Search results for: james kane

WARNING to my Saints friends: This post will include references to the Los Angeles Rams. Please feel free to substitute Philadelphia Eagles, Dallas Cowboys, or the team of your choice when I reference the team.

My husband, the Sports Dude, is a Rams “super fan.” I didn’t dub him that, our local news channel did in a story that ran earlier this week. Being a sports fan led him to becoming a sports reporter. Eric a fan of the the Dodgers, Lakers, Kings, and Clippers, but the Rams, they have his heart.

How does a kid born in Paris, who emigrated here with his parents and brother speaking no English, become an American sports fanatic?

Simply put, it was the team: from the owner to the coaches to the players. They taught him the game, and he learned how to love it and them in return.

The clothes made the fan

Original 1970s sketch by Henri Geller for Carroll Rosenbloomy father-in-law, 

My father-in-law, Henri Geller, was a men’s clothing designer back in the day, and he designed clothes for the Rams’ owner Carroll Rosenbloom and many of the coaches and players. My husband tells vivid stories of the players and Mr. Rosenbloom in his father’s design studio. They gave my husband his first tickets to an NFL game, which he still has in his memorabilia collection, and a fan was born, so to speak.

The Rams don’t know it, but they just created a Super Fan in Josh Garcia, the son of the team’s custodian. Watch for great things to happen for that boy.

Can law firms create Super Fans?

Continue Reading Creating a Super Fan

Summer is over, and that means a rash of conferences will be taking place between now and the week before Thanksgiving. Calls for speakers and sponsors are starting to go out for 2019. And my budget and calendar are busted.

Needless to say, I have attended, participated, and planned numerous conferences over the course of my career, and there’s just no excuse for crap programming.

I’m spending time (days out of the office, away from my family, plus travel), money (usually my firm’s, but for my service provider colleagues, it’s their money). And for my clients (the attorneys in my firm for me, but the paying clients for my firm’s attorneys), they are losing access to their trusted adviser/service provider/attorney for those hours or days.

It’s 2018 and there’s just no excuse for bad programming. So why are you still not taking speaking or moderating at a conference seriously? You said yes for a reason.  Continue Reading An Open Letter to Conference Organizers, Panel Moderators, and Speakers

It’s Monday afternoon and I have finally cleared my e-mail, spoke to a partner, posted a session recap/guest blog post (with three more in the que), and realize I have not personally provided any major content about the Legal Marketing Association’s Annual conference last week, except for my Twitter feed. Looks like I’m skipping the gym today.

First of all, the LMA annual conference is exactly what Tim Corcoran, our president, described in his opening remarks: part educational & networking conference, part family reunion, part high school reunion. And we all know who the crazy uncle is. There are so many layers to the LMA annual conference, that when I look at the conference from each individual pair of eyes, I find that it only tells one side of the story. Family reunion: It was wonderful to see so many of my former colleagues from across my career in legal marketing. Kevin McMurdo from Perkins Coie, Ellen Musante and Corey Garver from my Pillsbury days. Not to mention all the current and former committee and task force members I have worked with throughout the years at both the local and international levels. High School reunion: Some of my closest and dearest friends I have met through LMA. While we are in constant contact via Facebook, getting to see one another live is beyond measure. We have actually started to form an “after prom” event so we can focus on our business and networking while at the conference, knowing we’ll have our personal social time once the conference ends. Scenes from an LMA Conference Education & networking: Really, there is no better place in the industry for marketing professionals to gather. We are a strange breed, and only in LMA are “competitors” so open and willing to share, help one another as we traverse this road, mentor one another, and on board new legal marketers.

One of my favorite slides, ever, from Matt Homann
One of my favorite slides, ever, from Matt Homann

This year I found the two most powerful sessions, for me, to be the first and the last I attended. Continue Reading Personally yours, from the Legal Marketing Association Annual Conference

On Tuesday night I blogged here about an incident with my NOOK and my feeling that I, a loyal customer, wasn’t being taken care of by Barnes and Noble.

I got into a war of words with some loyal customers on Facebook who felt I should be satisfied with the offer I was being made by some mid-level managers (who were all very nice, by the way).

These managers were offering me the best “deal” that they were authorized to make. Which is fine.

