February 2022 Legal News Roundup: Women in Law, Promotions & More

Happy belated Valentine’s Day from the National Law Review team. Please read on for new legal industry hires, promotions and awards.

Firm Recognition & Awards

Much is included on the 2022 Top Workplaces USA list, which recognizes organizations with a people-centered culture.

“At Much, our culture centers on people: our employees, our clients, and our community partners,” said Managing Partner Mitchell Roth. “We work each day to support a collaborative, kind, and service-oriented environment, so to be recognized for our culture on a national level is a tremendous honor.”

The rankings are based on employee feedback from a survey administered by Energage, an employee engagement technology partner. The survey gauged various aspects of workplace culture, including  alignment, execution, connection, and more.

Womble Bond Dickinson is one of the Best Places to Work for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ+) workplace equality, earning a perfect score of 100 percent on the 2022 Corporate Equality Index (CEI).

The survey is administered by the Human Rights Campaign, and acts as a benchmarking tool to track how businesses are adopting equitable workplace policies, practices and benefits for LGBTQ+ employees. Womble Bond Dickinson earned perfect scores every year since 2015.

“We are honored to be named one of the HRC’s Best Places to Work for LGBTQ+ Employees once again,” said Betty Temple, Chair & CEO of Womble Bond Dickinson (US) LLP. “We at Womble Bond Dickinson have worked hard to promote diversity and inclusion. These efforts include earning Mansfield Rule 4.0 Certification. The goal of the Mansfield Rule is to boost the representation of historically underrepresented lawyers—including LGBTQ+ attorneys—in law firm leadership, partner promotions and lateral hires by broadening the pool of candidates considered for these opportunities. We have much more work to do, but we are proud to be recognized for the progress we have made.”

Lawdragon recognized Foley & Lardner partners Daniel Kaplan, John (Jack) Lord, Jr., and Rachel Powitzky Steely on its 2022 edition of 500 Leading U.S. Corporate Employment Lawyers, an annual recognition of the nation’s top advisors on workforce issues. Lawdragon selected the honorees based on submissions, editorial vetting and journalistic research.

Lawdragon said that this year’s honorees “specialize in defending corporations in everything from wage and overtime claims to trade secret disputes, while helping companies maintain global workforces throughout a pandemic.”

Law firm Hiring & Additions

Varnum LLP expanded its intellectual property practice with the addition of Timothy D. Kroninger. Joining the firm’s Detroit office as an associate, Mr. Kroninger focuses his practice on copyright law, trade secret law, patent and trademark prosecution and more. He also has experience in drafting design patent applications, as well as participating in United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) trademark opposition proceedings.

Beyond his practice at Varnum, Mr. Kroninger works as a supervising attorney in the Trademark and Entrepreneur Clinic at University of Detroit Mercy College of Law. There, he instructs law students on copyright registration, drafting corporate documents, and protection of trademarks.

Beveridge & Diamond PC elected four new principals: Eric Christensen, located in SeattleAllyn Stern, located in Seattle; Michael Vitris, located in Austin; and Gus Winkes, located in Seattle. Mr. Christensen practices in energy law, assisting companies and consumers in navigating the legal and regulatory landscape. Ms. Stern, former U.S. EPA regional counsel, helps clients develop environmental compliance strategies. Mr. Winkles practices in a variety of fields, providing solutions-oriented legal representation in the areas of enforcement defense, regulatory compliance, and contaminated site cleanup. Mr. Vitris, former litigation attorney with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, defends companies in class actions and environmental mass torts.

“Each of these Principals’ talents, skills, and expertise deepen and enhance B&D’s dynamic regulatory compliance and litigation practice as environmental and energy law continue to evolve,” said firmwide managing principal Kathy Szmuszkovicz. “They’ve proven their ability to deliver top-notch service to clients and to serve as thought-leaders at a particularly exciting time in our practice. We look forward to their continued success and contributions in their new roles.”

Barnes & Thornburg LLP added five new attorneys and legal professionals across various offices. Associate William Choi  joined the firm’s Los Angeles office, and associate Albert D. Farr joined the New York office. Mr. Choi focuses his practice on product liability and complex civil litigation, and he is well-versed in all aspects of pretrial case management. Likewise, Mr. Farr practices in transactional tax law, counseling multinational strategic and private equity clients on transaction tax structuring, tax diligence and more.

Furthermore, legal professionals Amit DattaAl Maloof, and Soyoung Yang joined Barnes & Thornburg’s ChicagoIndianapolis, and Washington D.C. offices, respectively. Dr. Datta, a business transaction advisor, provides targeted legal advice and strategic insight for European clients conducting business in the U.S. Mr. Maloof, a client relationship specialist, provides strategic consultation among the firm’s government services, compliance and regulatory attorneys. Ms. Yang, a legal fellow, aids attorneys and clients on matters related to international trade, customs and the supply chain.

William L. Nimick  joined the Construction Litigation and Counsel practice group at Goldberg Segalla LLP. An experienced litigator, Mr. Nimick is located in the firm’s Raleigh office, where he counsels insurers, contractors, subcontractors and corporate entities in liability claims including but not limited to property damage, personal injury and construction defects.

Previously, Mr. Nimick worked as a civil litigator across North Carolina, representing clients in areas such as wrongful death, workers’ compensation, and subrogation. Specifically he  handled subrogation claims such as motor vehicle accidents, product liability lawsuits and large fire losses.

Women in the Legal Industry

Angela Bowlin of Frilot LLC law firm has accepted a position serving on the International Association of Defense Council (IADC), an organization for attorneys who represent corporate and insurance matters. Ms. Bowlin focuses her practice on mass torts and class actions, with experience in asbestos and other toxic tort cases.

