Business Development

The Real Secret to Getting Referrals: Don't Beat Around The Bush

There's a lot of stuff floating around out there like this. While some of these items are interesting, I think they miss the real answer. As with a lot of other things, it's not anywhere near as complex as it's made to seem.

The best way to get referrals is like the best way to get any other kind of business: ask for it.

It's that simple.

Most people I've seen really, really beat around the bush on this one. It reminds me of that scene from American Graffiti in which the teenager is trying to disguise the fact that he's buying liquor by buying a lot of other stuff at the same time.

Shopkeeper ... "Want something?"
CMS ... "Um, yeah. Lemme have, okay yeah, lemme have a Three Musketeers, and a ballpoint pen, one of those combs there, a pint of Old Harper, a couple of flashlight batteries, and some beef jerky."

The best way to get referrals, hands down, is to be absolutely straightforward about it. I had this pointed out to me in a book with the unsubtle title Get More Referrals Now!, by Bill Cates. In Chapter 14, "How to Ask for Referrals" he divides the asking process into three parts. Part One is the most important -- it's called "planting seeds."

He recommends delivering a little speech every time you start working with a new client: "Lynne, I'm building my business by referrals. Which means to you that I will give you the best service I can. I want to earn the right to talk to you about whom you know who might also benefit from our services. I know if you are pleased with the work we do you'll be willing to have such a conversation."

EVERYONE understands this. Everyone knows how valuable referrals are. When you say so -- when you just come right out and say that referrals and introductions are how you grow, they know exactly what you're talking about. So, really, don't get too clever about it. Just tell them you're going to ask, then ask.

We'll See -- The Buddha on Business Development

I've been reading a lot about Buddhism lately (bet you haven't read many sentences that start that way lately) and the fascinating thing is the relentless focus Buddhists have on understanding what's really going on. Which means that what you think is going on may not be right at all. The point of much of Buddhism is awareness -- being fully present in the moment, and paying complete attention to what is happening right now. That, in a sentence, is the secret to marketing.

Professionals, particularly attorneys, are trained in process. There is one way to do something -- say, draft a brief -- and there is already precedent for everything you want to do. Someone's already done it. You just need to do it slightly better, or for a slightly longer time, and fame and fortune will be yours. Get a grade that' s just slightly better than the next guy, and you're on the Law Review. You get the job. You make partner, etc.

And increasingly, as Seth Godin points out in a recent blog post, modern life works that way, too. We're trained to be helpless. You can't fix your own laptop. You can't do your own taxes. You can't understand who to vote for without some help from a pundit. As I write this (in Chicago's Midway Airport) my flight is 90 minutes late, and there is absolutely nothing I can do to get myself home. Except sit here.

Except, of course, when it comes to business development. The market doesn't care about precedent, theories, or the way it's always been done. Nobody's going to do it for you. You can learn and follow all the so-called rules, and they will get you just exactly nowhere. The market cares about what it cares about, and it's your job, as a business developer, to understand what your market wants, and deliver it. Which means experimenting. And being willing to think about what's actually going on, rather than what you wish was going on, or what appears to be going on. There's a great Buddhist parable about this way of thinking:

There is a Taoist story of an old farmer who had worked his crops for many years. One day his horse ran away. Upon hearing the news, his neighbors came to visit.

"Such bad luck," they said sympathetically. "We'll see," the farmer replied.     

The next morning the horse returned, bringing with it three other wild horses.

"How wonderful," the neighbors exclaimed.          

"We'll see," replied the old man.

The following day, his son tried to ride one of the untamed horses, was thrown, and broke his leg. The neighbors again came to offer their sympathy on his misfortune.          

"We'll see," answered the farmer.The day after, military officials came to the village to draft young men into the army. Seeing that the son's leg was broken, they passed him by. The neighbors congratulated the farmer on how well things had turned out.          

"We'll see," said the farmer.

This kind of thinking is the exact opposite of what lawyers are trained to do. Which is why I have a business. At least so far. We'll see.

Sorry. Couldn't resist.

One. That's right, one. 1. Not Two. One thing to do in a pitch meeting.

