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If you were to strike up a conversation back in the day with any general counsel and ask them how they used to pick outside law firms, they’d probably come up with some version of this story: “Well, we’d short list firms the company has always used and maybe someone a colleague recommended over lunch.”
That has now changed as legal departments are spending more on outside counsel this year, not less. According to the findings of a survey conducted by the Association of Corporate Counsel, nearly half of chief legal officers planned to increase their outside counsel budgets in 2025, a jump of 17% from the year before.
So, evidently, there is more work up for grabs. The catch is that winning it now takes more than a good relationship and a solid name. Buyers are researching law firms the way they'd research any vendor, comparing specifics and checking track records, long before they pick up the phone.
This article walks through how that buying behaviour has changed, what it takes to build expertise visible enough to survive that scrutiny, how to turn it into actual client conversations, and how to tell if any of it is working.
How buyers choose firms today
In a 2026 survey of 516 general counsel worldwide commissioned by Axiom, 90% said their departments are still under heavy pressure to cut legal spend, and more than 80% plan to shift more work away from traditional law firms.
Reputation is carrying less weight too. Above the Law's own 2025 rankings, built from interviews with roughly 550 in-house lawyers, capture the same shift. Instead of asking "which firm is biggest," the survey asks in-house lawyers which firms they actually hire, and for what kind of work. That's a far more useful signal for a buyer trying to decide who to trust.
General counsel increasingly describe this as a deliberate process, not a habit. Eva Kovacic, General Counsel at pharmaceutical company Belupo, told CEE In-House Matters that her department "follows a structured procurement process to ensure a fair and thorough selection."
Here's the shift explained in simple terms:
How to build proof of expertise before you ever pitch
If buyers are researching firms before they call, a firm's content has one job, which is to make its expertise visible and specific, well before anyone books a meeting.
Generic legal content doesn't do that job. An article that just restates a law in plain English is quick to write and just as quick to skip past, because it only proves you can read a statute. It doesn't prove you have real experience.
For a law firm, publishing more original research and real data might look like a breakdown of exactly how a new regulation hits one specific industry, a firm's own numbers on how its recent deals or cases actually turned out, or a partner willing to put a specific, debatable opinion in writing about where a law is heading.
Incidentally, where that content gets published matters almost as much as what it says. Profound, which tracks how often AI tools cite different websites, studied 1.4 million citations between November 2025 and February 2026 and found LinkedIn had become the single most-cited source for professional questions across ChatGPT, Gemini, Google's AI tools, Copilot, and Perplexity. LinkedIn's citation rate on ChatGPT alone roughly doubled over that stretch.
So a well-written LinkedIn post now does two jobs at once. It reaches the humans doing their own research, and it feeds the exact sources AI tools pull from when someone asks an AI assistant which firm actually knows a given area of law.
That overlap is why AI search visibility has quietly become part of how firms think about marketing, rather than a side experiment.
Here's a simple test to ascertain whether content clears the bar: could a generic competitor have written this exact piece? If the honest answer is yes, it's not doing its job.
How to go about turning that visibility into actual conversations
Publishing good content and hoping someone calls isn't a strategy; it's a wish. Therefore, every piece of authority content needs a specific next step attached to it, or it just sits there looking impressive.
This matters more now because the old panels are breaking down. When companies worked off a fixed list, business development mostly meant staying close to the people already on it. Now that buyers are actively building a flexible mix of firms, alternative providers, and in-house teams, a firm has to earn its way onto that list the same way any vendor would, backed by a real outbound cadence, not just published content and good intentions.
How to tell if any of this is actually working
Page views and LinkedIn likes are easy numbers to pull and easy to feel good about, because neither one tells you whether the content is bringing in business. Here are the 3 measures that actually matter:
- Content-to-consult attribution. Which specific pieces of content came before a first conversation with a new prospect? Track it in the CRM, instead of playing the guessing game.
- Pipeline velocity. How long does it take a prospect to go from first engaging with content to an actual scoping call? A slow number tells you whether the problem is visibility, credibility, or someone just not following up.
- Where new matters actually come from. Is the share of new business coming from outside the firm's old panel and referral network growing, shrinking, or staying flat?
This is the same logic behind Mavlers Agency's GEO Visibility Index framework, adapted here for professional-services firms, which can help track how often a firm gets cited on the platforms general counsel are increasingly asking questions on, keep an eye on how that compares to named competitor firms, and connect AI and organic traffic back to actual scoping calls, not just visits.
A firm that only tracks total new business, without breaking down where it came from, has no way to know if it's building something repeatable or just coasting on a shrinking pool of old relationships.
Where to actually start
None of this replaces relationship-driven business development. It gives that work something to stand on. And it matters more now precisely because the old panel system, the one that used to guarantee a steady stream of familiar work, is no longer something buyers default to.
The starting point is smaller than most firms expect; one piece of genuinely original content, sent out with a specific outreach plan attached, tested against the three measures above before anyone scales it up.
Frequently asked questions
How long before this actually brings in inquiries?
Give it 2 to 3 quarters before authority content shows up in inbound inquiries. Search engines and AI tools need time to index it, and buyers usually need repeated exposure before they act. Direct outreach and warm introductions built on that content can move faster, since they don't depend on being discovered first.
Should firms drop referrals in favour of content and outreach?
No. Referrals and panel relationships are still a major source of work. This approach adds a second channel that doesn't depend entirely on who a firm already knows, which matters more as panels loosen.
Does this apply to smaller, boutique practices too?
Yes, arguably even more. A boutique firm without a big name or an existing panel spot has to lean harder on demonstrated expertise just to get onto a shortlist in the first place, since it can't fall back on brand recognition.
What's the most common mistake firms make here?
Publishing good content and never attaching a plan to act on it. A sharp article with no follow-up outreach behind it earns visibility, but rarely turns into an actual conversation.
