Legal Marketing Blog

I’m not referring to keeping up with the Jones’ or with large firms for that matter. What I am referring to is whether your firm is keeping up with the needs of your marketplace in terms of marketing and business development. Times change and competition is increasing. Both should be taken into consideration when calculating what your budget should be for generating new business.

Thanks to Mark Beese for his recent post on his Leadership for Lawyers blog, that brought to my attention The BTI Consulting Group’s annual benchmark survey on marketing and business development strategies. The significance of Mark’s post, and obviously the survey, is the information relative to the “dramatic boosts” in AmLaw’s “Second Hundred” law firms’ budgets. They are “catching up” (percentage wise) with what the First Hundred are spending. Hmm, competition does have a price.

Important aspects of budgeting that the survey uncovered include:

• 52.5% of marketing budgets was spent on salaries and business development (sales, face-to-face meetings, personal encounters, whatever you want to call it);
• 30% of that goes to client relationship development (which I presume includes client feedback programs, increasing and improving client communications, etc.);
• Budgets are consuming 2.1% to 2.6% of gross revenues; and
• Mid-sized firms’ budgets are on the rise.

Moreover, the question is not only whether your firm is spending enough dollars on marketing and business development to keep up, but whether it is spending it on the right things?

Hi Tom,

I am not a legal professional, but a realtor. I found your article quite on target especially considering the current economic changes. The bottom line is the economy is ever changing and people are ever changing. Many business owners and employees could benefit from the content of the blog you have posted. The reality is some of us are stuck and do not want to change, which will separate the successful from the non-successful. Thanks for your comments.

Hi Tom,
Not in the Legal Profession, Nevertheless, I have found your post to be informative and that so much of it can be adapted to our business. In Fact I have BookMarked your Site to come back and glean some other Jewels.

Yes, we agree with you that keeping up with the needs of ones marketplace in terms of marketing and business development is a main item of our Marketing Budget.

Looking at the economy gives evidence that times are changing and that has forced a subtle evolution into how marketing dollars are to be dispersed in the future. Competition always increases where there is a need.

We have known for sometime how important the Marketing Budget is!

NO Marketing Budget made it so hard to get our Brick & Mortar Business going!
I MEAN SLOW!
Therefore, Diversifying and endeavoring to generate additional streams of revenue has brought us to the Internet and we appreciate the goodness of people like you, who are here to help. We will make the effort to peruse your Site to glean all the gems!

Not having any budget (When We Started!) We began our search on finding something with, which to build one.

One thing that caught my eye was a question I stumbled on searching for marketing budgets, What Is Better Than Free? Nevertheless, we found the answer to be, Getting Paid For Doing It! And this was right down our alley! And now, we will soon be Cautiously Growing Our Budget!

Thanks again for the GREAT Post.