There’s been a lot of excitement about the new RB Web Mobile Apps that give your clients and resources access to their job information on their smartphones. While I am very happy so many of you are interested in offering this service to your clients, I don’t believe it is enough to offer this service; you have to promote and market it to make it a real asset to your users and your business.

With that in mind, I offer you my top tips for promoting your RB Web Mobile Apps:

1. Name Your App to Make an Impression.

You have a maximum 30 characters for the title that appears in the App Store or other app marketplace. I have several suggestions:

• Include your agency name in the title so it’s easy for your clients to find.
• Use other keywords you think people would use to search for this type of app. (Maybe RBWeb?)
• Go a different route and give your app a clever name (if your agency name is too long or not unique enough, for instance). Then promote your app heavily while always tying it to your company name.

2. Notify Existing Clients Quickly.

You have the perfect excuse to contact people — a convenient new way to work (every lawyer has a smartphone, right?) — use this opportunity to reach out to your base. It’s even a great excuse for contacting clients who’ve slipped off your books. I recommend notifying them about the service in whatever way is quickest:

• An email blast.
• SMS campaign (First time considering an SMS campaign? Here are some tips & guidelines).
• Tweets about the service if you have a Twitter account your clients follow.
• Facebook updates if you have a page for your business.
• Phone calls if your client base isn’t too large to make the task onerous.

Don’t limit yourself to one method. Some clients ignore emails, others aren’t interested in social media. Use whatever combination makes sense to you based on your knowledge of your clients.

If possible, keep these messages brief and include ways to contact you if the recipients can’t wait to hear more.

3. Follow Up in More Depth.

With brief announcements, you have primed your base to hear your message. Offer to demonstrate your new app and bring them a manual.

Before visiting clients, download the RB Web Mobile App user manual from our website and swap out the manual cover with one that includes your custom RB Web Mobile App title, company logo and colors.

If they are too busy to see you, you can drop off your custom printed manual, send the PDF in emails and/or post it on your website. Be sure to add a copy to all firm repositories on RB Web.

4. Get Help Going After New Clients.

Advertising your new service in traditional media aimed at your market has its value, and of course you will promote your new service on your company website and/or blog. But I think you can increase awareness by adding social media to your arsenal. Social media like Yelp and Facebook are changing how people find and choose products and services. Not sure about the impact? Learn some interesting statistics about social media from this video.

Perhaps the most relevant statistic presented is that while 78 percent of consumers trust peer recommendations, only 14 percent trust advertising.

• Make it easy for your clients to create a buzz about your mobile apps and recruit potential clients for you: Add a Facebook Like button to your announcement, so your clients can easily let other people in their circles learn there’s a cool new app they might also like.
• Expand their ability to spread the word about your new app by including a sharing widget on your online announcements, such as Add This or Share This, so they can publicize your mobile app on Twitter, via email, on their own blogs, and in dozens of other ways with a few clicks.
• And maybe it’s time to put up a Facebook page for announcements about your company and/or your RB Web Mobile App and invite clients, resources, and staff to “like” and “share” your page.

5. Keep Your App’s Mind Share.

Don’t let your app become “out of sight, out of mind” after its newness wears off. Remind people about it in a variety of ways. Ongoing promotion ideas ranging from high-cost to low/no-cost include:

• Ads and direct mail, if you already advertise or do direct mail campaigns, add something about your new service. If you don’t do either, I’d say you should probably focus on other ways to promote your app. I don’t know that you would get enough ROI on these methods as opposed to others listed here.
• Conference and trade show materials, including banners and take-aways.
• Presentation demonstrating your app (you can convert a PowerPoint or other presentation to a movie, even add audio, and embed it on your website). In fact, all presentations and materials about your company should include something about your mobile app.
• Messages on invoices and statements, envelopes, packing slips, anything you send to clients (consider getting color stickers made to make the message stand out more or even custom postage stamps).
• A mention in your NCRA listing and any other professional directory listings about your app.
• Articles/blurbs on your website, maybe an area dedicated to your app alone.
• Blogging and tweeting about different features or when there’s some newsworthy event relating to your app, like the first 100 downloads.
• Join LinkedIn and add your company. Then join groups on LinkedIn that fit your market demographic and post press releases about your app in the Promotion tab of your groups.
• Tagline on your email signature describing your app. And add something to email auto-responders about your app.
• Something brief on your company’s voice-mail and on-hold messages.
• If you have a newsletter or email blast, mention your app in them.
• Info about the app on your RB Web online log-in and/or News screen.

