How to Set Market-Level Signed Case Goals That Roll Up to Firm-Wide Revenue Targets

Most PI firms set a firm-wide signed case goal. Fewer set that goal at the location level in a way that connects to firm-wide revenue targets. The result is a managing partner who knows what the firm needs to achieve but cannot tell which office is responsible for which portion — or whether the firm is on track until the month is already over.

Building market-level case goals that roll up coherently to firm-wide revenue targets is part operational discipline, part financial modeling. This article walks through how to do it.

Start at the Firm-Wide Revenue Target

The right place to start is not with case volume — it is with revenue. If the firm's annual revenue target is $18 million and the average settlement is $90,000, the firm needs approximately 200 settlements this year. With a typical 12 to 18 month settlement lag, the cases that settle this year were signed 12 to 18 months ago. That means your signed case goal today is driving your revenue realization 12 to 18 months from now.

This is the math that most PI firms run backwards from revenue aspiration to current case volume — but many stop at the firm level and never cascade it to individual markets.

Disaggregating the Firm-Wide Goal by Market

Once you have a firm-wide signed case target for the month or quarter, it needs to be allocated across locations. Three factors should drive this allocation:

1. Attorney capacity by location

Each location can handle a certain number of active cases given its attorney count, caseload, and staff. A location with three attorneys at 80% capacity cannot absorb 60 new signed cases this month without degrading service quality. Set market-level goals that reflect realistic capacity — not aspirational targets that overwhelm the team.

A rough rule: multiply each location's attorney count by your firm's target cases-per-attorney ratio. If your target is 100 active cases per attorney and Location 1 has four attorneys, its maximum pipeline at any time is approximately 400 cases. Monthly signed case capacity is a function of how quickly cases close and create capacity.

2. Stage of market development

A location in its first year of operation should have a lower case volume target than a mature office — and a higher cost per case target. New markets take time to ramp vendor relationships, establish brand recognition, and optimize intake. Building a ramp curve into the goal-setting process prevents a new location from appearing perpetually underperforming against a target it was not yet equipped to hit.

3. Lead generation budget allocated to each market

The budget allocated to each market, divided by that market's current cost per case, tells you the expected case volume from marketing investment. If Location 2 receives $80,000 per month in lead generation spend at a $2,000 cost per case, the implied volume is 40 cases. That is a useful starting point for the market-level case goal — though it should be adjusted for seasonal patterns and any planned changes to the vendor mix.

Building the Roll-Up Mechanics

Market-level goals only roll up cleanly to firm-wide targets if the math is consistent. Two common mistakes to avoid:

• Setting goals that exceed total budget capacity. If the implied case volume from each location's budget exceeds the firm-wide case target, the targets are internally inconsistent. Either increase the budget or lower the targets — do not set goals the math cannot support.
• Setting goals without a shared definition of “signed case.” If Location 1 counts a case as signed at retainer execution and Location 2 counts it at attorney acceptance, the firm-wide roll-up is combining two different metrics. Define the milestone once and enforce it everywhere before tracking cases against targets.

Monitoring Market-Level Progress During the Month

A goal that is only reviewed at month-end is not useful for mid-course correction. Market-level case goals need a daily or weekly pace metric — the rate at which cases are being signed relative to the monthly target.

A simple approach: divide each location's monthly case goal by the number of business days in the month. If Location 1 needs 40 cases and there are 22 business days, the target pace is roughly 1.8 cases per day. Track actual signing pace against this daily target and flag locations that fall more than 15% behind pace by mid-month.

By the time you reach day 15, you should know whether each location is on track, ahead, or behind — and have time to act. Mid-month budget reallocations, vendor escalations, and intake coaching interventions are only useful if you identify the need early enough to act on them.

Connecting Case Goals to the Revenue Forecast

The full value of market-level case goal tracking shows up when you connect it to the revenue forecast. If Location 1 signs 42 cases this month at an average projected settlement of $85,000, those cases represent $3.57 million in expected future settlement revenue — arriving in 12 to 18 months.

Running this calculation monthly by location gives the managing partner a forward-looking view of the revenue pipeline — not just the current month's case count. Firms that build this connection report that partner conversations shift from “how many cases did we sign?” to “what does this month's signing volume mean for our revenue position 18 months from now?” That is a more valuable conversation.

Adjusting Goals When Markets Underperform

Market-level goals should not be static. When a location is persistently missing its signed case target by more than 20% over two or three months, the goal itself may need adjustment — not just the budget or vendor mix. A goal that reflects a misunderstanding of the market's capacity is not a useful accountability tool. It is a source of noise.

Adjust goals based on data, not pressure. If the data shows that Location 3 can reliably sign 25 cases per month in its current state — and the cost per case at that volume is within acceptable bounds — then 25 is the right goal, not 40. The firm-wide target should then be disaggregated to other locations or tied to a growth investment plan for Location 3.

RevenueScale gives multi-location PI firms the daily pace tracking, market-level goal monitoring, and firm-wide roll-up reporting needed to manage case volume targets with data rather than guesswork. Book a demo to see how market-level goal tracking works in the platform.