Darren Gower, head of marketing at Legal Futures Associate Eclipse Legal Systems, looks at how the largest law firm in the country, when judged by the number of branches it has, is using retail marketing principles to build a unique business model. It has created a scalable business that can be replicated and expanded rapidly and uniformly. Is this the future?

The legal market is undergoing seismic change. It’s not a threat of something that may happen; it’s happening now. If you wait to see how the market plays out, you will be too late. On a daily basis I engage with businesses, existing law firms and new entrants alike, who are plotting and taking action to radically change how legal services are delivered.

I’d hazard a guess that most of you look in the mirror every morning – whether you’re having a shave or putting on your make-up. The majority of people wouldn’t dream of walking out of the house without checking they present the right image, but do you pay the same level of attention to the first impression your firm gives?

Twitter now has over 500m users, 340m tweets and 1.6bn search queries per day. LinkedIn has over 175m professional members, 10m of whom work in the UK. Google+ has over 400m members (albeit with less activity than other networks). Legal Futures reported last year about how social media is the new golf course for law firms. There’s a buzz about social media for a reason and 2013 is likely to see a continued increase in the way social channels are used for business purposes. For the more advanced users, we will see an increase in more targeted interactions within niche communities and it will be important to align strategies accordingly.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has been celebrating the first year of its ABS licensing regime. It is not just a numbers game, but with 74 licences granted in that time and 300-odd still inching their way through the application process, it perhaps hasn’t necessarily been quite as glorious a first year as the SRA is making out – another way of looking at it is that there is a large backlog – but it has certainly been interesting given the range of approvals.