But it wasn’t enough for me.

James Kane, whom you know I respect immensely from my post Why do some people stay, and some people leave?, talks about the difference between loyal and satisfied customers.

  • Loyalty is not a brand. It’s not about rewards programs. You cannot bribe someone to love you.
  • Loyalty is not about satisfaction. Dogs are loyal. Cats are satisfied.
  • Relationships with our clients is satisfaction. They are transactional. We do something, they pay us, and they are satisfied. They owe us NOTHING.
  • Satisfaction is a mood.
  • Loyalty is a behavior.
  • Satisfaction is the past. What you did for me yesterday.
  • Loyalty is about the future. What I will do for you tomorrow.

Loyal customers will promote you and sell your products for you. Satisfied customers will use your products because they don’t have a choice.

Sunday afternoon I was a loyal customer of NOOK.

By Tuesday evening I was a POd customer who might have been lost for good.

After speaking with Danielle in the Corporate Customer Relations Department this morning, who has resolved my issues with my NOOK 100%, I am back up to a “satisfied” customer.

So how does Barnes and Nobel return me to the loyal customer who has encouraged her immediate family to purchase,  or personally purchased for them, SIX different NOOK products in the past 18 months (2 NOOK first generation, 1 NOOK Simple Touch and 3 NOOK colors)?

Simple answer: I don’t know. I guess we’ll see how things go over the course of the next few months.

However, we’re off to a good start.

My new NOOK has already shipped, and I cannot wait to read the new Hunger Games book my daughter is lending me. Hopefully I’ll be finished with it in time for my new Sookie Stackhouse guilty pleasure coming out on May 1.

Either way, summertime reading is upon us, which is why I purchased my NOOK in the first place. For the e-ink. You can’t read from an iPad outdoors by the pool or at the beach.

ETA: please click here to expand the post and read my comment on how Danielle in Corporate Customer Service saved the day.

Last week I was in Texas for the Legal Marketing Association‘s annual conference.

Like any conference, there were some knock-it-out-of-the-ballpark wins (keynote speaker James Kane) and there were some strike-outs.

In talking about one of the sessions that did not go as well as Jim’s, a colleague, who is a consultant to lawyers and law firms, shared:

It’s not okay to suck. Suck less.

That really resonated with me.

But, like most truths, it was followed up by a slap upside my head to make certain that I got the point:

If you, as an in-house person suck, whatever. But if I suck, my kids don’t eat.

It got me thinking. How many times have I, or one of my attorneys, rushed to get that presentation done? How many times have I waited to the last minute to do X or Y?

I’m an in-house marketing director. When I speak at a conference or event to attorneys, or fellow legal marketers, I am not there showing off my wares, balancing offering helpful information and hoping to land some work. I’m there for fun and for free. I’m there to lend a hand.

But that is not fair to the audience or the conference organizers. And it is doing NOTHING for my personal reputation.

I believe the reason that I am still fixated on Jim Kane’s presentation is that I can SEE the time and effort he put into it, and I am so impressed and appreciative of that effort.

Yeah, there were canned parts, which he delivered quite well, but at the end he 100% tailored the presentation to the audience. Not just legal marketers as a whole, but individuals in the audience including Laura Gutierrez, Mark Beese and others.

Jim got a hold of the attendee list and started Googling us. He included us in his closing slides. When he met and shook hands with us he remembered little factoids about who were were, whether or not we were in his closing slides.

Notice I keep saying “we.” Although Jim did not personally reference me, or my stellar job of selling Girl Scout cookies (thanks to everyone who bought some), I felt included because he included people I knew.

He took the time to get it right. And, as an extra “WOW,” please download the loyalty workbook he created for us.

So what to do WE do with this new truth?

Next time you are asked to speak, or meet with a potential new client, or are headed off to the beauty contest, don’t wait until the last minute.  Don’t just update your last presentation and materials. Don’t read the dossier in cab. Don’t wing it.

Do you research. Understand your audience. Take the time and effort that the people in the audience or in the meeting deserve.

Don’t just go through the motions.

Get it right. Knock it out of the ballpark. And, please, don’t suck.