“I am honored to have been selected as a member of IADC and look forward to working on the many important committees related to the law and its many facets,” said Ms. Bowlin.

Nicole Archibald joined Foley Hoag LLP as their Director of Legal Recruiting. Ms. Archibald will work alongside the Foley Hoag team to attract and promote a diverse group of attorneys to help the firm achieve its diversity and inclusion goals.

“We’re very pleased to welcome Nicole to Foley Hoag, and are confident that she will be a great asset to the firm and its culture. Her considerable prior experience as a director of recruiting, legal search consultant and practicing litigator will prove a valuable asset as we look to 2022 and beyond. Our executive committee, practice leaders, hiring committee and I are excited to begin working with Nicole to attract new talent and strengthen our market-leading practices,” said Foley Hoag Co-Managing Partner Kenneth Leonetti.

“I look forward to collaborating with Foley Hoag’s management, department chairs and practice leaders, and hiring committee to develop, implement and execute proactive recruiting initiatives to further the firm’s hiring goals and strategic growth plan,” said Ms. Archibald.

Norton Rose Fulbright appointed New York partner Robin Adelstein as the Co-Head of Commercial Litigation, joining Houston partner Andrew Price. Ms. Adelstein brings extensive experience in litigating complex commercial disputes and advises companies with respect to antitrust issues regarding mergers, joint ventures and more.

“Robin has long been respected as a leader within the firm as our Global and US Head of Antitrust and Competition, and she is a highly-recognized practitioner in her field. I look forward to seeing the great work that our commercial litigation group will do under Robin’s and Andrew’s leadership,” said Jeff Cody, Norton Rose Fulbright’s US Managing Partner.

“Our firm has a longstanding reputation for advising clients on their most complex and significant matters. It is an honor to head Norton Rose Fulbright’s commercial litigation group along with Andrew; I am proud to be leading such a talented group of lawyers,” said Ms. Adelstein.

Copyright ©2022 National Law Forum, LLC

2022 Legal Marketing Trends for Law Firm Success

Lawyers get into law to practice, not to focus on administrative tasks or marketing. However, running a law firm is much more than practicing law – it’s running a business. If law firms want to stay in business, they need to put effort into keeping abreast with legal marketing trends to attract new clients and keep the firm growing and profitable.

According to recent research, 57 percent of clients look for a lawyer on their own, and many use the internet to search for firms. In addition, 66 percent of solo lawyers do their own marketing, while 46 percent of law firms have a budget for marketing.

The global market size of the legal services industry is projected to grow over $900 billion by 2025, so it’s primed for innovation and evolution. Law firms need to stay current on legal trends and invest in marketing to be part of this massive industry growth.

Here are the top legal marketing trends for 2022:

  1. Setting SMART Goals

  2. Creating a Brand

  3. Running an SEO Campaign

  4. Embrace Content Marketing

  5. Explore Video Marketing

  6. Focus on the Right Social Media Platforms

  7. Post Reviews from Clients

  8. Showcase Case Studies

  9. Create an Email Marketing Campaign

  10. Use Automation to Track Legal Marketing Trends

  1. Setting SMART Goals

No strategy is worthwhile without goals. SMART goals are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound goals that ensure marketing results match their intent. Setting goals allows marketers to see what’s working and what isn’t to refine and reconsider the strategy.

For example, a goal to “generate new clients” doesn’t fit the SMART goals framework. Instead, the goal should be to increase the number of client leads generated per month from 15 to 30 as a result of the newsletter. This should be achieved in six months.

Each goal should be aligned with a purpose, or what the law firm is hoping to achieve. Here are some examples of general marketing goals:

  • Brand awareness

  • Lead generation

  • Client acquisition

  • Increased customer value

  1. Creating a Brand

Branding isn’t limited to retail corporations – law firms need a brand, too. A brand helps a law firm attract the right type of client and grow.

Creating a brand is a long process, but it starts with thinking about the mission and vision of the firm, the core values of the firm, and the unique value proposition (what separates the law firm from its competitors?).

  1. Running an SEO Campaign

Search engine optimization (SEO) is vital to any marketing plan in 2022. Competition is fiercer than ever, so law firms need to stand out and gain a ranking on the first page of the search engine results to drive traffic to the firm website.

Law firms should use tactics like content marketing, strong keyword research, optimized images, intuitive website structure, and a fast and secure web hosting platform to improve SEO.

  1. Embrace Content Marketing

Content marketing is essential for a law firm from both an SEO and a general marketing perspective. Valuable content turns a law firm into a thought leader in the industry or practice area, bringing clients back when they need a solution to a problem.

It’s important for firms to create in-depth, original content that addresses common questions for the target audience. A good place for firms to start is with a legal blog that addresses topics such as frequently asked questions from clients.

  1. Explore Video Marketing

Video marketing is sweeping the marketing world, and it has plenty of value for law firms. Consumers are more likely to listen to a message in video format than written format since people like to skim. Using a video gets the message across and serves to humanize the law firm’s brand.

Videos come in many shapes and forms, including animated explainer videos that break down complex legalese, spokesperson videos with a partner answering frequently asked questions, and client testimonials to showcase how the firm helps people. These videos can be used on the firm’s website, emails, or social media accounts like YouTube and Facebook.

  1. Focus on the Right Social Media Platforms

Plenty of law firms use social media platforms, but not all are created equal. It can be challenging to maintain accounts on every social media platform, so it’s best for law firms to select the platforms that have the most prospective clientele.

