Virtually every new regulation and court decision brings unique industry-specific impacts. Your ability to bring this insight is the difference between being invited in without competition or being left out of the conversation. And — getting much higher rates.

The Most Lucrative Differentiator

Understanding your client’s industry is the most lucrative differentiator. Even law firms with the highest rates enjoy even higher rates after successfully implementing industry groups.

Here are the 11 best practices driving the most successful industry go-to-market strategies:

1. Pick Attractive and Lucrative Industries

Make it worth the investment. Pick industries with complex legal needs, higher spending, and face growing complexity. This selection offers more opportunity than no growth industries — or those with less complex needs.

A few savvy firms develop objective criteria to evaluate and target industries with dedicated groups and resources. And they stick to the criteria.

2. Target Industry Leaders, Influencers, or Rising Stars

You are judged by the company you keep. The most successful programs include market leaders and standouts who will impress others. You get the benefit of their leadership.

3. Educate Clients

Clients love law firms’ successful industry programs because they get better outcomes faster. And clients love learning something new and valuable. Educating clients checks off all the boxes for excellent client service and business development. Education is the cornerstone of an enduring relationship.

4. Say What Others Don’t or Won’t

Put a stake in the ground. Examine what others are saying and adopt messaging with more insight and punch. The battle for industry supremacy is built with intelligence, knowledge sharing, and insight. Few firms look at what others say — they presume what they offer is good enough. Clients will always find their way to the best and unique insight.

Share opinions. Even when your client doesn’t agree, your new opinions help them develop their own.

5. Use Client Peer Networking

Encourage your anchor clients to invite their peers. Corporate counsel want to learn from each other. They also want to help each other. This is your opportunity to help corporate counsel with their own network while you build out yours — and you get the credit.

6. Provide New Insights Annually

Things change. Clients want to be the first to know. The successful industry group will position itself as the recurring source of an annual information and insight cycle. This insight prepares industry corporate counsel about key trends and performance metrics.

In a perfect world you will perform original research around the performance metrics that matter most to the industry — and share these regularly.

Release the results in industry media, industry-wide webinars, and events. This approach positions your firm as a primary source and a go-to law firm for the industry.

7. Use Research to Stand Out

Client research adds nuance you can’t get any place else. You can articulate the most relevant and timely intelligence and ensure it has the right wording and subtleties only an insider would bring.

8. Train Group Leaders in the Insights

The most successful industry groups select key partners to become experts in deep insights. While all attorneys share the insights the selected attorney takes the deep dive and articulates the message. They become fluent in the insights and industry nuances and support other attorneys in their drive to build the industry focus. They also split the origination credit.

9. Zealous Use of Social Media

Share your industry insights often. Develop your own digital ecosystem with strategically timed posts to reference other posts and repurpose content. The successful industry groups map these posts out on a calendar and assign responsibility for each. Encouraging everyone on the team to like, comment on, and share posts amplifies the message and your network.

Post to all industry leader site company pages and tag as many corporate counsel as possible.

10. Industry Group Budget

The successful industry group has its own funding. The research, training, and distribution channels cost money to develop and maintain are substantial investments.

11. Impassioned Leader

Leaders love industry and learning. They love sharing and being with clients — and getting more insights back in return. The leader of every successful group brings passion and enthusiasm — and uses all the resources the budget supports.

Industry-specific knowledge will only continue to grow in influence and become a magnet for new clients, as well as a key retention tool for existing clients. Corporate counsel have all learned that law firms with industry nuance deliver better outcomes — both legal and business.

The day is coming when all market-leading law firms will go to market by industry groups. As of now these firms are the exception. Jump in now and be one of the firms who make it the rule.

BTI’s 3-year deep dive exploration into Law Firm LinkedIn pages and performance has unearthed a fascinating landscape of achievements and opportunities across law firms of varying sizes. The implications are profound, offering high-performing firms a gateway to inbound business and providing others with a chance to catch up — or leap ahead in the latest source of new business.

Our research reveals that strategically minded and disciplined firms consistently deliver performance levels 3x times better than their larger peers. The extent of this performance spectrum underscores the crucial role of investment, commitment, and strategy in shaping each firm’s destiny.

At the epicenter of LinkedIn success lies engagement — comments, likes, celebrations, and posts that captivate your followers. The ripple effect extends to their networks, courtesy of LinkedIn’s algorithm, making every engagement a building block for stronger bonds and meaningful relationships. This leads to inbound business.

Our latest report, The BTI Benchmarking Law Firm LinkedIn Performance 2023, Unleashing the Power of LinkedIn, is the culmination of our in-depth research. It’s your ticket to decoding the secrets behind top-tier LinkedIn performance. But that’s not all — it’s a blueprint for harnessing LinkedIn’s full potential to drive inbound business for your law firm.

Please join me in congratulating the following law firms for their exceptional leadership position in LinkedIn Active Engagement by Touchpoints across all 3 Am Law cohorts plus large international firms:

Only one source provides law firms with unique insights into exactly where they stand along key LinkedIn performance metrics including:

• LinkedIn Followers
• LinkedIn Followers per Partner
• Active Engagement Percentage Rates
• Engagement Touchpoints and Activities
• Engagement Touchpoints and Activities per Partner
• Monthly Posting Cadence
• Where you stand compared to law firms in your size cohort

The BTI Benchmarking Law Firm LinkedIn Performance 2023: Unleashing the Power of LinkedIn is your gateway to this invaluable data, the most successful strategies, and the secret sauce to securing attorney support and engagement with your firm’s online presence. Don’t just keep up — jump ahead of the curve!

Ready to transform your law firm’s LinkedIn game? Click here to grab your copy of the report and embark on a journey to LinkedIn success.

Stay ahead, stay engaged, and stay successful on LinkedIn!

1. 20% follower growth for law firms for the 2nd year in a row

One of the last cohorts to adopt LinkedIn, corporate counsel are now joining in droves.

2. Am Law 2nd 100 firms out engaging all others

This group shows more precision in producing compelling content to generate engagement, including legal issues and firm news.

3. Followings show little relationship to active engagement

Gaining followers is a form of engagement — but followers aren’t the final frontier —engagement reigns supreme. It’s about sparking discussions, igniting likes, shares, and reposts for creating enduring digital and analog relationships.

4. The Holy Grail for learning about law firms for corporate counsel (and laterals)

All the insights in one place – outside the stiff formality of a website — and much easier to digest. Readers gain a more insightful understanding of law firms through LinkedIn pages compared to traditional websites. This trend will lead to LinkedIn’s potential to outperform law firm websites in creating perception and creating inbound leads.

5. Partners rarely outwardly supportive

Few partners actively support firm posts and activities — missing a major source of substantial outreach.

6. Posting drives engagement

The more you post — even repurposed content — the more likely your firm will generate active engagement.