The language of M&A

It used to be one of the gentlemanly niceties of the legal PR world that a 100-partner firm acquiring a two-partner practice would still be referred to as a merger.

But times have changed and few offer that pretence any longer. As a report last week from accountants MHA noted: “Whilst the reality has always been that a true merger rarely exists, there appears to have been a recent acceptance that deals are in fact acquisitions.”

Otherwise, the language of M&A is much the same. There is plenty of delight on all sides: the smaller firm can now offer a wider range of services to its clients and the larger firm has added strength to a particular practice area or extended its geographical reach.

There are plenty of deals every year, so you need to put some work in to make yours stand out. Here are a few tips.

First of all, provide facts and figures. Many assume journalists will be so fascinated by the deal that we won’t want to know the basics. For example, how many people are at each firm and is anyone from the small firm joining as a partner? Tell us your turnover – remember, if you are big enough to file accounts at Companies House, journalists can easily find out anyway.

You might not want to tell us if there are going to be redundancies, but again this may well come out anyway (LinkedIn posts from disgruntled staff are proving a fertile resource for journalists), so get ahead of the negativity. For consolidators, it’s often an integral part of the model.

Don’t forget to tell us about the name – sometimes the acquired firm keeps its name so as to retain local or sector goodwill, at least for a transitional period (‘Bloggs & Co incorporating Smith & Co’).

Outline the strategic thinking and your plans for the future – a way to make a small acquisition more interesting is to place it in the bigger picture.

So, rather than just saying that you’ve boosted your property team, maybe talk about the new types of clients you are targeting as a result. Or if you’ve moved into a new town, explain how the residents do not currently have access to what you’re offering and the benefits this will bring.

Also reflect the trends of the wider legal market – maybe you need greater scale to compete with the growing number of private equity-backed firms or you want to become a leading niche player.

And as ever, make sure you have someone available to speak to the news. It beggars belief how often I receive press releases (on anything) and my request to interview the person quoted in it is stymied because they are on leave.

Of course, nowadays many publications will just cut and paste what you send them, but not all will. There was one deal last year where, very unusually, a firm of about 40 people was taking over one of about 100. I was reluctant to run anything until I could ask some questions about this – the Axiom Ince disaster came from a small firm taking over two much larger ones (not that I’m saying this deal was like that, of course) – but the managing partner was abroad. After some time I got just-about-passable answers to questions by email but it was not legal PR at its finest.

Indeed, many acquiring firms actively want to talk because they’re on the lookout for more and publicity is a good way to tell the market, but often they don’t actively offer interviews. Offer yourself up for interview about your plans and the wider market – many reporters would be keen to talk.

In truth, this blog shouldn’t be necessary. Good legal PR people should be including this kind of information as standard. To me, the fact that they don’t speaks volumes.