Once law firms focus on the ideal social media platforms, they can observe how clients and other law firms interact and increase engagement with followers. Over time, the presence on social media will grow.

  1. Post Reviews from Clients

Client reviews go a long way in helping law firms attract new clients and earn a higher search engine ranking. If a law firm doesn’t have a lot of reviews, it’s important to prompt clients to leave a review on social media, Google, or the website.

If getting reviews is a challenge, law firms can create incentives for staff to ask for reviews and how it can impact the firm. The firm can also offer incentives to clients. Keep in mind that video reviews or testimonials can go a long way in increasing credibility for a firm.

  1. Showcase Case Studies

Case studies are in-depth and demonstrate expertise and success for clients. Law firms should have a page with current, comprehensive case studies that highlight successful case outcomes. If it’s well organized, clients can find case studies that are similar to their case and gain more confidence in selecting a firm.

  1. Create an Email Marketing Campaign

Despite social media and other communications, email marketing is an incredible outbound marketing technique that’s still important in 2022. Nearly 60 percent of marketers say that email delivers the highest ROI, no matter the industry.

Sending out targeted, value-packed emails can help a law firm build credibility, convert new leads, and attract new and repeat customers. Once the email list is built, law firms can segment the list according to the stage of the customer journey, location, practice area, and more to create highly targeted email messaging.

  1. Use Automation to Manage Legal Marketing Trends

The legal industry is traditional, but legal practice management software is the way modern firms get ahead. Legal management software, like PracticePanther, helps law firms in a variety of lucrative business operations including streamlining billing and invoicing managing client communications and tracking time. With the burden of marketing tasks, having legal practice management software allows law firms to automate many day-to-day tasks, freeing time to focus on marketing efforts. It also offers automation for some marketing efforts, such as custom tags to track lead sources or assigning marketing tasks through workflows to ensure you’re never missing a lead.

© Copyright 2022 PracticePanther

Article By PracticePanther

For more articles on legal marketing, visit the NLR Law Office Management.

Legal News Roundup December 2021: Firm Inclusion & Diversity Efforts, Hiring & More

Happy new year! Read on for the latest law firm hiring, pro bono and innovation news:

Ropes and Gray announced the opening of their 12th location in Los Angeles in 2022, which will focus initially on the healthcare and equity & asset management industries. Attorneys Howard GlazerTorrey McClaryRanee Adipat and Leslie Thornton will assist in opening the new office, as they look to expand their reach in the Southern California market.

Ropes and Gray also added Brandon Howald to their new Los Angeles team. Mr. Howald brings 22 years of private equity experience to the practice.

“Opening an office in Los Angeles is a really exciting move for Ropes & Gray. Southern California is a market where we have been active for many years. We already have a robust and growing roster of clients in a region with a vibrant private equity and asset management business, as well as strong California health care, life sciences, M&A, and technology practices. We have been very strategic in establishing a presence where our clients needed us, from Asia to London to Chicago to the West Coast. That same vision propels us into Los Angeles—and Howard Glazer, Torrey McClary and Brandon Howald have the industry expertise, entrepreneurial drive and Southern California roots to help lead us,” said Ropes & Gray’s chair, Julie Jones.

“We are opening in Los Angeles with a powerful platform: a roster of market leading clients, established partners with deep ties to Los Angeles like Brandon Howald, Howard Glazer, Torrey McClary and our powerful global network—all with the high bar of excellence clients come to expect from Ropes & Gray,” said the firm’s managing partner, David Djaha.

Real estate and general practice attorney Carmen I. Pagan has joined Romer Debbas LLP as Partner and the head of their Agency Lending Practice. Ms. Pagan specializes in commercial lending issues, senior and student housing through Freddie Mac Seller/Servicer and Capital Markets Execution programs, cross-collateralization loans and more.

Recently, Hofstra University School of Law, named alumna Ms. Pagan asan “Outstanding Woman in Law”  which acknowledges women who made inspiring contributions to the legal profession. Ms. Pagan is committed to the advancement of women’s issues in the workplace and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts.

McDermott Will & Emery announced three new additions to their Intellectual Property practice. The new additions are:

“McDermott continues to make incredible strides toward advancing our remarkable IP practice into an industry powerhouse. Simon and Jason bring significant life sciences patent litigation strength to our bench in New York, and Mac’s experience with Japanese technology and life science companies is unmatched. These three bring a lot of fire with them, and they will be incredible additions to our global IP team,” said William Gaede, Chair of McDermott’s Global IP practice.

Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton announced the addition of Ms. Lauren Strickroth as a partner in their Orange County office. Ms. Strickroth specializes in fiduciary litigation, business disputes, private wealth disputes and litigation involving estates and trusts matters. Ms. Strickroth also serves as general counsel for private businesses.

“Sheppard Mullin’s private wealth and fiduciary litigation team constitutes one of the premier practices in the U.S. We are confident Lauren will help expand our impressive record of success in the courtroom that has kept us at the top echelon of this niche field of trial attorneys throughout the U.S. and worldwide,” said Private Wealth and Fiduciary Litigation Practice Group Leader Adam Streisand.

“Over the last few years, our Private Wealth and Fiduciary Litigation practice has grown and their ongoing involvement in some of the most high-profile estate disputes is a testament to their outstanding reputation and expertise. We’re thrilled that Lauren is joining us,” said Sheppard Mullin’s vice chairman Jon Newby.

