PR Marketing vs. Content Marketing for Legal Marketers

Law firms have more ways than ever before to communicate with prospective clients. Yet many firms continue to rely on PR marketing rather than tapping into the potential of content marketing. What exactly is the difference?

Content marketing offers an effective and relative method for leveraging valuable content across a variety of channels. Law firms can use this method for engaging prospective clients, establishing influence, increasing awareness, and even shaping their brand. With content marketing, it’s possible for your firm to take control of the message you distribute to everyone from potential clients to others in the legal field.

The primary objective of content marketing is to encourage the interest of your audience rather than simply churning out messages and hoping someone takes an interest. A successful content marketing strategy for legal firms requires your marketing department to keep a keen eye on what is being said and then creating content that will engage your target audience.

In the ever-changing world of marketing, it’s imperative that law firms shift their focus from simply broadcasting events and press releases. Consumers today are actively searching for information that adds value. The job of a legal marketing department is to determine what the audience wants to read and then provide that content.

Below are just a few ways that content marketing for legal marketers can be an advantage when creating effective campaigns.

Measure the Right Metrics

First, it’s important for legal marketers to make certain they are measuring the right metrics. In terms of PR, it’s common to measure such metrics as the number of people who see content, otherwise known as reach, and the number of times the brand is cited. Effective content marketing moves far beyond reach, impressions, and mentions. Since the primary goal of content marketing is to bring in new clients, you need to focus on engaging clients in areas that matter to them. However, this is a process that builds upon itself and requires a series of steps.

In the first step, your firm can actually use relevant PR metrics. In the early stages of content marketing, PR-type metrics are effective because your goal is to measure the number of people consuming your content. At this point, you can effectively use such metrics as:

•     Website Traffic
•     Views
•     Social Media Impressions

Simply measuring these types of metrics alone is not enough. To create a relevant and strategic content marketing campaign, you need to encourage your audience to act. Content marketing is not simply a one-way street; it must be a two-way conversation. At the second stage, relevant metrics include:

•     Search Engine Results Page Traffic
•     Comments or Likes on Social Media Posts
•     Play Rates for Videos

As law firms are well aware, it’s imperative to instill a sense of trust in clients. With content marketing, legal marketers can lay the foundation for that trust by creating content that is viewed as reliable and trustworthy. At the third stage of your content marketing strategy, focus on the following metrics:

•     Likes and Follows on Social Media
•     Forwards and Shares of Content
•     Social Media Tags
•     Video Engagement
•     Number of Subscribers

Once you have engendered a sense of trust among your audience, the next step is to convert them into clients. Metrics for this stage could include lead generation forms or any other metrics that measure the number of people who have made the shift to becoming clients.

Following the stages described above can help your legal marketing department make the shift from outdated PR marketing into the more exciting and effective world of content marketing.