Jennifer Ramsey and Gina Sponzilli co-author: How Law Firms Can Use Account-Based Marketing Strategies

Three key developments in the legal industry are making account-based marketing strategies more relevant and important than ever:

• Law firm mergers are on the rebound in 2023.[1]

• Lateral partner moves have continued to move at a brisk pace.[2]

• There is an increased focus on the totality of the client experience — the sum of all interactions with a firm — which means law firms can differentiate themselves in this area to engender loyalty, retain key clients and grow revenue.

These three taken together make a strong business case for an increased focus on account-based marketing strategies in legal marketing, regardless of firm size.

Merger and acquisition activity and lateral partner movement can create significant disruptions in the legal industry. This type of marketing allows law firms to focus their business development and marketing efforts on specific accounts or clients, ensuring they maintain and strengthen client relationships, and allocate resources efficiently and effectively.

In addition, as partners move between firms or firms merge, client relationships can become strained. Account-based marketing enables law firms to maintain strong connections with their key clients and ensure they continue to receive the attention and service they need.

It is also useful for reputation management — these strategies can be used to manage and shape the narrative surrounding these developments, ensuring that the firm's brand remains intact or is improved.

As more firms embrace and emphasize the client experience to not only meet, but also exceed client expectations, this marketing approach puts the client at the core of the firm.

While not a new concept, demand for this type of marketing has continued to grow stronger due to measurable improvements that dedicated account-based marketing strategies produce.

For example, drawing on 279 qualitative interviews from account-based marketing leaders across the globe, Momentum ITSMA and ABM Leadership Alliance's latest benchmark study on the topic found that most of these programs drive substantial business impact, with an Jennifer Ramsey Gina Sponzilli 84% increase in pipeline growth, 77% in revenue growth and 72% higher return on investment than other types of marketing.[3]

Account-Based Marketing in a Legal Marketing Context

At its core, account-based marketing is an approach to business-to-business marketing and sales designed to uncover additional opportunities with an existing customer or client, and ultimately increase revenue. In the law firm context, this kind of marketing requires close collaboration between business development professionals and law firm leaders and partners to create personalized buying experiences for high-value accounts. When executed well, those experiences integrate the client company's specific attributes and needs. Successful account-based marketing programs also help build and maintain long-term relationships with premier clients.

This approach is particularly effective for businesses that operate in industries with long sales cycles, involve a complex buying process and develop into high-value accounts — all of which apply to legal marketing. It allows all stakeholders to take their most precious resource — time — and focus on accounts that have the highest impact on the firm's business.

Depending on the client company, that can be measured in terms of revenue growth, number of deals, retention value and expansion into new service areas. Account-based marketing is closely related to the client-team approach that many large law firms have adopted. Client teams bring together a diverse group of lawyers and professionals to focus on delivering exceptional service to a specific client. It involves deep research into the company and related industry trends.

It also requires an understanding of the client's goals and objectives, specific legal needs, and pain points. Client team marketers and business developers play an instrumental role in effectively communicating all this information to the service delivery team and the entire firm. Using this type of marketing, legal marketers and business developers can move beyond transactional exchanges to integrate relational interactions.

It incorporates relationship marketing, which is the opposite of transaction marketing: Transactional exchanges involve a single, short-time exchange with a distinct beginning and ending. Relationship marketing involves multiple, connected exchanges over time, and usually involves both economic and social bonds. Relational exchanges provide a competitive advantage to the extent that they create barriers to switching to a competitor and contribute to service differentiation.

Considerations for Launching an Account-Based Marketing Approach

With the ultimate goal being to effectively serve the client, account-based marketing provides a collaborative framework for internally bringing lawyers together from different practice areas to fully understand their colleagues' skill sets. For legal marketers, employing this form of marketing can be one of the more fulfilling and fun parts of the role. It requires a shift from an individual practice perspective to a team based orientation, with the client at the center of the conversation. Working together, the team uncovers client needs, matches service areas to those needs and wins new business. That said, there are a few things to keep in mind when launching an account-based marketing program.

Using an STP Approach

Legal marketers can incorporate account-based marketing into their strategic plans by using a segmentation, targeting and positioning approach.

Segmenting

Determine which clients are appropriate based on criteria such as potential revenue growth, strength of relationships with key client contacts, company size, strategic fit and industry position. An efficient way to identify high-value clients is to look at the firm's client base through an industry sector lens. A sector-based approach is designed around the client and brings together lawyers from different practices and with different specializations to help solve problems for clients in a particular industry. As an example, health care companies will have distinct legal needs, such as Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act compliance, versus a software company, where intellectual property protection is at the heart of its business.

