Chief Marketing Officers in large law firms are increasingly going by a newer, longer title: CMBDO, or Chief Marketing and Business Development Officer.
The CMBDO title may be a mouthful, but it parallels a broader shift in the business world to Chief Revenue Officers and Chief Growth Officers who are responsible for both Marketing and Sales.
...end-to-end MBDO process is effective only when Marketing and BD are in alignment along the client acquisition journey
Here’s the catch for most big law CMBDOs: the most integrated thing about their job is the title.
Double-click on most big law CMBDOs and you’ll quickly realize they manage two teams:
- Marketing team, which manages brand, website, social media, publishing, newsletters, events, and sponsorships
- A BD team, which helps partners set up prospect meetings and develop proposals
On an operational level, the two teams often have little do with each other. Both report up to the CMBDO, but that’s where the “integration” ends. It’s not really one team. It’s two teams managed by one person.
That’s a problem.
The CMBDO title came out of a recognition that traditional marketing activities are really a means to an end: driving new business. A firm’s publications, website, events, branding, reputation, etc. are supposed to help the firm win new clients and cross-sell opportunities to existing clients. Marketing and Business Development are not distinct processes, but rather two ends of a unified client acquisition funnel with Marketing at the top and BD at the bottom.
That integrated end-to-end MBDO process is effective only when Marketing and BD are in alignment along the client acquisition journey:
- Marketing supports BD by putting out thought leadership that resonates with clients and prospects.
- Marketing proactively refers high-potential prospects to BD based on company, title, reading behavior, etc.
- Marketing and BD work together to sponsor client-relevant events, invite the right attendees, and interact with those attendees before, during, and after the event.
- BD leverages the firm’s marketing investments by promoting the firm’s best thought leadership to clients and prospects.
- BD has upstream feedback loops into the editorial process to ensure alignment with client/prospect priorities.
- Marketing contributions to BD successes are measured, recognized and rewarded.
These alignment points don’t exist in most Marketing/BD organizations.
One big reason is technology. While “top-of-funnel” tools like content management, web analytics, and content syndication platforms generate a lot of interesting data, it often lacks the focus and specificity that BD needs in order to take action. Conversely, the tools that help BD find the right people (CRM, relationship management) don’t tell BD what to talk to those people about.
That puts CMBDOs in a tough spot. They know that Marketing and BD need to align, but lack the tools to make it happen.
The good news is that the technology is changing quickly thanks to—you guessed it—AI. AI platforms like MyMai are bridging the divide between Marketing and BD. Through its ability to quickly discern patterns in massive amounts of structured and unstructured data, AI can help integrated Marketing/BD teams:
- Discern the top issues for each client/prospect based on news, regulatory changes, online behaviors, etc.
- Make it easy to engage clients and prospects with the firm’s perspectives on their top issues.
- Measure when and where the firm’s thought leadership is being used for BD.
- Identify and fill gaps between a firm’s thought leadership and its clients’/prospects’ most pressing legal needs.
Of course, technology is just one component of organizational change. Marketing/BD alignment also requires changes to mindset and process. Marketing and BD professionals will need to think and work as one integrated team, rather than two teams throwing things to each other over the proverbial wall. CMBDOs will need to re-orient their vision, objectives, coaching, and evaluation around a truly integrated end-to-end process from the top of the funnel to the bottom.
The technology is ready. Are you?
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Formerly with leadership positions at PeopleLinx, McKinsey, and Socialtext, Michael Idinopulos is the Co-Founder of MyMai. Connect with him on LinkedIn. Follow his latest writings on JD Supra.
