What's a Realistic Cost-Per-Signed-Case I Should Expect?

The Question Every Firm Owner Asks Us

After working with over 1,400 law firms, we can tell you this is the most common question we hear. And honestly, it should be. Your cost per signed case determines whether your marketing is an investment or an expensive hobby.

Here's the straight answer: most firms should expect to pay somewhere between $800 and $5,000 per signed case. That range is massive, we know. But the number that matters for your firm depends entirely on what kind of law you practice and what those cases are actually worth to you.

We've watched firms celebrate a $3,000 acquisition cost while others panic at $1,500. Both reactions can be completely justified depending on context. A personal injury firm bringing in $50,000 cases at $3,000 per acquisition is printing money. A criminal defense attorney paying $1,500 for a $3,000 DUI case is bleeding out slowly.

What the Numbers Actually Look Like Across Practice Areas

Personal injury sits at the expensive end of the spectrum, and there's a good reason for it. Every PI attorney in your market is competing for the same car accident victims, and the margins justify aggressive spending. We typically see firms paying between $1,500 on the low end and $5,000 or more when competition heats up. The sweet spot tends to land around $2,500 to $3,000 per signed case. When your average case value runs $15,000 to $50,000, those numbers make perfect sense.

Criminal defense operates in a completely different economy. Cases need to close fast, clients are often desperate, and the decision-making window is short. This works in your favor. Acquisition costs typically run $800 to $2,000, with most firms landing around $1,200 to $1,500. Your case values of $3,000 to $10,000 can absolutely support these numbers if your intake process is tight.

Family law falls somewhere in the middle. We see costs ranging from $1,200 to $2,500, with averages hovering around $1,800 to $2,000. Case values of $5,000 to $15,000 mean you have decent margin to work with, but you need to watch these numbers carefully. Family law clients often shop around more than other practice areas, which can inflate your costs if you're not converting consultations effectively.

Immigration tends to be the most affordable acquisition in legal marketing. Costs typically run $600 to $1,500, averaging $900 to $1,200 per signed case. The catch is that case values also tend to be lower, usually $3,000 to $8,000. The math still works, but there's less room for error.

The Only Rule That Actually Matters

We've spent years refining benchmarks and analyzing data across hundreds of firms, and it all comes down to one principle: your maximum acceptable cost per signed case should never exceed 20% of your average case value.

This isn't arbitrary. At 20%, you retain enough margin to cover overhead, pay your staff, invest in your practice, and actually take home a reasonable profit. Push past this threshold and you're working for your marketing vendor instead of yourself.

Run the math on your own practice. If your average family law case bills $8,000, your maximum acquisition cost is $1,600. If you're paying $2,200, you're underwater regardless of how many cases you're signing. Volume doesn't fix bad unit economics.

We've seen firms try to rationalize higher acquisition costs by pointing to lifetime value or referral potential. Sometimes that logic holds up. More often, it's wishful thinking disguised as strategy. Stick to the 20% rule until you have hard data proving your clients actually refer and return at rates that justify higher acquisition spending.

Seven Signs You're Getting Ripped Off

We've audited enough marketing relationships to recognize the patterns. If any of these sound familiar, you have a problem that needs addressing.

Your cost per case exceeds 25% of case value. Some fluctuation above 20% is normal, especially when you're scaling or testing new channels. But sustained costs above 25% mean you're subsidizing someone else's business model. We've seen firms lose six figures annually because they never did this basic calculation.

Lead quality doesn't match what you're paying. We had a member paying $400 per lead for "exclusive" personal injury contacts. Half were fender benders with no injury, a quarter had already hired other attorneys, and the rest couldn't pass a basic intake screening. Price and quality should correlate. When they don't, someone's lying to you.

Nothing improves despite constant promises of optimization. If your vendor has been "optimizing" for six months and your numbers haven't moved, the optimization isn't happening. Real optimization produces measurable results within 60 to 90 days. Everything else is just excuse-making.

You can't get clear reporting on your actual costs. Any legitimate marketing partner can tell you exactly what you spent, how many signed cases resulted, and what your cost per acquisition came out to. If you're getting vanity metrics like impressions and clicks instead of revenue numbers, your partner is hiding something.

Long contracts with minimum monthly spends. The firms most confident in their results don't need to lock you in. We're deeply suspicious of any arrangement requiring 12-month commitments with substantial minimums. Good performance creates its own retention.

Your speed to lead exceeds 30 minutes. This isn't strictly a vendor problem, but it's often a symptom of a broken system. We've analyzed intake data across hundreds of firms, and the correlation between response time and conversion is staggering. If leads are sitting for hours before contact, you're paying premium prices for discount results.

You're paying per lead instead of for performance. The per-lead model fundamentally misaligns incentives. Your vendor profits from volume; you profit from signed cases. These are not the same thing. We've moved most of our members toward performance-based arrangements where vendors share risk in the outcome. Unsurprisingly, lead quality improved dramatically once vendors had skin in the game.

What Good Firms Do Differently

The firms with the best acquisition economics share common habits. They track obsessively. Not just total spend and total cases, but cost per lead by channel, conversion rates by case type, lifetime value by acquisition source, and close rates by intake staff member. You can't optimize what you don't measure.

They also negotiate. Marketing isn't a commodity with fixed pricing. The firms paying $2,000 per case in markets where competitors pay $3,500 got there by pushing back, testing alternatives, and refusing to accept the first number they were quoted.

Most importantly, they understand that acquisition cost is only half the equation. We work with firms who pay above-market acquisition costs but still outperform competitors because their intake process converts at 40% while the industry averages 25%. A $2,500 cost per signed case with a 40% close rate beats a $1,500 cost with a 20% close rate every single time.

Setting Your Own Benchmarks

Stop comparing yourself to industry averages that may have nothing to do with your market, your practice mix, or your operational capabilities. Your benchmark should be based on your numbers.

Start with your average case value over the last 12 months. Multiply by 0.20. That's your ceiling. Then work backward from your current cost per acquisition. If you're above the ceiling, you need to either improve conversion rates, negotiate better marketing costs, or raise your prices.

If you're below the ceiling, you have a decision to make. You can pocket the additional margin, or you can reinvest to acquire more cases and grow faster. Both are legitimate choices. The point is that you're making a strategic decision instead of flying blind.

We've helped firms cut their acquisition costs by 40% in a single quarter just by implementing basic tracking and holding their vendors accountable to actual performance. The opportunity is usually there. Most firms just haven't done the work to find it.

The Bottom Line

Your cost per signed case should make mathematical sense for your practice. Personal injury firms can sustain $2,500 to $3,000 because their case values justify it. Criminal defense attorneys should push back hard if anyone quotes them above $1,500. Family law and immigration fall somewhere in between.

Whatever your practice area, the 20% rule keeps you honest. If you're spending more than 20% of your average case value to acquire new clients, you're making your marketing company rich at your own expense.

The firms that grow fastest aren't necessarily the ones spending the most on marketing. They're the ones who understand exactly what each case costs to acquire, what each case is worth, and how to keep the ratio sustainable. Master these fundamentals and the growth takes care of itself.