How Can Lawyers Find More Speaking Opportunities To Help With Their Law Firm Marketing?

Nancy Myrland – The people, companies, and institutions you want to do business with, as well as those who can play a part in helping you accomplish your goals, are your target audiences. They are an important part of the foundation of your marketing and business development plans.

Speaking and presenting to your target audiences is important. It helps you gain exposure to those people, and it helps them get to know you even better. It also helps you build credibility with those audiences because they get to see and hear you while you share your knowledge with them.

That means you need to find ways to speak in front of these people. You need to give presentations and to be invited to the table to do so. Today we’re going to discuss a very important concept that will change the number of speaking opportunities you see coming your way.

How Do I Find More Speaking Opportunities?

Recently, I saw a question on a legal marketing listserv from a legal marketing professional who said that one of her lawyers wants to speak more, and he wants to get in front of more audiences. She asked for recommendations for him.

Some of our colleagues offered ideas such as:

Call your local chamber of commerce. They are always looking for speakers.
Contact your bar section. Volunteer to speak in front of other lawyers because they could be referral sources.

Several other good suggestions were offered. I observed the conversation for a bit before I offered my advice because it is way too easy for me to offer my two cents, which soon becomes five, and then ten cents. I can’t help it because my brain is wired to serve, and teaching and brainstorming with others are ways I can do that.

It’s Time To Look At This From A Different Perspective

My suggestion was to think about this from a different perspective. First, do all of those things that everyone had already suggested. They are important.

The other thing I recommended she do was to help her lawyer understand that he is in charge of speaking opportunities and that he has control of the number of them that come his way because he can become his own media empire.

How Can You Build A Media Empire?

Media empire wasn’t the exact term I used at the time, but let’s break this down a bit. What does that mean? Well, it means that if you want to get in front of more people than you can take control by strategically using social and digital media to do that.

Don’t wait for somebody to invite you to be a guest on their podcast, or to give a presentation to a nonprofit, a business, or a trade association. If you want to get in front of those people, put yourself in front of those people.

Tell Me The Ways

How do you do that? There are a number of ways you can do that, but first, you should have an idea what you want to talk about. If you and I sat down right now, and I asked you:

What are the five things you would love to talk to your target audiences about?
What messages do you wish they knew about your practice area?
What topics are they concerned about?
What developments should they be watching carefully?
What challenges are looming?

I have a feeling it would be very easy for you to come up with five or ten ideas about what you would like to say that might be helpful to your audiences. In the process of publicly answering those questions, you would be demonstrating your knowledge. You don’t have to answer all of those ideas in one sitting. Spread them out.

Different Ways To Get In Front Of The Right Audiences

Once you have these five or ten topics, or more if you are on a roll, then those can become the topics to communicate on whatever social or digital media platforms make the most sense for your target audiences.

One way is via a podcast, either yours or someone else’s. You could share your ideas on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or Snapchat.

You can write it in a blog post. If you want to dabble in video, you can create short videos on Stories on Facebook, Instagram, and now we have Stories on LinkedIn. If you don’t have them, you’re going to. I’ve been testing them for the past few weeks or so. Stories are simply fifteen or twenty second videos that you place on those platforms. Again, this is very short form content.

Stories go away in 24 hours so you don’t have to worry about them if you’re not really excited about how they turned out. All you have to do is hold your phone or put it in a clamp. There are inexpensive desk clamps that will help provide a steady shot.

With pre-recorded videos, you can secure your phone in a clamp or you can hold it, then press record and talk for a couple minutes about one of these five or ten points that you identified as being important to your clients, your prospects, your referral sources, and any other target audiences you have chosen.

Just upload them right from your phone and add a comment. Preface what you’re uploading and say something simple like: “I want you to know about {Topic A}. There are 2 quick things you need to know about it today.”

Be Consistent If You Want To Make A Lasting Impression

If you do what I have mentioned on a consistent basis, then you are going to get more mileage than if you wait to get invited to speak in front of groups. Don’t abandon that effort because those are important, but know that there are only so many of those opportunities to speak and to give presentations.

If I waited to be accepted to speak in front of my international association at its annual conference as the primary way to help my clients understand what they need to know, I could be waiting years, which is not good for them, or for me. There is a finite number of opportunities, so I need to take control of my message and create my own opportunities.

Give Yourself Permission To Take Control

You also need to take control of this and start sending your own messages and creating your own opportunities. Write down those topics that you would like to talk to people about and then decide whether or not you would like to communicate them via the written word, the spoken word, or via video.

Again, don’t sit back and wait for other people to give you a chance to present. Become your own media producer and decide that you are going to post and control your messages and your presentations to your target audiences.

Again, continue to try to get in front of groups to present to them in more traditional ways, because that is important and is a good idea. Right now, that is a little challenging because communication has become primarily virtual. Meetings and conferences are going through a transition. Don’t give up on those but take control and send your own messages.

Create Your Own Opportunities

Look at this from a different perspective.
Don’t wait for others to invite you.
Become your own media empire.
Learn various ways you can send your own message.
Be consistent to make a lasting impression.
Take control.
Build your own media empire.

Okay, it doesn’t actually have to be an empire, but you know what I mean.

Author:

Nancy Myrland is a Marketing, Business Development, Content, Social & Digital Media Speaker, Trainer & Advisor, helping lawyers and legal marketers grow by integrating all marketing disciplines in order to establish relationships and grow their practices. Also known as the LinkedIn Coach For Lawyers, she is a frequent LinkedIn trainer, as well as a content marketing specialist.