The best strategy for Lawyers before and after any conferences
Tanner Jones, your host and Vice President of Business Development at Consultwebs, welcomes you to another episode of the LAWsome Podcast by Consultwebs.
In today’s episode, Tanner is accompanied by Janet Falk, the Public Relations and Marketing Communications Professional at Falk Communications and Research.
Janet has over three decades of experience in her field. Her expertise spans various domains, including law firms, Wall Street, and the business and nonprofit sectors.
With her strategic insights, Janet offers guidance to attorneys, business owners, and consultants, focusing on achieving media coverage and boosting revenue growth.
Join us for an insightful session as Janet walks us through ‘The Top 25 Tips to Prepare for Your Next Conference’ Janet will draw from her years of expertise and best insights as a Public Relations and Marketing Communications Professional.
Key Takeaways:
- 00:26 – Introduction
- 00:27 – Journey as a Public Relations and Marketing Communications Professional
- 01:39 – Why attending conferences is important for lawyers
- 07:43 – Effective pre-conference strategy for lawyers
- 13:11 – The best form of outreach (method to connect) with a conference speaker/attendees
- 29: 20 – Final thoughts
Best way to contact Janet Falk:
Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Intro: Lawsome by Consultwebs. Breakthrough insights to build a thriving law firm with your host Tanner Jones.
[00:00:15] Tanner Jones: Listeners, today on our show, we’re talking with Janet Falk. She’s a public relations and marketing communications professional and chief strategist at Falk Communications and Research. Janet brings over three decades of rich experience in her field. Her expertise spans various domains including law firms, Wall Street, and the business and non-profit sectors.
Known for her strategic insights, Janet offers guidance to attorneys, business owners, and consultants, focusing on achieving media coverage. And boosting revenue growth. Today’s topic, it’s one law firms will absolutely not want to miss out on. Janet’s going to teach actionable steps to make the most of one’s attendance at an industry event, or even a bar association meeting covering the top 25 tips to prepare for your next conference.
So welcome, Janet. Thrilled to have you on the show covering this important topic.
[00:01:09] Janet Falk: Tanner, I’m very happy to be here and to speak with your audience. Now that we are fighting through the last stages of the pandemic, conferences are back in swing and people have to prepare in order to make the most of the event.
[00:01:20] Tanner Jones: No doubt. I mean, conferences, really, I mean, this is, we’re speaking my language, you know, I’ve been attending conferences now for well over a decade, specifically legal industry events, and there’s no question, law firms depend heavily on the power of networking and on relationships. So before, Janet, we get into all of the wonderful tips and actions that you would recommend to lawyers who are attending conferences, I think it’s helpful to start with the concept of why.
Why is this important? Maybe speaking, especially with your experience in public relations and marketing communications. Why should a lawyer care about attending conferences? Why must law firms set the right intentions when planning to participate in a future event?
[00:02:05] Janet Falk: Okay, Tanner, I see that there are two types of conferences.
And I think what you’re focused mostly on are industry conferences. And there’s also naturally Bar Association events. So let’s view them a little bit separately. If you’re going to an industry conference, you’re going because you want to keep in touch with what are the issues and the problems and the trends in your client’s industry.
And you want to also learn from the speaker who might have particular insights about, in house issues that people in that industry. So you cannot really do that well unless you are in the room where the event is taking place. If you’re going to this kind of industry events, you’re going to meet four different people.
So the first person you’re going to meet is your client, right, because you want to have face time with your client. The second person that you’re going to meet is your lapsed client or your dormant client. Because for some reason they are no longer working with you and this is an opportunity for you to rekindle that connection.
The third person you’re going to meet is the potential client, someone who is of interest to you, or someone you’re simply going to stumble across and learn more about them and their business and their legal issues. And then the fourth person you’re going to meet is the referral source, whether it’s a vendor who is exhibiting at the conference, Or somebody else who works with the same kind of clients that you do, and perhaps you refer business back and forth to each other.
So you cannot interact with these people well, unless you are face to face with them at the particular industry conference. Now if it’s a bar association, it’s a little bit different. Because there you’re interacting with your own species, your own kind. But it’s also a chance for you to interact with attorneys who don’t have exactly your practice area, but whose practice area aligns with yours.
