LNCtips.com: Bullseye!
Have you ever played a game of darts? If so, you know that you score the most points when you hit the bullseye, the smallest circle in the target.
Targeted marketing uses the same principle. The smaller you define your marketing audience, the better your chance of meeting that group's needs. In other words, you'll be more likely to sell legal nurse consultant services if you market to a smaller, but well-defined, group.
I know what you're thinking. In your legal consultant course, they told you that lots of different types of people need your services. You're afraid that you'll lose potential clients if you don't market to everyone in sight. But just because you CAN market to different types of clients doesn't mean you SHOULD. You'll spend time and money and not get the results you want. Here's how to identify your target market.
* As a new legal nurse consultant, you have a unique background and set of experiences. Use that distinctiveness to differentiate yourself from the thousands of RNs every year who want to break into legal nurse consulting. Let's say that you were a labor and delivery nurse for 24 years. That experience makes you an ideal candidate to market your services to attorneys who specialize in birth injury cases. On the other hand, marketing to attorneys who specialize in nursing home cases might be futile.
* Identify the ideal candidate for your services. Be as specific as possible - age, type of attorney, needs. For example, your target market could be younger attorneys who specialize in misdiagnosis or delay in diagnosis of cancer and who practice in small law firms. Younger attorneys won't have the same knowledge level about cancer that older attorneys may have. Attorneys in small law firms won't have the same resources (such as in-house LNCs and access to experts) that attorneys in a large group practice enjoy.
* Design your marketing materials to show how you can meet the needs of your target audience. For the cancer/small law firm example above, there are at least three things your marketing materials could emphasize. 1) You have expertise in the type of oncology cases the firm deals with, 2) You provide the type of legal nurse consulting support normally only found in large firms, and 3) You give that support on an as-needed basis, without the expense of full-time staff.
* Locate your target audience. We've been thinking small up to this point. Here's your chance to think large. There are attorneys in your target market throughout the entire country who need your services. One way to find your target audience is to Google it. For example, if you want to work with attorneys who specialize in operating room errors, search for "operating room medical malpractice attorneys" (without the quotes) or similar terms. Another way to locate your target market is through Martindale. In-person networking and social networking, such as LinkedIn, are other ways to find attorneys in your target market. On LinkedIn, join groups that your target market members have joined or create your own group.
* Make it easy for your target audience to locate you. Create a webpage or modify your existing one so that it outlines the value you provide to your target audience. Make sure that you identify keywords for each of your webpages so that your target audience can find you. If you have a newsletter or blog, invite your target audience to subscribe to it. Place the invitation prominently on each of your webpages.
Identifying your target audience can help you score a bullseye. But what if you just KNOW that you can analyze all kinds of legal cases, not just those related to your background? Remember the target. As attorneys get to know the quality of your work, you'll get hits on the outer rings of the target with other kinds of cases.
...Katy Jones