5 CHALLENGES: Facing Law Firms That Need to Apply Competitive Intelligence.

AuthorFulo, Leonard

The legal marketing profession needs competitive intelligence (CI). The more than 30 legal marketers who attended the first ever certificate class a few weeks ago can attest to this fact. The two day program was sponsored by the Legal Marketing Association with the certificate conferred by the Academy of Competitive Intelligence.

The challenge articulated by many in the room during those two days was: "How do we make CI work inside of our law firms?"

What they meant to say was this: "If CI's value to law firms is compared to the size of a Mack Truck, how do you make it fit in a law firm when you're only given a parking space that fits a Mini-Cooper?"

In other words, the need for CI is great, but the structure and nature of a law firm has limited the professional's ability to deploy it in a reasonable and effective manner.

Those attending absorbed the material we had to teach. That was not the issue. In our discussions during class and coffee breaks, students revealed five major challenges that both the marketers and the law firms must face if they are to fully benefit from what competitive intelligence can deliver for them.

Challenge 1--Leaving the customer comfort zone: Law firms ask these marketers to research existing and potential customers for new business opportunities. What they do not have a mandate to do is to actively and even aggressively assess competing law firms--at least not much beyond what they can find from competitors' websites or through a Thomson Reuters or LexisNexis search. They need this mandate.

Challenge 2--Redefine primary research: These students are ready to tackle traditional market research, meaning surveys. What this group may not be ready for is to ask questions in the marketplace about competitors and their competitive activity. One-on-one interviews, not masked surveys. We certainly explored the ethical approaches to doing so. That's not at issue. Indeed, primary research in competitive intelligence may take legal marketers out of their own and their law firm's comfort zone. They need to address this with the firm, draw up boundaries and protocol, but in the end, they must do primary research if they are to truly understand the...

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