Why Every Law Firm Needs a Marketing Plan

Here’s a cold, harsh fact. Every business needs a marketing plan, regardless of whatever sector it represents, and that includes law firms. The specialised nature of marketing for a law firm does mean that the plan needs to be a bit different, but the essential reasons for building a proper marketing plan remain virtually the same as for most other businesses.

Below are the reasons every law firm needs a marketing plan.

Reason 1: A Marketing Plan Defines Your Law Firm’s Goals

Law firms don’t operate in the same way as many common businesses, but at their heart is still the need for the firm to find success, meet targets, grow and develop into a larger company. Marketing strategies and plans help to define what those goals are, and thus create a roadmap to success, and more importantly show when the company is either not fulfilling its potential or simply not operating well enough.

Marketing is done to attract new clients, as well as make the firm attractive and reputable enough to bring in talent from outside to help grow and consolidate the firm and its work. It’s hard to tell if you’re really doing everything you can be without some kind of framework, and that’s what a proper marketing plan will provide.

Reason 2: The Marketing Plan Will Define Roles

Marketing of any kind, including for law firms, is a fluid process with many different elements, deadlines, and also stakeholders all taking part in making it all happen. Without a proper marketing plan, it’s hard to define who within the team is actively responsible for different aspects of the department’s work.

With a plan, it would be clear who, for example, was in charge of social media marketing, and who was in charge of client outreach, and who was responsible for coordinating graphic design, and so on. In the end, when things work out (or don’t) it becomes clear who are the strong and weak links in the team and perhaps how better to redeploy marketing resources in the future.

Reason 3: It Leads to Better Resource Management

In a similar way to allowing a law firm to better manage its human resources by clearly defining roles and responsibilities within the marketing operation, a proper marketing plan also makes it possible to better manage financial and other resources, too.

By creating budgets, and analysing the real costs of various marketing activities, the plan helps a law firm to better understand where their money is going, how effective that money is when spent, and thus where to make adjustments for the future.

Reason 4: Proper Marketing Helps Target Ideal Clients

A marketing plan will create a map for a law firm to use its marketing resources strategically in order to return to a more ideal clientele. Now, of course, you might argue that all clients are important and valuable, but the reality is that for certain law firms, there are some clients who are “more equal than others.”

This could be dictated by the particular expertise offered by the firm’s lawyers, or by the nature of the cases and the continued workload the client can bring. Law firms specialising in family law, for instance, have much less need to market to big corporate clients.

Reason 5: Did Marketing Help the Firm This Year? Consult the Plan!

Finally, another reason to have a plan set up in the first place isn’t just to see if marketing makes specific results or hits targets, but if it’s working to improve the status of the firm all around. If the law firm is better off at the end of the year than it was at the start, then the marketing plan can offer key insights as to why, and what role different departments had in contributing to that.