Legal Industry Awards and Recognition

Who’s Who Legal – Environment named Lynn L. Bergeson  as a leading legal practitioner in North America for the 17th time. Further, she was named a top lawyer in chemicals, manufacturing, nanotechnology, and pharmaceuticals industry groups by Super Lawyers for the 15th time. Ms. Bergeson, an experienced attorney in environmental, chemical, and nanotechnological law, is presently a Managing Partner at Bergeson & Campbell, P.C., as well as President of The Acta Group , Bergeson & Campbell’s scientific and regulatory consulting arm.

As noted in the recognition by Who’s Who Legal, “Lynn Bergeson is renowned as ‘an excellent lawyer, particularly in chemical matters’. Her in-depth knowledge of risk assessment and liability management receives further applause.”

Simultaneously, Bergeson & Campbell, P.C.  received National and Metropolitan Tier 1 rankings for Environmental Law and Environmental Litigation in U.S. News and World Report’s 2022 Best Law Firms. As of this recognition, the firm has held these rankings for a full decade.

Chicago Lawyer Magazine named Antonio M. Romanucci, Founding Partner at Romanucci & Blandin, LLC, their 2021 Person of the Year. The award is given to honor a notable newsmaker, trendsetter or legal leader in the preceding year. Mr. Romanucci, a long-time civil rights lawyer, most notably represented the family of George Floyd in the civil lawsuit against the City of Minneapolis and four police officers.

“There is no question that this honor is a capstone for my career as a trial attorney,” said Mr. Romanucci. “It’s so hard to believe how far my life has come since my days as a Cook County Public Defender to now one of the founding partners at a nearly 25-year-old Romanucci & Blandin. It’s a testament to the will and fortitude my law partner, Stephan Blandin, and I have always had to make sure the client comes first.”

“The banner headline for Antonio Romanucci this year is the historic $27 million settlement the George Floyd legal team secured,” said John McNally, Managing Editor at Chicago Lawyer Magazine. “It’s a major dollar figure for a case that struck nerves – many that continued to be frayed to this very day – throughout the United States. But where one could be despondent, Romanucci is hopeful. He has to be, otherwise what’s the point? So in addition to his heavy workload at Romanucci & Blandin, he’s barnstorming the country speaking to lawyers, law students and others who can make a difference in the quest for justice.”

Henry Talavera, a Shareholder at Polsinelli PC, received a Lifetime Achievement Award as part of Texas Lawyer’s 2021 Texas Legal Excellence Awards. A member of the firm’s Dallas office and the vice chair of the Employee Benefits and Executive Compensation PracticeMr. Talavera is well-experienced in the fields of employment law and tax law, and has represented clients before the Internal Revenue Service, the U.S. Department of Labor, and the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation.

Brian Bullard, Managing Partner of Polsinelli’s Dallas office, notes the significance of this award: “For the last eight years at Polsinelli and throughout his career, Henry has played a vital role in the legal community, not only providing needed counsel to his wide range of clients but serving as an advocate for diversity in the profession and beyond. This Lifetime Achievement honor recognizes just how vital his contributions have been for the past three decades, and all of us at Polsinelli look forward to witnessing and supporting his continued accomplishments going forward.”

Firm Inclusion & Diversity Efforts

Much joined the Law Firm Antiracism Alliance (LFAA), which aims to use the law as a vehicle for change to help oppressed and underserved communities. Much previously represented the LFAA in filing an amicus brief in the Supreme Court about an issue involving Jim Crow measures used to disenfranchise Black jurors.

“We’re proud to join the nearly 300 Alliance firms working together to address systemic racism in the law. It’s our privilege and our responsibility to continue working for the rights of marginalized people,” said Steve Blonder, who led the recent work with LFAA and also serves as chair of the firm’s social responsibility initiative,  Much Community.

The LFAA works to create systemic change and racial equity in the law.

Kimya S.P. Johnson joined Jackson Lewis as its new chief diversity, equity and inclusion officer (CDEIO) and principal. She will work with firm leadership, key stakeholders, and practice group leaders to expand, manage and oversee firmwide DEI initiatives and lead a team to execute a comprehensive, strategic DEI plan.

Ms. Johnson will also serve as a member of Jackson Lewis’ Corporate Diversity Counseling group, advising companies on diversity assessments and action plans.  She has over 20 years of experience as an employment attorney, and supports employers in their efforts to provide legally-compliant, effective and organizationally-integrative DEI plans. Ms. Johnson previously served as the chair of the Diversity & Inclusion practice group at Ogletree Deakins.

“With Kimya at the helm of our strategic DEI efforts, we will strengthen our inclusive culture that values the contributions of every employee and continues to emphasize the importance of having a workforce that reflects the various communities in which we work,” said Firm Chair Kevin G. Lauri. “In addition, I believe all within Jackson Lewis and beyond will recognize we are intentional and committed to doing what it takes to move our leadership, our firm, and our profession forward in this vital area. We are thrilled to add Kimya to the team.”

“Fostering DEI is a critical component of Jackson Lewis’ culture, and the CDEIO role will collaborate with all departments and functions to advance DEI as a firm value,” said Firm Managing Principal Samantha Hoffman. “Kimya has a track record of creating meaningful enhancements for law firms. She is known as an innovator and has already contributed excellent ideas to build on the success of our DEI strategy. We are so pleased to have her on board.”

Before her career as an attorney, Ms. Johnson worked as a public elementary school teacher in South Bronx, New York and served as campaign manager for a candidate for U.S. Congress.

Dinsmore received Best in Class for diversity in the legal profession by Crain’s Cleveland Business in its issue recognizing seven “notable businesses championing diversity and inclusion.”

