EI series 1, Part 2
Wesley Johnson, Energy Knect
In the current economic climate, businesses have been encouraged to re-strategize and find effective ways to remain competitive, or face the risk of being left behind.
Firms are typically faced with two primary options, inter alia to remain competitive and generate revenue in today’s market. There is the so-called traditional approach which entails increasing rates and reducing expenses, or the other approach, which is investing more in business development strategies to ensure that you are set up for sustainable and rapid revenue growth, according to Boston Consulting Group.
In Part 2 of our EI Series, we researched multiple revenue-generating techniques from across our network to identify the top performers to share with our network.
When deciding on which strategies are best suited to drive new business growth for your firm, it seems only natural to undertake multiple options, in the hope that one or two of your invested strategies produce results. However, it’s no secret that this approach can result in a waste of your time and money and become a challenge for you to identify the techniques that are delivering the ROI.
Following our research, it was highlighted that a well implemented strategy underpins the success of new business and revenue growth. Being able to connect your plan with your vision, will result in being able to identify the target clients that are aligned to you. By understanding your target market and client’s, coupled with clarity of your competitive advantage, will help your business prioritize its efforts.
Out of the many business development growth strategies that were identified through our research, which included the likes of; cross-selling, referrals, sponsorships, attending conferences and joining committee groups, there were clearly three top performers.
Develop Your Business Development Skills
When it comes to business development, there are typically two types of professionals. The naturals and the ones that are slightly more introverted. It’s no secret that lawyers are not taught how to be salespeople in law school. By building up your business development and networking skills, you can gain that competitive edge over your competitor and increase your revenue opportunities.
Lawyers, being the primary revenue drivers for your firm, need to be equipped with the skills to be able to network, deliver presentations and close deals. These are all very important skills that should never be overlooked. According to a survey orchestrated by introhive with more than 100 legal firms of all sizes, firms that recognized this gap and provided sales training or business development coaching, saw their lawyers generate more revenue and grow their client base faster.
As a solution, try to increase your firm’s business development coaching with one-to-one training sessions, group training, online seminars, or by partnering with third-party consultants to increase penetration in markets with limited sales presence. By employing a specialised outsourced consultancy to support your objectives, you will have the advantage of saving time, money and resources.
Client Education
When stepping into your client’s shoes, they typically hire legal firms for their legal advice, expertise and thought leadership. One way in which you can position yourself as a leader in your field and benchmark yourself against your competitors is to share your knowledge and expertise. The more you can share your expertise and educate your clients, the more valuable you become, which can improve retention, loyalty and support new business growth.
A few education techniques include;
Provide regular market intel – educate your clients by developing informative articles and Insight reports which includes your firm’s deep industry knowledge. Providing insights into upcoming challenges which impact your client’s industry, including how you are planning to deal with these challenges, is a very effective way in marketing your firms expertise.
Client (In-House) training – one way to get valuable face time and educate your clients simultaneously, is to provide online and onsite training to inhouse lawyers or other employees about a particular area of the law or a specific challenge. Due to the enforcement of remote working following the pandemic, online video conferencing and webinars have become an inexpensive and effective solution for onsite training and has the advantage of reaching out to a wider audience.
Networking – an effective approach to provide your clients with intel, is to host your own professional networking platform to help your clients meet other businesses and identify new business opportunities. Try to make a conscious effort to introduce your clients to each other and to third parties that can support their businesses. To enhance the effectiveness of this solution, couple this approach with a training session for your clients.
Strengthening relationships
Existing and potential clients want to work with professionals that understand their business and the challenges that they face. By having regular touchpoints with your clients, sharing your unbiased advice coupled with providing your professional expertise consistently will help strengthen your business relationships. Moreover, understanding the competitive environment your client operates in also provides your firm with a competitive edge.
Investing in technologies such as data-gathering tools, which include the likes of customer relationship software can be very effective in strengthening client relationships, as it allows you to identify your client’s preferences. Furthermore, technology can streamline and automate your businesses process which improves efficiency and reduces costs.
Strong relationships are not only for client retention and loyalty, but for driving new business and growing your firm too. In many instances this also becomes a catalyst for identifying cross-selling opportunities for your firm, which in turn, encourages revenue growth.
Conclusion
With the growing trend of fierce competition, coupled with challenging market conditions, legal firms will need to find effective ways to ensure that they remain competitive. By implementing a well-crafted strategy which helps connect your plan with your vision coupled with the use of technology resources, can help support new business and revenue growth success.
The Energy Knect approach
At Energy Knect we believe that every client we work with deserves a tailored approach to their unique challenges and goals. Our extensive experience, business knowledge and expertise is stimulated through our continuous engagement with our senior advisory board and global network of senior industry professionals. As a result, Energy Knect are well positioned to identify potential improvement areas within your business development function and employ proven business development strategies to support new business and revenue growth without the heavy investment tag.
Look out for our next article in our EI series, where we will provide you with insights on how to leverage inexpensive tech to drive new business and revenue growth.
