What is a good intake ROI for a personal injury law firm?

A healthy intake ROI for a personal injury firm typically falls between 500% and 1,500%, meaning every dollar spent on intake infrastructure returns five to fifteen dollars in case revenue at the point of sign. Firms below 300% are usually experiencing one of three problems: intake costs are too high relative to conversion volume, average case value is low, or the conversion rate from lead to signed client is underperforming. Firms above 1,500% are often underinvesting in intake relative to their lead volume, which creates conversion losses that reduce overall return on advertising spend.

What costs should be included in an intake cost calculation?

A complete intake cost calculation should include: (1) direct labor costs — wages, benefits, and employer taxes for all staff who handle intake calls and follow-up; (2) technology costs — CRM, e-signature platform, dialer or telephony system, case management software intake module; (3) vendor costs — answering service, outsourced intake partner, lead routing platform; (4) management overhead — the time supervisors spend on intake quality, training, and scheduling; and (5) space and equipment proportional to the intake function. Most firms undercount by 25 to 40 percent by only capturing direct agent wages.

How does intake conversion rate affect the ROI calculation?

Intake conversion rate is the most powerful lever in the ROI formula. Because case revenue is typically 10x to 20x the cost of intake, small improvements in conversion rate produce large ROI gains. A firm converting 20% of leads to signed clients versus 25% on the same lead volume sees a 25% increase in signed cases with no additional advertising spend. In ROI terms, this typically represents a 100% or greater improvement in intake ROI, since the numerator (case revenue) grows while the denominator (intake cost) stays relatively flat. This is why conversion rate is usually a higher-priority optimization target than cost reduction.

Should intake ROI be calculated per lead source?

Yes, and the results are often surprising. Intake ROI varies significantly by lead source because conversion rates, average case values, and intake time requirements differ across channels. TV leads typically have higher average case values and different handling times than digital leads from paid search. Referrals convert at much higher rates than cold digital leads. Calculating intake ROI per source allows a firm to identify which channels are generating the most value through intake and which are consuming intake capacity without proportionate return. This analysis often reveals that some lead sources are effectively subsidizing others.

How to Calculate Intake ROI: The Formula Every PI Firm Needs

By Jordan Ellis, Director of Intake Operations June 3, 2026 9 min read

Most personal injury firms calculate return on advertising spend with precision. They know exactly what it costs to generate a lead from Google, from TV, from referral programs. What far fewer firms calculate is the return on intake itself — the infrastructure that converts those leads into signed clients.

This gap matters because intake is not a fixed cost. It is a variable that can be optimized, and firms that measure it systematically make better decisions about staffing, outsourcing, and technology than firms that treat it as overhead.

The Intake ROI Formula

Intake ROI measures how much case revenue is generated for every dollar invested in the intake function. The formula is:

Intake ROI = (Cases Signed × Average Case Value) / Total Intake Cost

Expressed as a percentage: multiply by 100. A result of 800% means every $1 spent on intake generates $8 in case revenue at point of sign.

Each component needs to be calculated carefully. Here is how to approach each one.

Cases Signed

Use signed retainers for the period you are measuring, not conversions or contacts. A lead who spoke with an agent but did not sign is not a signed case. Track the actual point of retainer execution.

Decide on a measurement period (monthly is standard) and be consistent. Avoid mixing the lead arrival date with the signing date — for long follow-up cycles, these can fall in different months, which distorts the ROI calculation if not handled carefully.

Average Case Value

Use the average gross recovery per case, not the average fee. The intake function is responsible for capturing the case — the full recovery value is the economic unit that intake should be measured against. Using fee value undervalues intake's contribution and artificially depresses the ROI figure.

If you do not track recovery at the case level, use a reasonable estimate based on your practice mix. For a typical mixed auto accident PI practice, this commonly runs $35,000 to $75,000 per case at resolution. Using the fee (typically 33%) produces a lower number but is more conservative and easier to defend in internal reporting.

Total Intake Cost

This is where most firms undercount. Include all of the following:

Direct agent wages + employer payroll taxes + benefits
Supervisor and manager time allocated to intake oversight, training, and QA
Technology: CRM, e-signature platform, telephony/dialer, intake-related software modules
Vendor costs: answering service, outsourced intake partner, lead routing tools
Space and equipment proportional to the intake headcount
Training costs: onboarding, ongoing training, scripts development

Most firms that run this calculation for the first time find their actual intake cost is 30 to 50 percent higher than they estimated, primarily because manager time and technology costs are excluded from the initial calculation.

