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LexisNexis Martindale-Hubbell Conducts Comprehensive Benchmarking Study of Small Law Firm Marketing Trends
National Survey Provides Snapshot of Small Firm Decisions Regarding Marketing Strategies, Staffing, Budgets and Tactics
NEW PROVIDENCE, NJ, October 19, 2005 - LexisNexis Martindale-Hubbell, the leading provider of client development solutions for the legal profession, today announced the results from a comprehensive study of how small law firms in the U.S. market their practices to prospective clients.
The Martindale-Hubbell Small Law Firm Marketing Index, conducted this summer by Harris Interactive® on behalf of Martindale-Hubbell, surveyed nearly 1,000 small law firms nationwide (law firms with 20 or fewer lawyers). The study set out to establish a series of benchmarks for the specific types of marketing strategies that small law firms undertake, including an assessment of the kinds of marketing tactics they find to be the most successful for helping them to obtain new clients.
Marketing Spending on the Rise
Among the most notable findings was that small law firms are placing an increased importance on marketing their practice, as reflected by an increase in spending on marketing activities. The study found that the number of small firms surveyed spending 5% or more of their revenues on marketing doubled in the last three years, from 11% of firms in 2002 to 22% of firms in 2005
"Although legal market observers have debated the subject, our research documents that marketing budgets at small law firms have increased significantly over the past three years," said Ann Fullenkamp, senior vice president for the small law firm market at LexisNexis. "Moreover, we feel our study finds that this trend accelerates as you move to the larger firms within this segment of the market. For example, in 2002, only one out of 20 law firms surveyed with 11 to 20 lawyers reported spending at least 5% of their revenues on marketing; this year, that percentage has exploded to one out of five firms."
Some of the other key findings from the study included the following:
Marketing is an Integral Part of a Lawyer’s Time at Work
The study found that aside from practicing law and managing their business, small law firms surveyed spend much of their week engaged in marketing and business development activities.
"We found that, on average in small firms, practicing law takes up 63% of a lawyer’s week and managing their practice accounts for 14% of the week," said Fullenkamp. "Marketing-related activities are responsible for 8% of the week, and a similar amount of time is spent conducting research. Clearly, small law firm professionals are becoming part-time marketers."
The Emergence of the Marketing Specialist
Many large U.S. law firms now employ full-time marketing executives who oversee sizable budgets and employ teams of professionals both inside and outside of the firm. Martindale-Hubbell’s study discovered that this approach to marketing is now working its way into the small law firm market segment as well.
Among law firms with 11 to 20 lawyers surveyed, 13% reported having a marketing manager, director or officer with primary responsibility for the firm’s marketing activities1. Overall, the small firms who participated in the study report that a partner (68%) or member, associate or paralegal (17%) is most likely to have marketing responsibilities, although 9% said that they rely on outside sources (e.g., marketing consultant) for primary responsibility.
The Web Has the Greatest Perceived Value for Marketing
Small law firms perceive the operation of their Web site to be the most valuable marketing tactic for growing their practice, with 89% of all firms surveyed reporting it to be a valuable marketing tactic for them. Other top marketing tactics perceived to be valuable for growing their small practice include:
- Legal directory listings (85%)
- Public relations/articles (79%)
- Seminars (78%)
- Client meals/entertainment (75%)
Print and online yellow pages advertising came in sixth for perceived value of marketing tactics, with 68% of small firms surveyed considering it a valuable tool for growing their practices.
To access detailed results from the Martindale-Hubbell Small Law Firm Marketing Indes, or to obtain reproducible charts that illustrate some of the study’s key findings, please go to http://martindale.com/powerpoint/slindex.ppt.
About LexisNexis
LexisNexis® (www.lexisnexis.com) is a leader in comprehensive and authoritative legal, news and business information and tailored applications. A member of Reed Elsevier Group plc [NYSE: ENL; NYSE: RUK] (www.reedelsevier.com), the company does business in 100 countries with 13,000 employees worldwide. In addition to its flagship Web-based Lexis® and Nexis® research services, the company includes some of the world’s most respected legal publishers such as Martindale-Hubbell, Matthew Bender, Butterworths, JurisClasseur, Abeledo-Perrot and Orac.
LexisNexis Martindale-Hubbell (www.martindale.com) is the leading provider of client development solutions for the legal profession, partnering with its law firm customers to meet their practice development goals. The company offers opportunities to speak at industry conferences, publish legal articles and showcase expertise through a wide range of online products. The Martindale-Hubbell® database of more than 1 million lawyers and law firms, accessible at www.martindale.com and www.lawyers.com, is the number-one lawyer directory on the Internet (as measured by Nielsen//NetRatings). The company provides lawyers, business executives and consumers with detailed information to help them identify, evaluate and select legal counsel.
About Harris Interactive
Harris Interactive Inc. (www.harrisinteractive.com) is the 13th largest and fastest-growing market research firm in the world, perhaps best known for The Harris Poll and for pioneering and engineering Internet-based research methods. The Rochester, New York–based global research company blends premier strategic consulting with innovative and efficient methods of investigation, analysis and application, conducting proprietary and public research globally to help clients achieve clear, material and enduring results.
Blending science and art, Harris Interactive® combines its intellectual capital and one of the world’s largest online panels of respondents, with premier Internet survey technology and sophisticated research methods to market leadership through its U.S., Europe (www.harrisinteractive.com/europe) and Asia offices, its wholly owned subsidiary, Novatris in Paris (www.novatris.com), and through an independent global network of affiliate market research companies. EOE M/F/D/V
Survey Methodology
Harris Interactive® conducted the online survey in the United States on behalf of Martindale-Hubbell between May 31 and June 27, 2005 among 967 U.S. employees of small law firms. Qualified respondents worked as a sole practitioner or in a law firm with 20 or fewer lawyers and were either solely or partially responsible for the decision-making process of marketing their firm. The sample was provided by Martindale-Hubbell. The data were not weighted and therefore are only representative of those employees at small law firms surveyed.
In theory, with probability samples of this size, one could say with 95 percent certainty that the overall results have a sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points. This online sample was not a probability sample.
1 Small Base for this question. Data should only be used directionally.
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