What would you identify as some of the biggest challenges facing the legal marketing
profession?
Over the
past several years, legal marketing has gone quickly through several
stages. Less than 10 years ago there
was a focus on promotion through seminars and event marketing. Then law firm advertising became hot, and
business and legal publication editors lay awake nights thinking of new ways to
generate income from law firms. Legal
marketers realized that they needed a cohesive message, and the focus shifted
to branding - an attempt to position an image of their firm in the minds of
their clients and potential clients.
Many firms have now done the branding dance and are thinking business
development: what can we do to increase
revenues and profits? How can we make a
big difference in our bottom line?
On the
business development front, issues of cross-marketing, industry specialization,
client relationship teams, partnering, and winning core counsel competitions
are on the minds of legal marketers and managing partners. Progressive firms are implementing programs
to improve their relationships with key clients, and seek innovative ways to
serve their clients.
On another
note, law marketers have seen a great deal of change in their roles and
expectations over the past few years.
More firms are hiring “Chief Marketing Officers” (CMO’s) rather than
Marketing Directors, although the expectations differ from firm to firm. More firms are looking to marketing folks
not just for operational tasks – events, corporate communications, public
relations, proposals, and the like – but also strategic guidance, traditional
business development (read: sales) support, and change management.
I’ve heard
that the average tenure of a marketing director is between 19 and 30
months. Many of my colleagues spend a
fair portion of their time recruiting and training new marketing staff. Why is law marketing so difficult? What can we do to make law marketing a more
satisfying profession? As leaders of marketing departments, and in our firms,
we need to find ways to keep marketing professionals engaged, creative,
challenged, and loyal in an ever changing environment.
All of
these challenges – a shift to business development, an emphasis on client
service, changing expectations of marketing professionals and a desperate need
to retain quality staff – are functions of a firm’s culture. Nimble firms that can adapt their culture
quickly will succeed.
What
do you think are the biggest changes to the landscape in recent years?
Convergence. As legal departments and corporations seek to
reduce costs and improve efficiency, they are drastically reducing the number
of firms they work with. I spoke to a
GC of a Fortune 100 company some time ago.
“How many law firms do you use now?” I asked. His reply, “We’ve acquired many companies, and their associated
outside counsel, over the past 5 years.
We use more than 300 law firms across the US and internationally. In 18 months, we plan on reducing that
number to about 25 firms. We can’t
afford to have so many disparate relationships.”
As clients
seek to streamline their relationships with outside counsel, law firms are
forced to compete on, well, relationships.
Progressive law firms have invested financially and emotionally in
improving client service through client surveys, client visitation programs,
client team training, and even compensation systems tied to client satisfaction
and cross-marketing success.
Recently there has been an increase tools to increase client service, such as the widespread use of legal extranets, PDA’s with e-mail capacity, electronic billing, etc.
How
do you see sales people fitting into the law firm environment and what role
will marketing take in business development? What types of tools can marketers
then offer to their attorneys or sales professionals?
Ethics
rules in most states prevent non-lawyers from soliciting business on a
commission or traditional sales model.
However, several firms are experimenting or implementing some form of a
sales model to generate new business.
Consulting and accounting firms have used models for the past 15 + years
that are now being considered by law firms.
Marketing, and other staff departments, have often taken non-billable
tasks off the lawyer’s desk to improve their productivity. That’s hard to do when it comes to
relationship building. Business
development professionals can help by:
Law
marketers can assist BD efforts in three ways.
First, marketers can offer services that help lawyers or BD
professionals understand the client’s business, industry, and specific
situations through research and competitive intelligence. Second, marketers can advise on the crafting
of the needs analysis and developing a client-specific business development
plan. Third, marketers can help track
efforts and “nag” as needed. Many
well-intentioned and well-conceived plans die for lack of follow up.
I think
some firms will find ways to make professional business development efforts
work, but most will try to adapt the current “the lawyer is the salesperson-production
unit-owner” model to be more effective.
How
does a Web Presence fit into a firm’s overall marketing strategy? Is it one of
the focal points or just one of the aspects of a marketing strategy?
Holland
& Hart has about 12 web sites right now.
Clients want to have confidence that their lawyers are not only experts
in their field of law, but are intimately familiar with their own business and
industry. We have used the web to
communicate our expertise in both legal specialty and industry segments. In addition, our web site becomes a primary
branding tool. Holland & Hart’s
desired positioning statement is centered on being the leading law firm in the
Rocky Mountain West, so our website graphically and textually reflects that
brand. Our specialty web sites, such as
www.westernwaterlaw.com and www.westernconstructionlaw.com
underscore our brand and our familiarity with our client’s business.
Holland
& Hart has several ancillary services that help differentiate the
firm. CaseShare (www.caseshare.com) offers legal and
business extranets, and has been recognized as a leader in its field. The web site, as part of our gallery of
sites and portfolio of services, also helps the firm communicate that it is
tech-savvy. Persuasion Strategies (www.persuasionstrategies.com)
is the firm’s in-house trial consulting and graphics group, boasting four
Ph.D.’s trained in courtroom psychology.
Another client benefit, and by creating its own web site, highlights the
group and its services. Holland &
Hart’s Foundation (www.hollandhartfoundation.org)
serves thousands of people every year and engages nearly all of the firm’s 600
attorneys and staff. The web site shows
a part of the firm that is integral to our culture, and is important to our
clients, potential clients, and the communities in which we practice.
What
impact do you see Blogs in a marketing law firms?
We’ve been
using a blog (http://www.hollandhart.com/healthcare/blogindex.htm)
to promote our health care practice for nearly a year now. The blog has been a wonderful way to
communicate with an audience of clients, potential clients, and influencers
without the trouble of sending frequent e-mails. As spam filtering technology increases, and everyone’s patience
for non-critical e-mail dwindles, blogs are a wonderful alternative to
communicate substantive information to an audience.
The health
care practice group leader administers our healthcare blog. He writes the content and posts at his
leisure. Over the past 8 months, other
blogs and web sites have linked to our blog, increasing traffic and
recognition. Along with e-mail
newsletters, industry-related legal web sites, extranets, and webinars, blogs
will become an increasingly important tool to law firm marketers.
What
is the last book you read and why. How has it affected your approach in
Marketing at HH?
I am
currently reading, “King Arthur's Round Table: How Collaborative
Conversations Create Smart Organizations” by David Perkins. I heard Perkins speak at the Annual
Conference on Thinking (www.thinkingconference.com)
via the web this summer. I am trying to
figure out how to best influence a culture that is largely individual-based and
move it towards a culture of teamwork and collaboration. Perkins defines corporate culture as the sum
total of all the conversations we have within an organization. Are those conversations progressive or
regressive? Are we working towards
effective teamwork or building roadblocks to collaboration? The example of King Arthur’s Round Table
seemed fitting for application in law firms.
Arthur’s knights – around the table- are much like we’d like to see a
true partnership work.
I tend to
read several books at once, rarely finishing any one. I’ve also been reading:
Jeri Head is a Premier Account Manager for FindLaw, a Thomson Company. She advises law firms on strategic client development and retention strategies. Jeri develops comprehensive marketing initiatives including branding, generating PR opportunities, target marketing, extranet usage and Web site audits. Jeri's area of expertise is the use of technology, including Web sites for client development and retention.
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