All Posts by Michael Feit

Is the Tide Turning in Summer Associate Vendor Preference? Our Survey Results Are In!

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

One of the key indicators for predicting vendor success year after year has been the preference of incoming summer associates for Westlaw or Lexis.  For the last 5+ years, Westlaw has overwhelmingly been preferred by incoming Summer Associates.

Feit’s 2019 Summer Associate Vendor Preference Mini-Survey results show that the tide may be turning. 

We asked U.S. law firm research departments to participate in a survey of their perception of Summer Associate legal information provider  preference/awareness. 

Our survey results show that, although Westlaw has maintained its dominance in regards to the awareness and preferences of incoming associates, Lexis is moving the needle.  According to the survey, Summer Associate preference for Lexis doubled – from 15% last year to 30% this year.

Check out a sneak peek of some of the data collected: 

Lexis’ strategic push to concentrate on law schools is critical for them to successfully compete with Westlaw.  While 30% is an improvement, their academic program has a long way to go before Westlaw is dethroned.

Get the full details from Summer Associate Vendor Preference Mini-Survey – you can purchase here.

Mini-Survey: Westlaw Edge and Lexis Context

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

There’s a lot of buzz around Analytics/AI products like Westlaw Edge and Lexis Context—but to what degree are firms actually purchasing these products and, more importantly, are they happy with their purchase?  

We decided to find out! 

Last week, Feit Consulting launched a mini-survey to capture the reality behind the buzz—and the results are very telling already.  In a very short period of time, over 60 law firms (25% in the AmLaw 200) have participated in our survey.  This indicates to us that firms have a high degree of interest in understanding from their peers the value of these new tools.

An early result we can share is the percentage of firms that have Westlaw who have purchased Edge is roughly the same as the number of firms that have Lexis and have purchased Context: trending at 15%.

Context seems to be getting much more consideration, however, because of its much lower cost.  At this point 40% of firms with Lexis are actively considering Context. 

The proof in the pudding will be firms’ satisfaction with these products—we will continue to compile this data and will share the results with our survey participants.

If you and your firm want in on the complete data, participate!  All survey participants will receive a complimentary copy of the results —and participation takes less than 3 minutes.  The survey is open now and will close June 16th. 

Why Optimize Pricing? Here’s What Your Firm Could Gain

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

Feit Consulting’s Optimizing Legal Information Pricing book helps firms optimize their legal information vendor spend.  What surprises firms, however, is what this really means in hard dollar savings.  In just the first year, a typical 200 attorney firm could achieve over a million dollars in savings.   Watch the video below to learn how it works! 

Customer Sentiment vs. Pricing: Why are these not aligned?

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

One would think that customer sentiment and pricing would be like a dot-to-dot exercise with a straight line easily drawn from high levels of satisfaction to steady, if not incremental, year-over-year price increases. Instead, other factors like hitting the price ceiling and reaching critical mass with ancillary products also influences forecasted pricing.

This disconnect is what we found as a result of our analysis central to Feit Consulting’s 2019 Legal Information Pricing book.  When juxtaposing customer sentiment with the pricing forecast analysis, there are some striking discontinuities which at first glance, may seem even contradictory. 

The market, for instance, has a very favorable opinion of Westlaw; in fact, the most favorable opinion of any provider.

However, our pricing forecast went on to show Westlaw as the only product covered in 2019 Legal Information Pricing whose price will decline over the next five years.  How could this be?

Ironically, Westlaw’s consistent strong performance in comparison to Lexis, makes it extremely vulnerable.  Currently at nearly double Lexis pricing, the report fleshes out the unsustainability of this price gap.  In short, Westlaw–and the market–may have found its pricing ceiling.

Flipping the sentiment, on the other end of the scale, 32% of respondents were extremely or moderately dissatisfied with Lexis. However, this did not correspond with linear drop in price as Lexis now offers an array of products that most firms consider indispensable.  Lexis may have reached a ‘critical mass’ with well-used ancillary products that are creating different outcomes than expected. 

In terms of sentiment, Bloomberg is by far the biggest loser with 64% dissatisfaction.  However, our guidance indicates price growth for Bloomberg as they have important content.  In addition, the market now expects aggressive price increases.  As Bloomberg improves, we expect its pricing to stay competitive with Lexis and move toward Westlaw over the next five years. If you believe Bloomberg’s hype, its product will improve each year substantially and unlike with Westlaw and Lexis, and firms will not have to purchase add-ons as the product improves.

A comprehensive discussion is outlined in 2019 Legal Information Pricing.

Rethink Recovery?

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

Recovery rates continue to decline.

However, when we drilled down into our 2019 Legal Information Market Survey results we noticed a trend, with recovery rates holding steady at firms that continue to try.  This made us ask the question; should the trend to move online legal research costs to overhead be reconsidered?

Clearly the heyday of recovery is over.  Prior to the 2008 Recession a law firm could expect to ‘recover’ (bill clients for) 85% or more of their online research costs for Westlaw and Lexis. For a large firm, recovery at those rates meant hundreds of thousands (often millions) of dollars in cost reduction.  Often wiping out the vast majority of the cost of online legal research.  A firm with good recovery could effectively purchase and use Westlaw and Lexis as if it were free.  Clients were footing the bill, and there was little pressure on the firm side to analyze ROI or make strategic and optimal choices between offerings available on competing platforms.

After the Great Recession, everything changed.  Recovery rates nosedived as client’s began to scrutinize their billing and often removed Wexis charges as a matter of course.

Our survey results indicate that nationally all firm recovery is averaging 28%.  However, for Firms that actively try to recover (backing out the firms that have already moved to overhead) the true recovery rate has been holding at 38%.  Firms have discovered that there is a ‘bottom’ on the deterioration of pass-through costs and it looks like recovery has somewhat stabilized.

The overhead trend is clearly entrenched now, but it makes you wonder if it makes economic sense for anyone to move recovery to overhead.   You can learn more about the overhead trend, and see specific data and charts in our book Optimizing Legal Information Pricing.  This is particularly true in a market where vendors are aggressively increasing their prices and firms are looking for ways to reduce costs.

Obviously, there are cultural and qualitative reasons to move away from recovery.  Attorneys don’t like to pass through one-off research costs to clients or risk irritating them.  Many lawyers and firms believe there is a hidden marketing benefit to clients when the firm does not charge for online research costs.  We hear this often, but the true benefits are difficult to quantify.

On the other hand, if you are recovering our market average of 38 cents on the dollar, and your firm’s spend with Wexis is $1 million a year, your return on your recovery efforts is $380,000.  Obviously, there is a diminishing return the smaller the firm size (and the research cost).  In most cases, however, successful recovery provides some wiggle room in your budget to offset costs.

This made us re-think the idea that recovery should be a dying trend.  We now see an important upside in maintaining and enhancing recovery.

Pricing Mysteries Unlocked! What’s Inside our Optimizing Legal Information Pricing Book

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

In the world of legal information, pricing is a secret.  Secrecy is always an advantage to the seller, and a disadvantage to the buyer.  2019 Optimizing Legal Information Pricing is a guidebook we created for consumers to learn how their prices compare, and ultimately improve their negotiation outcomes.

What’s inside the 2019 edition?  Just take a look at the range of insights that offer firms of any size incredible value: