As a disability lawyer, it is vital to make sure all of your advertising is both legal and ethical. The following information will help lead you down the right path to make sure your marketing efforts will bring in new clients in a way that will keep you within the confines of the law and also lets your clients know they are dealing with an upstanding and honest law firm whose primary concern is about helping people.
Do not exaggerate
An old marketing tactic is to exaggerate information such as statistics and outcomes. Exaggerating information is not illegal, but it is not a good practice. Companies that sell diet pills will often exaggerate the efficacy of their product to entice people who want to lose weight to try their product. It is not difficult to manipulate numbers to make results seem better than they are. Marketers know this and use it as a strategy. However, disability lawyers should avoid this practice under all circumstances. When you present success rates in your marketing tools, make sure the numbers you use are accurate and not manipulated to give prospective clients a false sense of trust in your firm.
Follow your state bar rules
The advertising agency you works with needs to be capable of researching and working to make sure your advertisements do not break any of your state bar rules.
Avoid puffery
Puffery refers to advertising that relies on subjective rather than objective claims. When people seek the help of a disability lawyer, they are often in a heightened emotional state. It is easy to sway these people with claims that appeal to their sensibilities rather than to their common sense. However, people who are seeking assistance from a disability law firm must make their decisions based on hard facts rather than on what may be. So, when you are developing your marketing plan, make sure you are focusing more on objective information about your firm rather than appealing to the emotions of people who are seeking your help.
Avoid stereotyping
Stereotyping is often used in marketing efforts. However, that does not mean that it is an ethical practice. Unfortunately, stereotyping is easy to do. But, it should be avoided at all costs. To avoid stereotyping, you must consciously think about all of the various types of stereotypes and set out to avoid them. For example, avoid portraying women as sex objects in your advertising.
The best way to ensure that your Social Security disability marketing efforts remain ethical is to look at all of your advertising efforts with a critical eye. Ask yourself hard questions, and if you do not like the answers, change what you are doing. Keeping your disability law advertising ethical is the best way to keep your business strong.