I’m sorry, but the social media world has made me far more sensitive to this kind of poor customer service. What was this UPS worker thinking? Did she really need to act this way?

The customer had a problem to solve, but didn’t find any help at the UPS Store. Granted, the customer wasn’t trying to send a package through UPS, but clearly she doesn’t send packages often. It was also likely that she didn’t CHOOSE FedEX, it looked like a pre-paid package that was possibly sent to her.

The UPS Store could have won a new customer for life by:
-Helping this woman find a store close by
-Looking up a store for her in the phone book or on the computer
-Being civil

Was her question really that absurd? She walked into a “UPS Store” that used to be Mailbox Express in attempts to send out a FedEX package. How dare she, right?

Note to UPS Store employees: Put the customer first by learning where the nearest FedEX drop-off location is. It is probably a frequently asked question.

With the increased transparency of the internet, average customer service won’t cut it. Maybe nobody from UPS will ever read this blog post, but you can guarantee that me and the woman with the FedEX box will go elsewhere to handle shipping needs.

The Harvard Business Review recently published a paper that challenges the way employers see motivation. They asked over 600 managers from dozens of companies to rank factors that have the biggest impact on employee motivation. Their choices were: recognition, incentives, interpersonal support, support for making progress and clear goals.

“Recognition for good work” came out as a clear number 1. Unfortunately, the managers had it all wrong. In a separate, multi-year survey that tracked the employees thoughts and feelings (what a novel approach, eh?) it was determined that the one item Managers ranked dead last was the most important to workers- a sense of PROGRESS.

A close analysis of nearly 12,000 diary entries, together with the writers’ daily ratings of their motivation and emotions, shows that making progress in one’s work—even incremental progress—is more frequently associated with positive emotions and high motivation than any other workday event.

Progress matters more than anything else to us. This desire to grow, expand and overcome challenges is insatiable- and the managers that recognize this will have a much better understanding of how to encourage and motivate workers. But what does this mean for individuals? How can individuals gain greater self-motivation by understanding this principle? The answer lies in what progress means to each one of us.

When I talk to busy attorneys about desires when it comes to blogging, they have very similar concerns:

-Will blogging help me bring in business?
-Can blogging help me gain recognition for my expertise?
-Can this get me on the “short list” of experts?
-Is anybody I want to do business with reading blogs or spending time on Twitter?

What they are really asking is, can blogging help me make progress? Can it help me make progress with my network, progress in my business development and progress in the way I am perceived within my firm? If professionals don’t believe that blogging and interaction through social networks will help them progress in some way, it won’t be worth it to them. Blogging requires too much time and energy.

Progress really means very different things to different people. The #1 reason law firm lawyers cite as the reason they want to bring in more business? They feel it will substantially improve the way they are perceived within their law firm. For solo attorneys and smaller practices, they often want to blog to bring in more business because progress means survival to them. These large or small firm attorneys believe that bringing in business will help them advance the rock in one way or another.

If blogging won’t advance the rock for you, is it still worth it? Most will say no, others enjoy the connections and camaraderie that comes with blogging. The sense of feeling connected to other lawyers that are going through the same things make it worth it. In my opinion, blogging is way too much work for it to serve as nothing more than a glorified water cooler.

What does progress mean to you? If you don’t have a clear idea, you may not have what it takes to wake up again tomorrow and resume pushing that rock up the hill.

-Hat tip to Charles Green for pointing out the HBR article to me.

Somewhere along the way I switched gears and started talking to other lawyers about social media. This was a far more narrow niche and required a very tight focus. For this very specific group a big following wasn’t nearly as helpful or attractive. Worse still, I was following so many people that my Twitter stream was filled with content that was at best irrelevant and at worse distracting. The biggest challenge for me was that I could no longer focus on new followers or qualified prospects because they were lost in the noise. It was time to get a hair cut.

Months ago I noticed that Alexis Neely had trimmed down the list of people she followed- so I asked her how that went for her. She responded, “I have no regrets.” Than I noticed that one of the nicest people I know on Twitter, Del Williams had done the same. She told me how great it was to no longer have so many auto-DM’s and the SPAM coming her way all the time. She told me about a program called http://unfollowall.com that let’s you un-follow everyone with a click of a button. If you have a larger following it takes about 15 clicks- but it sure beats going through them all manually.

