The continental challenge

While slow and steady often wins the race, many law firms in Continental Europe still seem to be struggling to implement - and maintain - truly strategic marketing programmes. But the marketing message is gradually filtering through, as Silvia Hodges reports.

Continental Europe has been a tough challenge for foreign law firms. A cultural and linguistic patchwork, it is nearly impossible to succeed on the Continent with a one-size-fits-all, ‘cookie cutter’ marketing programme. Firms are learning that what works in London and Liverpool might not be successful in Lisbon and Lyon. Successful approaches in Boston might be counter-productive in Berlin and Bratislava.

But marketers should not despair: Continental European differences seem to account for less than one would assume. Everywhere on the Continent, from the Atlantic coast to the latest members of the European Union in central and eastern Europe, legal marketers have been cropping up. It has been an astonishingly rapid development, particularly during the past five years. The timing is perfect for this development, with an increasingly competitive market environment and the continuing fragmentation of cross-border, commercial legal services into complex high value-added advice on the one side, and commoditised services on the other. As Sylvie Marcha, european marketing and business-development director at Jones Day comments: “Competition is high and clients increasingly buy some legal services as they would buy telecommunications, airline tickets and printers.”

Another significant contributor to the competitive environment is decreasing loyalty among clients and their external law-firm suppliers. Clients are now offered much more choice in a marketplace where in-house counsel and buyers of commercial legal services are under continuing pressure to regulate and reduce legal expenditure.

Increasing globalisation of clients, another continuing trend, has stimulated the expansion of UK and US firms. The arrival of these on the domestic turf has altered the modes of operation on the Continent. Alexander Gendlin, head of business development and marketing at Austrian firm Wolf Theiss, believes that many firms see their UK and US counterparts as “somewhat of a benchmark or guideline for their marketing”, a view that is seemingly shared in other European countries, too. “The foreign firms have fuelled the evolution of the organisational model, with domestic firms becoming more competitive themselves,” adds Micol Scabbia, marketing director at the Milan office of international firm Clifford Chance.

Changes at home
Increasing competition also comes from within: the number of (local) lawyers has significantly risen in several jurisdictions – such as Italy, where it has doubled over the past ten years. And this might not change any time soon.

Although a large number of older, ‘baby boomer’ lawyers will soon be reaching normal retirement age, European lawyers (unlike their UK and US colleagues) often keep practising
long past their 65th or even 70th birthday. In addition, new regulations in a number of European jurisdictions now allow certified public accountants, banks and insurers, for example, to offer legal services.

Aside from competitive forces, the rise of European legal marketing might also be explained by changes within the firms. Over the past ten to 15 years, the average size of firms has risen significantly all over Europe. For example, in 1996, a firm with 75 lawyers would have been considered rather large in Madrid, Milan and Munich. In the same markets today, it would likely be classified as mid-size. Clearly, these larger organisations tend to have a more ‘corporate’ approach, including their marketing functions.

These crucial organisational shifts, however, have not always been accompanied by changes in culture and mindset, which are essential to successful marketing. Many national Bar associations never seem to tire of pointing out differences between the legal profession and ‘normal’ commercial activities, according to Dr. Georg Schima, partner of Kunz Schima Wallentin in Vienna and member of the executive committee of the Vienna Bar. The most conservative Bar associations throughout Europe, he says, resist change and persistently argue whether marketing is necessary at all and ‘worthy’ of a lawyer’s attention, debating the rules and regulations of advertising, which, as we all know, plays only a minor role in strategic marketing.

There are a few exceptions, such as the Finnish Bar Association, which launched an instruction programme for start-up law firms to market their services and conducted a national study on client satisfaction. “It was welcomed by the bar association’s members and discussed widely”, says Vesa Turkki, managing partner at Turkki Kokko Heliö in Finland.

In France, too, a television, billboard and newspaper campaign was launched a few years ago to promote the legal profession to the public, as an important ‘partner’ in their lives.

Still, change within law firms certainly takes time. Several national Bars such as those in Germany and France changed their codes of ethics in the 1990s, thus paving the way for marketing. “Yet, many lawyers in Europe still point out that doing marketing is something that, just a few years ago, would not have been imaginable,” says Dr. Friedrich Blase, principal at consultancy Edge International. The fact that European lawyers still refer to marketing as a ‘recent phenomenon’ underlines the conservative nature of the industry.

What is worse, is that in no other industry are organisations so quick to declare that their specific situation is ‘so unique and completely different from others’, which explains why otherwise commonly accepted, tried and tested business principles are ignored. “Law firms do not think they apply to them,” says Blase.

Contrasting views of marketing across industry sectors also still exist. “Companies usually view legal spending as a cost and marketing as an investment, whereas lawyers in private practice almost always view marketing as a cost and not an investment,” says Eric Gardner de Béville, chief marketing officer at CMS Albiñana & Suárez. Having said that, top-tier firms across Europe, independent of their jurisdiction, appear to be the first ones that are embracing marketing. Other firms are tending to follow more reluctantly, and truly strategic marketing has not yet trickled down. While leading firms are likely to be well organised and have strategic marketing plans, the lower-tier firms tend to market themselves in a more ad hoc way. Their marketing is still predominantly tactical, focusing on the promotional aspects, rather than strategy. It frequently lacks the most basic decisions, such as a clear positioning of what the firm stands for. Claudia Schieblon, a member of the Professional Management Network, noticed that in Germany, only the leading firms actively market themselves based on strategic marketing and business development plans and customer-relationship management (CRM) strategies. Most others are busily engaged in updating websites, organising client events and preparing for pitches. “They are reacting instead of operating in a proactive way,” says Schieblon.