In a post a few days ago, Larry Bodine reprinted Stacy Clark's list of 19 tips for preparing for a pitch meeting. Basically, they boil down to:

• Do your homework
• Ask questions about what the prospect wants
• Follow up

All good, all useful. Lists like this are mainly designed to help attorneys avoid sins of omission -- they're like preflight checklists. You know, #8? Look for spinach in teeth, and remove if present. And so on.

However, in point of fact, these items aren't things the prospect is going to notice. He may, however, notice if you forget or fail to do them. These tips, really, are a list of mistakes to avoid.

But what can you do that will set you apart? What can you do that will get you noticed? Easy. There is an almost-bulletproof tactic for this, that I learned from a senior salesperson almost ten years ago.

Stacy's list has 19 tips. Mine has one. Just one. 1. You know, more than zero and less than two?

Here's what you do. Assuming you have followed Stacy's list, not tripped on the carpet, demonstrated you have done your homework and so on, there's going to come a point when the conversation shifts from chitchat and preliminaries to the real purpose of the meeting. And when this happens, say something like this:

"Well, Mr. Prospect, obviously, we've prepared pretty carefully for this meeting, and we have a lot of material we'd like to share with you. However, in order to make sure that this time is as productive as possible, could you please take a minute, and tell us what you want to get out of this meeting?"

Simple as that. Let them tell you what they want. Ask a few followup questions to clarify. Then, make sure you deliver it, and afterwards, refer to what they said they want and ask them if they got it.

This is incredibly powerful, because it allows the prospect to appear to be the one running the meeting, or at least setting the agenda. It also allows you to find out what really matters to them, and to go after it first. Rather than sitting there grinding through a prepared presentation, you're letting them structure the conversation, and you can begin it by addressing their key issues.

This tactic has several advantages. First, it makes a strong statement, right up front, that you are client-focused. Second, it allows you to lead with your strongest (to the client) capability. Third, it gets the client's attention -- not a lot of people ask this question.

Four out of five times, the prospect will say something like "Well, I'd like to acquire an understanding of your firm." Fine. Then probe. Say something like "Great. We're prepared to respond to that. Is there any special aspect of our practice that's particularly important to you?" Then find out, and tell them.

Fly Fishing and Business Development

I wish I'd thought of this. In his Marketing Catalyst blog on Monday, Bruce Allen used a wonderful metaphor that I think is extraordinarily valuable -- marketing and business development are a lot like fly fishing.

I've been a fly fisherman my entire life. I don't do it much lately, but I began when I was about 12. My father grew up in New England, home of the Temple of Fly Fishing, which is Orvis, in Manchester, Vermont. He taught me to fly fish, and among other things, passed on to me an Orvis bamboo rod, circa around 1930, which is basically a work of art. I wouldn't dare actually use it to fish. When my father died, we buried him with flies, and a friend of his, an elderly fisherman himself, read the last few paragraphs of A River Runs Through It at his funeral.

Fly fishing, like sex, meditation and a few other pursuits, is both easy and hard. It's easy to learn the basics. To become really good is extraordinarily hard.

The basic idea behind casting a fly is to imitate nature. You're trying to get a very light, very tiny object, which has been built by hand to resemble an insect, onto the water in a way that fools a trout, usually, into thinking it's the real thing. Rather than simply overpowering nature, or ignoring it, as you would with bait, with a fly, you're trying to adapt to nature. You're trying to join in.

Trout are often very fussy eaters. They will feed on a certain type of insect, which will be over the stream only at certain times of day (the "morning rise" and the "evening rise") and under certain conditions. If you are casting a Beaverkill, which looks like this: and the trout are feeding on Tan Elk Hair Caddises, you're not going to catch any fish.

How does all this relate to marketing? Allen explains it like this:

In truth a fly fisherman never really catches a fish -- the fish catches itself. In the natural order of things the fish is really volunteering to jump on the hook just by responding instinctually within its own environment. That's marketing!

Marketing to me is to create, consider, experiment and keep placing messages in front of a target market until they volunteer to bite. No one message is going to work everyday or ever at all. I need to be open to changing my message or how it is delivered.

Exactly. This may be the best explanation I've ever read of how marketing works for professional services. It's important because it beautifully illustrates a central point that clients often have difficulty grasping.

The problem is that unless they're taught to think otherwise, professionals, particularly attorneys, tend to gravitate toward the transaction model. They want to view marketing as a manufacturing process -- you spend money and undertake marketing activity X, and it will produce Result Y. Input. Output. ROI. Simple.