Keynote speaker James Kane is here to talk about loyalty. Why do some people stay, and some people leave? But we’re loving his slide deck – it’s all about getting to know him. You can fan him here on Facebook.

Our brains were going crazy during his presentation because we were finding something similar to ourselves in him. We were finding something we liked in him.

Relationships fall into four categories:

  • Antagonistic – I HATE you. I will write, Tweet and share how much I hate you. We have such a need to be social and a part of, that when
  • Transactional – You do something for me, I pay you for it, we’re square. I don’t owe you anything. We think we should be getting love for what we do, but we’re just fulfilling a contract
  • Predisposed – I like you, but I don’t love you. I’m not expecting anything until the game changes and then I need to make a change.
  • Loyal – The strongest relationship. It’s about forgiveness when we make mistakes. It’s about advocacy.

Loyalty is not a brand. It’s not about rewards programs. You cannot bribe someone to love you.

Loyalty is not about stisfaction. Dogs are loyal. Cats are satisfied.

Relationships with our clients is satisfaction. They are transactional. We do something, they pay us, and they are satisfied. They owe us NOTHING.

Satisfaction is a mood.

Loyalty is a behavior.

Satisfaction is the past. What you did for me yesterday.

Loyalty is about the future. What I will do for you tomorrow.

Human beings live in social communities. We learn from one another.

If we’re going to live in communities, I need to know I can trust you.

The process that builds love within the brain, builds loyalty.

Stages of love:

  • Attraction– romantic, can be familiarity. Attraction is contextual – what we know or what we aspire to be. We desire the familiar.
    • In our world this is called marketing. Get them to notice our firm.
    • Our job is to define/figure out what “attractive” means for our clients
  • Passion – Once we make the choice, the two parties define their interests and are willing to overlook everything else the person does to get their end result. We made a choice and we need to defend it. This is the flower, candy and love notes stage.
  • Pair-bonding – This is when the passion might be waining, and wondering why the attraction is not what it used to be. This is where loyalty kicks in. Do you make my life easier? Do you make my life better?

The challenge for us all is: “Do we make their life better?”

Our clients have an abundance of choices. Are they choosing us because they’ve always chosen us? Are they forgetting about the value you have provided in the past? Are they looking for someone else, today, who can provide the value you once provided and still can?

People don’t want a lot of choice, they just want to have control over making that choice.

LOYALTY = TRUST – BELONGING – PURPOSE

TRUST

We walk into every relationship with the expectation of trust. You can then lose trust.

We think we should get great credit for meeting expectations.

Trust is about managing expectations.

PURPOSE

We want to feel a part of a bigger community. We want to feel that we have impact. We want to feel that we can change the world. We just don’t have the capacity.

When we can bring a sense of purpose to our firms, and thereby our clients, because we can do nothing without our clients. Don’t take credit for charitable activities. Give the credit to your clinets.

BELONGING

Recognition – Do you know who I am? Do I know the partners in my firm, or just their bios? Why should they feel a sense of loyalty to ME, as their marketer, if I don’t know who they are?

Do you know your clients? Are you taking notes about their needs and want? Use social media to get to know who these clients are? Receptionists should know who is walking in the door. Know something about them. Converse with them with that acknowledgement in mind.

Insight – Next challenge is to be insightful. You need to look beyond the obvious.

Most of us are not looking to save money, we’re looking to MAKE money.

You need to take a step into the back of the room and look around and figure out what is going on. Get that 10,000 ft view of what’s going on with your clients and their challenges.

Proactivity – Having insight takes practice. Being proactive is doing something before someone asks. Doing it when someone asks is just courtesy. Anticipate something I didn’t know I needed, and solve the problem before I knew I had it, and you become invaluable.

Inclusion – Solve my problem, but I need to be part of the process.

WWIC – Why Wasn’t I Consulted?

If you need to roll out a new marketing plan, you need to include others in the process. If not, it’s your plan and they can hate it. Hard to hate something that you helped prepare.

Identity – Do I feel that I know who you are? And do I recognize something in me in you?

You can do this by the things you place in your office, or on your website bio, or through your Facebook page or Twitter feed.

Definitely one of the best presentations I’ve ever seen. Guess I’ll have to go and buy the book.