how much time should a solo lawyer spend marketing verse practicing law

by Cali Kuhlman 4 min read

How much do small law firms make?

Jul 25, 2016 · Solos spend 16 percent of their time with clients, while those in 11-29 lawyer firms spend 8 percent. Roughly two-thirds of solos have annual revenues under $200,000, with 28 percent under $100,000. Three percent of solos have revenues of $600,000 to $1 million, and none bring in more than that.

How many lawyers are there in the United States?

I was shocked to see that attorneys in a “full service” law firm spend 44% of their time managing and marketing the firm. This piqued my interest because most attorneys in a full service law firm are expected to bill around 1,600 hours a year, but with only 56 percent of their time devoted to the practice of law, their required workload would exceed 55 hours a week.

Do women lawyers make less money than men?

Jun 20, 2017 · After taking time off to be at home with her new baby, Kelly decided to get back into practicing law and made the decision to pursue solo practice. “I wasn’t ready for a 60-hour per week commitment that comes with practicing in a larger firm,” Kelly said, “I wanted to be able to have flexibility to balance work and family.”.

What does a lawyer do?

May 01, 2018 · After practicing for five years, and seeing how much business my office referred out to Virginia lawyers, I decided to study for the Virginia Bar, which I passed. Virginia requires Maryland lawyers practicing in Maryland to take their full exam, a process most Maryland attorneys already in full-time practice simply do not want to deal with.

How much should a law firm spend on advertising?

How Much Does an Average Law Firm Spend on Marketing? It's good practice to allocate anywhere from 2% to 18% of gross revenue to marketing. In 2018, the Legal Marketing Association reported that law firms only allocate an average of 6.7% of their revenue to marketing initiatives.Jan 19, 2022

What do lawyers spend most of their time doing?

According to a survey of 2,915 U.S. legal professionals, including some who use Clio, the lawyers devote 48 percent of their time on administrative tasks, such as licensing and continuing education, office administration, generating and sending bills, configuring technology and collections.Sep 26, 2017

How do you market a solo law firm?

Three Tips to Market Your Solo Firm and Still Have Time To Enjoy Your Life—01. Don't be intimidated. Marketing can seem scary, especially if you're just starting out and don't have much experience. ... —02. Find a routine. Solo firms thrive on consistent habits to run efficiently. ... —03. Know when to delegate.

How much do small law firms spend on marketing?

The U.S. Small Business Administration recommends spending 7%-8% of your firm's gross revenue on marketing. Law firm management consultants encourage firms to spend 2% to 5%, but this number depends on the area of practice, geographical location, how established the law firm is, etc.Feb 7, 2022

Why do lawyers work long hours?

If we look at the complexities of the typical career path of lawyers, it's evident why lawyers work so much. There's so much to do—from meeting billable hour requirements, managing clients, going to court, and staying on top of case prep.Jul 20, 2021

How much time do lawyers spend on documents?

The report found that information workers (including lawyers and other professionals who are connected to the Internet and create, edit, review and/or approve electronic documents) spend 11.2 hours a week dealing with challenges related to document creation and management. At least six hours of this is wasted time.Jan 28, 2016

How do you attract big clients?

Here are 10 tried-and-true tips to help you attract more customers.Offer new customers discounts and promotions. ... Ask for referrals. ... Recontact old customers. ... Network. ... Update your website. ... Partner with complementary businesses. ... Promote your expertise. ... Take advantage of online ratings and review sites.More items...•Feb 28, 2020

How do lawyers attract clients?

Following ways can help to get first client as an Advocate (The list is not exhaustive):-Friends, Family & Relatives. ... Join the Bar Association of your Court. ... Public Speaking, Events, Conferences and Meet-ups. ... Social Media: A Powerful tool. ... Online Marketplaces and Platforms. ... Search Engine Optimization (SEO)More items...•Oct 20, 2020

How do law firms win clients?

They have to put together fully costed proposals, sometimes deliver presentations and then the client picks. Sometimes the law firms sit through the presentations delivered by the other firms they're up against, and sometimes it's all done behind closed doors/ using documents only.Aug 28, 2020

How much do law firms spend on marketing?

Smaller law firms tend to spend between 5-10% on their marketing, again depending upon their marketing strategy, areas of practice as well as how well their intake and sales processes are dialled in.

How does marketing work in law?

Marketing, generally works and can be explained by physics principles such as momentum and inertia. Marketing can take time to pay off and therefore, when your firm’s budget permits, there are several stages of your law firm marketing funnel that require adequate investment.

What are the expenses of a law firm?

While it does depend on the law firm and nature of its business model, one of the largest expenses you can expect to see is marketing and advertising. This will depend on how certain factors such as: 1 Areas of Practice 2 Size of the Law Firm 3 Firm’s Desire & Aggression in Client Acquisition 4 Cost per Client Acquisition 5 Effectiveness of Marketing Channels 6 Types of Marketing Activities & Overall Strategy 7 Time Investment into Marketing

What is the consideration segment of a legal funnel?