Targeting

Research stakeholders, company strategy and business expansion plans, and then map back to the firm's strengths and differentiators. Positioning Develop programming that speaks to the client, demonstrates an understanding of their needs and clearly articulates how the firm is positioned to serve those needs.

Know Thy Client — The Human Factor

Clients are not faceless entities representing companies, but rather humans whose decisions are influenced by a delicate interplay of reason and emotion. Understanding executive decision makers, influencers and end-user personas is key to running successful account-based marketing programs. This same thinking can be applied to and expanded upon in legal marketing. Identifying personas beyond the office of the general counsel to include the C-suite, board of directors and other legal department leadership expands a firm's networks and offers a competitive edge.

Consider specific role-based topics, including:

• For C-suite executives: on-demand legal advice, M&A, board management, risk analysis and corporate governance.

• For the board of directors: fiduciary duties, corporate governance, shareholders' rights; executive compensation and key executives' succession planning.

• For general counsel: risk management, litigation and dispute resolution, legal expense budgeting and operations, and data privacy and security.

• For staff attorneys and others in the office of the general counsel: human resources and employment issues, litigation, IP management, and legal cost containment.

Sample questions to ask clients to better inform ABM include:

• What are your day-to-day responsibilities?

• What results and outcomes do you measure?

• What business metrics are you measured by?

• What aspirations or goals are driving your decision

• What are the top strategic challenges or priorities you are currently facing in your role, and how are you addressing them?

Asking questions like these is paramount to building strong, long-lasting relationships with clients. Relationship building is a cornerstone of account-based marketing and helps foster trust and rapport, which are crucial for successful business-to-business relationships. By asking questions and actively listening to client responses, lawyers and legal marketers demonstrate genuine interest in learning more about clients' businesses and challenges.

Valuable insights can be gained that allow for delivering highly personalized experiences to individual client accounts. The answers also allow lawyers and legal marketers to uncover pain points or challenges that the clients may not have initially mentioned and gives way to customizing solutions to client needs.

Creating an Account Plan for a Holistic Client Experience

The deeper the relationship, the more holistic the client experience, which can lead to lower customer acquisition costs and reduce churn. Delighted clients are more inclined to give testimonials, provide referrals and participate in thought leadership. A comprehensive client-centric account plan that members of an account or client team can create, or even co-create with the client, and refer to over time, is invaluable for achieving a holistic approach to client experience. The plan is evergreen, evolving and present at every account or client team meeting. Key components include:

• An overview of the client relationship, organizational structure and company strategy;

• The firm's revenue targets and other objectives;

• An analysis of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats — an activity that all client team members can participate in;

• A legal needs assessment of the client and the firm's tailored solutions; and

• Relationship building activities and timing.

Data Analytics Rule: How to Measure Success

Detailed account data paired with analytics and a reporting tool are helpful to properly launch and measure an account-based marketing program. Without some type of system to measure performance, it is difficult to evaluate the program's impact. One of the key metrics to measure the success of this kind of marketing is customer lifetime value. "Customer lifetime value" is defined as the total amount a customer spends with a company during the lifetime of the relationship. Those accounts — i.e., clients — that are in the higher range of customer lifetime value are prime candidates for this type of marketing focus. The goal of account-based marketing is to increase customer lifetime value to a percentage growth rate or spend amount. This metric can be especially useful for legal marketing and business development. To effectively measure customer lifetime value in a law firm context, metrics to look at include gross margin associated with each client engagement, average revenue per year and the number of matters. Other metrics that are accretive to customer lifetime value include value from referrals, potential revenue from cross-selling opportunities, and the cost to acquire a new client or matter.

What's Next

The legal industry is undergoing significant transformation in 2023, which creates a compelling business case for full adoption of account-based marketing strategies. With the pace of law firm mergers and lateral partner moves, these trends further underscore the need for law firms to adapt and enhance their marketing strategies. Coupled with the growing emphasis on the holistic client experience, these factors highlight the potential for firms to stand out, foster client loyalty and drive revenue growth through this marketing approach. These three developments collectively reinforce that now is the opportune time to embrace the account-based approach in legal marketing and leverage it for sustained success.

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Reproduced with permission. Published October 12, 2023.