“Everyone has a customer in the business world, and the customer population is becoming more diverse,” partner Richik Sarkar told Crain’s. “Look around your company. If everyone seems the same, especially in leadership, you’ll have a problem serving your customer, and if you don’t take steps to understand your customers, you’ll face failure sooner rather than later.”

Dinsmore previously earned the Mansfield Rule 4.0 Certification Plus for the 2021 iteration of the diverse leadership hiring initiative. The firm also partnered with Procter & Gamble and the Ohio Innocence Project at Cincinnati Law to create a fellowship for a diverse recent law school graduate to gain experience in civil rights litigation and policy-making.

The firm’s Pre-Law Minority Program also helps students of color at four Kentucky universities.

Copyright ©2021 National Law Forum, LLC

Article By Hanna Taylor, Chandler Ford and Rachel Popa

For more articles on legal marketing, visit the NLRLaw Office Management section.

Hiring and Marketing in the Legal Industry with Roy Sexton of Clark Hill Law and Legal Marketing Association [PODCAST]

Thor’s hammer, “Mjollnir!” Attorneys with dogs! Superman t-shirts! Roy Sexton leads a lively discussion about how the little quirks make your law firm more attractive to new hires, current staff, and the audience of your marketing efforts. He shares his career anecdotes and Clark Hill Law‘s recent branding revamp while being frank about the need for a new type of law firm culture. Learn more about the Legal Marketing Association here.

We’ve included a transcript of our conversation below, transcribed by artificial intelligence. The transcript has been lightly edited for style, clarity, and readability.

 

 

INTRO  00:02

Hello, and welcome to Legal News Reach, the official podcast for the National Law Review. Stay tuned for a discussion on the latest trends in legal marketing, SEO, law firm best practices, and more.

 

Rachel & Jessica  00:15

I’m Rachel. And I’m Jessica. We’re the Co-Hosts for The National Law Review’s Legal News Reach podcast.

 

Rachel  00:22

In this episode, we’re excited to talk to Roy Sexton, Director of Marketing for Clark Hill, about hiring and legal marketing. Roy would you like to introduce yourself?

 

Roy Sexton  00:30

Sure, I think you’re gonna regret having me as a guest. But I’m Roy Sexton, Director of Marketing. I’m also an active volunteer with the Legal Marketing Association, recently named President-elect for 2022, and President in 2023. Again, probably something they will live to regret. But I’m very honored to have been tapped in that way.

 

Rachel  00:50

Congratulations. As I mentioned earlier, one of the topics that we really want to dive into here is hiring and marketing trends in the legal industry, I think there’s been a lot of interesting hiring and sort of labor/employment topics to come out out of the pandemic.  In particular, specifically, how it’s getting harder to hire people, you know, retaining people that we do have, and just how COVID maybe long term will affect labor in this country and employment and hiring and all those things. In terms of the difficulty that midsize firms are finding it hard to hire lawyers on their legal staff. Is that a trend that you’re seeing? And if so, like, how can offices really remedy that issue?

 

Roy Sexton 01:30

Yeah, obviously it’s a trend we’re seeing in the industry. But fortunately, we’re not seeing it at Clark Hill. I had a recent opening in our team. And it’s for an events role. So presumably there are a lot of people out there that in the event space that we’re looking so I’m not going to put you know, you got to think about what, again, each submarket of the hiring market, right, and what’s influencing that, but in this case, we had like 85 applicants all pretty strong. And when I’ve had positions posted before I get me like 2030. So again, it’s an event so that’s probably driving that as well. I think we as a firm have really pushed culture, we launched our new brand in May. And my boss Susan Hearn, who’s a genius and wonderful because performance reviews are coming up soon. I love you. She, you know, she had the wisdom with our chief HR officer Kathy Sullivan, to say, when we launched that brand, let’s take the values that we usually keep for internal purposes and make them the spotlight on the brand. So we push that hard. And we did a lot of video asset creation about the firm generally the culture we are because we knew our clients and prospects would say that’s a nice place. Those seem like good people, I want to work with them. And I think we now that our second phase of the brand launch, launched about a week or so ago was a talent brand specifically. And we have Kathy with a video that’s gotten like 60,000 views on our social media so far, talking about, “these are our values, we believe in them.” And at Clark Hill, everyone has an equal footing. I mean, I think we know law firms struggle with that kind of upstairs-downstairs thing. If you’re not an attorney. Well, you’re just you’re dispensable and you don’t be treated with the same level of respect. I think clerk Hill has tried to intentionally take a different tack in that regard. And the attorneys are there with us. I mean, it’s not like we’re trying to sell them on an idea that they themselves don’t believe. They are there already. So we’ve fortuitously pulled from the culture, we already had clerk Hill has grown through acquisition. So we had a lot of different regions that came together to be Clark Hill. And it was important for us to go forward or the brand that told the firm story, elevated, everyone, and said, “I’m part of a bigger family here.” And I think, knock-on-wood, our recruiting efforts have benefited from that kind of message. So you know, I don’t want to, you know, spoil the secret sauce. But for those firms that are facing that conundrum, everyone always says, Oh, we’ve got a great culture. Well, show it, demonstrate it, use video, use photos. This is my home, I’m in the basement. My husband sent me down here 19 months ago, and I haven’t come back. But you know, we in the early days of pandemic, I had my dog here beside me the whole time and my social media person, Tommy said, Hey, let’s do a four-legged coworkers campaign. And we did and we got so much response from that we were posting dogs not and you’re like oh, and Facebook, right? I think LinkedIn. Interestingly, a year later, LinkedIn now has dogs of LinkedIn. Have you noticed this? They promoting that and I’m like they stole our idea. After we went through about six weeks to this one person in the firm said, should we be doing that? That doesn’t really seem like something we should be promoting. I said Well, too late. It’s over. It’s said to people, this is who we are. We’re human beings. We do good work showing our humanity does not detract from our ability to do good work. It enhances it. And I think that’s what the pandemic has hopefully shown people that are willing to listen.

