This year's panelists from Colgate Palmolive, Nestle and Aramark advised law firms and their marketers as follows:
1. Get to know your clients' buisness. Do research. If they are publicly traded, read their annual and quarterly reports. Understand their tolerance for risk.
2. Provide CLE/Educational programs for their lawyers and business people.
3. Dispense with golf outings and lavish dinners. They have to report them to their companies to avoid conflicts of interest.
4. Don't send so many emails, but make sure your clients receive information that is important to their businesses.
5. Don't focus on the General Counsel. Assistant and Associate General Counsel are critical and often make the decision as to which law firm to hire.
6. Law 360 is the popular legal information source for these companies.
7. Effeciency, cost and predictability of outcomes as well as the bills are important.
8. Don't think you are a hero if you come in under budget. That money has been set aside at the expense of another initiative and cannot be recovered.
9. They did not look favorably upon client satisfaction surveys. The panelists thought that face to face meetings with the in-house counsel with whom the attorneys worked would be more productive.
10. They like working with associates and are in favor of secondment programs especially for attorneys that they can later recruit.