Not every day in the legal marketing world is a home run. And some days you even strike out.
The highs in the legal marketing world are high. The phone doesn’t stop ringing, cases get booked all day long, and everybody loves everybody. But the lows are also low. Money seems to fly out the door. It feels like centuries between new cases being signed up, and nobody likes anybody. Lawyers get stressed about money, marketing managers get stressed about client retention, marketing technicians get stressed about job security. Everybody starts thinking that they’re going to go broke. And everything sucks.
But this is the way it has to be. This is the game we all choose to play. When you invest heavy marketing budgets and can get clients instant analysis of the day’s and the hour’s results, you’re going to experience brief periods of outlier performance. Sometimes artificial time periods that we humans we rely on, like hours or days, are going to be so successful and it will feel euphoric. And during other periods of time, the results will be so bad you’ll want to cry. But again, this is the way it must be. This is mathematics. This is statistics. This is reality.
The key lesson here is variance. Any time probabilities and statistics are involved, you will experience variance. And legal marketing is no exception. Some days will be above your average, in terms of success. Some days will be below average. But over extended periods of time you will experience your individual average results.
Take poker for example. In hold ’em, on average, you will be dealt pocket aces 1 out of every 121 hands. And that is the true average that will prove out over time. But during any given short time period (and sometimes even medium or long time periods) you could be dealt aces more than average or less then average. You could potentially go on a heater and get dealt aces three times in 20 minutes. Or you could potentially go on a dry run and not get dealt aces for 30 hours. The difference between the average and the results you experience in periods of time is called variance.
And in the legal marketing world, you’re going to experience a lot of variance day to day. Some days the leads will come in above average. And some days they’ll come in below average. But over time the leads will come in at the deserved average level that your marketing skills and strategies are supposed to achieve.
It matters how your carry yourself day in and day out. When variance is on your side you must remain level-headed, humble, and continue to work for improvement in your campaigns. And when variance runs against you you must remain calm, keep your spirits high, stay positive, and focus on achieving great long-term results.
Running marketing campaigns for lawyers can be stressful and difficult. But if you understand and accept variance, it can make the job easy, rewarding, and interesting. Manage variance, don’t let it manage you.
