It’s good to talk. Remember that now infamous line uttered by the brilliant Bob Hoskins in that BT ad in the 80s? And the statement couldn’t be more relevant to professional services firms vying for customer attention in a saturated market either.
Conversational marketing could be key to your law firm’s marketing efforts. Read on to find out why it matters and how to use it as an effective lead generation tool.
What is conversational marketing?
Conversational marketing is any two-way online or offline interaction with a customer that occurs in real time.
Integrating this process into your outreach will hasten the customer journey and strengthen relationships.
Why does conversation marketing matter?
In your industry trust is integral to the sign-up process. Whether the customer is creating a will, going through a difficult divorce, or struggling to get their head around inheritance tax, they’ll want to secure social proof before hiring you to do the work.
Conversational marketing puts the customer at the centre of the buying journey. Rather than trying to generate a lead off the back of some brief and hastily-assembled online content it produces meaningful interactions and builds closer relationships.
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Conversational AI: the same thing or different?
AI is one of many avenues your firm can leverage to build relationships with its customers – both existing and prospective. Technology is largely driving this trend though and to ignore this would be the digital equivalent of committing Hari Kari.
Hence the rise of the robots: powerful chatbot tools that converse casually with your audience rather than in strict rigid tones, as you might expect from a technological device. These ‘bots’ can be integrated into your website, mobile app, and more.
Chatbots:
- respond faster to enquiries than real people, providing customers with instant and detailed answers to their queries
- simulate spoken human language customers won’t know the difference
Programming bot-technology to create seamless chat flows is hard. And very few law firms have the in-house expertise to undertake this specialist work themselves.
Add to this the complexities of interacting with multiple demographics and AI conversational marketing becomes quite daunting.
Outsourcing – although it comes at a price – is usually the best option and likely to pay for itself in terms of more leads and better retention.
Three benefits of conversational marketing
Changing how your law firm interacts with its customers is a big deal. Will it deliver better customer experiences and speed up the buying process or sabotage your brand credibility?
Provided the strategy is well executed, conversation marketing could reap big rewards for your professional services organisation.
Improved agility
Conversational marketing isn’t brand new. But it’s not universally known either. Once competitors in your space learn of its benefits you’ll be playing catch-up – and by then it could be too late.
Start personalising your conversations now and you’ll be able to answer customer questions promptly, ironing out kinks from your sales funnel that might otherwise disrupt the user journey.
Brand experience
Brand is everything. Your company values, the services you provide. The logo on your website. How you talk to customers and the technology you use to facilitate those discussions.
Although chatbots can be programmed to sound natural they have their limits. So why not replace your automated software with a live chat instead – so you provide answers in real time.
Lead generation
Better customer experiences build trust, making your brand more credible. And prospects who feel fully informed are more likely to click through from a landing page to contact you – as opposed to hitting the back button on their browser because they can’t find answers to the questions they’re looking for.
Examples of conversational marketing
- Less is better. Crowded landing pages packed full of information will only overwhelm visitors. Instead keep explanation to a minimum – making your chatbot the centerpiece of your page instead.
- Speaking to customers. Rather than directing visitors to an enquiry form, add a clickable phone number to your page, so customers can talk to a team member in person – rather than engaging with an automated bot.
- Using polls. These short image-driven journeys could be tailored to suit different demographics – resulting in more personalised experiences which included a recommendation at the end.
Start a conversation with us today…
Get closer to your customers by speaking to one of our digital marketing experts and let’s talk.