Lawyers and marketing
With marketing not a part of the law-school curricula in most jurisdictions, lawyers usually lack background knowledge, and it is something that does not come naturally to them, according to Bert van Drie, marketing director of the Dutch firm De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek. “However, they are bright people, so after a while many of them learn,” he says.

Still, this does not explain why the leading firms across Europe generally embrace marketing, while others, which are seemingly more in need of it, do not. This raises the question of causality: does marketing help firms to become leaders in their sectors, or do the leading firms market themselves strategically because they stand for a more flexible approach in general, which welcomes change rather than ignoring it?

In almost every jurisdiction, there are a small number of ‘old style’ leading firms that pride themselves on not marketing. For the moment, they seem to feel safely above the rest – but in
a rapidly changing marketplace, only time will tell if this will remain true in a few years.

Most other firms feel the growing competition and more or less grudgingly view marketing as an unavoidable necessity, making overcoming lawyers’ resistance to market a daily chore of legal marketers. Some marketers feel that their function is somewhat underrated. As lawyers think that everyone communicates, therefore everyone can do marketing and communications. But this is not always the case. “In a corporation, not every employee is a marketer,” says Gardner de Béville. “Why should it be any different in a law firm?”

Marga Jorissen, marketing and communications manager at Loyens Advocaten-Avocats in Brussels, fully agrees with him. “That is why marketing professionals come into the picture,” she says. “We need to demonstrate how we can support them.”

Getting familiar with marketing is indeed a long, gradual process for lawyers; something that might even be a bit frightening. “You cannot take further actions if the other party is not convinced. Both are in it together, it’s a relationship,” says Jorissen. The relationship needs to grow and be based on mutual trust. Marketers need to win lawyers over by demonstrating that marketing can really benefit them – by contributing to their bottom line. Also, showing lawyers what their most important competitors do is often quite convincing.

Chris Scoble, head of marketing and communications, Europe, at international firm Dewey Ballantine, is convinced that ‘slow and steady wins the race’. “If we push new ideas and ways of doing things too hard in the early stages, the barriers will go up, making further progress doubly difficult,” he says. He believes that to take things forward, legal marketing needs to be given to lawyers in bite-sized chunks. Every little success builds confidence both for the partners and for the marketing professionals, which enables firms to move on to the next stage with a track record of success behind them – and greater confidence about future initiatives.

“The best way is to start with two or three lawyers, deliver what they ask for, and to propose market and client analysis to help them better understand their client portfolio,” says Marchal. Then, propose some directions, help them, show how marketing professionals add value in terms of identifying key figures and trends.

Marchal has attempted to establish a marketing culture in the different jurisdictions she is responsible for, covering basic marketing principles. “A small proportion of lawyers will attend such sessions,” she says. “But almost none of them will find the time to implement a programme.”

Integrating marketing with business
In order to be successful, marketing needs to be closely connected to the firm’s business plan and embraced by the fee earners. Most effective in achieving this is education and training, which demonstrates that marketing directly contributes to the bottom line, instead of just adding bells and whistles.

Patricia Gannon, a partner at Karanovic & Nikoliç in Serbia and Montenegro, says that for her firm, roundtables on new legislation targeted to potential clients, and accompanied by cocktails, work well. The firm is also considering creating a networking club for its key clients, whereby influential ministers or policy makers would be invited to mingle with clients to discuss issues affecting their business.

As external-relations director at A. M. Pereira, Sáragga Leal, Oliveira Martins, Júdice e Associados – one of the pioneers of legal marketing in Portugal – Matilde de Mello Cabral involves lawyers in a number of marketing activities that put them in direct contact with current and potential clients. The firm also has its own art foundation supporting young Portuguese artists. This, according to de Mello Cabral, is a great marketing tool, as it helps the firm to maintain a high profile in society and regular contact with existing and potential clients.

And being in touch with clients directly and developing the business is exactly what lawyers should be doing. Marketing and business-development professionals should support them in this, says Keith Bain, public-relations manager at German firm Hengeler Mueller. “It’s the lawyers doing the best job and doing it consistently that makes the difference, and is ultimately the very best form of marketing,” he says.

The biggest marketing issue in Europe seems to be based on logic, or sometimes the lack thereof. Not all lawyers apply a consistent and methodical process to analyse, fund and measure new business opportunities. But this should change sooner or later, as the logical and analytical legal mind should have no trouble anticipating clients’ and competitors’ moves alike. For law firms, applying the principles of chess to their own business is what marketing is about – not worrying about advertisements

Silvia Hodges is founder of legal marketing italia, a network for marketing professionals in Italy (see news on page 31). She can be contacted at silviahodges@hotmail.com