Is a Legal CRM System the Right Investment for Your Law Firm?

Is a Legal CRM System the Right Investment for Your Law Firm?

Most modern law firms have discovered the power of Client Relationship Management (CRM) software to manage and surface relationship intelligence that helps them drive new business opportunities and build stronger relationships with clients. The CRM tools specifically designed for the legal industry can serve as a catalyst for enhancing operational efficiency, elevating client satisfaction and driving firm growth.

But many law firms continue to rely on basic spreadsheet software (e.g., Microsoft^® Excel^®) or general-purpose CRM products (e.g., Salesforce) to collect client data.

There are a few problems that can emerge from relying on these sorts of limited tools:

• The lack of visibility into lawyer interactions with a client can lead to multiple contacts of the same client by different lawyers in the firm, perhaps even with conflicting or inconsistent information being shared, causing the client to question how well your firm really knows them;
• The absence of available data analytics specific to the law firm business model can lead to wasteful spending on business development initiatives that are ineffective with clients;
• It becomes more likely that clients will view the firm as appropriate for only one legal area — and our research has found that if your firm is used for only one type of legal service, you are five times more likely to lose that client.

Law firm business development leaders now have access to cost-effective legal CRM tools that can help them more easily align their planning with their tactical initiatives to develop specific revenue opportunities. But how can a law firm know if investing in a legal CRM system makes sense for them and their unique needs?

Assessing Your Firm’s Readiness for Legal CRM

Before embarking on a journey to investigate CRM software options, it is a good idea to conduct a thorough assessment of your firm’s current business environment.

1. What kinds of clients do we serve?

   Review your client demographics so you understand the size and composition of your client base (e.g., corporate, small business, individuals, etc.). The more varied the mix of clients, the greater the opportunity for benefitting from CRM.

2. What is our caseload?

   Consider your caseload complexity by examining the volume of matters handled each year, the areas of practice involved, and industry focus. If this data isn’t readily available, that might be an indicator that your firm could use legal CRM tools.

3. What is our firm size?

   You should also assess the firm size and structure as measured by the number of lawyers and staff members who might utilize a CRM platform. Firms of all sizes can benefit from CRM, but that information can help guide you to the right product.

4. What is our technology infrastructure?

   Then evaluate your existing technology infrastructure to determine other tools that might become important applications for potential integration, such as practice management or document management software.

5. What are our strategic objectives?

   Finally, take a moment to think about your firm’s overall business objectives — such as improving client retention, enhancing business development or optimizing workflow efficiency — and whether a CRM system might contribute toward achieving those goals.

Potential Value of Legal CRM

Once you have completed your firm assessment, you may want to consider some of the practical benefits of CRM adoption to determine whether investing in a legal CRM platform is the right move for your firm.

For example, a legal CRM tool can help you to target cross-selling opportunities across the firm. The best of these systems will offer a “who knows whom” feature that allows your professionals to quickly identify who in the firm has an existing relationship with specific individuals whom you may wish to contact.

Also, legal CRM can be a powerful tool for easily identifying new business opportunities. Look for a product that offers business planning and pipeline management features to help your firm optimize workflow efficiency and professionally manage all client development activities.

Moreover, a legal CRM platform can empower your firm to significantly strengthen existing client relationships. Systems built specifically for law firms should be able to surface contacts with whom you have had low recent engagement so you can quickly assign a professional to connect with those existing clients and preserve the relationships for the firm.

The Power of a Trusted Brand

LexisNexis^® unveiled InterAction+^™, a new cloud-based CRM solution that accelerates business growth in law firms of all sizes with the only legal CRM platform that utilizes relationship intelligence and reveals new business opportunities for a competitive advantage. Customers can choose the hybrid cloud solution, in which they manage their own data, or the full cloud solution, in which LexisNexis stores their data on their behalf.

InterAction+ has helped law firms drive business relationships, accelerate firm growth, and increase revenues for three decades, by embedding client intelligence at the heart of every engagement.

Click here for more information about InterAction+ or to request a free demo of the platform.

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