The High Cost of Cheap Intake: Why Cutting Corners Hurts Law Firms

We’ve been at this for a long time. Over the past decade, we’ve offered countless reminders to the legal community about the importance of new client intake and never treating lead capture as an afterthought.

For years, law firms were largely unaware of just how critical legal intake is. It was a blind spot for most attorneys. But as time has passed and discussions about intake have become more common, a new problem has emerged.

Today, most law firm leaders know how valuable intake is. They’re not neglecting it out of ignorance. They’re neglecting it to save a buck.

We understand the instinct to cut costs wherever possible, but lead capturing is the absolute last place where law firms should try to save a few dollars. Cutting corners here might save money today, but it will cost far, far more in lost revenue tomorrow.

Is Your Firm Shutting The Door On New Clients?

Imagine you’re throwing a huge party and have invited the whole town. You’ve spent countless hours and a ton of money building excitement, creating videos that showcase what the party will look like, running social media ads about why it’s an event no one should miss, and ensuring every detail is top quality.

But there’s just one problem: when the party begins, the front door is locked and no one is there to welcome the guests. Your advertising did its job and people showed up, but no one is ready to greet them. Inside, you have top-tier service and amenities waiting, yet no one will ever get the chance to experience them.

Guests arrive, realize no one is there to let them in, and quickly move on to find another party. All that was needed was a team ready to open the door and make them feel welcome. But you decided that was an area where you could cut costs.

You’ve probably guessed by now that this is a metaphor for lead capturing. In this case, the party is your law firm.

When you invest in marketing, you are essentially inviting a crowd of new people to your front door. These days, they may not be knocking on your physical office door, but they are calling your phone or reaching out online. Your window to respond is just as short as if they were standing outside waiting to be let in.

People have little patience these days and endless options for legal help. You need to be ready to greet them right away or you’ll lose them.

What It Takes To Capture New Clients In 2025

We’ll drop the metaphor now and get straight to the heart of what law firms need to do today to effectively capture new business.

You must be ready to answer phone calls 24/7.

This is simply non-negotiatable for growing law practices.

Now to be clear, it doesn’t have to be you personally taking every call. In fact, we advise against you doing that. But you do need a trained representative of your firm available to greet potential new clients at all hours of the day.

At this point, some of you are probably holding your wallets a little tighter, cringing at the thought of hiring round-the-clock phone answering staff. The good news is there are affordable virtual receptionist services available that can cover the calls your existing team can’t get to.

If you choose a service like Answering Legal, you’ll get 24/7 coverage from a team of highly trained professionals who specialize in legal intake and lead capture.

Yes, there will be a cost to ensuring your firm is always ready to greet new leads. You’ll need to get over that. Because if you don’t make this investment, you’ll pay for it in lost opportunities.

If a potential client calls at 10:45 p.m. and no one answers the phone, you’ll almost certainly lose their business. Chances are, that person is facing a time-sensitive legal problem and needs to speak with someone right away. Sending them to voicemail is the equivalent of hanging a “closed” sign on your door. Stressed individuals looking for urgent help won’t wait around. They’ll keep dialing the phone until a law firm picks up.

Letting that kind of opportunity slip away just to save a few hundred dollars a month is shortsighted. For most firms, the revenue from even one missed case could easily cover a full year of service with a company like Answering Legal. Recovering multiple missed cases each week could result in several thousands of dollars in additional revenue for your firm.

A Brief Sidebar On Handling Online Leads

We’d be remiss not to mention that in 2025 welcoming potential new clients via your website is just as important as answering their phone calls. While phone calls remain one of the top ways new clients reach out, many prospects now prefer to begin conversations with new businesses online first. Therefore…

Your website must offer 24/7 live communication.

Of course, you shouldn’t be the one monitoring chatbot messages day and night. But you do need an expert presence ready to engage visitors, provide instant answers to their questions, and guide them through an initial intake process.

Fortunately, there’s a solution that makes this simple and affordable. Answering Legal has developed an AI-powered intake chatbot that we offer completely free to all law firms.

That’s right, we said free. So there’s absolutely no excuse for not taking advantage.

Our chatbot uses the latest in AI technology to deliver instant, empathetic, and conversational responses to web visitors. It asks customized questions designed by your firm, walks potential clients through the entire intake process, and then sends all the collected details directly to you once the conversation ends. Our team will even assist with installation to ensure your chatbot is live and ready to capture leads right away.

You can explore our chatbot further and book a demo here.

Now back to capturing leads over the phone…

I’m sure some of our more ambitious readers might be thinking, “Why don’t I just answer the phone myself 24/7 and save the money?”

Well, that’s certainly one approach.

Where The “I’ll Do It Myself” Approach Goes Wrong

Let’s go back to the scenario where a potential client calls your firm at 10:45 at night. This time, the call is forwarded directly to your cell phone. It’s now on you to put on your game face, answer with warmth, guide the caller through the entire intake process, record all of their information, and schedule a follow-up conversation.

Are you ready for that? More importantly, are you ready to go through that process potentially several times a night?

Many of these late-night calls will not even be from viable leads. They’ll often be irrelevant or spam, which means you’ll frequently interrupt your personal time for no real reason, simply out of fear of missing a genuine opportunity.

Running a growing law practice is already mentally and physically exhausting. You’re probably making sacrifices with your health, family, and personal time as it is. Adding “24/7 intake specialist” to your list of responsibilities is a recipe for burnout. You might be able to keep it up for a short while, but sooner or later, exhaustion will catch up to you.

Burnt Out Attorneys Shockingly Aren’t Great At Intake

If protecting your personal well-being isn’t reason enough to invest in phone support, consider the impression you make on new leads. A tired, half-awake attorney answering calls late at night probably won’t deliver the warm, professional first impression that converts prospects into clients. Rushed or cranky responses can send potential clients straight to another firm.

And what happens if a Spanish-speaking caller reaches out after hours? Are you prepared to communicate effectively with them? A virtual receptionist service like Answering Legal provides 24/7 bilingual answering, but most attorneys won’t be able to match that level of accessibility on their own.

In short, the do-it-yourself approach comes with a high risk of burnout, missed opportunities, and poor customer service. It’s not a wise path to take.

It’s Time To Test Out A New Approach

You already know how crucial client intake is. You’d be fooling yourself to think otherwise. Letting new leads go unanswered for hours isn’t just bad business strategy. It’s wasted marketing spend.

Handling new leads on your own around the clock simply isn’t sustainable. You know this. You’ll burn out quickly, and your clients will feel the effects.

At this point, it all comes down to cost. But the truth is, the investment pays for itself once you start capturing clients you would have otherwise lost without 24/7 lead capturing support.

If your firm’s budget is too tight right now to invest in help from an answering service, we completely understand. At the very least, take a look at our pricing and make use of our free intake chatbot so your online leads are always covered.

For those who do have room in the budget and are simply holding back, it’s time to stop pinching pennies. Invest in a virtual receptionist service, and within weeks you’ll start to see real ROI.

We’ll even let you try this approach before you commit to spending. Answering Legal offers a 400-minute free trial for all law firms.

You can get started by booking a consultation call with a member of our team. During the call, you’ll get a preview of how our service works, have the opportunity to fully customize how we represent your firm, and get answers to any questions you may have about our company.

Fill out this form to get started.

Want to learn more about what it takes to master legal intake? Tune in to our new podcast, The Legal Intake Experts! In each episode, marketing pros Nick Werker and Tony Prieto share practical intake tips, real-world examples, and insights on the latest trends shaping the legal industry. See the first episode here!