Strategy is defined in the Pocket Oxford Dictionary as: 'The art of war, especially the part of it concerned with the conduct of campaigns, choice of operations to be attempted and getting forces into favourable positions for attempting them.'Strategy development is one of those topics that everyone thinks is difficult.

Purist advisers advocate complex academic processes, reams of research and rather dry reports that are unlikely to be used.

Not surprisingly, strategy is often neglected by small law firms.For those who prefer to get on with the job of generating new business, the development of a marketing strategy can seem like an unnecessary and tiresome task.

But strategy is vitally important if you want your firm's limited marketing resources to be used effectively.A marketing strategy will help you to: decide what it is you are trying to achieve and how; identify your target audiences; and produce the appropriate mix of activities to achieve your aims.The process of producing a strategy is often more valuable than the final product.

A small firm does not need an elaborate strategic planning process.

The following steps will guide you towards a basic but workable marketing strategy.

Put it on the agenda for the next partners meeting.-- Step A: positioning.

Where are you now? First, gather the following information:1.

a list of your 50 largest fee-earning clients and their businesses (if a commercial client), the services they use and their location;2.

annual fee breakdo wns by the type of service, ie personal injury, commercial conveyancing etc;3.

a list of the clients won and lost over the past six months, plus the reasons for those gains and losses;4.

a list of all the enquiries that have been received recently and their source, eg advertisements, mailshots etc;5.

the fee income and profitability figures for the past three years;6.

a list of all your most recent marketing activities and the results they have generated.Your systems are unlikely to have the exact information you require, so you should try to produce a close approximation.

Do not spend too long trying to get too much or perfect information - try to gain a broad picture and identify trends.

Then ask your partners and senior fee-earners and, if you are really brave, a few of your clients, to produce a list of the firm's strengths and weaknesses.If you have the time and resources it is a good idea also to gather some information about the local market.

This is where you can identify opportunities and threats.

What type, size and number of businesses are there locally? What industry sectors are they in? What competitors seem particularly active at present?The most difficult part of any strategy development is getting all the partners to agree on where they want the practice to go over the next few years.

Once the current situation both internally and externally is understood, a brief poll of the partners on 'what are the firm's aims?' should produce a list of aspirations that can then be prioritised through discussion.The emphasis of your strategy might be internal development, developing more work with existing clients, or winning new clients.

You must determine which aspects of your service are of most interest to the market and how your firm is different from your competitors, as this is an important part of your firm's positioning and strategy.

It will also become your main platform for later marketing activities.

Where there is difficulty identifying differences you might consider looking a little harder at your competitors or commissioning some research into selected clients' perceptions.There will be lots of options and the key is to select a few on which to concentrate.

You must decide on just one or two areas of service, eg personal injuries and employment law, and/or just one or two markets, eg companies with a turnover below £5m and the engineering sector, to promote actively.-- Step B: targeting.

Even major marketing campaigns need to focus on segments of the potential market in order to ensure their limited resources are directed at a manageable market and to ensure their messages are likely to be relevant to each segment of the market that is approached.

The review of your existing client list and your analysis of the local market should help you identify the specific groups of companies or individuals you are going to target.Try to identify groups with common interests or needs.

There are many different ways you might produce groups of target clients, for example:1.

location, eg companies or individuals in a five-mile radius of Ipswich;2.

industry sector, eg companies in the information technology sector;3.

size, eg companies with a turnover of between £3m and £6m;4.

interest/need, eg individuals who have had a workplace accident, companies producing large amounts of waste.For effective targeting of commercial organisations you will need information on contact names, addresses, telephone numbers, existing links with the firm, current advisers, size - turnover or number of employees - indus try etc.

A computerised list will make it easier to produce mailings and target lists for each partner and fee-earner.Targeting individuals is more difficult as the information is not usually so readily available.

Although you may not be able to get names and addresses, you should be able to identify the locality of the individuals and provide a profile of the sorts of attributes they might have, such as union membership or credit cards, and the places they might go, for instance public libraries or doctors' surgeries.These profiles will help you identify ways to reach this audience in an indirect way - through, perhaps, advertising or intermediaries - or to identify suitable mailing lists that can be hired.-- Step C: marketing planning.

There is a vast choice of marketing activities for you to select and blend together into a marketing campaign, so do not limit yourself to the usual brochure and advert.To be effective, your plan must not only indicate the range of activities to be undertaken but the date by which each will be completed and the name of the partner 'volunteering' to action it.

Each activity should reinforce other activities to maximise effectiveness.A regular check on progress of activities and results will ensure that your marketing strategy and plan remains a useful document and that your marketing is effective.