Digital Transformation in Law Firms: Part I - Understand Your Customer

HOST: SCOTT DUDA: Good morning and welcome. I'm Scott Duda, an audit partner and leader of our Professional Services Group with Cherry Bekaert.

HOST: SCOTT DUDA: This is our first installment in our Law Firm Digital Transformation series. We're discussing the importance of law firm digital transformation, and in today's podcast we're going to talk about the importance of understanding your customer and how law firms on the digital transformation journey might leverage these capabilities to better know their customer.

HOST: SCOTT DUDA: I'm joined by Steve Holiday, director of Cherry Bekaert, who helps companies with their digital transformation journeys and provides guidance about improving business outcomes, especially using data. Welcome, Steve. Before we get started, Steve, can you help us set the table here? What is it we're really after, and what do we mean when we say "understand your customer"?

STEVE HOLIDAY: Thanks, Scott, for inviting me. It's a pleasure to be here.

STEVE HOLIDAY: Research tells us that customers who are delighted with a company's products or services are much more likely to buy more and to refer others. To achieve customer delight, research by Professor Norak Kino suggests there are several different types of needs to understand and deliver.

STEVE HOLIDAY: This research is commonly referred to as the Koo model: what is expected from a service, what is requested, and what is unexpected in a good way. Have you ever had a service experience that left you feeling, "Wow"? That's what I'm talking about.

STEVE HOLIDAY: You can't deliver a "wow" if you don't deliver what is expected or requested. Every interaction your customer has with you, someone in your firm, or one of its business processes is a customer moment of truth. Did we deliver? Were we easy to do business with? How did the interaction leave your customer feeling?

STEVE HOLIDAY: Putting measures in place to proxy for the customer experience is essential. For example, phone calls: how long did the customer wait on hold? How long did it take to return an inquiry?

STEVE HOLIDAY: Billing: was the bill accurate? Was the account credited correctly? Services: what was the matter for which they sought our assistance, what was the outcome, were they satisfied with the outcome, and what feedback did they have about those who helped them with their matter?

STEVE HOLIDAY: A critical capability in understanding your customer is having data that describes what experience they had with your company. It also means gathering relative information about your customer that would help anticipate their needs and interests.

STEVE HOLIDAY: I once studied the Ritz-Carlton for its legendary service. Each of their "ladies and gentlemen," as they call their staff, is responsible for collecting customer observations that help customize services for guests. These observations are fed into a guest reservation system to help deliver exemplary service.

STEVE HOLIDAY: When you pay attention to the details, the information you gather might lead to additional business with your company or might mean your customer sends referral business your way.

HOST: SCOTT DUDA: So what you're saying is understanding your customer or client is just good business. We hear so much about loyal clients generating repeat business or recommending services to others. What's the relationship between understanding your client and client loyalty?

STEVE HOLIDAY: Great question. I'm a big believer in that old adage: what gets measured gets done. By gathering data and focusing on improving key output metrics, you can improve loyalty by delivering upon customer needs.

STEVE HOLIDAY: If we revert to the Koo discussion earlier, it is difficult to wow a customer when basic needs are going unmet. As firms grow, there's inertia to maintaining a personal touch. I don't think any customer wants to feel like a number.

STEVE HOLIDAY: What is your firm doing to keep that personal touch? Do you monitor key touch points? Do you gather customer feedback? Do employees build customer profile data?

HOST: SCOTT DUDA: To pull this together, how does digital transformation help our listeners achieve better client loyalty?

STEVE HOLIDAY: Research shows that a loyal customer is a more profitable customer. To generate loyal customers, firms need to consistently meet customer needs. To meet customer needs, an organization needs to understand customer needs.

STEVE HOLIDAY: To better understand customer needs, an organization needs to gather customer information and use this information to improve processes and customer outcomes. A digital transformation assessment, if you have not already started a transformation journey, will help your organization create a roadmap for the capabilities you will need to improve loyalty.

STEVE HOLIDAY: In an assessment, we would look for the tools and techniques in use today and how those help your organization improve customer understanding. Some sample technology for a law firm transformation journey might include a CRM, the customer relationship management platform, as the heart of the customer information system.

STEVE HOLIDAY: It might include workflow systems to gather experiences in critical customer-facing processes. Workflows are all around an organization, and it's important to understand how long those workflows took and what the outcome was.

STEVE HOLIDAY: It might include websites as a key point of entry and initiation, and customer survey tools where we gather information about customer experiences related to recent touch points. Finally, I would suggest some type of customer dashboard that reflects progress in improving key processes and outcomes as an essential part of the digital transformation journey.

STEVE HOLIDAY: Data is absolutely essential, and how you bring that data together and represent it visually is a big part of helping to visualize the customer experience and know where you need to drive improvements.

HOST: SCOTT DUDA: That's great, Steve. Is there anything else you'd like to share with our listeners?

STEVE HOLIDAY: Yes. The digital transformation is an exciting opportunity to position your business for the future. Cherry Bekaert is here to help; please reach out to us if we can assist in any way.

STEVE HOLIDAY: I want to thank the listeners for being here. Be on the lookout for the next in our digital transformation series. The contact information for Steve and me is available where you access the podcast. We appreciate the opportunity to be your guide forward.