How to write a law firm marketing plan

Set one goal

A plan needs a goal that can be tested. “Raise our profile” cannot. “Twelve new corporate clients in the technology sector this year” can.

Choose one main goal for the year. Typical goals are more work of a particular kind, entry into a new market, better clients in an existing practice, or less dependence on a single source of referrals. Two goals are possible. Five means there is no plan.

Name the client

Describe the client the goal depends on. For a business practice: the industry, the size of company, and the person who chooses the lawyer. For a consumer practice: the situation the person is in and where they live.

Then ask how that person finds a lawyer today. Do they ask a colleague, search online, consult a ranking, or ask their accountant? The answer decides where the firm’s effort should go.

State the position

Write one sentence that says who the firm acts for, in what matters, and why a client should choose it. Test it on someone outside the firm. If they cannot repeat it back, simplify it.

The reason to choose you should be something a client can check: experience of a particular kind of matter, lawyers admitted in two jurisdictions, a recognised ranking. Adjectives are not reasons.

Choose a few channels

A channel is a route by which the client in step two comes to know the firm in step three. The main ones are the website and search, published expertise, profiles and rankings, referral relationships, speaking and events, and paid advertising.

Choose two or three and do them properly. The right ones follow from how your client finds a lawyer. A firm whose clients rely on rankings should invest in submissions. A firm whose clients search online should invest in pages and local search.

Set the budget

Build the budget from the plan, not the other way round. List the work each chosen channel needs this year, separate one-off items from continuing ones, and cost each.

Count lawyers’ time as a cost. A plan that needs ten partner hours a month for writing and review should say so, and those hours should be protected.

Hold back a small part of the budget for opportunities that arise during the year, such as a conference invitation or a change in the law that deserves a guide.

Assign each task to a person

Every item needs a named person and a date. “The firm will publish articles” does not happen. “The employment partner will publish the employment guide by 31 March” does.

Appoint one partner as responsible for the plan as a whole. Marketing that belongs to a committee belongs to no one.

Decide what to measure

Pick three or four measures tied to the goal: enquiries by source, enquiries that became matters, the value of those matters, and one early sign such as search visibility for named subjects.

Review them every quarter with the partners. Keep what works, stop what does not, and write down why. That record makes next year’s plan far easier.

A one-page outline

• Goal: one sentence, with a number and a date.
• Client: who they are and how they find a lawyer.
• Position: who we act for, in what, and why us.
• Channels: the two or three we will use, and why those.
• Work: the tasks under each channel for the year.
• Budget: one-off costs, continuing costs and lawyer hours.
• People: the partner responsible, and a name against each task.
• Measures: three or four, reviewed quarterly.

Keeping the plan alive

Put the quarterly review in the partners’ calendar now. A plan that is reviewed is adjusted and used. A plan that is filed is forgotten by March.

If you would like an outside view before you write yours, our review of a firm’s site, search visibility and public record is the first stage of every engagement. See law firm marketing.