I had one of those forehead slapping “d’uh” moments the other day. Of course I want to share it with you!
I was talking to a mediator from the Midwest (she’s read this post in advance, by the way). She’s been in private practice for about two years and is not yet coming close to paying the bills. She’s been advertising in her local daily, takes out an annual yellow pages ad, has a static website, sends out a print newsletter quarterly, and has a few other traditional strategies in her informal marketing plan. The yield from these strategies is pretty dismal, despite real effort and care put into them.
During the conversation, I asked her how she communicates her passion for mediation and its benefits to her prospective clients and audience. There was a long silence. Then she said, “As a mediator, I believe it’s my responsibility to convey neutrality and professional distance. Passion doesn’t really enter into it.”
If I hadn’t had a telephone headset on, I’d have slapped my forehead soundly, because her response awakened me to something I hadn’t considered before: That some (maybe many) mediators hesitate to convey passion for what they offer because the directive to be neutral is so well ingrained or taken very comprehensively. Neutrality may work for mediation (I’m a much bigger fan of the notion of impartiality), but it surely doesn’t work for marketing mediation.
What do you think? Leave your comments below!
Hi, slapped my forehead too. Certainly a different perspective – it sounds that some mediators might actually be embarrassed to market their business due to that perception. You asked an excellent question.
For many years I used the "professional aloofness" approach as an attorney–never really marketing my law practice and basically waiting for business to come in. That worked pretty well for my law practice, but I've found it doesn't work at all for mediation practice. It took me a while to understand that and change my paradigm to think in terms of marketing being an integral part of a mediation practice. I'm coming around, but it doesn't happen overnight.
Pep, I do think there's something going on, maybe embarrassment, maybe something akin to it, when some mediators think "marketing." Perhaps it's the unfortunate association between marketing and "selling," as in the used car salesman stereotype. I say unfortunate because marketing not only doesn't have to be that experience…but shouldn't be! I'd cringe and be embarrassed by it too!
Boyd, you are so on the money with your comment. It doesn't happen overnight and there is an adjustment period. I'm interested in knowing, if you see this message, what you think might help the paradigm shift happen more comfortably and easily for mediators.
Of course, the first clue that something was wrong with my marketing paradigm was that my phone wasn't exactly ringing off the hook. But I think that changing the paradigm is really an educational process. I have tried to read as many articles and books as I can on the subject of mediator marketing. That has finally made me realize what I must do. But a big obstacle is that I have a busy law practice in other areas, so marketing my mediation practice gets pushed aside for other urgent things. I really want my practice to become exclusively mediation. But this takes a commitment that is hard to make. It's just hard to give up other income producing activities to concentrate on marketing, which takes a while to pay off. I would be interested in knowing how other people have handled this.
Boyd, I think I'll see what other readers have to say about the question of finding time to really develop business while also needing to maintain an income stream. I did something generally not recommended: I walked away from a very well-paying and influential job and went right to into building my practice. Worked for me but the general business development wisdom seems to focus on a more incrementailist approach. I'll see what I can find out via a future post!