 

Rachel  04:47

I mean I dunno about Jess, but I’m all for more dog photos in general.

 

Jessica  04:52

Yes. Spoiled pets!

 

Roy Sexton 04:54

I also benefit as a manager from previous experience. I worked in healthcare for a decade and that’s fraught with its own challenges in the healthcare system I worked at had a Leadership Academy and I took every class I could and I loved it. And it was very much about, listen to your team, help them succeed. Find you have a job description, you have the talent, but find the path for them. So they see they have a career and potential. One of my early management memories is I had taken over marketing at this healthcare system, and they had an outboard Remember, you’re too young to remember those. It was like, it was a whiteboard, and it had little magnets or like I’m in, I’m out. And I had an exceptionally talented person who did our radio show all this stuff. She loved working from home, this is about 15 years ago. And I said, Fine, you can work from the moon, I don’t care. If you’re doing good work. I don’t care. Now look where we are. Well, she would always like to write on the board. I am working from home. So a colleague came in, who managed the quality and accreditation and was that kind of busy body of the of the health system. And she looked at that in whiteboard. And she kind of made a mental note and walked away. And later she goes, Roy, I got a call on the hotline. Do you have people working from home? I’m like, Maureen, you did not get a call on the hotline, you saw that board. So what I did is I walked out of my office and I said, “Hey, Barb, does this come off the wall?” And I ripped the whiteboard off the wall, I said, Yep, comes off the wall. So I solved for the problem a little differently. Lisa continued to work from home, I’m sure it was in violation of some policies and processes, but she was doing good work. And to change that, because someone was being a busybody in the organization was going to hurt the outcomes of the organization. You know, I’m not advocating people ignore the rules of their organization, don’t get me wrong, but understand your talent in what they need. And if they shine in a certain environment, let them be there. And don’t worry about what time they’d showed up. And because they’re gonna give you more than you ever expected, but if you manage for style and time and what they were, and when they showed up and how many hours they were in, they’re only going to give you that they’re not going to give you any more.

 

Rachel  06:59

I think that level of trust is really important. I think when they feel they can be trusted to sort of do that in their own way. And yeah, in the way that makes them work better. I think that’s something I hope many industries learn from this pandemic.

 

Roy Sexton 07:15

I don’t want to seem ageist, I do think we have generational issues. And it depends on your leadership and what they’re comfortable with. We are used to our cell phones and zoom in all these different ways that I can, you know, for 15 years now, I basically could do my job remotely, wherever and whatever I was doing, because there are those tools. So their assumption is, we all know what we know, they assume nobody’s doing anything because you’re not here in a suit and tie. No, it’s a little harder for a manager. But it’s so much more rewarding to focus on the outcomes. So you learn your talent, you learn their limitations, you help them fly, you don’t overly critique them until they’re ready. You can calibrate but let people get the foundation, let them be safe, folks who want to be here in a suit and tie if that’s what you want, you come in, but don’t expect that of everybody. You have to focus on the individual. And if they have talent, where are they going to shine the best, and it’s a job. And I appreciate that I work in a culture that has its rules, they follow the protocols, they ask you to commit to well, what are you doing to create a culture that people want to be part of, and it’s going to solve itself?

 

Rachel  08:23

You touched on this a little earlier in terms of bringing people into new roles, training them. And we touched a little bit on hiring, one of the things that we wanted to ask you about is what are your thoughts on hiring professional staff with like no experience in the legal industry, and what are the advantages and the disadvantages of that?

 

Roy Sexton 08:41

I think people get very linear and they’re like, Well, you only have these criteria, you don’t qualify for this. You don’t have to talk to the universe of people, some people just aren’t the right fit, but look at their personalities as much as the background they have. And I think you gain a lot. Somebody should at least have lawyers in their family. If you’re going to work for a law firm, you got to fit the personality is unique. Doctors have a unique challenge in that they love risk, but they love data. So if you’re working in marketing with doctors go in with enough data that they see you. You did some scientific method of this. Yeah, sure. Okay. Great. With lawyers, I went to I went in with data, because that’s what I knew from healthcare, oh, I barely left the room alive, because all they saw was risk and possibility. They want to avoid risk. You know, there’s some things you learn about the culture quickly, that that’s the only thing I would say if you’re going to hire somebody. And you have a very difficult law firm culture, a very demanding group of attorneys, you might want to grab somebody who’s at least worked with lawyers in some aspects. I don’t need to know the nuance of what the litigator is doing. But I need to know why it’s important, what audience you’re trying to reach. And then trust me to figure out the channels, the mechanisms and all that to do and sometimes attorneys jump into that they want to tie your hands and say I want to sponsor this rodeo because I’m going to get all this stuff out. I’m like, That’s a stupid idea, I can’t say that, I have to say, well, they could do that. Or you could do this, I don’t think you need to have a law firm background, at least for roles like mine. I hate it when people say it’s not rocket science, what we do is difficult, let’s not minimize that it is as hard as rocket science. Because it’s people, it’s relationships, and you never know what you’re getting when you walk in the door with somebody. But if you have some emotional intelligence, you have the chops to communicate to right, you understand the digital channels that are available to us. And you have the sensitivity to appreciate. This very busy person who has an attorney is very stressed out, and they’re not mad at you, they just don’t know what you’re talking about. And you have to have the patience and the calm and the kindness to understand what’s important to them, you can work very well. So that’s kind of what I look for when I’m interviewing people. I don’t get hung up on if they’ve worked in a law firm before. But if I feel like they’re a bad culture fit, and they haven’t worked in a law firm, and they don’t have the skills, and I said to somebody yesterday, you don’t want to work in a law firm, you’ve worked in retail, most other places don’t do it.

