ROBIN’S BLOG
Robin has 30 years of professional and financial services marketing experience. Here he provides commentary about some of the key evolving issues within professional services strategy and marketing. The aim is to provoke thinking and provide useful information that marketers can use within their firms as they continue to improve performance.
thriving… Improving marketing, business development, client satisfaction, and financial performance.
How would your fee earners respond?
It can be really useful to see how those with client contact respond to possible real-life scenarios, and discussing these can lead to some real insights both for marketers and fee earners alike.
A colleague of mine in The Winning Alliance (Phil Gott of Peopleism, see www.peopleism.com ) have been using scenarios like this in training programmes we’ve been running for fee earners, to improve client development and business development performance. See what you make of the following:
“During a meeting with a member of the client’s in-house legal team, they describe how they are dissatisfied with turnaround times for work. They say that this is becoming an increasing problem, given the range of current and upcoming matters that are pressing on their time.”
Try it out with your fee earners (for those not in the legal sector, you can substitute any different but relevant function for the in-house legal team). What elements do they focus on? What actions do they decide to take? Do they determine the real nub of the issue and its level of severity by asking the client, or do they just assume?
Indeed, do they pick up the final words about the range of matters that are pressing on their time? These nuggets can make the difference between successfully developing a relationship and not…
Clients and Prospects that look the same, really aren’t
I’ve been reminded of this through research we’re currently doing for a client, which is looking at how corporate risk managers choose insurers.
Companies which look very similar from the “outside”, by size, sector, ownership, objectives etc have very different processes for choosing insurers and the factors they view as important also differ.
Its a bit similar to a project we once did for a firm that targeted major financial institutions and investors for training. Firms that looked exactly the same from the outside had completely different views about the value of training, often driven by the culture of the organisation and even the personal values and judgement of the key decison maker.
But we often forget about this in our marketing plans, targeting approaches and prioritisation. In fact the “external” facts about a prospect company are just the starting point. Take the example of two owner managed, lets say €10m, businesses in the same sector. If you’re an law firm or accountancy firm, the things a 55 year old owner looking at exit and succession will value are likely to be completely different than those a 40 year old who wants to build a force in the market.
Ironically, often fee earners understand this a little better than marketers. its not new at all, though the phrase “needs based segmentation” puts me off a bit. But ignoring the terminology for a minute, how do you build this into your BD efforts?
Why do some firms grow and others stagnate?
Accountancy Age recently reported on the contrasting fortunes of the top 100 UK Accountancy firms by revenue. See https://www.accountancyage.com/resources/top50 for more detail.
Many had achieved slow growth over their previous financial year, but there were some “outliers” with shrinking revenue and others which had posted strong double digit increases.
My strong feeling is that those achieving the strong growth have identified and executed on the opportunities that others haven’t. So, for those firms who are perhaps standing still in revenue terms, three things to think about (which apply to any professional services firm)…
1) Have you made any real changes to marketing strategy and the way in which you design and execute it, in the last 2 years?
2) Have you properly reviewed the marketplace for new opportunities and then gone out and implemented on these?
3) Have you fully identified the potential to provide more value to your own client base, by asking the right questions?
If you haven’t done these, my suggestion would be to start thinking about them – and fast.
New pricing approaches and determining “value”
In North America, the Association of Corporate Counsel is placing a lot of emphasis on value-based pricing, and hence creating pressure on law firms to respond to this. You can see more detail on www.acc.com by the way.
Of course there is some specific focus on approaches to setting and agreeing fees. In Thriving, we often respond to this by fixing or capping our fees. Gradually law firms are also responding to this requirement. The implication is to set a new means of communicating with clients about what drives the value to them and understanding this.
That’s really important. Its rare that – for legal work of significance to the client – that the choice of firm is driven by absolute fee levels alone. We hear clients talking much more about “value for money” rather than cheapest, and thus choosing the firm based explicitly or implicityly on the answer to the “sum”: value divided by price.
It will be interesting to see if the call from in house legal and other buyers of legal services becomes more collective and explicit in the UK and Europe – or if it remains more implicit. Either way, it will increasingly become a source of competitive advantage.
Contact me if you’d like our research about what law firm clients say drives value to them.
Client Development effort hotting up in law firms – does this herald a shake-out?
Recently Legal Week has reported on intensifying efforts by some law firms to boost their business development capability and in particular, the effectiveness of fee earner efforts to develop relationships. Some of the articles can be found at:
https://www.legalweek.com/legal-week/news/1724064/taylor-wessing-partners-devote-hours-business-development and https://www.legalweek.com/legal-week/news/1724027/ashurst-train-partners-client-management
What does this signify? I think – in part – it’s a sign that firms are becoming more confident. There is a recognition that growth is out there – but to compete, you’ve got to be better at relationship building rather than changing the background on the website (again).
In an indirect way though it may also though be a forerunner of the heavily mooted changes in the sector. Increased confidence about the future for legal services – in the round – may also intensify the interest of potential 3rd parties and investors. The whole issue of Alternative Business Structures and “Tesco Law” has been around for a while now but owing to the depressed market conditions of the last 2 years, some had consigned it to “won’ t happen here”.
I’d argue that the increased focus or client development and the recognition of growth potential make it more likely that happen it will. All marketers should keep an eye on this in the next 12 months.
The importance of drinking coffee (or tea/beer/wine)
I’ve been reflecting on how we all aim to build relationships and ensure that our contacts and clients gain confidence in our skills.
With the rush to digital marketing, and indeed blogs (ironically like this one) I think sometimes we forget the importance of “real” conversations and relationships. Which is not to say that digital marketing and blogging is no use, but it is an addition to, rather than a replacement of, the other ways we build lasting client relationships.
Two things in particular make me say this:
Firstly, every time we do client research one of the key things that interviewees and decision makers say is something like “they would be in a better position to win more work from us if they spent more time with me (or us) to understand what we are trying to do”. Nobody has ever said “I don’t use them because I don’t like their website” – but often they say “it would be good to have a coffee more often with them”.
Secondly, I had a meeting with a long standing client the other day; we’d kept in contact via email, but during an informal meeting (in the pub) we scoped a project that we both left feeling huge enthusiasm f0r and commitment to.
My feeling is that these days, its tempting to tell ourselves we’re building or maintaining a relationship when we send emails or have a quick chat by ‘phone. Sure, we’re keeping people aware of us, but that’s where it begins and ends. Particularly if what you provide has any complexity, advisory component, or relies on trust – so that’s most things then – you need to meet up.
It’s more fun too.