I’ll try and stop blog free-loading. By that I mean, looking to other’s blogs as a source of motivation, inspiration and ideas but at the same time not doing anything on my own web site. I am going to try and spend the next few entries on barebones advice, the technical stuff.
Yellow pages strategy. When is your yellow pages deadline for submitting an ad? If you don’t know that you must go and find out even if you are not going to be doing yellow pages advertising I think you should be aware of the deadline as (at least in my area) you only get one chance to get your listing in the book per year. I didn’t know this when I started out, for some reason I though that they had rolling submission dates. If you haven’t taken a look through they yellow pages ads, I suggest you do. I found it interesting to see how people presented themselves, what combination of practice areas they listed etc. If you call up the yellow pages, a sales rep will probably come to your home or office and give you all the details, rates etc. So there is an easy “to-do”, give a call and set up a meeting with a yellow pages rep., it will take no more than an hour and you will know what your options are.
In my area, Verizon publishes several regional yellow-pages books. Because my office was located right on the line of two regions I initially decided to advertise in both books. I then had to decide whether to go with the general attorney section or a part of the book where they have a specialization directory. I went with the specialization directory under Elder Law attorneys, this is what other people had done that practice in this area and it seemed like the general directory was too big, this is also what the sales rep pushed me towards and it seemed like the right thing to do.
I ultimately went with a 2inch x 2inch advertisement, that listed my web site. Rather than list practice areas, I phrased the add to read something like “We offer help in answering these questions . . .” and then listed the kinds of questions I thought readers would have if they were looking to hire an attorney. I did not advertise free consolation (I was advised by a few attorneys that this can be a waste of time as, apparently, there are lots of people out there that use this as a free way to get legal advice that have not intention of paying or hiring an attorney); I did include a link to my web site (which I think is critical) and will advertise a free consultation on the web site at least for now. The cost for the one add in the one book was about $1500/year. As I mentioned, I was going to advertise in two books for a total cost of about $3000/year but, in a moment of financial panic, I cancelled the second 2x2 ad but was then talked into just an attorney name listing with web site in the specialization directory at a cost of about $500/year (total yellow pages spend of $2000). I recently called to try and cancel that attorney listing but was told it was too late.
I know yellow-pages adds do not have the best reputation, but given that I will only need one or two paying clients to make my money back it seemed like a reasonable investment. I did not find any interest in negotiating down the rates from the yellow-pages rep despite trying and canceling my initial ad placement. Also if you do have success with the yellow pages ad, next year don’t tell your ad rep that or she will use that as a way to get other attorney’s to advertise (that is what my rep did, saying how successful another attorney in the book had with the listing in the same practice area).
One more interesting thing, I didn’t realize this but you do not need to list your address in the yellow pages directory so if you are thinking of moving or do not want to limit yourself, leave it out and in its place put something like “serving the X, Y, & Z communities”
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