Don't Overcomplicate Your Marketing

One of the eerie things about reading self-help or advice materials is that in describing the "problem" they seek to address, their description of the person with the problem sounds exactly like me. It's as if the author had been following me around, watching my every move for the last six months.

It happened most recently when I read this post at Business Development, in which the author writes about how lawyers tend to complicate their marketing efforts by planning and analyzing them to death rather than just getting out there and doing it. Geez, that was almost painful to read.

But "getting out there and doing it," thank God, is something I have already willed myself to do. Fortunately, I had recognized this over-planning problem months ago and have already started correcting it. It's a problem related more generally to the problem of perfectionism, which makes one plan something to death before trying it. I'll have lots more to say about perfectionism in posts to come, I'm sure, for it has dogged me for quite a while.

But boy, did this over-planning ever screw me up for the first 18 months or so of my practice. As a result, I am way behind where I should be in results from marketing.

Here's what the post's author writes to help you overcome fears of giving a speech:

Fine, you probably won't win any prizes for style. Your speech may stink. Your conversations may be awkward. You may feel like an idiot. But you will learn more from actually trying and seeing what happens than you will from a hundred hours spent crafting The Perfect Newsletter. And you know what else? It will be far, far more effective than you suspect.

There's an old adage in sales that applies here. If you're a salesperson, and you meet a hundred prospects -- that is, stand in front of them, and talk to them, you will sell one-third of them, no matter how bad you are. They need what you have, and that's that. Another third will not buy what you are selling, no matter how great you are at communicating. They don't need it, and that's that. The third third, the swing vote, are the ones you can sway with skill. But if you see enough people, even if you have Tourette's Syndrome, you will make plenty of sales.

Ironically, speaking is the one thing of which I am pretty much fearless. That is, I have no generic fear of speaking in front of people. I don't have to use tricks like imagining them all in their underwear to make them less intimidating.

At any rate, my advice is the same: whatever marketing method you select first, just get out there and do it starting on day one. Make a simple plan, then execute it.