Do I regret it?

Actually no, you see the people that CARE have sent me a message and I have followed them back immediately, the people that don’t care- well, why were we following each other in the first place? Seth Godin says the magic number is 10. I have written about this before, but 10 raving fans will make any business successful. By following 50,000 it was making it hard to focus on the 10- or 100 people that I really care about.

If you were un-followed in what I refer to as “The Great Cleanse,” please shoot me a message and let me know so that I can follow you back. And this time, my following you back will mean more. Please don’t be upset with me though, I would hate to have to “sleep with one eye open.” (that’s a Metallica reference if you didn’t catch it.)

Starting a blog is easy. Finishing a blog, now that takes work. As I speak to attorneys all over the country about blogging, one of the #1 fears that I hear from them is:

“I don’t want to start something I can’t finish”

Two weeks ago I talked about Why anybody can blog, but most people fail. This week I want to talk about how attorneys can create an effective blog strategy AND have increased productivity. We are going to talk about how lawyers can create a process that will guarantee they can make their blog a reality.

The Devil is in the details

As professionals we work well under pressure. Deadlines, due dates and clients in crisis. These things don’t phase us, after all it is our job to make the problems of our clients our problems. This means that every client call is most likely urgent. There are always new fires to put out. It is impossible to plan for the calls, so we need to be ready to clear our schedule and help our clients solve their emergencies. This high volume of urgent and important matters can make it difficult to work on those things that matter the most to us. Some of the things that are the most important to us, aren’t urgent and certainly aren’t emergencies:

-watching your son’s soccer game
-dinner with your family
-date night with your spouse
-lunch with your best client
-follow up calls with your best prospects

None of these items are urgent, but it can be safely said they are all extremely important. Steven Covey describes the conflict of urgent/important versus not urgent/important with this 2×2 matrix

Our focus should be on the top right quadrant.

Sometimes we get so bogged down that when we finally have free time we spend it in the bottom right quadrant- doing things that are not important or urgent. Becoming “stuck” and living our lives in quadrants 1 and 4 is very common. There are four secrets to escaping them.

1. Have a clear vision of your future

What’s the point? Why are you creating the blog? What is your end goal? What matters most to you? Will your blog help you get there? If you can’t answer these questions- your blog will die an ignominious death. You won’t have the motivation to keep going.

2. Have a set time each week for planning

You’ll never find time for blogging. You can’t “make” time for blogging either. You need to schedule it, and that requires you to have a planning process. Set aside time each week to schedule your week and make it a priority to blog at times when you are less likely to have distractions.

3. Build accountability into your blogging goal

Who else knows about your goal to blog? Does your wife know? Does your boss know? Your business partner? Your coach? Make sure someone is checking up on you. Almost daily I hear professionals complain that they aren’t good at keeping regular commitments. Being accountable to someone else can help.

4. Make blogging a habit (this is probably the hardest step)

This comes as no surprise, it is difficult to start new habits.

“Man, I can’t floss my teeth. People talk about how hard it is to stop smoking; about as hard as it is to start flossing.” – Mitch Hedberg

If Mitch were alive today, may he rest in peace, I think he would agree that blogging is AT LEAST as hard to start as flossing. It takes commitment and dedication.

Ok, that is all I have to say right now. My wife is calling me, and it’s time to take my son to the park. Let me end by saying, if blogging is important to you, make it happen. If not, don’t beat yourself up for not doing it.

“I’ll have the butter please,” my Grandpa said to me.

“Here it is,” I said as I quickly handed it to him.

“Now Adrian, good manners is not just about passing things when they are asked for, and saying ‘please’ and ‘thank-you.’ Having good manners means anticipating what people will need BEFORE they ask for it. When you see someone breaking their bread, go ahead and pass them the butter. If they don’t have anything to drink, offer to poor them some water.”

Anticipation is a powerful tool both for dinner-table manners and for business. Now on to the rock stars.

Madonna doesn’t have to anticipate. She is a pop-icon that is always recreating herself. She has such talent and charisma that whatever she chooses to be or however she choose to re-invent herself, people adore her for it. Or think about a production company like Pixar. Everything they create is solid gold, so they have the luxury to create from nothing something fantastic in every one of their productions. Unless you have CRAZY talent, you may not be able to be like Madonna.  You may need to learn the art of anticipation.

