LexisNexis: Helping Firms Wise Up

LexisNexis today released a slew of new solutions to help professional services firms do more business better. The Client Development solutions line comprises two new solutions, LexisNexis atVantage and the LexisNexis Corporate Intelligence Subscription. The line rounds out LexisNexis' Total Practice Solutions strategy, targeted at services firms, and the release marks the integration of a wider information base for LexisNexis users, aimed at helping firms tighten their hold on existing customers and grow their business with new clients.

Denis Pombriant, founder and managing principle of Beagle Research, explains that optimized information is crucial to services firms as they sell to a saturated space. "The number of customers [for service firms] is relatively fixed and the number of vendors is much more elastic," he says. "If professional service firms are going to grow, it's because they are better able to be attuned to customer needs, are able to sell more into the same customers. It's all about wallet share."

LexisNexis's Client Development line will provide solutions for all sides of professional services firms' business. The company's new solution, atVantage, was created for the marketing, to help professionals analyze the growth potential of business for existing customers and new prospects as well as keep their finger on the pulse of the industry's trends and of competitor's moves. The solution provides companies with detailed information on their clients to amp up cross-selling and identify when customers might be in need of additional services.

"We are changing the way the market looks at client development and specific product categories such as CRM and business intelligence," says Joe Douress, senior vice president and general manager of client development at LexisNexis. "The market has long ago decided that content is king, and that successful marketing and business development tools must be fueled by great content."

Content will drive the Corporate Intelligence Subscription, which integrates all of LexisNexis's external content with their existing InterAction CRM solution. This deeper information base will help companies optimize their decision making process as well as improve marketing campaigns, the company claims. According to Douress, the Corporate Intelligence Subscription, alongside the atVantage solution, marks the first of many offerings that will provide firms with relevant and expansive business content.

Pombriant says that the depth of information LexisNexis can provide its customers is important due to the intense competition within the professional services market. "This is a market where there is a bit more supply than demand so in a lot of areas it's going to be critical for companies to understand customer needs, biases and requirements. Tools like this should have a long future ahead of them."

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