A Worked Example

Consider a PI firm with these monthly figures:

Signed cases from intake: 18
Average case value (gross recovery): $42,000
Total intake cost: $31,500 (3 agents at $6,500/mo fully-loaded + $6,000 technology + $3,000 manager allocation + $1,500 miscellaneous)

Intake ROI = (18 × $42,000) / $31,500 = $756,000 / $31,500 = 24.0 = 2,400%

At 2,400% ROI, this firm is generating $24 in case value for every $1 spent on intake. This is a healthy figure — it indicates the intake function is well-matched to the lead volume and has room to absorb additional investment (more agents, better technology, extended hours) before ROI starts to compress.

Now run the same calculation with a modest conversion improvement. If the same cost produces 22 signed cases instead of 18 (a 22% improvement in conversion rate):

Intake ROI = (22 × $42,000) / $31,500 = $924,000 / $31,500 = 29.3 = 2,933%

A 22% conversion improvement produces a 22% improvement in intake ROI. This linear relationship between conversion rate and intake ROI is why conversion optimization is almost always a better investment than cost reduction in intake operations.

What the Formula Reveals About Common Intake Problems

Low ROI from high cost, not low conversion

Some firms have reasonable conversion rates but poor intake ROI because their cost base is inflated. An intake team with redundant staffing, expensive technology that is underutilized, or high management overhead per agent will show poor ROI even when converting leads competently. The formula surfaces this by showing a low numerator relative to denominator.

The usual culprit in this pattern is staffing for peak volume rather than average volume, or keeping full-time staff to cover hours that would be more economically served by an on-demand or outsourced model.

Low ROI from conversion loss, not high cost

The opposite pattern is more common: low ROI from poor conversion despite controlled costs. A firm with two agents and minimal technology overhead that signs 8 cases per month from 150 inbound leads has a conversion rate of 5.3%, which is dramatically below the 12 to 20 percent range typical for a functioning PI intake operation on qualified digital leads.

Low conversion ROI usually traces to one of three causes: delayed response time (after-hours leads not contacted before competitors), poor qualification and follow-up protocols, or high case rejection rates from misaligned lead generation. The formula identifies the problem; the diagnostic work determines which of these is driving it.

Invisible ROI from after-hours volume

Segment your ROI calculation by lead arrival time: business hours vs. evening vs. weekend. Most firms that run this analysis find that their after-hours conversion rate is significantly lower than their business-hours conversion rate, which compresses overall ROI. The intake cost for the business-hours window may show excellent ROI, masking the fact that the 55% of leads arriving outside that window are generating minimal return.

Using Intake ROI to Make Staffing and Outsourcing Decisions

Intake ROI provides a principled basis for staffing and outsourcing decisions that many firms currently make based on intuition or habit.

Should we hire another intake agent?

If adding an agent increases fully-loaded intake cost by $7,500/month and the expected marginal conversion from additional capacity is 3 additional cases per month at a $40,000 average case value, the marginal ROI of that hire is (3 × $40,000) / $7,500 = 16.0 = 1,600%. This is a straightforward yes at almost any reasonable threshold for acceptable intake ROI.

The question becomes more nuanced when the marginal case gain is uncertain. In that scenario, model a range: if the agent produces 1 additional case per month, ROI is 533%. If 2, it is 1,067%. The break-even point is the case count where the hire pays for itself — everything above that is margin.

Should we outsource after-hours coverage?

If an outsourced after-hours service costs $4,000/month and produces 4 additional signed cases that would otherwise have been lost to after-hours non-response, the ROI at a $40,000 average case value is (4 × $40,000) / $4,000 = 40.0 = 4,000%. The economics of after-hours coverage are almost always favorable when the calculation is run explicitly.

Running the Calculation Monthly

Intake ROI is most useful as a monthly trend metric rather than a one-time snapshot. A single month can be distorted by large cases settling, unusual lead volume, or temporary staffing disruptions. A rolling three-month average smooths out these distortions and surfaces real structural changes.

Track: intake ROI, intake cost per signed case (total cost / cases signed), and conversion rate in parallel. When all three move in the same direction, the signal is strong. When they diverge, there is usually a specific cause worth investigating — for example, conversion rate holding flat while cost per case rises typically means cases are getting more expensive to sign without any improvement in how many leads are being converted.

Want Help Building Your Intake ROI Dashboard?

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