For over 20 years, I have been helping law and other professional services firms to win more business by building systems and processes that help them to win more with fewer resources. At many small and midsize firms, it seems that there is a constant “reinvention of the wheel” nearly every time that a pitch or RFP comes through the door, which wastes money and time and increases staff turnover.
Smaller law firms can significantly increase their chances of competing with large “Goliaths” by bringing an industry focus, maximizing their digital footprint, building processes and systems around the pitch/proposal process, looking backwards for strengths, and engaging in social media.
Become an Industry Expert
To be blunt, clients are not very concerned with how law firms are structured internally. For example, a restaurateur doesn’t care that one attorney forms her company while another works on labor and employment issues; they want a single point of contact and they want advice contextualized around their specific needs and issues. One of the most effective ways to do that is by shifting the focus from selling services to selling integrated solutions.
...[shift] the focus from selling services to selling integrated solutions.
By understanding clients’ needs and pain points, law firms can tailor their pitches to address specific issues and demonstrate how their focused services can add value. That only comes from internal collaboration and integrating offerings under an industry-focused go-to-market strategy. At the very least, instead of simply listing out services and practice areas on your website, focus on showcasing the interdisciplinary issues, outcomes, and benefits that clients can expect by choosing your firm- and list these results by industry. Think case studies and testimonials!
Optimize Your Digital Footprint
According to a recent Gartner study, legal and other B2B buyers are roughly 57% of the way through the selection process before they pick up the phone to contact a potential partner. After getting 3-4 recommendations from colleagues in their network, prospective buyers will typically Google the attorneys to see if the listed bio/industry/practice qualifications match what they are seeking. Trust me, nobody is going to call an attorney or firm to ask if they happen to have depth in an industry that they didn’t see on the website- so in their eyes, if it’s not on your biography or practice page, it didn’t happen.
It's also critical to use data to understand where you are losing buyers in the awareness journey, whether via Google Analytics’ website bounce rate, gauging client alert reads and forwards and A/B testing emails, or honing the live/in-person messaging that doesn’t resonate.
It should also be critical to encourage attorneys not only to speak, but also write or record thought leadership and other mediums that can show their personalities. After all, people buy from those they like and trust. But as importantly, they want to see that you are the forefront of thinking through their specific problems. There’s no better way to lose a prospective client than for them to visit your bio and see that you haven’t developed thought leadership in 2-5 years. Again, if it’s not on your page it didn’t happen- and you’ll be out of the game before you even knew you were in it.
Audit the Pitch and Proposal Process
The rough math on this one is staggering. If partners ($800 per hour) are spending 3 hours on a pitch or submission, and staff ($143/hour, based off $100K per year) are spending 10 hours on a pitch or submission, law firms are potentially leaking over $375,000 annually by recreating the wheel (to say nothing about the lack of customization that occurs with last-minute pitches). To improve your pitch win rate (and win more awards), law firms must build efficient and effective processes around crafting drafts, leveraging design, integrating analyst and reporting information, etc.
This involves building a “go/no-go” strategy that is followed throughout the firm, managing expectations for both big RFP’s and quick turn pitches, creating an RFP database for commonly asked questions, building time for customization and research, building an escalation process for “top client” pitches, tracking win/loss rates, rehearsing for oral presentations, and making data-driven decisions to improve future pitches, to name just a few.
By soliciting feedback from clients, staff and attorneys, law firms can gain valuable insights into areas that need refinement and steps that can be streamlined. Further, implementing changes based on this feedback can lead to more compelling pitches that resonate with clients and increase the likelihood of success.
In this area, it is mission-critical to centralize all of the firm’s experience; properly code it (industry, attorney, client/matter number, jurisdiction, practice, issue, etc.); and write it in a consistent way across the firm. If your firm is still sending “pardon the interruption” emails every time there is a new business opportunity, you’re more likely losing more pitches than you’re winning. Another key is to develop an RFP/pitch answer bank of the most commonly asked questions. While this seems intuitive, it’s my experience that small and midsize firms are lacking in these low-hanging areas.
This becomes especially important for boutique and smaller firms who are trying to compete upstream with large opportunities, as they will be facing massive marketing teams who have all of this data ready at their fingertips. The solutions can be basic to start and build proof of concept for investment (i.e. even in Excel), but ultimately tying these descriptions to the financials can help in attorney resourcing and pricing, and will facilitate the gap analysis necessary to find cross-selling opportunities while also helping teams to audit and develop missing descriptions on attorney bios and practice pages.
Look Backwards to Look Forward
In order to effectively pitch for new business, you need to have a keen grasp of the issues inherent in the industry in which you are pitching. And so many lawyers don’t have all of their own experience on their bio, let alone the collective firm’s experience at the ready. A secondary benefit in aggregating attorney, practice, and firm matters is that attorneys will find that strategic planning initiatives are much easier once matters are centralized into a single database that can be searched and sorted. So many AmLaw firms don’t realize their collective power by industry (as they are still aligned by practice in many cases) and they fail to put their best foot forward in pitches and submissions, as well as on the website.
Armed with what has worked and what hasn’t across industry, firms can be much more strategic in regards to pricing, streamlining legal services, and resourcing, enabling them to put the whole strength of their firm forward in all external communications, client pitches, and future planning. Build the systems and scale them- or you won’t be winning much business (or keeping clients).
Engage in Social Media
If you haven’t gotten the message about how effective LinkedIn can be, now’s the time to get on it. But it’s not about simply having a presence and occasionally posting some “brag” about yourself or your firm…you need to engage with your network. According to my friends over at Furia Rubel, 96% of executives use LinkedIn as their preferred content source, and 53% of in-house counsel find it valuable as a content distribution platform. Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good- comment and add value (especially to the GCs with whom you are connected). Of course, the ripple effects can be huge- other LinkedIn members are watching and an insightful comment could lead to a new opportunity for you. The key is to get out there and be top of mind. This isn’t a legal document - so be human and be sure to show your personality.
Did you know that you can also use LinkedIn as a targeting tool? For example, you could build a golf tournament by searching for GCs who live in Roanoke who attended Boston College Law School- or search for current Directors of Legal and Business Affairs who once worked at Disney and live in Arizona. The possibilities are endless- and it’s all free! (Of course, the Sales Navigator version of LinkedIn is even more powerful with lead and account creation).
Firms must develop guardrails to ensure that social media policies are set and communicated- but it shouldn’t stop every employee at the firm from engaging in the firm’s successes and becoming a social “ambassador” by sharing publicly available wins, events, and thought leadership. And with so many options for streamlining these processes to get approved content to the proverbial “five-yard line,” your social channels should be heating up every day.
As mentioned on my LinkedIn recently, change management is everything. Firms need to incentivize the behaviors they want to encourage/see through either carrots or sticks...if these incentives are not well thought out, there is a major risk of unintended consequence which can be even worse.
These five ideas are just a few of the easy ways to increase your firm’s profile, aggregate your firm’s experience, and win more business/awards/cross-selling opportunities- but as you can see, there are a host of ways to do it. The key is streamlining these processes so you can win more today, tomorrow, and the next day- or your firm will continue to increase reputational risk and lose business.
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Mike Mellor is the President and Founder of 742advisors, where he helps build systems and processes that help firms to earn new business. A former CMO at an AmLaw 200 firm, Mike brings over 20+ years in helping law firms, Big 4 firms, and financial services firms to win more with fewer resources. He can be reached at michael@742advisors.com.
