Use the News to Get Leads

If I were a sitting at my law firm desk eating a soy yogurt and surfing news pages on the web, here’s what I would do if I came across this blazing headline: “Bank of America Announces $50 Billion Environmental Goal.” I’d skim, and I would fixate on this sentence: “The bank intends to achieve its new goal through lending, equipment finance, carbon finance, capital markets and advisory activity, and advice and investment solutions for clients.” Here is what I would wonder: Does my firm represent Bank of America? Does my firm represent lenders, anyone in equipment or carbon finance, and so on? Is there a business opportunity—and an accompanying legal opportunity—that my firm could leverage? Does my firm represent a BoA rival? What is it doing re environmental goals? Have we made any suggestions?

Okay, I don’t work for a law firm, but I never stop thinking about how I might get more business, and lawyers shouldn’t, either. Neither should their marketers, managers, or paralegals. Read proactively and then do something. Send a note, shoot off an email, have a casual conversation. Make something small lead to something big.