Willie Nelson didn’t have crazy talent. At least not in the way Madonna did. Willie Nelson was an extremely talented song writer.  He wrote big hits like “Crazy” for Patsy Cline.  The problem was, he didn’t want to write, he wanted to sing- but none of the major record labels would sign him.  They said he didn’t have the singing voice to be a star.  Instead of trying to force it, he changed tactics.  Willie noticed a movement in country music towards a little rougher cowboy.  Call this the “Harley Davidson Movement.”  He saw this growing trend, and he realized that it was going to be big.  Maybe even bigger than country itself at the time, so instead of trying to create the new trend- he decided to ride the wave by writing music to resonate with this new growing market.  He anticipated their needs before they knew they had them, and not only did he land a huge record deal and propel his career to stardom- he even got to sing and play the music his way.

How can you possibly anticipate the next big trend? How about anticipating the needs your clients will have next?  Do you need to read their minds, or shuffle through their garbage? No, but I would recommend you start by listening to them.  You need to be tuned it.  Talk to them.  Ask them what is keeping them up at night.  If one client calls with a new concern, chances are there will be other clients with similar concerns.  Find out from the source. It’s not the only way, but it gives you the best chance of success.  Madonna’s are one-in-a-million but new smart business people that are able to anticipate are springing up everyday.

Anybody can learn to anticipate, but for starters take a lesson from my Grandfather, and pass me the butter.

In dozens of conversations with busy professional I hear time and time again similar excuses to the ones I made to my Father as a kid.

“I’m too busy.”
“I barely have time to respond to all my emails.”
“I don’t want to commit to something I can’t stick with.”

Most people who try to blog fail for three major reasons. 1. They aren’t sufficiently motivated to blog. 2. They aren’t organized enough to blog. 3. They don’t know what to say.

Motivation

If you don’t believe that blogging will help build your business, build your reputation, or gain valuable exposure for you- you may not have sufficient motivation to make blogging a priority in your life. That is ok, blogging isn’t for everybody. Last week in my post: Do you believe in social media? we talked about this very point. If you really want to start blogging, these questions may help you: What will blogging mean to your career? What networking opportunities will blogging provide you with? How will landing a new client through your blog affect how you are perceived in your office? If answering these questions motivates you to start blogging, you are part of the way there. The next step is to make a plan.

Organization

“I’m just not good at keeping weekly or daily commitments.”

We all do the things in life we want to do. What do you want most? Do you want to write a book? Do you want to travel to Europe? Do you want to buy a rental property? Make it happen. Create a plan and follow it- but stop saying you really want to do something and start planning to make it happen.

When it comes to blogging you need a schedule. Set aside time every day or every week when you can blog free from distractions. If you don’t have any free time, reevaluate some of the other “essential” tasks that are filling your days and find out which tasks are keeping you from achieving the things you most want to accomplish. Eliminate the the time sinks.

I schedule time three days a week to blog, sometimes I only come up with 2 blog posts, some weeks I come up with 4, but it is part of schedule. One of the biggest mistakes people make that start blogging or using social media is underestimating the commitment. I’m not talking about wasting time on Twitter or Facebook. You can easily waste 2 hours each day on social networking, but that isn’t the point here. The point is schedule time in a strategic way so that when you write and when you spend time online you are maximizing that opportunity by either creating content, learning, or building relationships. Your time and energy are your most valuable resources, so use them wisely.

Figuring out what to say

What are you the best at? Where do you have expertise? What is a topic you are passionate about? What types of news articles make your blood boil? You always have things to talk about, you just need to start saying them online.

Another great way to get started is to blog about questions people frequently ask you, or questions you personally would like answered. If the questions are interesting and important to your clients, they will most likely be helpful to others as well.

When I know I have to blog on a regular basis, it changes the way I see the world. In the middle of conversations I will often say, “wow that would make a great blog post.” Blogging changes the way you think. Suddenly an idea can become much more. Your simple thought bubble makes for a compelling blog post. You just need to start writing them down.

