Three Steps to Building & Maintaining a Strong Network
By Christopher Walters
Chris Walters is a business litigation attorney. He was a partner at an international law firm before starting his own firm in 2014. He represents business owners in contract/business disputes and has extensive experience with business divorces (disputes within a company between partners/shareholders).
There are several different ways to develop business. Some lawyers use advertising like billboards and advertisements in magazines. Other lawyers use the internet with Facebook ads, pay per click, and search engine optimization. There are definitely benefits to these methods, including that it does not require a lot of time by the attorney (although it may be costly) and if done correctly, it can make the phone ring. The question is whether or not those potential clients are the right clients for your particular firm. I have personally chosen to develop business by establishing and nurturing a network of contacts. Overall, this requires more attorney time than some of the other methods (I need to personally attend and interact with my colleagues), but I have found that while the referrals are not high volume, they are often more appropriate for my practice and firm.
I am a business litigation attorney, with previous experience as a partner at a large, international law firm before I began my solo practice six years ago. I position myself as an alternative to the larger (more expensive) law firms and my goal is not a high-volume practice but to instead attract fewer clients with larger litigation matters (twenty new clients per year). All of these affect my networking efforts.
My networking model has three steps:
1. Establish Relationships with Trusted Advisors
Who are the people that would know of litigation issues for local companies and would be asked for a referral to a litigation attorney?
2. Educate Trusted Advisors
What are the best cases/clients for my firm? Why should they recommend my firm to their clients/ contacts?
3. Maintain Constant Contact
How can my law firm stay "top of mind", ensuring that each trusted advisor thinks of me when learning of an appropriate client/case to refer?
1. ESTABLISH RELATIONSHIPS WITH TRUSTED ADVISORS
To begin, you need to identify the categories of trusted advisors who are a good fit for your practice. This depends on what your practice is and what type of clients you are looking for. Are you hired by consumers so that every person is a potential client that may need your legal services? What is your realistic revenue goal for the clients: how large of matters are you looking for?1
Once you have identified the type of clients you are seeking, you can then determine who is the trusted advisor to such clients. When this potential client discovers that they have the need for services you provide, who do they ask for a referral? For example, in my practice, when a San Diego company is sued for a million dollars, who does the CEO ask for a litigator referral? These are the type of people that I want to meet and that allows them to be in a position to send me quality referrals.
[Page 9]
Secondly, identify individuals within this category that you would like to meet. Perhaps as a business litigator, you need to meet transactional lawyers.2 Then you need to decide if you want to meet: solo transactional lawyers, lawyers who do transactional work along with other types of law as well, or large firm transactional lawyers?
Once you have identified exactly who you want to meet, you can then develop a plan on how to meet those people. One way that I did this was to go on LinkedIn, identify somebody, and then see if we had a common connection who could make a warm introduction. I also went online to identify transactional lawyers who were actively involved in networking groups (some groups post their membership list online). Again, I would look for a common connection to make an introduction. I also ask my current contacts for introductions explaining that there is synergy between transactional lawyers and my practice (explaining that I do not do transactional work so I need to give my own clients referrals for those needs) and ask if my contact knows anybody who would be a good fit for my personality and practice.
Now that you have identified who you want to meet and have set up an initial meeting, you want to make a good impression. If you chose to develop deep relationships with a few trusted referral partners, you can concentrate referrals on a few different transactional lawyers, rather than giving one referral every ten years to fifty different lawyers. Personally, this means that I get to know the person well and meet with them frequently. People want to help those that they like. So, when you build a deeper relationship with a business colleague, you are more likely to get referrals. It is not just about the biggest book of business, but rather who do you want to be spending time with for the next twenty years? The fact that somebody has a different business philosophy or no common interests with you does not mean that person is bad or would not be a valuable partner for somebody else, it just means they are not a good fit for you. So, now that you have met the right person and established a personal connection, how do you take it to the next level, including the generation of client referrals and revenue?
2. EDUCATE TRUSTED ADVISORS
The second step is making sure your networking partner has a clear idea of the types of referrals that you are seeking. When you are meeting with referral partners, you should not be doing a constant pitch for work or monopolizing the conversation; your referral partner needs to know what kind of referrals and potential clients are best for you. They will appreciate this because if they are sending you clients and you always say no, it starts to reflect poorly upon them. Decide what message you want your partner to walk away with.
It is helpful to be as specialized as possible, but not so narrow of a niche that the right referral never comes up. In my case, I have the experience to do several types of business litigation matters, and in fact my practice covers a wide range of commercial disputes. However, when I am networking, I say my niche is doing business divorces (internal disputes between partners and shareholders). Most of my referral partners know other business litigators, and some have litigators at their firm. However not many litigators state specifically that they specialize in business divorces (although many of them could in fact handle such a dispute). This is a legal issue that comes up on a fairly regular basis for corporate transactional attorneys, yet few litigators are holding themselves out as experts with these issues.