So, for example, say you are a matrimonial law attorney. Then you might want to interact with the Real estate attorneys, because oftentimes in a matrimonial dispute, there’s going to be some real estate asset that has to be disposed of. And so there can be referrals back and forth with those folks.
You’re also going to be able to earn CLEs, right? And you could do that from the comfort of your own office. But you won’t be able to connect as readily with these others whose practice areas align with yours. And finally, let’s face it, practicing the law is a stressful position. It’s a stressful profession.
So maybe you just want to get out of town and go to Vegas, and just cut loose and be away from everything that’s piling up on your desk. So I think there are a lot of reasons why people go to conferences. They want to keep up with what are the issues in their client’s industry, and those are quite varied.
They could be operational issues, technological issues, financial issues, problems with supply and demand of material, problems with supply and demand of employees. What are opportunities for expansion? What’s the competition, whether it’s domestic or international? What’s happening on the M&A front? You won’t know about all these issues because not all of them concern you.
But ultimately, they will have an impact on your practice. So by attending a conference, you will get a crash course in everything that’s happening in your client’s industry. And whether you practice employment law or you practice intellectual property, or you have an M&A practice, you will be up to date.
And then you will be able to better serve your clients.
[00:06:23] Tanner Jones: Yeah, Janet, I would agree just from my own personal experience. I think you hit it on the nail there that there are a lot of why’s there may be a number of reasons why someone would take the time to do that. But from my experience in attending these events, in many instances, you have your regulars, if you will, those who have just embraced the importance of going consistently, even despite, once we got past the heart of the pandemic, those individuals that we had seen prior back in full swing.
And so I think to a large degree, we’re not really speaking directly to them because they’ve already understood the why, if you will. But it’s an encouragement, I think, for our listeners who may have. They may have been considering this topic for a while, especially coming out of the pandemic. And and I think this one, especially not only is it going to be beneficial to those who have been attending for a long time, but those who have really.
Kept it in the back of their mind. They know it’s probably something they need to be doing. They just haven’t yet. Now’s your call. It’s time to take action. We’re going to give you a lot of tips for those listeners on how you can really start to take advantage once you do take action, but there’s no question staying relevant understanding what’s happening in your industry.
This is one of the best ways. to do that So let’s set the stage here, Janet, for lawyers that are listening here. Behind every conference law firms plan to attend this year, there needs to be planning. Planning before, planning during, and even after the conference. I always like to lean on this famous phrase by Dwight D. Eisenhower, who says, Plans are nothing. Planning is everything, and I think you would agree, based on the strategies you’ve implemented and deployed for your clients. So, to begin with, in your view, Janet, what are some of the most effective pre-conference strategies that lawyers can begin to take advantage of even before they hit the ground running? And how are they going to make the most of networking opportunities while they’re there?
[00:08:14] Janet Falk: Sure. Let’s think about what are your goals in going to this particular conference. If, as we’ve been saying, you want to keep up to date with what’s happening in the industry, then one thing that you can do is look at the agenda and look at the speakers who are going to be presenting and get in touch with those speakers in advance.
No doubt their company affiliation is listed there and you can probably find them on LinkedIn if you can’t find their email address. And get in touch with the speaker in advance and say, I’m so interested in your topic of X. Are you going to talk about Y aspect? Now, the reason you do this is first to introduce yourself to the speaker.
But from the speaker’s perspective, you’re giving them feedback as to what you are most interested in. And it may be that you will help them to shape their presentation because they’ll see that there is an interest in Y aspect. Now that you’ve gotten in touch with the speaker and you said, are you interested in talking about Y aspect?
You can take one step further and say, is there a question that you would like to have asked at your presentation? Now you’ve given many presentations, Tanner, I’m sure. And there’s always a topic that you can’t fully speak about because it’s just a little marginal or you don’t have enough time to develop the point well in your presentation.
But, if someone were to say to you, Tanner, is there a question you would like to have asked? You could identify that minor point and say, Yes, would you please ask about this? And then what happens? During the course of the session, you ask the question of the speaker. And at the end, when everybody rushes to the front and they get the speaker’s business card and they try and have a little chit chat and it’s so crowded up there, you just hang back very casually.