Above that, in the consideration segment of the funnel are people that will need services in the near future, but may be doing research about their case or shopping around for the right attorney to handle their legal matter. The overall goal is to create a closer touchpoint, where the audience gets to engage with your brand – usually accomplished by having them visit your law firm’s website. This can be driven by a number of different forms of marketing, but generally can be accomplished with targeted PPC ads or content marketing such as blogging to attract your ideal legal clients.

What is first contact law?

According to Law Technology Today, law firms take 3 or more days to respond to initial messages from new leads and potential clients 42% of the time and 35% of instances, phone calls from leads aren’t answered.

What is the top level of awareness?

The top level, known as awareness segment can be thought of as where you want to perform your top of mind advertising. This can be invested in displaying larger spread campaigns with lower direct impact, such as posting on Facebook or YouTube, using simple geo-targeted display ads and other awareness marketing campaigns.

What is the final property to measure from different lead sources?

The final property to measure from different lead sources is consistency . If you could go to Walmart and save 15% on your groceries, that’s great. However if they don’t stock some of your essentials items on a weekly basis, then this produces problems and nuisances – having to shop at multiple stores.

Growth

Do you want to increase the number of cases you handle monthly/annually, and if so, at what pace? If you do not want to grow your practice and are happy with the cases coming in, you may only need to spend little to no money on marketing. If you are looking for moderate growth, you will likely have to spend in the 6-8% of revenues range.

Competition

If you practice in a competitive area of law and want to grow your practice, you will likely need to spend above the 8% average to get a consistent flow of cases coming in. The SBA recommends that you spend up to 20% of your revenue on marketing if you are in an extremely competitive industry.

Margins

If your law firm has high operating profit margins, you can afford to spend a higher percentage of your revenues on marketing. An operating profit margin is a way to measure how much revenue you have left after accounting for variable costs like staffing or marketing expense.

We Can Help

At eGenerationMarketing we generate case leads for Social Security disability, personal injury, workers’ comp and employment law attorneys. We work with law firms of all sizes and with vastly different marketing budgets. Give us a call at 617.800.0089 to find out how we can help grow your caseload!

Who is Stephanie from FindLaw?

As Senior Customer Marketer at FindLaw, Stephanie specializes in telling the stories of successful solo attorneys. Stephanie is also a licensed attorney, and prior to joining Thomson Reuters, practiced family law and criminal defense at a five-attorney firm in the Twin Cities.

When did Kelly Kelly leave her clerkship?

In 2007, Kelly became a mother to her first child and left her clerkship to spend time with her growing family. After taking time off to be at home with her new baby, Kelly decided to get back into practicing law and made the decision to pursue solo practice. “I wasn’t ready for a 60-hour per week commitment that comes with practicing in a larger firm,” Kelly said, “I wanted to be able to have flexibility to balance work and family.”

Stable Compensation – Overall

The report shows a slight decrease in overall income.Compared to a mean of $198,000 and a median of $140,000 in 2017, 2018 saw attorneys earning a mean of $194,000 and a median of $135,000.

Making More or Making Less?

When comparing their 2018 earnings to their 2017 pay, close to half of the respondents reported increases .

Who Is Earning the Most?

The highest-earning practice area this year is medical malpractice, which boasts an average salary of $267,000.

The Report

The full Attorney Compensation Report offers a more detailed picture with details such as:

Is tracking your online performance easy?

Tracking your online performance is really easy. There are tons of free and paid tools available on the market. One of the most popular analytics platforms is Google Analytics (GA for short).

Can law firms use email marketing?

Many law firms still don’t take advantage of email marketing, although it can be one of the most cost-effective and high ROI marketing strategies a legal practice can implement. Email marketing can be used for a number of purposes, including lead magnets, drip campaigns, and newsletters. Law firms practicing or specializing in almost any area of law can benefit from email marketing in one form or another. Check out our guides linked just below to learn more about the benefits and implementing email marketing into your law firm’s client acquisition and marketing objectives.

Can lawyers be experts?

Attorneys and law firm marketing specialists are fully aware that lawyers can’t claim to be experts or specialists. However, it is within the full discretion of a lawyer to define what types of law they practice and focus on. This has many advantages, among the more substantial, including the ability for lawyers to:

Why is SEO important?

SEO is one of the most important things for any website, and for your legal website SEO, you will find that in addition to the costs for the technical know-how and implementation, many other things will, again, factor into the cost.

What is a website host?

Your website’s host is basically your website’s host. It is where all of your website’s content lives, ready to be displayed when someone visits your site. Hosting should not be an overly expensive thing.

What is a domain name?

The domain name is your website’s address – it’s what you type into the address bar on your web browser. It looks like ranktoday.com or google.com. You will generally find multiple payment options for your domain name, monthly, yearly, multi-yearly or even in groups of 3 months or 6 months.

Is digital marketing hard?

The truth is, it’s often harder than it seems at first glance. The digital marketing industry takes multiple factors into account to calculate the prices for the services they offer, and they include what specific niche your business falls under.