,” or "Survive and Thrive Post-Pandemic: A Guidebook for Legal Services Providers."

Link to register - https://busdevinc.com/webinars.html. For every three registrants from the same firm, receive one registration for free.

Consider commissioning one or more of these other highly rated webinars for interested lawyers and other members of your firm:

 1.      How Lawyers Can Optimize Their LinkedIn CONNECTIONS for New Client Development, which can be tailored for women lawyers, litigators, intellectual property lawyers, M&A, and other for other practice types.

2.      How Lawyers Can Get on Desired "Short Lists" for Outside Legal Work

3.      How Law Firms Can Win More Requests for Proposals (RFPs) for Outside Legal Work Law Firms

4.      How To Increase ROI from Your Law Firm's Events Using LinkedIn

5.      How To Consider, Create & Calculate an “All In” Alternative Fee Arrangement (AFA)

6.      Best Practices in Scoping a Matter/Case Using an AFA

Contact: Julie Savarino, Julie@BusDevInc.com

Lawyers: Perfect Your Online Pitching Skills for New Outside Legal Work

In two weeks, three leading in-house counsel will discuss ways lawyers can “Perfect Your Online Pitch for Outside Legal Work” during this webinar being held Tuesday, May 4, 2021 from 1 to 2 p.m. ET. 

If you cannot make the live webinar, register anyway. Only those registered before the start time will receive the recording if they miss the webinar.

Most RFP (requests for proposal) responses, and pitches for new legal work require some (if not all) virtual and online communications, such as video conferences, telephone calls, uploads, and emails. 

When working remotely, video conferencing is the best proxy for an in-person meeting. So, all lawyers gain competitive advantages by optimizing their online pitch and proposal skills. During this webinar (based on the acclaimed “Perfect Your Pitch for Lawyers” workshops), three leading in-house counsel speakers will address the topics below and will provide specific tips for what to do and not to do when approaching prospects or pitching for new business online. The facilitator will summarize the key takeaways:

Pet Peeves — What Not to Do When Pitching and What to Consider Doing Instead:

• Overall, three general pet peeves when communicating with outside lawyers virtually, whether on a video conference, by telephone, by email, or by other means.
• Greatest pet peeves in these specific situations:
• When lawyers you already work with and know pitch potential new work they could do for you/your legal department/your company.
• When lawyers you have never met or worked with contact you to hire them/their firm.

In-House Counsel Speakers:

Chasity Wilson Henry, Senior Vice President, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary at CECO Environmental Corporation.

Efe Ukala, an in-house international investment attorney with extensive experience in private equity who is a board member of the Association of Black Women Attorneys.

Sean Simmons, former general counsel, corporate secretary, and compliance officer for a Fortune 500 company.

Facilitator: Julie Savarino, Chief Client Service Officer, Business Development Inc.

Each registrant will receive this checklist, “How to Optimize Your Online Pitch or Presentation,” and is eligible to receive a free Kindle copy of Julie Savarino’s acclaimed book “Survive and Thrive Post-Pandemic: A Guidebook for Legal and Professional Services Providers” — a $49.95 value!

Register today at this link - https://busdevinc.com/webinars.html