How Much Should a Law Firm Spend on Marketing?
There’s no single right figure for how much a law firm should spend on marketing. The right budget comes from your growth goals, how competitive your practice areas are, the resource you already have and how long you can commit, and it should be reviewed against results.
Budget is usually one of the first questions a firm asks when it starts taking marketing seriously, and it’s a fair one. Partners want to know what they’re committing to, and what they’ll get back.
The difficulty is that a sensible figure for one firm can be far too much, or far too little, for another. So rather than give you a number to copy, this guide walks you through how to set a law firm marketing budget you can stand behind, and how to manage it once it’s in place.
Why there isn’t one right number
You’ll often see marketing budgets expressed as a percentage of fee income. It can be a useful sense check, but published benchmarks vary widely and many are drawn from the US market, where firms compete very differently. A percentage also tells you nothing about what the money should actually do.
A more reliable approach is to work upwards from what you want marketing to achieve, then check the total against what feels proportionate for your firm.
How to set a law firm marketing budget
These are the steps we’d suggest working through, ideally with the partners who’ll be signing off the spend.
1. Start with what you want marketing to achieve
Be specific about the business goals behind the budget. Growing a particular practice area, launching a new service, building a presence in a new city, strengthening directory rankings and attracting talent all need different activity, and cost different amounts. If you can’t name the goal, it’s very hard to judge whether the spend is working.
2. Work out what a new client is worth to you
Look at the typical value of an instruction in each practice area you want to grow, and how much repeat work or referral business a good client brings over time. This helps you decide what’s reasonable to spend to win one. A single commercial client can justify far more investment than a one-off, fixed-fee matter.
3. Consider how competitive your market is
Some areas of law are fiercely contested online, particularly high-volume consumer work, where firms compete hard for search visibility and paid advertising. Others rely more on reputation, referrals and directory rankings. The more competitive the market, the more sustained effort it takes to be seen, and the more your budget needs to reflect that.
4. Take stock of what you already have
Before adding new activity, look at what’s already in place: your website, your existing content, your contact data, any in-house marketing support and your directory and awards history. A marketing audit is a useful way to do this. It often shows that some of the budget is better spent fixing the foundations than adding new channels.
5. Choose where to focus
Very few firms need to be active everywhere at once. It’s usually better to do a few things well and consistently than to spread a budget thinly across every channel. This is where marketing strategy and planning earns its place, because it links each channel back to the goals you set in step one.
6. Budget for the full cost, not just the fee
Whether you hire in-house or work with an agency, there can be costs on top of the core fee. So, it’s worth considering:
- Paid advertising spend, if you run ads, which is paid to the platform separately
- Software and tools, such as email, social scheduling or analytics platforms
- Award entry fees and event tickets, where they apply
- Photography, video and printed materials
If you’re weighing up a new hire, remember to factor in salary, pension, recruitment, training and equipment too.
Our guide to in-house marketing vs agency covers that comparison in more detail.
7. Commit for long enough to see results
Much of the marketing that works best for law firms builds over time. Search visibility, content and reputation all take months rather than weeks, and legal directories run on an annual cycle so can take years.
It’s better to set a budget you can sustain for at least a year than a larger one you’ll need to cut after three months.
How to manage your budget once it’s set
Setting the budget is only half the job. The firms that get the most from their marketing spend tend to manage it actively.
- Agree what success looks like. Decide upfront which measures matter, such as enquiries, new instructions by source, directory rankings or website conversions, rather than likes and impressions alone.
- Review it regularly. A quarterly review is usually enough to see what’s working and move spend towards it.
- Keep some room for opportunities. A new award, a speaking slot or a change in the law can be worth responding to quickly.
- Share results with fee earners. When lawyers can see what marketing is delivering, it’s easier to connect it to business development and treat the budget as an investment rather than a cost.
How we approach marketing budgets at Ruche
We don’t start with a percentage. We start with a conversation about what you want to achieve, what you already have in place and what you’re comfortable spending, then shape a marketing retainer around it.
Retainers with Ruche start from £600 a month. A retainer can cover strategy, project management, social media, email marketing, website content (including SEO, GEO and AEO), design, and legal directory and award submissions, so you have one predictable monthly cost rather than a string of separate invoices.
That flexibility is what helps you find the right level of spend. Because the retainer is led by your goals and budget, you decide where the emphasis goes. You might start with a focused scope while you see what works, then build from there. As your priorities change, we review the retainer with you so the budget keeps following the results.
You can also request a trial run before you commit to anything, and one of our directors will be your account manager throughout.
Talk to us
Get in touch and we’ll talk it through properly. No pressure, no jargon, just an honest conversation about what your firm actually needs.
Award Winners for Four Years Running
- 2023 to 2026
SME News Business Elite Awards
- Content Marketing Agency of the Year Manchester 2026
- Best Legal & Professional Services Content Marketing Agency 2025
- Content Marketing Agency of the Year North West 2024
- Best Content Marketing Agency Manchester 2023