I wish this were true. It would make my job a lot easier. But that's not at all what really happens. Instead, clients, like trout, are swimming in their own environment. It's almost impossible to know in advance what kind of message,in what environment, will result in a bite. So you try, and then you experiment, and you change messages, change environments, and try something else. Over time, you develop a sense of what works, and why, and then you do more of it.

And when it works? There is nothing like it. When you're fly fishing, and you have read the water right, and picked the right fly, and cast it in the right spot, and a trout hits it, you are suddenly holding onto a rod with something wild and alive at the other end of it, something you couldn't even see, that you have successfully tricked into going from its world into yours.

And when you're marketing, and the phone rings, and on the other end of the line is someone who wants to become your client, because they received your message, and understood it, and it was the right message, delivered in the right way, at the right time? It feels exactly the same way.

Thanks, Bruce.

Will It Work? Nah.

One of the most frequent, albeit challenging, conversations I have with new client is the one about Results. For some reason, maybe connected to the prevalence of direct-response marketing ("Operators are standing by") the model they have in their minds is that you market, and you get clients. As Seth Godin points out in a recent post, it doesn't work that way.

Instead, it's often a process of trial and error, and of the slow, gradual accretion of effect, of relationships and of awareness. Marketing professional services isn't fishing -- it's not just tossing in your line, and waiting for a bite. It's more like fish farming -- you feed and nurture your contacts, until, over time, you begin to have something.

Which means -- ready? That there are time when you are going to fail. You are not going to get the results you wanted. Things are not going to to go the way you planned. Interestingly, these are often not epic failures -- real train wrecks are pretty rare. But what will happen is ... nothing much. The earth won't shake; the sky won't split open, but you don't get what you thought you would.

And that moment, right there, is your opportunity. When something doesn't seem to work, you have two options. Option One is to just decide that it doesn't work, stop the show, and have that be that. Option Two is to put some time and thought into why it didn't work, and to try something different, or see what lessons to be learned are present. But this means, first, accepting the possibility of failure.

Now, obviously, you don't just go out and do something stupid, that you know is not going to work. But the question for marketers isn't so much "will it work" as "How can we make it work better?" This is difficult for a lot of people to understand, much less, commit to. It goes directly against the grain of cause/effect that we are all taught from childhood is how the world works.

The reason for this is that ultimately, business development for professional services is about relationships, not transactions. Relationships take thought, and time, and commitment. They just do. As usual, Seth is right on the money.

The Diploma Doesn't Know You Own It

There was a perversely fascinating post on Susan Cartier Liebel's blog yesterday about some guy who's auctioning his law degree off on eBay. Susan's comment is evenhanded, gracious and thoughtful.

Mine won't be.

The diploma seller, who claims his name is David Wold (although he's not listed in Martindale-Hubbell) spends 750 words going on (and on and on) about how he spent $100,000 for his diploma, and how he hates his job, his life, and so on.

My post won't be gracious because I have been exactly where he claims to be. I got my diploma, too, at enormous expense. My legal career didn't work out, either. I was deeply in debt, not making a lot of money, and really not happy being a lawyer. So, when I comment, it's not hypothetical. See?

I think that, in one fell swoop, this guy has made himself a living example of how not to think about being a lawyer. He's a lemming walking off a cliff. And by whining and pouting, he's simply digging his grave deeper. On the other hand, this thing may also simply be a PR stunt for his new porn site (I'm not making this up). But there's a lesson to be learned here. It's short, and it's simple, and it's critically important. And it's one every wounded veteran, every single mother, every failed entrepreneur and every fat person who wants to lose weight, among others, has to learn.

It doesn't matter how you got to where you are. The only thing that matters is what you are going to do about it. You can whine about unfair breaks, circumstances, or, in Mr. Wold's case, education policy, until the cows come home, and it's going to get you absolutely nowhere. Until you actually do something, you're in neutral.

If you're a lawyer, you may hate marketing. You may feel like you lack the time, the trainng, the motivation, and the prospects. There may be a thousand factors lined up against you. And you know what?

None of that matters in the slightest. At the end of the day, the week, the month, the year, your career, results are results. Either you get going, beginning from where you are right now, and make it happen, or you don't. The rest is detail.

