Bankruptcy lawyers can purchase a wide variety of leads from different lead generation companies. But which return a solid, profitable ROI to your law firm, and which do not? Here are some guidelines for buying different bankruptcy leads for lawyers which may surprise you.

3 Different Lead Generation Models

1. Email leads generated from a common content site
   This model is where a website is set up that provides a lot of general information about bankruptcy. There is also an email form for site visitors to request to be contacted by a local bankruptcy attorney. Email leads are sold to the local attorneys who sign up to receive the leads. Sometimes this can be multiple lawyers receiving the same email inquiry.
2. Purchased list of prospects
   A number of sources can sell you “sales lead” lists of local people who have bad credit scores, are in foreclosure, or other indicators of the eminent need to file bankruptcy. While the cost per lead is very low, you will need a skilled team to contact these leads, track them and to pitch your services once they do get a prospect on the phone.
3. Direct phone call leads generated from a custom lead-generation microsite campaign
   This is the model used by Swift Legal Leads to generate bankruptcy leads for lawyers across the U.S. We set up custom search engine marketing campaigns to attract visitors searching for a local bankruptcy lawyer and then convince them to directly call your firm. We track all phone calls from the campaign and charge you only for the most qualified new clients you receive, not for every call.

Conversion Rates and ROI of Different Models

Most lawyers, like any business person, would initially focus on buying the lowest cost leads. After all, the less you spend, the more money you’ll make. Right? Unfortunately, bankruptcy leads from different sources do not convert into clients the same.

THE NUMBER OF NEW CLIENTS A BANKRUPTCY LAWYER TYPICALLY RETAINS OUT OF 500 LEADS RECEIVED:*

Various factors can influence this number tremendously, such as the personal ability of lawyers to close prospects following an initial consult, the offers used to attract the leads, and the distance the prospect must travel to the lawyer’s office.

TYPICAL COST-PER-LEAD OF DIFFERENT TYPES OF BANKRUPTCY LEADS:*

TYPICAL LEAD GENERATION COST PER NEW BANKRUPTCY CLIENT RETAINED:*

*Data reported from clients of Swift Legal Leads across the U.S. who have used these various lead generation methods.

Why Do the Low Cost-Per-Lead Models Result in the Highest New Client Acquisition Costs?

It’s all due to how the bankruptcy leads are generated and who the prospects really are.

Email leads from a general information site are typically people who are information gathering about a legal subject – they are not yet ready to make a decision to hire an attorney. Often they don’t even know who the specific attorney is that their email request will be going to. Additionally, with email leads, you have to follow up to get in touch with the prospect – and that can sometimes take a lot of effort on your part, only to find out that the prospect is already speaking to another lawyer.

Purchased lists of leads generally take the most work in order to turn them into paying clients. As with email leads, it’s up to you to contact the prospects. Additionally, depending on the source of the list, it may have been weeks or even months since the list data was mined.

Additionally, the number of leads generated per month from the two sources above can be pretty meager.

With direct-contact phone leads from custom microsite campaigns, (i.e. bankruptcy leads generated by Swift Legal Leads for lawyers), the prospect calls you, the lawyer, at the precise moment that he wants to set an appointment to discuss filing bankruptcy. Since the prospect calls you, you don’t have to track them down in order to pitch your services to them – they’ve already decided they’re interested in filing and have chosen your firm to meet with. Some of the bankruptcy lawyers we work with report conversion rates as high as 90% on the bankruptcy leads that we generate for them (though average conversion rates are about 45%). Plus, this model often generates more new clients than a firm can initially handle – so you may need to set lead limits when first starting a campaign.