Stevens & Associates Lawyers
We chatted with Stevens & Associates Lawyer, Josh Hoggett, about how their firm achieved $200,000 in revenue over 10 months working with Yo Media. Starting out at the firm in 2016, Josh had seen a lot of change and development within the firm during his time there, which he credits in part to enlisting Yo Media to help with marketing.
The Business
Stevens & Associates is a boutique Law firm based in Sydney, near Martin Place. Specialising in employment and work health safety, they assist employees, business owners, senior executives, and CEOs in facilitating positive outcomes across a wide range of matters, including:
- Strategic trade matters
- Unfair dismissal
- Adverse action
- Redundancy
- Defensive investigation
- Discrimination
- Harassment
- Bullying
- Whistleblowing
- Employment contracts
Placing a high emphasis on client-focused relationships means ensuring that everyone they work with has access to their Director, Nick Stevens, who has over 30 years of experience in the industry.
Being intensely focused on achieving excellent outcomes for their clients, providing personal service, and a fast turnaround for clients is an absolute for all matters taken on. Being a smaller boutique firm allows client engagement on a much more personal level, which fosters higher quality service across the board.
Project Overview
Delivery Timeframe: June 2022 – April 2023
- SEO Campaign Targeting Various Niches of Employment Law
- Website Optimisation
- Content Delivery
What were your marketing challenges before working with us?
Our firm had been 100% built upon word-of-mouth referrals, with all new business coming from recommendations from clients who were really happy with their service. Word-of-mouth referrals are great but aren’t always consistent.
This created quiet periods for our firm, which arose from labour market trends or the general economic situation. We also had an increased capacity to take on work due to our team expanding.
My idea was to engage a marketing company to assist our firm.
‘I wanted to supplement our word-of-mouth referrals using SEO, which is exactly what we have done. We now have a hybrid model between word of mouth and online referrals, which has been really good for us.’
What necessitated finding a marketing company to work with for your business?
We went through a growth period, even though we’re still a smaller firm. We initially had three lawyers, and I was a paralegal then, but I’ve since transitioned to a solicitor. This meant growth in the amount of work we could take on and the amount of work we wanted coming in.
‘Having Yo Media on board and having more enquiries has really helped to facilitate that growth and change.’
What were you looking for in a marketing company?
The first thing I was looking for was outcomes and results. After some Google searches and looking over the website, I saw that Yo Media had achieved some impressive results. I could see they’d won awards and testimonials from clients.
‘Aside from outcomes and results, working with an engaged and communicative team was really important. Mark and the team have been excellent in this regard.’
What made you decide to work with Yo Media?
I believed in SEO, but it wasn’t something our firm had previously considered. We may have had some SEO with the previous website, but I don’t think we saw online enquiries from it.
From the outset, some of my colleagues were slightly sceptical about engaging a marketing company. I needed to help them understand the potential benefits they may have needed more awareness about. There was some hesitation and ‘I don’t know if I believe in it’ to contend with. I guess I overpowered my colleagues’ reluctance by encouraging them with potential benefits. It was hard, but we’ve had great results, so I’m glad we went ahead.
The project
Part of the work has been designing a new website that looks awesome. There are also targeted SEO campaigns running, aiming to create pages our target clients find, then move those pages and our homepage up to the top of Google search.
It’s been going really well, even though we haven’t done any Google ads yet.
‘The SEO campaigns have seen a huge increase in the number of enquiries and leads we’re getting to the firm. The enquiries are converting into new clients, which is precisely what we’re after at the end of the day.’
In terms of the project, can you tell us about what you most wanted to achieve?
I wanted to see a significant increase in the volume of enquiries and leads, translating into higher profits for the firm – after the cost of engaging Yo Media. I had to weigh up what revenue was coming in, what it was costing us and how good it really was – because it’s obviously only as good as what it’s generating based on our investment.
What were the biggest challenges that came up during the project, and how do you feel Yo Media helped you solve them?
The biggest challenge so far has been honing in on high-quality leads. With the volume of enquiries increasing, we’ve needed to really specialise the campaigns so they’re targeting the type of clients we want. Yo Media have done really well with tinkering with our pages to target clients suited to us. They’ve worked with us to build pages that will first attract those high-quality clients and then make sure that they are streamlined, which is why we are really getting clients that are a good fit for the firm. It’s also been great in terms of the sales process; they’ve given me great advice on how to qualify initial leads. That’s definitely been a learning experience because I’ve had to deal with more sales calls than I ever have.
What can you tell us about the results of the work that Yo Media did for you?
‘The results we are getting are excellent. The more targeted enquiries we get, the more quality leads arrive. This means that we see more conversions, more clients, and more revenue.’
We are seeing quality leads coming through from people who are in senior executive roles, as well as a few from companies. We still get some people who aren’t the right fit for the firm, but the quality is there overall, and this has been pleasantly surprising for some of my colleagues.
What are some results you can share in real terms?
‘The amount of enquiries coming through has significantly increased, complementing word-of-mouth enquiries well. That has meant over $200,000 in profit in under a year and many ongoing and new matters, which is a really good result.’
Our return on investment after 50K of costs is a 4x return on investment, which we’re looking forward to seeing an increase in the future and continue for us.
Do you feel that the overall process, from the initial briefing through to now, has been thorough?
‘The process has been really thorough, incredibly easy and user-friendly from my point of view. The monthly feedback and chats we have are always really transparent.’
I can ask Mark any questions I need, whether they are easy or hard. The overall process has been easy for us to implement, although it is pretty technical and complicated. It hasn’t taken up a lot of my time, which is essential as I have to be doing my job as a solicitor, I can’t be spending a lot of time on marketing stuff, so it’s good that I can kind of monitor it and touch base with Yo when I need to.
What do you feel Yo Media has done well?
Having a transparent process and being very communicative – ready to answer any questions or action that we want to do with respect to what we are working on.
‘Yo Media has also managed legal terminology really well, adapting it to help our clients understand something they’re not particularly familiar with. I’m still impressed that they can do this, and the copy that gets sent through doesn’t require much input from me.’
They can look at a legal market and implement an effective strategy in consultation with us for that market. That’s really impressive to me.
What feedback have you received internally, or from clients, about this project?
Internally, the response has been very good. The initial view was somewhat pessimistic, so it was really positive when we started seeing results. We had a leadership and strategy team meeting late last, and during the year-end review, we talked about what had gone really well for the firm. This project and the SEO side of things, and all the enquiries are one of the things that came to the forefront of that meeting. Everyone was really happy about the project and how it was going. People were really excited that it was working. Particularly me, because it’s my baby, as my boss reminds me. So it’s been overwhelmingly positive, which is great.
How would you describe the Communication & Responsiveness from Yo Media during the process?
It’s been a 10 for us because every time we communicate, there’s a direct response that addresses exactly what we’re asking. Definitely a highly responsive team.
Did the outcome of the project match or exceed your expectations?
It’s matched my expectations. In terms of the rest of the firm, it’s definitely exceeded their expectations. I really had faith in this from the outset, so I’m excited to see it’s working! I still want to see it develop and grow for us, but in terms of our firm, it’s exceeded expectations massively. Some of the team probably didn’t expect it to materialise, but it certainly has, and that’s been demonstrated in the strong performance and results seen today.
Would you recommend Yo Media?
I’d definitely recommend Yo Media, yes. It’s been very easy from start to finish, and we’re excited with the results and the results we’ll see in the future as well.
– Josh Hoggett, Solicitor
