Marketing without Attribution Is Just Expensive Guesswork: Lessons from the Legal Industry

Guest Post by Bobby Steinbach from MeanPug Digital

In the legal industry, marketing budgets are anything but modest. The top firms in the U.S. routinely spend hundreds of thousands, sometimes even millions, of dollars per year to attract cases. This is rightfully so, because one high-value case can generate tens of thousands to millions of dollars in revenue.

But here’s the problem: too often, firms make decisions based on gut feelings rather than hard data. These decisions are contingent on clicks, impressions, or anecdotal feedback, resulting in statements no business owner ever wants to hear, like “Well..we think it’s working”. In reality, the uncertainty of it all drains your marketing budget every day, without any definitive data or results to justify the amount of spend. 

The truth, though, is that marketing without attribution is just expensive guesswork. And in a high-stakes, hypercompetitive industry like law, that kind of guesswork can cost more than a missed opportunity – it can cost you dominance over your market. Attribution tools like CallTrackingMetrics (CTM) can help transform “we think” moments into “we know” confidence, giving legal marketers and agencies the data they need to back their budgeting decisions more responsibly.

The High Stakes of Legal Marketing Spend

When you break it down, legal advertising can be quite pricey:

• Cost-per-click (CPC) for valuable legal keywords can exceed $100 in competitive markets.
• Large firms may spend $50,000 to $500,000+ per month on advertising across their channels.
• A single misallocated campaign can waste six figures annually.

When your ad budget rivals the price of a luxury home, a “let’s hope this works” idea isn’t a strategy; it’s a liability. 

Why “Vanity Metrics” Just Don’t Cut It

Many firms still measure marketing success using surface-level metrics like impressions, click-through rates, and social likes and shares. While these numbers look impressive on a report, they often don’t correlate to revenue. A social post with 10,000 likes but zero calls from qualified leads, for example, delivers little to no ROI.

The real questions firms should be asking are:

• Which campaigns actually drive phone calls?
• Which ad sources bring in qualified, case-worthy leads?
• What’s the true cost to acquire a new client?

Without attribution, those answers are just guesswork – and guesswork in legal marketing is too expensive to risk.

What Attribution Means in the Legal Industry

Attribution isn’t just about reporting. It’s about understanding exactly how clients find your business and using that information to invest in your brand more smartly.

In legal marketing, signing a retainer often begins with a phone call, not a web form. Call tracking platforms like CTM allow firms to:

• Assign unique tracking numbers to different campaigns (Google Ads, social media, billboards, TV spots, etc.)
• See exactly which source, keyword, or ad creative triggered the call
• Integrate that data into CRMs or case management systems for closed-loop ROI tracking

When attribution is built into the process, every marketing dollar is properly accounted for.

Case Example: Social Media Video Ads in Action

One mid-sized firm worked with legal marketing agency MeanPug to test the waters on trying out video and social media advertising. However, without call tracking, they could only measure their video views, click-through rates, likes, comments, and shares. But none of those metrics could answer the one question the partners cared about most: “Did this campaign generate actual calls from qualified leads?”

To solve this, MeanPug added a dedicated call tracking number to their account that was assigned exclusively to social media videos. Any call made to that number could only have originated from someone who saw a video in that campaign.

Within just two weeks, the firm received a call to that number from a qualified lead with a case inquiry. Interestingly, the caller never mentioned seeing the video, which would have left the conversion invisible without call tracking. That one call justified that the firm should further invest in video ads, and without attribution, the firm might have scrapped the campaign entirely, assuming it “wasn’t working.”

Why Call Tracking Matters for Legal ROI

In legal marketing, where one case can pay for an entire year of advertising, attribution helps law firms identify:

• Which PPC keywords lead to signed cases
• Whether social media ads generate actual phone calls
• If offline channels like billboards or print ads are worth the spend

Without call tracking, underperforming campaigns can drain budgets for months before anyone notices. Attribution data allows firms to cut losses fast and redirect funds toward their more successful channels.

Call Tracking Justifies (and Protects) a Law Firm’s Marketing Budget

Whether you’re an in-house marketer or an outside agency, you’ve likely had to, at some point, defend your budget to your partners. Attribution provides hard numbers that transform subjective “marketing success” into measurable ROI.

Common mistakes firms make without attribution include:

• Relying Only on “Last Click” Data – The last click before a contact form or call doesn’t tell the whole story. Multiple touchpoints, like search ads, remarketing, and social content, can and do work well together to create a lead.
• Ignoring Phone Call Conversions – In the legal field, phone calls are still the dominant conversion method. Tracking only form fills leaves a huge data gap.
• Combining Different Campaigns – Without unique tracking numbers for each channel, it is impossible to parse out the higher-performing sources from the dead weight.

How to Implement Attribution in Legal Marketing

The first thing you want to do when implementing attribution in legal marketing is map out the client’s journey. Outline every touchpoint, from PPC ads to community sponsorships, that might influence a potential client before they call.

Next, you’ll want to assign unique tracking numbers to each campaign, platform, or ad type. Then, you need to integrate call tracking data into your case management system to connect your revenue back to its marketing source. Check your attribution reports regularly to spot trends, stop waste, and commit to investing in what’s actually working.

Attribution as a Competitive Advantage

In an industry where client acquisition costs can reach thousands of dollars, knowing exactly which campaigns deliver signed cases isn’t just nice to have – it’s a competitive edge. Firms that master attribution can:

• Confidently outspend competitors
• Test new marketing channels without fear of wasted investment
• Build a sustainable, data-backed growth strategy

Legal marketing agencies benefit from attribution as well. Attribution strengthens the relationships clients enjoy with their marketing agencies by providing law firms with the value of their campaigns using clear, indisputable data.

Guessing Is Expensive. Data Pays for Itself.

In legal marketing, every decision you make has high stakes attached. Without attribution, firms risk wasting six-figure budgets on campaigns that look successful but deliver little value.

Attribution turns those question marks into data-backed decisions. It’s not just about tracking calls; it’s about turning marketing from a cost center into a predictable revenue engine. For law firms ready to move beyond “we think it’s working” and into a world of data-backed certainty, attribution is the first and most important step they can take on their path to success.

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