 

Rachel  11:07

That focus on interpersonal skills is something that I think, in the past has been undervalued. Yeah, sort of going off of what you said earlier, in terms of you know, you’re in college, you had an arts degree, I mean, think just my both have parts degrees, in some sense. And I also have a partner that has a STEM degree. And you know, there’s sort of like this dichotomy of like, those very hard math and science skills like, yeah, aren’t always what you need to succeed, a lot of times it is learning how to talk to people and form relationships and things like that.

 

Jessica  11:36

So when we think about the increasing conflation of a firm, like their operations that are changing- your cultural changes, what do you see as the role of a marketing professional in the market that exists now?

 

Roy Sexton 11:51

I think we’re in a unique opportunity, and a really strong one, you know, people, people fixate on the AI as an abstraction versus something that just needs to be the reality. When you think about the AI, or when you think about wellness or any of these topics, that confluence of law firms are struggling, we need to fix our culture, we need to have representation, we need to have legitimate, you know, put people in leadership roles that look like us on this call, you know, there are people of color there, you know, so people see themselves in the leadership ranks, and they’ll stick around. So if you make that change, now take the victory lap for marketing, tell people about it don’t don’t suddenly get shy. I’m celebrating a leader who’s creating great change. I’m celebrating young people who are being seen, their friends and family are like, wow, that’s a neat organization. And, again, you have to see that larger, you know, Disney, Apple, those companies do a good job of creating an environment you want to be part of, if you can steal some of that, as a law firm, don’t get so focused on I want a case tell everybody I won that case, it’s going to get me business. Okay, maybe. But if they see what kind of organization it is the culture change that’s happening, the fact that good work is coming out of that organization, then you’re going to attract talent, you’re going to attract customers, you’re going to have a sustainable model. And I do think sometimes people are just so linear in their thinking they miss that that broader storytelling, opportunity. So you know, I think we’re in a unique place. I also think the other side of the coin, I’m going to get real, technical, we have so much data available to us right now. We have so many tools. It is a marketer’s dream right now that we have to work with, we don’t have to go to outside agencies, sorry, service providers to do stuff. Use data in that way, again, to drive change in the culture to drive engagement. And these digital channels, you’re, you’re using them beautifully. I mean, I really, when I saw Jennifer Scholler, at ALM, she was overwhelmed with the response that has come from your platform. In recent months. This is it’s off the charts, because you got good content, you’re reaching people, you’re putting it out there in smart and clever ways. And you have a following. And people then gravitate, you know, they gravitate to where there’s a following, so.

 

Jessica  14:10

I’m so glad you mentioned how the legal industry does have the weird, high walls around it. Sometimes I think there’s such a particular hierarchy in a law firm in general. So the fact that you know, we all know people want to connect with people. So if you keep just having these tall walls of legality, I guess. Preventing people from wanting to connect with you. That’s why I mean, over and over. If we beat anything into this podcast, it’s that people want to know a law firm. They want to know the people. That makes them want to go to you in the first place.

 

Roy Sexton 14:47

I switched my LinkedIn picture the other day and I switched it back but I had one of me and a Superman t-shirt. Somebody took me I loved it. And I got so much great response to that but I got some people inside from like, Do you think that’s really the professional look you want to be going for and I second-guessed myself, I changed the picture. And then I resented myself for it, finding those moments of authenticity. That’s what people respond to. And I think we get so worried in law firms are rife with this law firms want to be first to be second, like, they don’t wanna be the first one to do anything, in case it’s too risky. But they want to be right there at second, we’ll be the first, no one’s paying that much attention anyway, you’re not going to, you’re not going to ruin your organization, anybody who comes at you with a phrase, you need to be taken seriously run away from them, because they’re worried about the wrong, none of us need to be taken seriously. We need to do good work, we need to be accessible, we need to have fun and enjoy the lives that we’re living. And those people who say those things to you, they’re nervous themselves, they want to be out of their own shell.

 

Jessica  15:46

It’s just that old environment, like what you’re saying about employees, you know, there are the ones who want to wear the suit and come in, and that’s fine. But that’s because that’s who they are. Yeah, and you should be okay with that, if that’s what you want to do. You know, but also the same has to go for people who want to work remote, and yeah, have Thor’s hammer behind them. You know what I mean? Like, I just feel like, I’m hiring the attorney that posts dog photos. That’s something I can connect with. And yeah, I think that attorneys in particular, so before this, I was a paralegal for a couple of years. So I’ve worked around attorneys a lot. And I think the, it’s that competition with each other, you know, you got to be the best you got to put up your Super Lawyers because people won’t take you seriously. I don’t know why that idea persists.