Another benefit is the term "business divorce" is memorable and pretty easy to understand. It does not take me 5 minutes to explain what I do and expect my partner to remember that in three months. I have an estate planning colleague who specializes in LGBT families. Again, this is something that is easy to remember and comes up with enough frequency to result in significant referrals to this lawyer. Another colleague does personal injury work specializing in bicycle injuries. And yet another colleague is a transactional lawyer who specializes in assisting foreign companies creating restaurant franchises in the United States.
You want your referral partner to remember what your specialty is three, six, or even nine months after your meeting when they have a client who is complaining about the issue that is a great fit for your practice. Now that you have met the right person and they have a good understanding of what is a good referral for you, how do you ensure that person is sending you all those referrals for the next twenty years?
[Page 10]
3. MAINTAIN CONSTANT CONTACT
Maintaining constant contact is about keeping your practice "top of mind". When a client or colleague raises the legal issue that you are an expert at, how do you ensure that your partner mentions your name? How do you make sure they are still thinking about you one year after you met them for the first time? There are several different approaches. Some people send out newsletters or mailers. My path is more personal, but that likewise means it requires more of my time. Many people talk about the number of "touches" you should have with each referral partner. There are different types of touches and a successful networking plan uses each different type.
Within your list of contacts, prioritize certain people based upon whom you have more fun with and deeper connections with. Make sure there is a return on investment for all the time you spend with contacts. Establish calendar reminders to have a face-to-face meeting with your top referral partners on a quarterly basis. This means that you may have a lot of breakfast, lunch, and happy hour meetings that are time consuming. But it works. Often when I have not had a referral from an attorney in three months, I get a call three days after we had lunch together. While this is time intensive, if you are connecting with the right people, it is a good use of your time.
Between face-to-face meetings, use electronic methods to stay in touch. LinkedIn can be very useful. Connect with the individual on LinkedIn and then set a calendar reminder to do an endorsement every three months. You can also tweak your LinkedIn profile every three months and this will result in a notification to everybody you are connected with. Personally, I have also found it helpful to set up a Google alert for each of my contacts. If there is an article mentioning that person, I can send a congratulations email so the person knows I am thinking of them. You want to help promote their online reputation through LinkedIn endorsements and to congratulate them for their accomplishments. This can all be done authentically, and this will translate into stronger connections for your network.
Another tool that you may find useful is setting up group events. This could include letting your contacts know something that you have an interest in that is separate from your work life. For myself, I like to smoke cigars and drink whiskey. So, a few times per year, I do a "Bourbon & Business" event. I can invite a large number of my contacts to these events and it is easy to do. This accomplishes a few different objectives: it lets my network know something about me other than I am a business litigator and it increases the occasions when my referral partners may think of me. For each event, consider picking a "co-host." This strengthens the relationship you have with that individual, and it also serves to expand your network (as well as those of your referral partners) as it is not just the same group of people at each event.
You also want to bring value to your referral partners. Consider whom your partners would want to meet. Once you determine which type of individual was a good referral partner for them, you could make appropriate introductions, e.g. introduce the estate planning attorney to 2-3 financial advisors. To take this to the next level, you can make calendar reminders: every three months, John Smith wants to meet financial advisors, think about who you have met that would be a good introduction. Again, you are providing value to your referral partners and it is human nature to try to return that favor.
Lastly, joining the right networking group can be very valuable. Networking groups allow you to broaden your network while not requiring you to go hunt down the individuals and seek a warm introduction, plus everybody there is interested in networking and growing their circle. Further, you can do 5-10 short face-to-face meetings at a single event, which may be all you need to stay "top of mind", providing you have laid the groundwork by meeting with the individual and delivering a memorable message about what clients are good referrals for you. At different points in your career, time is more valuable than money and vice-versa. When I was building my firm, I had lots of free time due to lack of clients, so I was happy to do 4-5 networking meetings in a single day. As my business increased and there was billable work to do, I could justify paying the membership fee of a networking group that somebody else took the time to build to save me networking time that I applied to client work. As stated throughout this article, there is no one path that is right for everybody and that includes the balance between spending your time or your money.
[Page 11]
For attorneys, all we have to sell is our time. So, while our time is very valuable and we cannot afford to waste it (especially considering all the non-business activities we need to make time for), you do not have to be fake. You can choose to network and do business with those people who are both good referral partners and those that you like personally, and that is the path that is most likely to lead to financial benefits as well as happiness (and not the dread of doing more networking).
[Page 12]
——–
Notes:
1. The answer to this second question may be guided by your prior experience (including education and legal work). It also relates to your risk tolerance. My personal goal is to have a fewer number of clients with larger matters. That can be great when the clients are all paying their bills, but if I have 2-3 clients that start falling behind in their bills or 1-2 large cases get resolved, that creates a large gap in my firm’s revenue that may be difficult to backfill.
2. As mentioned, you do want to diversify your networking base. It is usually good to have relationships with several categories of professionals. For me, while transactional lawyers are great referral partners, I can also work well with other business litigation attorneys, including those at large firms who can send me their small cases/conflicts and I can send them any case that is simply too large for my staff.