A guide to successful newsletter marketing in 2021

A monthly newsletter is a wonderful way to share tips about how your legal services can help your client base and connect your clients with your law firm’s more personable sides, such as your community involvement and altruistic efforts.

But there are some pitfalls that the best legal newsletters should avoid that have been outlined below to help make sure you don’t annoy your readers or inadvertently turn away their business.

Ready? Let’s get started with the basics.

What is a newsletter?

A monthly newsletter is simply a way to stay connected with your clients in a more personable way in between the times that they may need your services.

Your newsletter’s main goal is to provide helpful information and education to your client base with an opportunity to bring in organic sales (which we’ll talk about a little later on in this article).

Always aim to keep it simple when it comes to your legal newsletter ideas.

You can choose a theme each month to educate your client base on while also including an update on firm news and activities.

The emphasis is on helping your client base first and providing subtle ways to drive sales of your services.

So now that we know what a newsletter is let’s talk about how to go about writing one.

How to write a newsletter

Picking a topic to focus on each month is the best way to approach writing your newsletter.

You can include images within your newsletter, but make sure you balance the ratio of images and text, influencing your newsletter open and click rates.

What are open and click rates?

These terms refer to the percentage of people within your email list that opened your newsletter and clicked any links from within your newsletter.

A goal for healthy open rates is between 15 and 25%. With unique click rates, you will want to aim to land at 1.5% and above.

Your email platform will be able to provide you with these analytics for each newsletter.

Writing your newsletter

Your newsletter’s goal is to find a healthy balance of content with 90% information/education and 10% sales focused.

Where possible, write in plain English. While you’re a law firm, that doesn’t mean you need to overwhelm your clients and potential clients with legalese. You’ll have more people opening your newsletters if you keep your writing simple.

A great tool to help you achieve this is The Hemingway App or Grammarly. These web-based editing app will help you make sure that you’re writing is simple and free of unnecessary words.

Developing the best law firm newsletter content

When writing your newsletter, keep in mind whom you’re writing the newsletter to. Most of your client base isn’t going to really care about the nuances of the latest court rulings in your area of practice.

Instead, focus on the issues being addressed in the court rulings and how they could affect your clients and potential clients.

Some legal newsletter ideas could include answering a series of questions based on court rulings. You could then use these as a basis for content for your newsletter in the form of answering the questions.

How to successfully include sales copy

As we discussed above, you’ll see success when you provide law firm newsletter content focused on the reader and practical issues affecting their lives.

Here are two ways that you can incorporate some sales-specific copy:

  1.  If you’re running a special deal or discount on your services. This is a good time to mention it in your newsletter towards the end. A simple “contact us if you want to learn more” is all that needs to be said.
  2. Include your services in the PS section. It could start with the sentence “And when you’re ready, here are three ways we can help you:”

Bottom line: you can’t go wrong when writing your law firm newsletter content if you keep the reader in mind as you write.

The importance of email subject lines

Now that you’ve written your amazing newsletter for your clients and potential clients, it’s time to send it out to them.

But before you do that, there’s one more thing to do. Make sure that they won’t miss it in their inbox!

Writing email subject lines that entice people to open your emails is somewhat of an art form. It can take a few tests and tweaks to find the right mix that appeals to your clients.

You might be tempted to go with a subject line that reads “Your Law Firm Name Monthly Newsletter.” And while that might work initially, over time, your clients will ignore those emails.

It’s important to be creative with your email subject lines so that your client is excited to read your law firm newsletter content.

Here are some email subject line examples from a company called Thrillist:

  • “A Fight You’ll Want to Get In”
  • “WARNING: This Email Is RED HOT!”
  • “What’s Your State’s Biggest Food Chain?”

They provide a good example of different ways to encourage your readers to want to open your emails. Capital letters, questions, and strong statements work well.

One last thing to cover in newsletters is how to capture email addresses for your newsletter…

How to capture email addresses for your newsletter

The easiest way to capture email address for your newsletter is to add it to your client onboarding process. By asking a new client for permission to send them marketing and education content via email, you’ll be able to add them to your newsletter mailing list.

Another option is to include an opt-in form on your website. That way, when visitors land on your website, they can fill out the form with their email address and receive your next law firm newsletter.

Jessie Bower is a marketing expert specializing in email and automation processes for lawyers and small law firms. Her role as a Marketing Manager with Denver Legal Marketing allows Jessie to consult with various types of solo and small law firms to optimize their communication with clients and streamline their digital presence