Legal Marketing, BD & Communications Salary Guide - New York

Welcome to Ambition’s first Legal BD, Marketing & Communications salary guide, specifically for New York Law firms.

The salary information provided below is based on a combination of data from placements we have made in New York as well as additional intel from vacancies advertised externally by law firms.

Whilst I hope you find the information below useful, I do want to add a disclaimer that law firm Marketing & BD salaries and job titles can vary significantly from firm to firm.

This can be due to the structure of teams and remit of roles being quite different, even if the title on paper is the same.

This has become even more prevalent as we’ve emerged from the pandemic, where job titles and salary bandings have, in my opinion, become a bit blurred, therefore the information below should only be interpreted as a guide.

If you are looking for more tailored salary information, please get in touch. You may want some more personalized advice tailored to your current situation or perhaps you are looking to hire for your team and want to benchmark salaries. We would be delighted to help so please do reach out.

Alternatively, if you would like to see any additional salary breakdowns that aren’t included in this document, do let us know, feedback is welcomed!

But first, here's a breakdown of our observations so far in 2023:

Legal BD & Marketing market trends in 2023

Hiring has returned to pre-pandemic pace

It was without doubt a crazy 2022, as we ventured out from the pandemic, the release valve was pressed on hiring and it created a market not witnessed before.

2023 has changed the speed of hiring back to what we were always used to. We're now seeing the usual peaks and troughs throughout the year and the majority of the Legal BD, Marketing & Communication vacancies are replacement hires rather than new headcount.

Despite less roles being on the market, it remains candidate led

If clients were hoping for a more subdued market, making hiring processes easier, unfortunately that hasn’t been the case.

Given the large amount of vacancies in 2022, those employees that were motivated to leave their roles had mostly already done so as we entered 2023.

In the high volume areas of the market - BD Coordinator through to BD Managers - a large number of people started new roles in 2022. Therefore, it was even more important to engage a passive audience and the onus was really on the firms to sell their job opportunities.

Firms are being more selective with their hiring processes

Law firms on the whole are under less pressure to fill a vacancy compared to 2022, when some firms were so stretched that getting new headcount was paramount to managing workloads and trying to stop current staff from being overwhelmed.

As the market has cooled a bit this year, there isn’t the fast and furious approach to most hires, therefore firms are interviewing more people and on the whole processes are taking longer to complete.

Return to the office is on the rise

From Q2 onwards in 2023, we have seen a real shift in firms' expectations on office attendance for their professional staff.

Whilst the 3 day office policy had been in place for a while, on the whole from what we’ve observed this wasn’t hugely enforced. However in the past 4-6 months, we have seen firms doing this more frequently and even seen a number of firms move to 4 days. This will be interesting to observe, as again from our interactions it’s clear that people still highly value a degree of flexibility in their working pattern.

Predictions for Q4 and into 2024

Potential return of candidates at Specialist level looking to move into a Management position?

Given the life span of those individuals at specialist level generally being somewhere in the region of 18-24 months, we may well see those professionals who moved right at the beginning of the post covid job splurge, begin to look at seeking out that first management position.

This should create potentially more options for BD & Marketing manager roles as these people on the whole have been excluded from the market this year. It’s also something for hiring managers to be aware of, in terms of staff retention of these individuals too.

Q4 to see an uptick in job flow following the summer break

This may seem obvious, but in the past 10 years of covering Legal BD and Marketing recruitment, October and November are generally really busy months, where firms want to get the team aligned and settled as much as possible heading into the New Year.

This has traditionally been the cycle and through our conversations I don’t anticipate it being any different this year.

Continuation of more interview processes moving to face to face processes

Given a couple of points mentioned above, namely people being in the office more often than not and firms generally taking longer with their hiring processes, we have seen a trend of firms including more face to face meetings during the interview process.

This can have its benefits, in terms of allowing firms to sell the culture and environment - doing this in person helps to bring that to life, especially if your competing against other firms or engaging with very passive individuals.

However this shouldn’t be at the detriment of speed - firms that take ‘too’ long will continue to lose out on top talent.

Employees should not anticipate the same increase in salaries as last year

Given 2022 was an anomaly in the market, the salaries offered to new hires or to keep existing staff was also above normal. We anticipate that this will dial down in terms of salary jumps when moving or having internal salary reviews.

One area of the market that might be slightly different is for those at a Senior Management level, who maybe didn’t move during the pandemic. This has probably been the one area of the market that hasn’t seen the jump that first time BD & Marketing Managers saw, as an example.

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Notes on salary table:

• The above salaries are based on remuneration in global law firms. Titles and levels vary from firm to firm.

• ​The salary ranges given are only approximate guides. For tailored salary advice, please contact us directly.

• ​12-month base salaries are assumed.

• ​All other benefits and bonuses are in addition to these figures.

• ​Bonus ranges can vary significantly from firm to firm and will be influenced by market conditions, business and individual performances.

• For more tailored salary advice, please contact ben.curle@ambitionsearch.com or call Ben on 212 540 9207.