Every marketing tactic works. In fact, there are marketing tactics I’ve never heard of that work. Anything will work if you stick to it and make it work.

Here are some examples:

• Lawyer cooks biscuits, and folks come by for breakfast each morning. He has a kitchen set up in the office to cook the biscuits. Biscuit eaters become clients.
• Lawyer encourages client reviews on Yelp. Now she gets most of her clients via Yelp. She pays nothing.
• Lawyer writes a book and gives away 10,000 copies. Boom. Clients.
• Lawyer prints band-aids with a slogan and firm info to promote his personal injury practice. The band-aids are all the rage. Clients call.

Are these the best tactics? Who knows. What I do know is that they work.

Each of these tactics took time, effort, and a bit of creativity. Mostly, however, they took a willingness to stick to it.

Why Most of Our Marketing Tactics Fail

Here’s what most of us do instead:

• Print fancy business cards and letterhead.
• Worry about signage for our building.
• Send out announcements of our new practice.
• Place ads in print publications, on the radio, on TV, or online.
• Build our website.
• Worry about SEO for our website.
• Get up to speed on Facebook, Twitter, etc.
• Rationalize why we don’t have time to take people to coffee/lunch.

We spread ourselves thin. We do a bit of this and a bit of that.

One day, we try buying pay-per-click ads. Then, three weeks later, we decide that it’s not working. Then we switch gears and have an open house. We don’t get sufficient RSVPs, so we panic and cancel. Then we buy leads off some irritating woman who keeps calling. Then we install that annoying “Can I help you?” pop-up crap for our website.

We’re an anxious, unfocused, insane ball of energy running in 12 directions. Stop.

Stop running in 12 directions.

Pick one. Figure it out. Screw it up. Fix it. Fix it some more. Stay with it. Keep at it. It’ll take time. It might take years. Do it anyway. Focus on it and make it successful. One tactic is enough if you’ll stick to it and make it work.

Every marketing tactic works. Seriously. They all work. Just pick one and make it work for you.