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April 6, 2019
Law Firm Marketing Tips: Do you employ an in-house or outsourced marketing team?
Law firms want to be experts at practicing law but to retain new clients is crucial and therefore, marketing is required. These days, online marketing and business development is critical, so critical it can either make or break the success of a law firm. Many law firm owners are left with the decision to either hire in-house marketing staff or outsourcing various functions of marketing to a law firm marketing agency or various contractors be it, SEO, Social Media etc….
Deciding on your marketing team impacts all facets of business development for your law firm, one wrong move and this could be a costly exercise. One of the major concerns law firms small and large alike have is finding marketing solutions and talented people, to best handle their business development growth strategies. Law firms basically have two choices: hiring an internal marketing individual or team, or outsourcing the marketing function to a professional agency or a group of contractors. When law firms grow (painful times), the focus shifts to matters pertaining production and operations, scheduling attorneys and making sure the law firm gets paid. Question is where in the growth cycle is your law firm?
Tip 1: The choice to employ and in-house marketing team
Choosing an in-house marketing person or team can have many benefits along the way. In-house marketing people can often have more expertise in your particular law firm, and can target marketing solutions for your practice. If you have an existing in-house marketing person or team, depending on the size of the law firm and the scope of your marketing efforts, it is possible that the in-house team may be more efficient and better equipped to handle marketing solutions best tailored for your business. If you choose to hire an in-house marketing person or team, it is important to consider how their expertise relates to your law practice, and how they can deliver tailored solutions without compromising growth. Crucially, it is important to quantify key performance indicators to measure each persons’ success.
Some hiring decisions have to be made around these questions:
a. Is there leadership within the law firm to put together a sales and marketing strategy and implement it?
b. What type of talent is best suited, and how do we go about making sure they understand branding, keywords and the types of clients the law firm needs?
c. What sort of budget is required for an in-house marketing team and how much does the law firm have to invest in training to keep the staff up to speed with everything related to Google and online marketing?
So lets say you decide, you need a Marketing Director and a team around that person, to do it ALL. You will have to consider, salaries, employer taxes, workers comp issues, HR directives, training, performance reviews and a must with the younger generation is constant supervision!
Tip 2: Outsourced marketing team (Recommended)
Outsourcing marketing for your law firm can be significantly beneficial than choosing an in-house marketing team. One of the major issues with in-house marketing is growth. While they can often deliver tailored and personable marketing solutions, in-house marketing can often be less effective in terms of securing a flexible growth strategy for businesses. If your law firm grows, or significantly slows down, it is important to have a marketing team that can adapt to the growth patterns of your business. In-house marketing can lead to an inflexible future: the only way to scale up is by hiring more marketing professionals, and the only way to scaled own is by firing them. Law firms need intermediary strategies to reduce risk and secure the firm during times of growth and turbulence. Outsourced marketing teams can gauge their efforts by either spending more hours or less hours on your firm, depending on your decisions (guided by the health of your firm). Scaling back the number of hours outsourced marketing professionals spend on your firm does not require a total elimination of that marketing team, as it would within in-house solutions. Outsourced professionals can leave the marketing plan for your firm intact, and simply reduce how much time is devoted to it, rather than totally erasing that plan. Outsourcing empowers you, the law firm, to decide how marketing should be done and how much professional effort should be devoted to it at any given time.
Aside from scalability and flexibility, there are other reasons a law firm would choose outsourcing over in-house marketing. For example, if your in-house team is not delivering the results that you desire, despite how hard they might work, it may be wise to outsource to professionals who are more well-versed in marketing strategies and solutions. Often times, in-house marketing teams or individuals may be overworked, and a small staff of marketing people may not be the most efficient solution, therefore commanding the need for an outsourced solution. Other reasons to choose outsourcing may include time constraints, a desire for task-driven solutions, or a desire to advance digital marketing operations (rather than traditional marketing solutions).
Tips on how to choose the right law firm marketing team:
- Do they have experienced in generating leads for other law firms?
- Do they have a sales minded business owner that is in tune with your law firm’s needs?
- Are they working as a team on all matters from SEO to Social Media to eMail Marketing?
- What is the budget and how do they demonstrate success in generating leads or showing that you are ranked on the first page of Google?
These are huge decisions for law firm owners. Our law firm marketing agency is dedicated to providing custom solutions, solutions that connect the dots with keywords to lead generation, branding to lead generation and ultimately increasing the chances of law firms closing and retaining a client. There is much to be done, and with our law firm marketing agency we are focused on whats’ important, for your specific practice. For more information contact us at 855 433 3522 or message us HERE