And then at the end, you go out to the speaker and you say, Thank you so much. I really enjoyed hearing your remarks, and I’m so glad that you were able to ask this question, and they’ll say, Oh, no, Tyner, thank you, because you made it possible for me to answer that question, which I could see generated a lot of discussion.
So now you have established rapport with the speaker. By one, asking, are they going to talk about why aspect, and two, would they like to have a certain question asked, which gives them an opportunity to, go into more detail about something that they weren’t able to come cover. So that’s one aspect of pairing in advance is connecting with the speakers.
Now, here’s another, and this is something that I’m sure as a vendor, you do all the time. When you’re going to a conference as a vendor, you get a list of the attendees in advance, right? But as an attendee, you don’t get that list. Not exactly. As an attendee, if you’re a member of the host organization, you have the member directory.
Look in the member directory and identify who are people that you would like to speak with at the event. It could be that they are lapsed clients. It could be that they are potential clients. It could be that they are people that you knew in a previous situation that were on the other side of the transaction or the other side of the litigation that you were involved in.
And reach out to these people. You will identify them in the member directory and say, I’m going to be attending the event. I hope to see you there. Let’s plan on catching up. Maybe you don’t know these people at all, but the event is taking place in Vegas and you’re from Iowa And so you see that there are other people from Iowa listed in the directory Maybe you want to connect with people from your home state or from your hometown so that’s another way that you can prepare in advance is Look in the membership directory and see Who you are interested in getting in touch with and building a relationship with.
And then at the end of the day, if you meet them at the conference, that’s great. But if you don’t, you can follow up with them and you can say, I’m sorry, I didn’t get to meet you at the conference. I really enjoyed the presentation. Here’s one thing I thought you might be interested and let’s find a way that we can connect.
So you can still connect with people with whom you have a shared interest, whether you’re a friend, Focused on the same industry or the same kind of practice, or you’re from the same state or the same hometown. And, of course, you’re going to follow up with the speaker. Afterwards, as well, and say how much you enjoyed their presentation, what you learned from it, and you look forward to keeping in touch with them.
[00:13:01] Tanner Jones: Yeah, very practical suggestions there. I would be curious. I want to move into the during the conference preparation. But before we do that, Just a practical question from your experience. If you have a membership list, most instances, you may or may not have an email address. I know you referenced LinkedIn as a possible other way to connect.
Have you found, I mean, is it appropriate to call the office? Would it be appropriate to do other forms of outreach outside of either phone or LinkedIn? Any suggestions there?
[00:13:30] Janet Falk: Well, I would inform people because people are very particular about protecting their time. So I think email is always best because people can respond to email when they’re comfortable.
And I think LinkedIn is a great way to do it. As long as you personalize the event the invitation, excuse me, personalize it and say, your name came to, your name came into view as a member of the such and such organization. You know, I’m also a member. I’m looking forward to attending the next conference and hope to meet you there.
And I would remind you, Tanner, that. Back in the day, many conferences had an app that they would distribute to registrars so that they could in advance connect with each other. So conference organizers specifically wanted the attendees to be able to network informally. And by creating these apps, they were opening the avenue for them to make that connection.
So I believe that email or LinkedIn invitation is the best way to go. It respects the person’s privacy and time. And it shows that you’re professional about doing that.
[00:14:39] Tanner Jones: Very good. So let’s move to the during conferences, you know clearly engagement getting attention. Those are usually part of any in person event but how about from your experience, could you share any unique or effective legal professional ways that, that someone can stand out and begin to really start to establish strong, natural, authentic conversations among a sea of other people?
[00:15:06] Janet Falk: Sure. There are a lot of moments for informal interaction with the other attendees. So, to begin with, there’s breakfast, right? We go to breakfast, and my suggestion is to sit with people that you already know. Sit with people that you already know. Why? Because breakfast is fast. People come in, they go out, they’re eager to get to the session, they don’t want to spend a lot of time talking.
So you really can’t have a meaningful conversation, but you can touch base with people that you already know. So that’s breakfast. Then there’s the mid-morning coffee break. Okay? So that’s an opportunity where you can talk to the people that are standing around and say, I went to the such and such session.
I didn’t see you there. Which session did you go to? What were your takeaways from that session? How are you going to implement those practices at your company or at your firm? How are you going to share the information that you learned from that presentation? So this way you get an earful about what happened at the session that you did not attend.
