What Outside Consultants Should Deliver (And What Firms Want)

I was having a conversation earlier this week with the CMO of an AmLaw 100 firm, and for some reason, I asked him why and how he brings in outside consultants (like me) to help his marketing team. His answer was interesting.

“We almost never hire them. 95% of them are totally slinging bullshit.”

That got my attention.

The conversation closed over our heads, and we went on with our discussion, but I thought about that for a long time. He’s right. I know exactly what he means.

There are a LOT of legal marketing consultants out there — hundreds, maybe thousands. And a lot of them are slinging bullshit. You may take issue with the terminology, but you can’t seriously argue that there are a lot of us out there who are characterizing themselves as experts, or giving something that’s not that spectacular a catchy name and selling the daylights out of it, or simply making promises they can’t possibly keep. In our business, there are definitely shiny objects and flavors of the week/month/year, and plenty of people willing to try to capitalize on them.

I try pretty hard not to do this. At the risk of publicly patting myself on the back, I think I make an effort to be realistic, honest and straightforward about my capabilities, and with a couple of exceptions, not pass myself off as God’s gift to legal marketing.

I’m a generalist — I don’t claim to be a world-renowned expert in anything — strategy, branding, coaching — but I do all these things for clients, and I’m really good at what I do. So, in the absence of a promise to be some sort of miracle worker or genius, what do I think an independent consultant should promise to deliver? What should clients expect? Well, although I despise the alliteration, I think it comes down to three things, all of which begin with the letter “C” and all of which an outside consultant should bring to the party, at a very high, professional level. They are:

Credibility
This one’s interesting. We all work with attorneys who are typically very smart, under a lot of pressure, and typically are intensely factual, logical, concrete personalities. If you’re going to walk in from the outside, and tell them how to market their practices, develop business or build a strategy, the second they begin to doubt that you know what you’re doing, you’re done. As an outside consultant, you have to present yourself and your ideas in a way that makes it absolutely clear that the lawyer you’re talking to should listen. More than in most consulting relationships, I think, lawyers are disinclined to listen to legal marketing consultants, so this is particularly important. Attorneys are skeptical, and you absolutely have to get, and keep, their attention and respect or else you’re kind of cooked.

Competence
This is pretty obvious, but you have to know what you’re talking about, and you have to be smart enough to work with smart attorneys. Really, competence is table stakes. If you can’t define a brand accurately, and in a way an attorney (who knows nothing about branding) can grasp and relate to you, you have no business consulting.

Creativity
This, I think, is what separates decent consultants from great ones. To be an outstanding external consultant, you have to be able to think on your feet, and come up with inventive, effective approaches to situations. This, in my opinion, is where the sheep get separated from the goats. Mediocre or bad consultants have a toolbox with a certain set of ideas, and they trot those out for every situation. The real secret sauce of great consulting — being able to think creatively, draw on a lot of experience and information, and come up with ideas, observations or plans that address the issue, but aren’t cookiecutter.