Becoming A Strategic Partner with Deep Sector-Specific Insights
by: Tom Hochstatter, President
Back in October I wrote about the decline of patent litigation in District Court and IPR filings at the PTAB over the past five years. Current 2019 numbers through November suggest we’ll be down again this year making it six full years in a row.
In that post I posed a series of not so rhetorical questions about moving our industry from a reactive “when the client calls, jump” industry to one of strategic partnership - maintaining a meaningful engagement throughout the years and being relied upon to look over the horizon to help clients maximize economic potential and mitigate unforeseen risks.
One of those questions I was still wrestling with was “What are law firms doing with idle IP-related resources?” Are those resources just in major business development mode right now working on their next client engagement - plaintiff or defendant? Are they supporting other groups within the firm?
It still wasn’t clear to me, but then I came upon this commentary article last week from Law.com entitled, “Why Your Firm Needs a Sector-Based Strategy—and How to Build One”. And that’s when it all came together.
The article discussed a significant opportunity for law firms to be more of a strategic partner or management consultant to their clients by building deep “Sector-Specific Insights”. This is no longer the idea that you may have a client or two in a particular industry and a handful of attorneys working for them; thus, you have deep expertise.
“Clients tell us again and again that they value service providers who know their business and markets—not superficially, but as deeply and profoundly as they do.” -Joe Calve, chief marketing and business development officer at McGuireWoods
IP Advisory Takes A Village
This is an open invitation for your firm to find a meaningful way to become irreplaceable with your current clients and more importantly to differentiate from competitors on new pitch opportunities.
We have helped IP practice groups prepare for new client pitches for years. It pains us when all our client firm wants to do is pull some slides on the prospect’s patent portfolio and dump them into a Powerpoint deck with the law firm’s logo on it.
We at Techson have had the opportunity, or more specifically, the privilege to come alongside a couple of our larger patent research (law firm) clients and do just this – help them begin to build these Sector-Based Strategies and jointly approach the client with an entirely new business model.
Just as your clients rely on external services provides, like law firms to fill a business gap, your firm can rely upon Techson to help build this capability within your firm. Then we can jointly take this new services offering to the marketplace.
Techson Puts Strategy First
Beyond our obvious expertise in patents, research, technology we set out earlier this year to augment the team with senior-level management consultants to round out our IP Advisory capabilities across dozens of industry sectors. Additionally, we have a methodology and seminar series run by our Dan Spaeth to help walk your firm through the process of building deep sector level expertise and maintaining over time.
Source: 2019 Report on the State of the Legal Market: January 2019
Where on the stack do you want your firm or more specifically your IP practice to end up? Let’s partner on your next business development engagement, or more compelling, let’s engage your top client or two and prove that being proactive is the first step in building that all important strategic partnership.
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