And how that was a valuable takeaway or not, maybe it was, around that was very well known and how the person is going to implement it. So you’re developing more of a rapport and an understanding. of their business, of their practice, and so on. Now, a lot of times you’re sitting in a session, and the first panel is leaving, and then there’s a little pause, and the people are moving around, because the next panel is coming up, and so on.
Turn to the people next to you and say, what do you think about that? Are you going to be able to use this information? How are you going to use this information? Those same questions from the people that are seated near you. And if someone comes in, sits next to you, and you didn’t see them before, as I said, ask them about the previous session.
Now, what happens at lunch? Lunch is when you have an extended period of time to sit and talk with the people at your table. So, that’s a place where you should definitely sit with people that you do not know. Because you want to be able to develop more of a conversation. Maybe one person at the table is someone you recognize, and you’ll be able to touch base with that person.
But basically, you want to be having conversations with people that you do not know. Now, here’s a couple of don’ts. Do not look at your phone. Do not look at your email. Do not look at your smartwatch. Pay attention to the people who are around you. There’s no reason for you to be looking at anything else.
And if you have to look at something else, leave the room because otherwise people will think you’re just ignoring them and being rude. The point of being at the event is to be at the event, learn from others, whether formally from the speaker or informally from the people that are sitting around you.
[00:18:03] Tanner Jones: It takes an important discipline there, and I’m glad you mentioned that. In fact, I just came back from a national event. Conference just this last week. And, as you’re saying that I’m thinking there were so many people, as I looked around several of the active speaking spots, there were attendees absorbed in the, either their desktops, they had their laptops rather open on the table or just consumed by their phones.
And you’re right. It’s almost like it, it turns, it’s a turnoff and it implies that you’re not getting. Value from the event itself and you have more important things to do, which then again, someone might ask, why in the world are you even here at the event? So I’m thankful for that. What about you have any thoughts on dinners, strategic dinners or taking advantage of some of that in person time?
[00:18:49] Janet Falk: Well, I think what I’ve said, comes to bear in the same way, perhaps you and your colleagues want to host a client dinner. So that’s an opportunity for you to convene with people that you already know. Maybe you ask them if they want to bring somebody else along as a guest. Sometimes law firms have receptions so that they can meet many people all at the same time and so on.
That is the time when you should be meeting the people at the Chicago office. During the event, you’re there to make new contacts, you’re there to renew contacts. So don’t be socializing, don’t be networking, I mean, with the people from another office of your firm. So if your firm has the budget to host a reception or host a private dinner, then yes, that’s a good idea because it creates a certain intimacy among the attendees.
And especially if you’re working at a remove from the client, you’re on one coast and the client is in the Midwestern and not the other coast. If your firm has the budget, that’s a great idea.
[00:19:56] Tanner Jones: So Janet, let’s move more into what happens after the conference. Some would suggest this is the most I would say advantageous time to actually bring things to fruition for productivity.
Arguably, just as we’ve already discussed, the planning and preparation helps the process. Make this most, most successful, but let’s spend some time here. The conference may end wraps up, everyone goes back home and then they show up Monday morning, their inbox is full. Everything’s crazy busy for everyone.
How do you begin to advise someone to take full advantage of the time and the work that they’ve already invested up to that point?
[00:20:33] Janet Falk: Well, let’s pretend that, or let’s assume. That you have gotten business cards from many people that you’ve interacted with the people you met at breakfast, the people you met at lunch, the people you read at the informal coffee breaks, people you met at the networking session, people that you spoke to, in between sessions, when you were having conversations while the panel was Assembling and so on.
So one thing that a client told me she does is she takes a picture of someone’s business card and then she emails or texts it to her assistant. With a note that says, send Tanner this article, which I promised, or send Tanner this link to the newsletter or to the podcast or the blog or whatever it is that you promised.
So if you do this as you’re going through the conference and having your assistant help you with the follow up, then what happens? The next time you see that person in the hallway, the following day. Two days later, they’re going to say, thank you so much for sending me that article. So right there and then you have shown how serious you are about establishing a relationship and communicating with them because you took a photo of their business card.
You asked your assistant to send them valuable material. And then you’re going to be able to follow up with them a second time because now you have your, their email address, you have their phone number, and you’ve already established a common interest, whatever it was that you promised them that you’ve sent them.