Overcoming fear

What if people don’t like my posts? What if people don’t read them? What if people criticize my writing?

For most people the problem isn’t that they don’t have anything to say. The problem is that they are afraid. Fear can be crippling, and fear of saying the wrong thing keeps people from blogging. Overcoming this fear takes practice. Through repetition your confidence and skill level will grow and and your fear will dissipate. Learn by doing, and the more you blog the better you will be.

If you are motivated to blog, make it part of your routine and make it happen. It isn’t easy. It requires dedication, creativity and hard work. It can be amazing though. Blogging is great for so many reasons. Get over these major hurdles and blogging can work for you. Just remember what my Dad taught me:

“We do the things in life we want to do.”

Lawyers sometimes act as if the rules of business don’t apply to them. They don’t need to market, they don’t need to calculate the cost of goods sold, they don’t need to project manage and they certainly don’t need leads that may or may not convert into any real business. It is time that lawyers start to pay attention to insights from the rest of the business world. Last week Andrea Stimmel, Marketer of the Year, shared with me her opinion that for lawyers to stay on top of the latest trends they need to watch what other industries are doing with social media. Hubspot’s inbound marketing survey of 1,400 small-to-medium sized businesses allows you to do just that. You can see the entire report here.

Before I share with you what I found to be the most relevant statistics to lawyers, I just need to clarify one thing. This report speaks a lot about “leads” – not necessarily about new clients. Leads take two forms- (1) potential clients that come to your blog or website and call you to ask you questions, or (2) potential clients that “opt-in” by submitting their name and email address on your site.  If your site isn’t set up for that, fix it. Leads drive appointments and appointments drive new engagements.

Now for the good stuff.

1.  Businesses that used blogs brought in more business, but only after reaching a critical mass of posts.  The magic number when it comes to blog posts is 52.  Businesses that reach 52 posts double the number of leads they bring in each month according to the report.

So why 52 posts?  The report provides a number of different reasons.  Companies that hit the big 52 have a commitment to posting regularly and they also have a critical mass of pages indexed by Google- this helps boost their search engine results substantially because it helps them rank for dozens if not more than a hundred different key works.

2.  Twitter matters.  Businesses that used Twitter on average doubled the number of leads in comparison to those that didn’t use Twitter.  Another interesting fact, you don’t need a huge following on Twitter.  In fact those businesses with 100-500 followers on Twitter fared extremely well – better than those with more than 501 followers.  This shows that quality not quantity matters on Twitter.  A few hundred targeted followers is all your business needs.  ”Customers with large numbers of followers are probably attracting viewers who are exclusively interested in the content,” the report explains.  A gigantic Twitter following is great for sites that are trying to generate traffic, but not so much those trying to bring in leads.

Twitter takeaway: “Follow to get followers.  Build your Twitter reach by following companies and individuals related to your industry.  They will likely follow you [back].” It is worth it, at least until you reach a few hundred followers.

3.  Increase the number of indexed pages on your site.  Simply put, you need a critical mass of content on your site and that content needs to be tagged appropriately.

Conclusions:

-There is a clearly defined business case for blogs and social media- but you need the appropriate strategy behind it.  Use your blog to generate leads, and then create a process for follow-up so that your leads are converted into new clients.

-Use Twitter.  It helps people find your site and has been shown to substantially increase the number of leads generated.

-The rule of 52.  You need your blog to reach 52 posts as quickly as possible.  If you are blogging once per week, this will take a year- twice a week, 6 months.  You get the idea.  If you can find ways to bring in guest bloggers, task associates with creating the content, or even brining on an intern to research blog topics for you, it makes sense.

Do these statistics apply to lawyers and law firms?  The practice of law is different, right?  Just keep telling yourself that, and wait for the phone to ring.  In the meantime for those that are looking to actively market and build your business, learn from these statistics.  Hat tip to Stephen Fairley from the Rainmaker Institute for pointing out the Hubspot report to me.

If you don’t think these statistics apply to the legal market, tell us why.  Share your experience.  I’ve spoken to a number of lawyers that have never found a single client through blogging or Twitter.  Most of them gave up too early.  Did they reach 52 posts?  Was their site designed to generate leads?  Please share your experiences and insights here.

To help you remember the number 52, I’ve also included a little music video to help you get ready for the weekend.