Ultrahypercomplexificationismist

"Eighty percent of success is showing up."
'Woody Allen

Yesterday I gave a seminar at a big firm in Philadelhphia, and afterwards, had a very long conversation with a partner. And basically, about two hours of talking could have been boiled down to this excellent post in Tom Kane's blog. Summary: when it comes to marketing, just do it.

The seminar I gave was on using writing to market a legal practice. The room was full -- I'd guess about fifty associates at this law firm. Long, elegant conference table, sweeping views of the city, and as I talked, I could practically see everyone thinking, as we lawyers do, of all the ramifications, options, possibilities, challenges and issues what I was recommending posed. As usual, they were making the subject very complex. I wanted to stop the show, jump up on the table, and start yelling. "Stop it. Just stop it! Stop analyzing this to death. Just do it!"

I didn't.

Then, I ended up going out to Holt's Cigars, a place I've patronized since I was eighteen, to burn one and talk, over coffee, about legal marketing. It was a great conversation, and in the end, as always, the topic turned to Why Lawyers Won't/Don't Market.

There are two basic reasons. The first is fear of rejection. The second, or perhaps the first's twin, is Because They Think About It Too Much.

Kane, quoting a longer piece in a blog by Mark Hermann, of Jones Day,  gets right down to the solution to this problem.  Just do it. Now.

Marketing of any kind is about engaging with your market. Every dime that every flowed into any law office anywhere did so because someone went out to a potential client and communicated with them. Especially if you're new to it, or uncomfortable with it, Woody Allen was dead right. Just show up.  Just try it. Try anything.

Fine, you probably won't win any prizes for style. Your speech may stink. Your conversations may be awkward. You may feel like an idiot. But you will learn more from actually trying and seeing what happens than you will from a hundred hours spent crafting The Perfect Newsletter. And you know what else? It will be far, far more effective than you suspect.

There's an old adage in sales that applies here. If you're a salesperson, and you meet a hundred prospects -- that is, stand in front of them, and talk to them, you will sell one-third of them, no matter how bad you are. They need what you have, and that's that. Another third will not buy what you are selling, no matter how great you are at communicating. They don't need it, and that's that. The third third, the swing vote, are the ones you can sway with skill. But if you see enough people, even if you have Tourette's Syndrome, you will make plenty of sales.

And if you're a lawyer, you will have plenty of clients.

This year, make it your goal to Just Do It.

The Business Development Instruction Manual

This should be good.

Thanks to Amy Campbell and Larry Bodine, I just discovered In-House Rants, the cranky postings of an anonymous in-house counsel. He describes himself as follows:

Inhouserantor has been practicing law since the Regan administration and has had just about enough of the nonsense that passes for the practice of law. Actually, he’s had just about enough of everything.

In a post from November 28, he launches a series called "How to Get My Business." It's really, really good. Read it. My commentary can't do it justice. I'm a little slow off the mark with this one, but this is definitely worth it.

Marketing by Being Difficult

In a post yesterday, Seth Godin makes the point that sometimes, good marketing means making your customers uncomfortable. His example is the ridiculous Black Friday ritual in which department stores kick off the post-Thanksgiving shopping season by opening early, and making everyone suffer. Here's what he wrote:

Tomorrow is the ridiculous Black Friday ritual, gaining in steam every year, in which large American retailers run big sales that start at 6 am. People line up even earlier to get in first. Kids are stampeded. Muscles are pulled. Friendships frayed. Credit cards exhausted.

This is actually a little optimistic. I saw an ad in the Philadelphia Inquirer announcing that Macy's was going to open at 4 AM today.

Yes, folks, that's 4. In. The. Morning.

Marketing, at the end of the day, is all about creating some kind of relationship. There are all kinds of relationships, both healthy and unhealthy, happy and awful. By recognizing this, and thinking about it, you may be able to find some new ways to build relationships with your clients that are effective, but not all about keeping them blissfully happy at all times.

For example, Google's AdWords system has this addictive quality. It's enormously tempting to keep playing with it, to try to better your results, which makes the whole program that much more compelling and sticky. The Typepad software I'm using for this blog works the same way.