So that’s something that you can do in the course of the event. And if you don’t have an assistant, then you can hire a virtual assistant for a couple of hours a day for the length of the conference, and they will do that follow up for you. But in every interaction, I do stress that you provide value, that you offer to give someone something, that you offer to, share with them some insight that you have, some article that you wrote or some article that you read, a presentation that you gave, whatever it might be.
Because then the person is in the position where they have to write back to you and they have to thank you for providing them with whatever it was that you promised them. Now, what happens when you go back to your office? And you have all these cards of people that you spoke with, usually, let’s hope you’ve made a notation on the card of any further action that you’re going to take or anything else that you promised to send them and so on.
So you’re going to be sending that to that person. And you’re going to be also attempting to clean out your overstuffed email box and the other matters that piled up while you were out of the office. Thank you very much. Now, what’s going to happen to that person who’s going to receive your note?
They’re going to, of course, on their side, do the same thing. They’re going to want to reach out to you and say, how much they enjoyed meeting you at the conference. Here’s whatever it was that they promised to you and so on. And they’re going to be deluged with the same level of activity, which is what is piled up while they were away.
Plus now the influx of correspondence from all the people that they met at the conference. So now that you’ve engaged in this back and forth on both sides, what I recommend you do is set a date in your calendar two weeks from that first email and get back in touch with that person. Give them the time that they can recover the same time that you’re recovering so that you can, again, continue your conversation.
You can’t expect that people are going to write you back right away because they’re doing the same, delusional material that they’re trying to manage and they’re doing their same follow up. I think it’s very important to set a date two weeks from whatever correspondence you have with that person and follow up.
And that’ll indicate how serious you are and how professional you are about cultivating your networking relationships.
[00:24:45] Tanner Jones: I know there was a resource that you had mentioned in a prior conversation, and I think it would be helpful if you can explain the business card approach that you had pulled together. Can you speak to that?
[00:24:55] Janet Falk: Right. So, I think it’s important to give something of value to other people because it’s not about me. It’s not about me, myself. It’s about you, the person that I’m interacting with. And what I like to give away is informative material that will help them to be better at their jobs.
And it’ll help them to understand how I can assist them in being better at their job. So I have developed a business size card, which I’m going to hold up here and hope it can become visible. And what this does is on the front, it explains five fast tips to maximize a media phone interview. And it has my name, my email address, my URL.
And on the back, it has more contact information and a QR code. You can subscribe to my monthly newsletter. But inside, this is what’s really valuable. Inside are the five fast tips that an attorney can use to maximize a media interview. Now, because this is only the size of a business card, it’s something that an attorney can keep in their wallet or they can keep it on their desk and they can have this very useful information to help them when they’re going to have an interview with a reporter.
And I think if you can give something away like this, that’ll help other people to remember you and show how you can be helpful to them, then that is a stellar giveaway. And I encourage people to come up with that. You know, three tips, five tips, an example, so that they will have a better grip on who it is that you are, what it is that you do for your clients, and how it is that you can be helpful to them in helping them to be more successful at operating their business or resolving whatever their legal issue might be.
So, for example, if you were an employment attorney, and you focused on employers, then you could have best practices on hiring, or best practices on firing, or best practices on contract negotiation, or on non-disclosure agreements. Whatever it was, and this way people would have the card handy so that when they had that problem, they would remember you and get him back in touch with you.
[00:27:22] Tanner Jones: That’s incredible. And for those, I mean, I think there have been a number of takeaways for our listeners, but if they’re going to hear any, anything today, to me, I think that is a powerful, unique way to stand out. And we live in a world of, I guess, people who appreciate. The concept of reciprocity, the idea of you took enough time to add value to my business or to my life.
Now I’m indebted to you to find a way to add value to you. How can I help you? So I love the concept. It is most certainly proactive. It’s something that ideally you’re thinking through now, maybe you have some ideas, but the question you can ask is simply. Of your expertise of the years you’ve been practicing law, you know What are those simple effective tips that you’ve seen impact lives make more money save money It doesn’t you don’t have to overthink that would you agree, Janet?
