Marketing Spending on the Rise in Small Firms

"Marketing budgets at small law firms have increased significantly over the past three years,"  according to Ann Fullenkamp, senior vice president for the small law firm market at LexisNexis.

On LexBlog, Kevin O'Keefe posted today that:

The number of small law firms (20 or fewer lawyers) spending 5% or more of their revenues on marketing doubled in the last three years, from 11% of firms in 2002 to 22% of firms in 2005. This per a survey on small law firm marketing trends commissioned by LexisNexis(R) Martindale-Hubbell(R).

Segmenting these results by firm size shows, astonishingly, that among firms with 11-20 attorneys, only 5% of firms spent over 5% of revenues on marketing three years ago whereas 20% of these firms now spend over 5% of revenues on marketing!

The survey further states that the "firm's website is perceived to be the most valuable marketing tactic for growing a small firm practice."

80% of the firms have a website and 50% of these firms invest in SEO. 3% use blogs.

9% of the firm's surveyed (967 responded) indicate that outside companies (consultants, ad firms, etc) have primary responsibility for the firm's marketing and 4% of the small firms have in internal marketing person.

Here's the breakdown of how respondents spent their marketing money, by initiative:

22%    Print or online yellow pages
20%    Client meals/entertainment
19%    Print or online legal director listings
13%    Their website
7%     Event sponsorships/community events
6%     Giving or hosting seminars
5%     Public/Media Relations/Writing articles
3%     Referral services
3%     Local outdoor advertising
2%     Pay per click ads (online)
1%     Sponsorships/Placements on legal web sites

It still floors me how much firms throw at legal directories for peer-to-peer advertising!

This is a great little survey. Look at this to be an indicator of CPA firm marketing expenditures rising in a similar fashion though I think the breakdown of expenditures will vary significantly from law.

Thanks to Kevin at LexBlog for sharing this interesting survey.

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