In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Sue Kirchner discuss:

• The role of personal and firm branding in professional services
• Differentiation strategies in a competitive legal marketplace
• The evolving dynamics between name-based and value-based branding
• Branding’s impact on mergers, acquisitions, and business longevity

Key Takeaways:

• Law firms that remove individual names from their brand and adopt a more strategic, memorable identity are better positioned for scalability, talent acquisition, and potential future sale or merger.
• Before spending on marketing, professional service firms must first define their brand strategy by clarifying their core values, audience, messaging, and differentiators to ensure efforts resonate and generate ROI.
• In a saturated legal market, individual lawyers must actively build personal brands—often rooted in authentic personality traits or interests—to stand out and create emotional connections that drive client decisions.
• During mergers and acquisitions, brand strategy is essential at every stage—from making the firm attractive pre-sale, to managing messaging consistency on day one, to ensuring smooth internal integration post-deal.

"The best you can do is to have your messaging and your actions best reflect what you want them to take away from your brand." — Sue Kirchner

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About Sue Kirchner: For over 25 years, Sue Kirchner, Founder of Brand Strong Marketing—a brand strategy consulting firm—has helped thriving businesses create Wow! brands, allowing them to scale faster, easier, and more successfully.

Her proven Brand Strong Methodology has enabled organizations to attract the right customers and employees, enter new markets successfully, create an amazing customer experience, and increase sales to consistently take the business to the next level.

She is also the host of The Turbo Branding Show, a podcast and video series designed to help Founders and CEOs of thriving businesses gain the insights and inspiration they need to ignite growth by leveraging their brand.

Connect with Sue Kirchner:

Website: https://brandstrongmarketing.com/

Show: The Turbo Branding Show: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-turbo-branding-show/id1771868942

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/suekirchner/ & https://www.linkedin.com/company/brand-strong-marketing/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BrandStrongMarketing

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brandstrongmarketing/

Connect with Steve Fretzin:

LinkedIn: Steve Fretzin

Twitter: @stevefretzin

Instagram: @fretzinsteve

Facebook: Fretzin, Inc.

Website: Fretzin.com

Email: Steve@Fretzin.com

Book: Legal Business Development Isn't Rocket Science and more!

YouTube: Steve Fretzin

Call Steve directly at 847-602-6911

Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You're the expert. Your podcast will prove it.