Ensuring Your Firm's Sport Tickets Are Used Effectively

Firm Issues

By Bob Weiss

May 2004

Recently one of our clients was sitting in his firm's $175 seats with a client at a playoff game. He turned to the young woman seated next to him and asked how she got her ticket for that night.

Our client was asking because she was sitting in a seat purchased by his firm. The young woman was about 20, wore low-slung jeans, had visible tattoos and a pierced navel. She was a stark contrast to the partner's guest.

She replied that her father had been given the tickets a few hours earlier by a neighbor. We later determined the neighbor was a client of the firm. She brought a friend for the other seat. The girls left at half-time saying they were going to check out the downtown nightclub scene, our client reported.

Our national survey of marketing effectiveness shows that a majority of all firms buy sports tickets as part of their business development efforts. Routinely, firms debate the effectiveness, efficiency, and cost of these tickets. We regularly hear stories of tickets gone begging, or when given away being passed along by firm clients to their own customers as if they were the client's tickets. We know of one instance where a client sold a firm's tickets to scalpers. Baseball tickets, due to the frequency of games, are problematic.

It's clear that a substantial portion of sports tickets purchased wind up providing little value to the law firm. As a result, firms should adopt a sports ticket policy to ensure these marketing dollars are not wasted.

First, it does lawyers little good to give someone tickets and then not accompany the recipient to the game. Tickets aren't gifts-they are opportunities to spend time with clients and prospects, to get to know them on a personal level, to learn what they need and how you can improve and expand your business relationship. Your firm's policy should be that lawyers must be present at the game with the client or prospect for tickets to be reimbursable.

Many firms worry they won't be able manage season tickets they buy if this is the policy. The answer for many firms has been to split tickets with another firm. Remember, it does not have to be another law firm. Many firms split tickets with their CPAs, insurance brokers, or bankers.

Your marketing director, or the managing partner's legal assistant, can track who gets the firm's tickets and who is taken to the game. Can't find someone to go to a game? Give the tickets to a hard-working member of your staff-and then move the cost off the marketing expense line and into HR.

ALYN-WEISS & ASSOCIATES, INC.
Public Relations | Marketing
1331 - 17th Street, Suite 410
Denver, CO 80202

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