[00:28:14] Janet Falk: Yeah, absolutely I mean to me the role of an attorney is to help other people save time, save money and make more money. In other words, by following these best practices, this attorney will have your back, and you will not have to think about anything going wrong. You will be operating within the boundaries of what is required and be in compliance.
So that way they help you to save time and save money, keeping you out of litigation, out of distress, so that you can focus on your business and make more money.
[00:28:49] Tanner Jones: That’s what we all want. Thank you for that, Janet. Any final or closing thoughts that you’d like to share with our listeners?
[00:28:55] Janet Falk: Well, I hope that people will visit my website, which is Janet, J A N E T, L for law, F A L K dot com and I have a lot of resources there that are available for free, including 25 tips to prepare for your next conference. We’ve only scratched the surface of some things that are best practices. For attending an industry conference or attending a bar association meeting.
And I hope that people will look for that e-book, and then they will be able to improve their attendance and, get more of a return on the investment of their time and the expense of registration, flight, hotel, meals, and so on. It’s a big investment of time and money, and you want to make the most of it.
By exploiting these opportunities for networking with the attendees by looking at the directory, networking with the speakers by contacting them in advance. You can also network with reporters. Reporters are probably going to be covering an industry event. They might be moderating the panel.
So that’s a good person that you can get in touch with. And finally, you can network a little with the organizers of the event too. If it’s run by the organization that you’re a member of, then volunteer to get on the conference committee so that next time you can be one of the speakers. Or if it’s run by an outside organization.
Send them a note saying how much you enjoyed the presentations and it was a great conference. If you have some constructive feedback, very gently mention that and suggest a topic that was not covered at the conference. So perhaps you will be a speaker next time. So think about all these networking opportunities that you cannot have without being on the conference floor.
[00:30:52] Tanner Jones: Janet, we at Lawsome, thank you for taking time to join the show and provide so many wonderful, actionable tips for our listeners.
[00:30:59] Janet Falk: My pleasure.
[00:30:59] Tanner Jones: Thank you so much, Janet.
[00:31:02] Outro: Lawsome by Consultwebs with Tanner Jones. For show notes, links, and info, go to Consultwebs.com slash podcast. Be sure to subscribe and leave us a review.
Watch for the next Lawsome episode to discover more breakthrough insights to build a thriving law firm.
Episode Tweetables and Quotes:
“If you’re going to an industry conference, you’re going because you want to keep in touch with the issues, problems, and trends in your client’s industry. You also want to learn from the speaker who might have particular insights about in-house issues that people in that industry are facing. So, you cannot really do that well unless you’re not in the room where the event is taking place.” @consultwebs
“ If you’re gonna go to this kind of industry event (conferences), you’re gonna meet 4 different people. The first that you’re gonna meet is your client. The second is your lapse clients or your dormant clients, for some reason, they’re no longer working with you, and this is your opportunity to rekindle that connection. The person you’re gonna meet is the potential client. Someone who has an interest in you or someone you’re simply going to stumble across. Learn more about their business and their legal issues. Then, the fourth you’re going to meet is the referral source. Whether it’s a vendor, who’s exhibiting at the conference, or somebody else who works with the same kind of clients that you do, and perhaps you refer business back and forth to each other. So, you cannot interact with these people well unless you are face to face with them at a particular industry conference.” @consultwebs
“If it’s a bar association, it’s a little bit different because there, you’re interacting with your own species or your own kind. It’s also a chance for you to interact with attorneys who don’t have exactly your practice area, but whose practicing area aligns with yours. For example you are a matrimonial law attorney, then you might want to interact with real estate attorneys. Oftentimes times in matrimonial disputes, there’s going to be some real estate asset that has to be disposed of. So. by attending a conference, you will get a crash course in everything that’s happening in your clients and industry. Whether you practice employment law or intellectual property, or you have an MNA practice, you will be up to date, and you will be able to serve your clients better.” @consultwebs
“What are your goals in going to a particular conference? If you want to keep up to date with what’s happening in the industry, then one thing that you can do is look at the agenda and the speakers who are going to present. Get in touch with those speakers in advance. Then, look at the member directory and identify the people you would like to speak with at the event. It could be one of the 4 types of people in the conference (potential client or lapse client, etc.) At the end of the day, if you meet them at the conference, that’s great. But if you don’t, you can follow up with them and still connect with people with whom you have a shared interest.” @consultwebs