1. To increase their visibility on law school campus’ in order to continue to attract top law students
2. To raise the visibility of the firm in targeted key markets
3. To enhance the collective networking efforts of their lawyers

CHALLENGE: They didn’t have a lot of money to spend to solve these problems.

Andrea Stimmel faced the problems head-on, and although as business development director she was not in a position where she could make all the decisions- she had the ability to influence multiple parties that inevitably would.  In my recent conference call with her, Andrea shared 5 steps to implementing social media within a firm.  I believe these 5 steps can help any organization bring about organizational change.  (Click here for the MP3 or click below to listen to the entire call here)

1.  Plant the seed.  For months before Curtis took the plunge into the realm of social media, Andrea was feeding articles to the management committee at Curtis.  Some of the articles were about what other law firms were doing, but many were from what other industries were doing with social media.  The accounting industry, management consulting and others were a pretty good predictor of where law firms where headed when it came to social media.  Prepare your firm for change  by planting the seed in advance with good articles.

2.  Start small. The low hanging fruit for law firms to use social media is to bolster the recruiting efforts with the help of Facebook.  Curtis was the first law firm to use a Facebook page for recruiting.  There were some concerns that the Facebook wall could be used to criticize the firm, but this doubt was overcome by having a staff member within the firm moderate the wall posts to the Facebook group, only once having to remove a post that wasn’t deemed relevant.  Starting small with an obvious tool like Facebook, and seeing some quick results through a growing number of fans across the country, Andrea was able to gain more buy-in from the firm and set up for the next stage.

3.  Create a social media policy. The social media policy isn’t for the employees, it isn’t really to protect the clients either.  The social media policy is the key convincing a number of different parties within the firm that social media is a safe place for attorneys to network.  From the IT department to the General Counsel to the Management Committee, there must be buy-in at multiple levels.  This is part of the reason Andrea was so successful, she was able to overcome the fears and doubts of a number of very different groups within the firm.  How strict should a social media policy be?  At Curtis all blog posts must be approved by a Partner and Andrea.  My personal opinion is that with more gatekeepers for content, you risk creating a chilling effect and discouraging creation of materials.  You do need a social media policy though.

4. Attorneys must join the party. The obvious next step is to have attorneys across the firm join LinkedIN, update their profiles, and start building their list of contacts.  Even if your attorneys aren’t ready to be active on LinkedIN, at least boost the firm’s visibility by having some level of participation and a firm awareness of what is going on there.  This same step could be done using Twitter, Martindale-Hubbel Connected, AVVO, Legal OnRamp, or JD Supra- just don’t make the mistake of having your attorneys join too many networks.  Just pick a couple.

5.  Let them blog. Andrea explained that at Curtis the purpose of the blogs is to be seen as subject matter experts.  Do you know anything about Oman law?  Curtis does.  In fact, at http://curtisoman.blogspot.com/ you can read all about Oman Law.  A small niche, maybe, but if you do a Google search for “oman law blog” you will find http://curtisoman.blogspot.com/ near the top.  Curtis has also created a Tax blog and IP blog as well.

So what are the next steps for social media at Curtis and other mid-to-large firms?

-Video

-Mobile devices

-3d? (just kidding)

Start small, get a few quick wins, and then build on those successes.  Listen to hear the entire call below.  A special thanks to Andrea for coming on the call!

Next Friday at 12pm EST join us when we speak to Paul Lippe, Founder of http://legalonramp.com to hear about how in-house counsel are using Legal OnRamp, and how law firms can gain valuable exposure by participating. CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FOR THE WEEKLY CALLS

“I can be really funny,” Chris N. responds oblivious to the look on the Bachelorette’s face that seems to ask- “is that all you’ve got?”

“I don’t feel like I’ve gotten to know you, what else can you tell me about yourself?” She asks him, giving him what would be his last chance to redeem himself before being ceremoniously dumped from the group of potential husbands for the Bachelorette.

“I like Mexican food.” No joke, that is seriously what he said. His last chance to redeem himself, open up, and all he has to say is that he likes to eat Mexican food.

We can all learn a lot from Chris N’s blunder.

