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One of the hardest things about business development is that demand for legal services is highly variable and therefore unpredictable. As a result, little may happen for long periods despite your efforts to generate new business. And then several opportunities emerge at once, seemingly out of nowhere.
That is one reason the common boom-and-bust approach to business development isn’t optimal. Many lawyers pursue work more aggressively when work is slow, but then let efforts fade when they get busy. The problem is that legal demand does not arrive on your schedule. And that’s why consistency matters so much.
Focus on Their Demand, Not Your Supply
Lawyers and clients experience the market for legal services from very different vantage points. Lawyers tend to see business development from the supply side. They focus on what they offer: experience, credentials, and practice areas. Those things may help a client choose you, but they rarely create the need in the first place.
From the client’s perspective, the decision to hire a lawyer begins with a problem, not a search for legal services. It’s triggered by a specific situation or challenge that makes them realize they need help. Until then, even your ideal client usually has no reason to consider hiring outside counsel.
From the lawyer’s perspective, this can feel random. For long stretches, clients have no active need for help. Then, suddenly, things change, and someone who wouldn’t take your call or reply to your email urgently needs your assistance.
That is when demand appears.
And once you see that, you start to think about business development differently.
Show Up Before the Need Arises
If demand were steady and predictable, business development would be simple: promote your capabilities and wait to be discovered. But sophisticated clients don’t start the process with an open search. They look first to those they already know and trust. And that’s why simply “getting your name out there” is not enough.
Being broadly visible is not the same as being well-positioned. You need to do the work to be known in the right places, among the right people, in ways that fit the situations that lead clients to hire lawyers.
I think of this as the ecosystem of attention of your ideal clients. You need to spend time there. You need your ideas to show up there, too.
For some lawyers, that ecosystem is organized around an industry. It includes the conferences, associations, publications, newsletters, and conversations that shape how people in that sector think and make decisions. For others, it is more local or community-based. A trusts and estates lawyer needs to connect with the wealth advisors, accountants, and business owners in a particular city. A startup lawyer has to stay close to founders, investors, and the circles in which they exchange information and ideas. You get the idea.
The point is not to be everywhere. It is to be visible where your ideal clients are already paying attention. In that sense, it is better to be known well by a relatively small group of people who need what you provide than to be broadly known by a much larger group that is unlikely ever to hire you.
When demand is hard to predict, your presence plus your positioning matter most. You cannot always appear at the perfect moment, but you can make sure that when the moment comes, you are already known.
That is a very different objective from broad self-promotion. And it also highlights why patience is so important in business development.
Play the Long Game
Most of your effort, whether it’s individual outreach or writing and speaking, will reach people who do not need you yet. Most of the people you meet, stay in touch with, or share ideas with will not hire you anytime soon. That doesn’t make your efforts wasted. It simply reflects the nature of the market.
Business development is a long game. The way to play the game is to stay visible, credible, and relevant over time, so that when a client needs your services, you’ll be top of mind.
Many lawyers struggle with this because they expect a tighter connection between effort and outcome than the process usually provides. They attend an event and hope it quickly leads to work. They publish an article and look for an immediate return. They reconnect with someone and assume that if nothing happens soon after, the opportunity is gone. Often, it is not gone. The conditions for the client taking action have simply not yet arrived.
You cannot force legal demand to appear. But you can ensure you are well-positioned to seize it when it does.
Lawyers who excel at business development tend to be the most consistent. They remain active in their ecosystems, build relationships, maintain pipelines, and stay close to the right people and conversations so they are remembered at important moments.
For lawyers, that is the real challenge. Not being known everywhere, but being known where it counts, consistently enough, and long enough, to be the person clients think of when the need becomes real.
Jay Harrington is president of our agency, a published author, and nationally-recognized expert in thought-leadership marketing.
From strategic planning to writing, podcasting, video marketing, and design, Jay and his team help lawyers and law firms turn expertise into thought leadership, and thought leadership into new business. Get in touch to learn more about the consulting and coaching services we provide. You can reach Jay at jay@hcommunications.biz.