Try, try again

Not all of these suggestions will be appropriate for your audience or your company, but I hope there is something here to help you promote your RB Web Mobile App. I truly believe this new app will make it easier for you to share information with your clients, and you both will benefit. But your audience needs to know about it – and probably needs to be reminded occasionally if they don’t try it right away because lawyers are busy people.

I know you are busy too, so I hope that some of these suggestions represent a worthwhile investment of your time and you use them successfully. Let me know how it goes. And remember: anytime we upgrade RB Web Mobile Apps you can go through an abbreviated version of this cycle to raise awareness, increase usage, build customer loyalty and ultimately gain more clients.

Introduction

[This introduction & 3 tips are reprinted from OMTI's brochure for the 2010 NCRA Firm Owners Executive Conference, held Feb. 3-5 in Orlando, FL.]

I wanted to give you my top three tips for ensuring your business will survive and thrive in 2010.

Last year was a tough one for many court reporting firms. It was the worst I’ve seen my clients experience in my 25 years of developing software and services for managing and marketing legal support businesses.

While the overall economy is slowly improving, I foresee continued tough times for your industry. The legal industry is experiencing stagnant business growth so cost containment is one area they are focusing on, leading many firms to drop longtime vendors in the hopes of lowering their outside costs.

At the same time, they are also more open than ever to new ways of doing business and using technology to save money and improve their own services. So in spite of the disturbing trend of disappearing loyalty, there is still business for you out there, but only if you do everything you can to cut costs, maximize efficiency, provide relevant services and communicate effectively.

I believe you can be successful in 2010, and to help you hold onto your clients, win new clients and improve your business, I offer you my top tips for 2010 and best wishes for a prosperous year.

Sincerely,
Yong Lee, President & CEO
OMTI, developers of ReporterBase

Tip #1 | Tip #2 | Tip #3

It’s never too late to get a jump on the competition.

Since everything I’ve described is in RB already, you don’t have to start from scratch finding and adding the latest technology and offering the best services. So even if you feel like you’ve lost ground in the marketplace, you can come out ahead by incorporating RB into your business now.

And if you are hesitating to make such an investment in a down economy, think again:

• We’ve been developing this system for 25 years, so you’ll have better tools than the big national firms’ proprietary systems.
• You can rent the system instead of buying it, so you can get $10M software for as little as $125/mo.
• If you don’t like it, you can cancel it at any time — you’re not stuck if it doesn’t work for you.
• You can add all the web and mobile features with RB Web for a flat $199/mo. for all of your clients. And if you have only one client who needs an online repository for one case, you can add RB Web to meet their needs. Then when they don’t need it anymore, you can cancel the online services.

Keep your clients and win new clients by offering cutting-edge online services and competitive prices for all of your services with the help of powerful RB tools.

Move your business forward in 2010

While you might have spent 2009 in business survival mode, 2010 should be different.

Be pro-active and talk to your clients now about what you can do to help them control costs and take advantage of the benefits of new technology. Don’t let your clients forget you or wait until they drop you before you contact them about how you can work together to succeed in a difficult business environment.

And as we have for the past 25 years, OMTI is here to help you control your own costs and provide valuable services that lawyers want. We understand your industry and new technology, and actively work with our clients to continue to develop RB to meet the ever-changing needs of court reporting and other legal support firms.

To find out more, visit our website or contact us today.

Tip #1 | Tip #2

*Updated* 7th annual Team RB user conference, Sept. 25 & 26

Every year since 2002, OMTI has sponsored a conference for litigation support business owners and managers. Topics covered typically include the latest developments in business management software, new technologies and best business practices for the industry.
The conferences are called Team RB user conferences because they focus on ReporterBase (RB) software and companies that use it. This year’s conference theme was “Navigating through turbulent times.”

Three seminars were presented over 2 days covering what’s new in business management & online services, plus future projections for the industry. Emphasis was on cost cutting while preserving business and protecting profits.

Yong Lee, president & CEO of OMTI, led the seminars.

In keeping with this year’s theme, this year’s conference was online to be easy to attend and inexpensive.

Visit our website for more details.