Question 1

What is a good client intake conversion rate for law firms?

Accepted Answer

A healthy conversion rate depends on your practice area and fee structure. For contingency-fee practices like personal injury, 20-30% is typical because firms screen out many cases that do not meet their criteria. For hourly or flat-fee practices like family law, estate planning, and criminal defense, 30-50% is a reasonable target. If your conversion rate is below 20% regardless of practice area, your intake process likely has significant friction points such as slow response time, excessive paperwork, or poor follow-up. Firms that implement automated intake consistently see conversion rate improvements of 25-40% within the first 90 days.

Question 2

How do I calculate my true cost per client acquisition?

Accepted Answer

Add up all costs associated with generating and converting leads over a given period. This includes direct marketing spend (advertising, SEO, directory listings, referral fees), staff time on intake activities (valued at their hourly rate or salary equivalent), technology costs (CRM, phone system, intake software), and overhead allocation for intake-related office space and supplies. Divide the total by the number of signed clients in that same period. Most firms find their true cost per acquisition is 2-3x higher than their marketing cost per lead because they fail to account for the staff time invested in converting each lead. The national average across all practice areas is approximately $1,200 per signed client.

Question 3

What are the biggest bottlenecks in law firm intake?

Accepted Answer

The five most common intake bottlenecks are: First, slow initial response, where leads wait hours or days before hearing from the firm, causing 50% to hire the first attorney who calls them back. Second, manual data collection, where clients are asked to fill out paper forms or provide the same information multiple times across phone calls, emails, and office visits. Third, conflict check delays, where manual conflict searches against existing client databases take hours instead of seconds. Fourth, engagement letter turnaround, where generating, sending, signing, and processing retainer agreements takes days when it should take minutes. Fifth, follow-up gaps, where leads who do not immediately convert receive no systematic follow-up sequence and are lost entirely. Automation addresses all five of these bottlenecks directly.

Question 4

How much can intake automation actually save my firm?

Accepted Answer

The savings depend on your current volume, conversion rate, and billing rate, which is exactly what this calculator quantifies for your specific firm. As a benchmark, a 5-attorney firm processing 100 leads per month with a 25% conversion rate and $350 average hourly rate typically saves $180,000-$240,000 annually through intake automation. This comes from three sources: recovered attorney time that can be redirected to billable work (usually the largest component), reduced staff costs from eliminating manual data entry and follow-up tasks, and increased revenue from higher conversion rates capturing clients who would have otherwise been lost to slow response or process friction.

Client Intake Efficiency Calculator for Law Firms

Measure Your Intake Efficiency

Client Intake Industry Benchmarks

How to Use This Calculator

Enter Your Lead Volume

Set Your Conversion Rate

Estimate Time and Cost Per Intake

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Benefits of Optimizing Your Intake Process

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a good client intake conversion rate for law firms?

How do I calculate my true cost per client acquisition?

What are the biggest bottlenecks in law firm intake?

How much can intake automation actually save my firm?

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