I've often thought that big-box discounters, like CostCo, deliberately make the interior of their stores as cheerless and depressing as they do in order to create the perception in shoppers that they're suffering, and therefore, must be getting a bargain. "Look -- this place is a dump. These must be the lowest prices."

And I have seen law firms do the same thing, perhaps inadvertently. Wachtell, Lipton's web site is fascinating. It's in black-and-white, basically. No images. No graphics. No nothing. This website does not attempt to be enticing. Instead, it seems to me to be a little standoffish. Maybe a lot standoffish. They're not going to attempt to reel you in. If you don't know who they are already, they're not the right firm for you. This is a fascinating play on "If you have to ask what it costs, you can't afford it."

Oh, and by the way, Wachtell's profits per partner are over $3 million. They're the most profitable firm in the country.

If marketing is about managing the potential client's experience, maybe it shouldn't be all sweetness and light. Strong relationships aren't simple, because neither are your clients.

Let's Think Outside the Pumpkin

In a nice post yesterday, Ed Poll wrote this (I've edited it a little):

Sometimes, in today's very competitive legal environment, lawyers and law firms must think "outside of the box," beyond the norm . . . Other fields of endeavor often provide us with examples of this type of thinking.

Well, DUH.

Seriously, though, in his usual elegant, lucid way, Ed is making an incredibly important point. As marketers, our whole job is to innovate. It's my firmly-held belief that a major part of the value I deliver to my clients is creative thinking. Many of them have told me this.

I come by it honestly. I was trained at Arnell/Bickford, a New York advertising agency founded by Peter Arnell, who is a legend. He now runs another agency called the Arnell Group. Peter is one of the most talented, relentlessly creative people I've ever seen. He could be a holy terror -- he was named by Gawker.com as one of the worst bosses in New York, but he was extraordinarily fair to me, and he is unspeakably talented.

He's also passionate about design, and beauty, and it just radiated from him. As one example, he kept scrapbooks, and he was constantly adding images, ideas, anything that he thought was interesting or beautiful or important. He had dozens of them when I worked for him; by now, he must have hundreds. One entire wall of his office -- thirty feet by thirty feet -- was a giant bulletin board, covered with images and ideas.  Everything he saw was grist for the mill, and I learned the importance of connecting disparate ideas from him. Here, for example, is his rendition of a goldfish bowl. The concept has a lot of Jeff Koons' work in it, but Arnell's genius here is in applying it somewhere completely new. Peter taught me that it's absolutely essential for marketers to apply creativity in the service of their clients. It's what makes good marketing great. It's also fun.

As a result, I am constantly taking in new ideas from all over the place. I can't help it. It may sound like some kind of "I Am An ARTIST, damn it!" ego trip, but I have been like this as long as I can remember. Nothing gives me the same visceral thrill as a new, cool idea. I also tend to get very enthusiastic and vocal about them. My daughters call this "Daddy's Big Deals" and as an example, here are this week's:

Snow Patrol. I never really knew about this band, but this video is one of the most perfect little musical gems I have ever seen. What's especially impressive is seeing a rock band use a lot of backup singers in a restrained, careful way, to add some accent and sheen to the song without simply overpowering everyone. Take a look. At about 2:20, the backup singers kick in, and it lifts the song to an entirely new, spectacular level.

Howard Schatz: This guy is a high-end fashion and fine art photographer in New York who specializes in making exquisitely beautiful images underwater. They're incredible. Here's an example:

Alinea Restaurant, Chicago: This is one of the nation's best restaurants. The chef, Grant Achatz, pushes cooking to its limits, and creates food that is art. Literally. Here is how he serves bacon. I have seen something approaching this kind of care and beauty in Japanese cooking, but this is something else entirely.

Why does this matter? It matters because as marketers, we typically have clients who are some of the best people in the world in their fields. One of my clients, for example, has an undergraduate degree from Harvard, a law degree from Stanford, has been an attorney for fifteen years, and is just rocket-scientist smart. Scary smart. Plus, she's a wonderful person.

We are marketing an incredibly high-quality product. The professional equivalent of a Cartier watch, or a BMW, or a Gulfstream jet. Yet, all too often, the marketing these clients receive is more of the Same Old Thing. That's unacceptable. It drives me crazy. As marketers, it's our job to deliver the best possible marketing, which means the most effective, which almost always means, the most innovative, which means creative.