Marketlaw: Probate is a valuable access point to your firm and legal services
9th June 2010
Alastair Moyes, Director, Marketlaw
Last summer I presented a seminar at the Law Society Probate Section conference and followed it with a summary article in their magazine. In my rush to enjoy the sunny weather at the time I made a grammatical error, starting the article by suggesting probate clients provided great future opportunities. What I should have said was, the beneficiaries of a probate client presented a valuable source of future clients.
Marketlaw’s experience would suggest that the value of the potential clients generated by a probate matter is increasing as the competition in the legal services market accelerates. The question is how to retain them as clients and gain their next matter. Recent consumer research echoes a truism, that people tend to go back to the last solicitors they used or had contact with. Since probate (& wills) is third behind residential conveyancing and divorce (& family) it should be seen as a valuable access point to the profession and one that needs to be carefully managed to retain and gain clients within a firm. This should also highlight the hidden value in a wills bank that does need to be tapped into. If managed and promoted well, I believe that wills and probate services offer a bright future for firms.
More Competitors
What makes this all the more pressing is the current new legal service providers in Halifax bank, the CoOp and other brand organisation that are already well established in the market and increasing their market share. Alongside these names are those to come with ABS in 2011, potentially Virgin Legal, M&S Legal or John Lewis Professional Services. This means that traditional solicitors have a limited time to claim their past satisfied clients as their own. This can be achieved by promoting the firm’s name, in the local area to the clients they want to represent, using the marketing and promotional techniques the big brands will certainly unleash soon. This is not necessarily about buying advertising space, spending money on PR or sponsoring a roundabout. Although it may include them, this is first about understanding who you want your firm’s future clients to be, then telling them about your firm.
Retain and gain
So the question is what can you do to make sure the clients you have know you are their solicitor? Marketlaw starts with the idea of “retain and gain”.
Retain and gain is specifically that way round to highlight the need to first retain the clients you have and by doing so potentially gain more. To retain a client you must know who they are and where you can contact them, now. And I mean now, by having an up-to-date, regularly maintained database of past clients. This can cover just your department but for real progress it should be firm wide. In essence it’s fully using your current IT system by keeping good client records that can be used to send them information about the benefits of your services. The big brand services are using this type of approach with multi-million pound budgets (think of Tesco’s Club Card, CoOp membership, Halifax bank account etc). Your firm almost certainly has the IT system to match given the difference in scale. It up to you to use it well.
Once you have an accurate database you can use it in several ways that will bring in high quality business. Two of the most important are selling more services to the good clients you already have and finding new clients that are similar to your current good clients. This is encompassed in regular communication with the clients who already have a will with your firm. ‘Regularly’ could mean once every 3 or 5 years to remind them to update their will if required.
Focus on benefits
While probate law doesn’t change as quickly as employment law where email updates arrive almost daily, new things come along that provide an excellent opportunity to remind your clients of the benefits of your services. The WillSearch services that Title Research and Certainty offers is a good opportunity to tie in clients and add future clear benefits to your firm. Writing to executors with brief details of their responsibilities can identify potential new clients. Offering your firm as an executor, when explained carefully to the client, all helps towards keeping your firms name in front of the client. Each letter or email needs to be relevant, timely and present useful information to reinforce their loyalty to your firm and confirm their commitment to you as ‘their solicitor’.
While none of the ideas here are new, what needs to be is your approach. If you don’t have the time to plan and implement these ideas, find someone who can. There is a quickly closing window of opportunity for you to retain your clients to gain their future legal work before you will have to fight hard against big brand names.