(Side note: Let me just start by saying, my wife makes me watch The Bachelor with her. Let me further add, sometimes I enjoy it. For those of you that aren’t fans of the show, it is based on a very simple concept- if you take 25 guys looking for love and introduce them to 1 very pretty girl, and have her eliminate the men one at a time, eventually she will find her true love and live happily ever after. What makes it even more realistic, is that every interaction she has with the men, is filmed for the world to see. Or at least to be watched by girl’s night’s everywhere)

Chris had a problem, after spending weeks with this girl he couldn’t open up to her, in fact when lobbed a softball questions, “what can you tell me that nobody else knows about you?” He totally blew it. He should have shared a childhood memory, an embarrassing moment from high school, or his inability to park straight (actually that is mine, and my wife is well aware of it). Chris’ inability to have a conversation that was more substantial than sharing his favorite foods prevented him from engaging in what could have been a very worthwhile conversation.

I find that many professionals are similarly challenged when it comes to starting conversations with prospects. They have a hard time taking conversations beyond- where did you go to school? what did you study? Do you like Mexican food? Call it breaking the ice or call it having good social skills, it just doesn’t come naturally to most people.

So how can we do a better job of talking to people without coming across like we are forcing the conversation?

Here are three tips that I think might be helpful.

1. Say something to break the ice

Here is how NOT to start a conversation:

“Hi, I’m Adrian Dayton,” as you offer to shake hands. This makes you look presumptuous. #FAIL

or even worse,

“Hi, I’m Adrian Dayton, here is my business card.” #FAIL First off, why are you giving a total stranger your business card? Second, if you can’t think of anything to say to them in person, what are the chances are they are going to want an awkward conversation with you on the phone?

You need to be a little more strategic. Break the ice with something very generic:

“Is it always this hot in Chicago?”

or

“Did you manage to stay awake for that last speaker? That was rough.”

Obviously these need to be created to match your personality. This will put the other person at ease and show them you are interested in CONVERSATION not just acquiring a new contact.

2. Ask GREAT questions

The first question you ask may have to be a little generic:

“What do you do?”

But if you have already asked that, or you already know exactly what they do then it is time to ask a question that dives a little bit deeper:

“How have you weathered the economic storm of the last year?” “What have been the biggest challenges you have faced?” “Anything exciting coming out of your business in the next year that I should be aware of?”

These types of questions get to the heart of their business, something they are likely very passionate about. Give them a chance to brag about what has gone right- or share frustrations. Either way you show yourself to be more concerned about them than you are about promoting yourself.

3. Get an appointment

You don’t actually have to schedule an appointment on the spot, but you need to schedule some type of follow up that gives you an excuse to trade business cards.

“I just read an article about chimney sweeping in Asia that I think you would find really interesting as it pertains to the trends in the US market. Would it be ok if I emailed it to you?”

OR

“I would love to learn more about how your company is dealing with the challenge of deregulation, could we set up a time to chat this next week?”

Successful networking is all about getting appointments, so remember- the purpose of every appointment is to make another appointment. You gotta keep things rolling.

BREAK THE ICE

ASK GREAT QUESTIONS

GET AN APPOINTMENT

By the way, these same steps work when networking online- so give them a try.

Chris got knocked off the Bachelorette last night, and it wasn’t because he didn’t want to create a relationship. It wasn’t because he didn’t like the girl. It was because he was afraid to open up, and afraid to expose himself. He wasn’t willing to take his conversations below the surface and really talk on another level. Do find yourself having similarly dull networking conversations? Perhaps it is time to re-evaluate your networking strategy. Time to get beyond, “I like Mexican food.”

As you can see in the multiple posts I have written on the topic this last month:

Do you believe in social media?

Biglaw Gives it Away

Facebook for Biglaw? Believe it.

Tomorrow we are having on the call one of the Biglaw pioneers of social media, Andrea Stimmel. Andrea won the Hubbard One Award for the Marketer of the Year this past January at the Marketing Partner Forum and she has agreed to come on the conference call tomorrow to discuss how she was able to overcome the barriers to adoption of social media as the Business Development Director of the New York City firm of Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle.

Join our call Friday at 12PM EST to hear her tell her story. If you have any questions for Andrea or for myself, feel free to send them to info@adriandayton.com

Here is the recording of the call: