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Need-to-Know News - August 27th, 2004 |
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 By Michael Cummings and Allan Boressof Sage Legal Marketing. Michael and Allan are experts in strategic client account management, business development and entrepreneurial skill building for professionals. They are authors of the best selling book Best Practices in Legal Marketing.They can be reached at info@sagelegalmarketing.com or at 800.411.8078
The anatomy of a client relationship in crisis
It is a familiar scene these days. We sit across the table from a senior partner in a top law firm. He or she looks troubled. They talk about how they either just lost one of their top clients – or failed to get a pivotal piece of new business that would drive the relationship to new levels. Their pain is evident.
It’s a fact: clients are less loyal and more willing to open up their business to other firms and specialists. Your aggressive competitors are on the hunt for an opening. And one day you see these competitors walking the halls of your top clients – how were they able to prey on this treasured client relationship?
Here’s the sad part of this story: If the firm knew how to manage this client relationship, then the results would be different. When it comes to strategic client management, law firms are novices. Most firms do not have a proactive and comprehensive process to build client relationships.
Net result? They lose business they should win, fail to find all the ways they can serve clients, and waste opportunities to get referrals and additional work.
Why?
The 6 mistakes that put your client relationships at risk
Over the past year, we have conducted over 150 in-depth interviews with senior legal decision-makers at both Fortune 1000 and middle market companies. In addition, we have benchmarked the client relationship management practices of law firms – and compared these practices to best-in-class professional services firms (consulting, accounting, banking and investment banking).
As a result of this work, there is no question that law firms are novices when it comes to strategic client account management. Here are six key reasons we found that law firms to fail at building vital account relationships with their top clients:
- Attorneys are not perceived as “business advisors" because they lack an in-depth understanding of their client’s business strategy, operational priorities and drivers of emerging legal needs.
- Most firms lack proactive, strategic account plans to target and land new business.
- Most attorneys lack the proactive account marketing, networking and selling skills required to build world class relationships.
- There are often severe internal obstacles to cross-marketing and team selling.
- Leaders in law firms don’t know how to be account leaders, sales strategists and coaches for their account teams.
- Firms do not have the support structure, training and management systems required to make this process work.
Best practices in strategic client account management
Law firms that aspire to excel at strategic client account development must adopt the following five key best practices.
- Know your client’s business, management agenda and drivers of their legal “pain"
To be a “business advisor” you must; understand your clients industry and organization on an in-depth basis. And you need to know the personal priorities and “pain” of the senior executives.
- Leverage this proprietary knowledge to anticipate their upcoming legal needs.
Being proactive can give you a pre-emptive, “sole-source” shot at solving the legal issues you identify. 92% of our respondents reported that their law firms did not anticipate their legal needs, and as a result when something came up they would start the buying process all over again. This is the foremost reason law firms do not enjoy the long-term, taken for granted relationships they once did with prime clients.
- Your attorneys must learn how to be account leaders, sales strategists and coaches.
By definition, strategic client account management is a team sport. Therefore, you need a head coach or quarterback. He or she must be able to motivate and secure the cooperation of a team of partners across a range of practice specialties. The account leader needs to have the clout and personal skills required to establish an account action plan and define team milestones – and get the team to commit and follow through on their commitments.
- Your attorneys must master cross-marketing and cross-selling.
It’s no surprise to you that attorneys are extremely territorial when it comes to a client relationship. They don’t want to take the risk of introducing a fellow partner – because if there is a problem with this engagement, then the lead partner feels that the broader relationship may be hurt. Other times there is no cross-marketing or selling because the lead partner is not attentive to any legal needs outside his or her main expertise. And, in many firms, there is not incentive or motivation for attorneys to cross-sell.
So, what happens?
Your competitors get the introduction that you could have given to your fellow partner – and you just let a predator into your treasured relationship.
Instead, learn from the best-of-breed firms:
- Embrace the doctrine that says a client is a client of the firm – not of a practice or partner.
- Set cross marketing and cross selling goals by account. Get the account team to realize that the goal is to build the total revenue of the account – rather than selling the services of just one practice.
- Understand that introducing a fellow partner is the best way to keep competitors out.
- Develop entrepreneurial account game plans and have your attorneys trained to implement them
The account plan is an action plan to meet, qualify and evaluate the “pain” of senior decision makers.
Your attorneys need the following five essential account marketing and selling skills to accomplish this:
- Packaging and marketing service capabilities
- Getting internal introductions & referrals within the account
- Growing personal business relationships
- Conducting qualifying interviews and
- Maintaining control of the selling process
- You must implement the management systems and support structure needed to make the whole process work
To make the strategic client account management process work, you need the help of outside resources, your internal marketing team and the leadership of your firm.
The kind of expertise necessary to create an effective, long-life Strategic Client Account Management Process simply doesn’t exist in your firm – or you would already have one. And it makes no sense at all to try to reinvent the wheel.
- Team up both outside experts and your internal marketing team to analyze your top client’s business and educate your attorneys on the client’s business and operational priorities.
- Have an outside expert facilitate a team meeting to develop the account strategy and game plan.
- Hire a trainer to build the coaching and sales management skills of your account leaders.
- Get your internal marketing team to keep up to date on developments at the client, update the action plan and manage the agenda for the ongoing team planning meetings.
- Most importantly, get your firm leadership fully involved and supportive of the effort
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