Textbooks Don’t Teach It, But Rainmaking Is Within Your Reach
By Kluger, Kaplan, Silverman, Katzen & Levine, P.L. November 19, 2015
Commentary by Richard Segal, Daily Business Review
I am 31 years old and honored to be the youngest partner ever at my law firm.
I started practicing at the age of 23. I have been practicing for more than 2,500 days, and for the last 60,000 hours of my life there has not been an hour that has gone by that I have not thought about marketing. I was fortunate enough to have senior named partners in my firm stress that the lifeblood of achieving success as an attorney is mastering the law and mastering the market.
Here are 10 tips I have learned along the way. Use this to build your road map, and stick to it.
1. Keep what works for you — Try not to emulate someone else’s marketing path or success. Recognize their path, heed their advice, and incorporate what works naturally for you.
2. Do it naturally — If you don’t naturally like giving speeches, then write articles. Start off with what comes naturally, but then don’t be afraid to push yourself outside of the norm. When it feels natural you will enjoy it more and subconsciously do it more often.
3. Find a place where your story will be well received — Figure out what story you are going to tell. I do almost all of my marketing in Miami Beach. I joined the Miami Beach Chamber of Commerce early in my career and quite frankly did not really know how to “work the room.” My grandparents moved to Miami Beach in 1948, my father was born in Miami Beach at Mount Sinai, I was born at Mount Sinai, and my newborn son was just born at Mount Sinai. Starting to see my story? While I didn’t know at first how to work the room, if I could do nothing more than just tell people about my roots in Miami Beach, I was connecting.
4. Trial and ERROR—– Join many different groups and take many people out to business lunches. Then find the place where your story is being received well. Take your internal temperature after each event. If you walk away in a pleasant mood it is more likely that when you were networking you were engaging and likeable. People do business with people they find enjoyable.
5. Light up the room — This is easier said than done, but the quicker you can make it natural, the quicker you will be climbing the marketing ranks. Walk into the room and be bold (not bombastic. Light the room up, don’t just be one light among many in the room.
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