Over the years, we have developed a proven intake and lead conversion system that has doubled the lead conversion rates of thousands of attorneys all across the nation. It consists of four major components:
#1: Training for your front office and intake staff;
#2: Specific tactics and strategies to maximize your conversion at each stage;
#3: An intake customer relationship management (CRM) software that automatically tracks and follows up with every lead; and
#4: Tracking and measurement of key metrics.
The subject for today’s post is #2:
#2: Specific Tactics and Strategies to Maximize Conversion at Each Stage
Dr. James Oldroyd, visiting research fellow at MIT and David Elkington, CEO of InsideSales.com, researched three years of data across many companies that respond to online-generated leads. The data included 15,000 unique leads and 100,000 call attempts, which the researchers scoured to determine how companies should respond to their online leads for the best possible results. The results were broken out into four areas and reveal the best days to make contact, best times, response time and persistence. Here’s what they found – and what you can use to guide your intake person in responding to online leads:
Wednesday and Thursdays stand out as the best for making contact with online leads. In fact, there was almost a 50 percent bump for calls made on Thursdays in comparison to calls made on Tuesdays. The best time to call leads is between 4 p.m. and 5 p.m. The second best time is between 7:30 a.m. and 8:30 a.m. Prospects are more willing to talk to you either before they start their day or at the end of the day.
We have discovered over 45 additional techniques your intake staff can use that can rapidly increase your lead conversion rate. Here are a few of the top techniques:
Every lead must be followed up within five minutes! Research is very clear that speed-to-call is the highest predictor of lead conversion.When the initial follow-up call/contact goes from five to 10 minutes, lead conversion drops by up to 400 percent! The intake team must be trained and monitored to ensure every potential new client is being called back within five minutes or less.
Every lead must be called back a minimum of six to 10 times!It’s not enough to call back a prospect once and then hope they call you back. When dealing with consumers you need to be persistent, often calling them back four, five or more times before you reach them. Once you reach them, you either disqualify them and stop calling or qualify them and set the appointment. Just making one or two attempts will net you next to nothing; if you don’t connect, you have to be persistent in continuing to call.
The first day, each lead should be called two to three times.The average consumer calls five to seven law firms when making a buying decision and the law firm that gets them on the phone first will likely be chosen. We never received more than one call back or voicemail the first day.
Scripts need to be written for voicemails so they aren’t always the same.Unless you give them direction, most staff will leave the same, generic message, “Hi this is Stephen from ABC Law Firm calling you back. Our number is (888) 588-5891. Please call us back.” This does nothing to differentiate you from the pack of attorneys they have already called. Come up with different voicemails that encourage the prospect to call your office back. For example, “Hi Mr. ____. This is ____ with ABC Law Firm. I’m calling about a potential motor vehicle accident you inquired about. I need to get some more information from you to determine if this is a case we can assist you with. If you could please give me a call back as soon as possible, I can be reached at (888) 588-5891 and my extension is 613.”
Never make an attorney or paralegal responsible for making follow up calls.They will not do it. They just won’t. Trust me. We have tried every possible incentive to get associates or paralegals to make follow-up calls and they will not. As much as possible, you want to build a wall between anyone who takes calls from prospects and those who do the work.
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