 

Roy Sexton 16:32

So I realize it come into a room. And it’s easy for me to say I don’t need to worry about being taken seriously, because I have the latitude to have Thor’s hammer behind me. And it’s colorful, somebody else who’s coming maybe and nobody knows I’m gay unless I tell him but I tell everybody, I have the latitude to be a little more myself. And I appreciate that some of what I’m saying may not work for people who have been in marginalized groups or who have felt, I’m speaking to two women. And so I’m going to mansplain back to you the experience you’ve had my husband, I were talking about this last night, he had a colleague who posted something about I’m part of this women’s group, and I’m so grateful for their support. And my husband’s kind of manager who literally does not see gender color. He just sees talent. He’s a wonderful human being in that regard. He goes, does that do people really need those groups still, I go, honey, you’re different than everybody else. A lot of women have had to go through hell. We saw it in the “Me Too” movement, things that we never knew or heard about. It happened behind closed doors, slights that happen, the marginalization that happened. So I realize there is an element sometimes if I wear the outfit everybody else is wearing, it gives me entree to then be myself, try to help us try to break down that need in an environment. If you knew the hurdles you had to overcome to get into your role, break them down for other people don’t let that continue. Because it’s unnecessary.

 

Jessica  17:57

I want to know because I’m sure law firms now with all these changes are getting so…not frightened- that might be too strong of a word, but they’re very cautious about things in general, you know, the risk, the risk management part of that is definitely a little bit. But when it comes to how you’re doing things with marketing, you know, how are you using like numbers to show that the work you’re doing is effective? You know, how are you doing that to reassure firms that yeah, you know, the necessity of it.

 

Roy Sexton 18:32

So we use Power BI as a sort of a baseline, we’re doing a lot of analysis through what we use sprout for social media. I’m not I’m not advertising to these people. I’m just saying that’s what we use. We’re working with ALM right now sorry, on some direct advertising. And and, and that’s giving us that ability to target and figure out who we’re reaching when we’re reaching and how we’re reaching them. Were really, with the new launch of the new website and brand, we stepped up our SEO, and we’re working with a partner there that isn’t just doing the SEO for us. They’re teaching our team how to do it correctly. So we have a monthly report that we send out to the firm, that’s more anecdotal. But he always take those laps, put yourself back in front of the firm going, here’s everything that happened this month, half of them read it, we get some nasty grams too long, didn’t read fonts too small, that kind of stuff. But mostly they’re like, we’re here. And now on a weekly basis, we send another digest, like, here’s how many alerts went out. Here’s how many events. So those are your kind of leading indicators that people go, there’s some kinetics happening and social media is really helpful that way.

 

Rachel  19:31

For our next topic, we want to focus in more on what Clark Hill has been doing in recent months, like you mentioned specifically earlier that the firm, create a new brand and focused on you know, the sort of value in the culture-aspects of it. How did that process go and what can law firms learn from?

 

Roy Sexton 19:48

The pandemic served us well, it gave us more time. We had a very aggressive timeline that I don’t know that we would have hit before. It gave us more months to dig in, and really what we had done in the development of brand- we worked with One North on the brand and the website. And we had a lot of listening and learning outposts. That was important to me. And it was important to my boss. And so we had a survey of everybody in the firm, not just attorneys, and we got like an 80% response rate with like, a shortlist of questions. What do you think the brand is? What do you hear that? You know, because we were bringing a culture together too. And then we went externally, we did client interviews, what do you think of the brand? What do we do? Well, what don’t we do, we baked all that together. So we did the discovery piece of it to then move to well, What messages do we think are a reflection of who we are, and then what’s our stretch to what we want to be, and we took the time to go through that process. And then we landed on a brand, we then with the pandemic, we had the moment to step back and go, Okay, we didn’t think we’re gonna be able to go through all the content on the website like we wanted to, we do. So let’s use the Education own moment here. Rather than just marketing, go rewrite everything and put it up. We use this as an educational opportunity with our BD folks and everybody to divvy up all the bios, we had a new structure to it, we had a headline, we did that intentionally, like let’s create a structure that forces a rewrite of the BIOS. So then we had the time to do a bio project. And Alex, France and Tommy on our team, they, they set it all up, they put a video together, we went to each business unit said, This is what we’re trying to do, the voice we’re trying to capture. We got pushback, we got people that didn’t want to do it for mostly though people. And the attorneys themselves took a swing at it. We use the development of the brand and the website very collaboratively, we delegated everybody got some time in it. We worked with all the operational areas in the brain lunch, we had an extensive process. Cheryl Kravitz helped us with a timeline of HR, you’re doing this, it you’re doing this, it’s not just only marketing things, everybody gets a piece of this. And at the end of it, we had a celebration, everybody got a swag box, we wanted to make sure everybody wherever they were got a box of new branded stuff, we had a wonderful video that tells studios put together of who we are telling our story. I’m an opportunist, and I’m cheap. So I’m like, we want to do a video that will work internally. And then I can slice it up and put it externally people didn’t understand what the hell I was talking about until we did it. They were like, well, this is for we want to talk about internal things. They go no, no, just inspire people. We can have some framing stuff from our leaders, but just inspire people. And then we’ll have that out in the world. We had like 370,000 views of that video, when all was said and done. It was thrilling. And we told our story, but we took time to have everybody feel like they were part of it. So when we launched the brand, not many people had seen it. But they felt like they were part of it when they saw it. And that made all the difference with all the other random stuff that comes our way on a daily basis to do this correctly, and make it launch where you don’t have 1,000 knives in your back. Give yourself two years and really open up the process where you can have people feel like they were part of it.

 

Rachel  22:51

Yeah, I think what you’re saying how the pandemic helps move things along is not uncommon. In terms of like the interviews we’ve done so far. I think a lot of law firms have said that the pandemic really pushed them to make these changes. And these changes were something that were in the pipeline for a while, and they just forced to move forward with them because they didn’t have any other choice. So that’s sort of that sort of leads into my next question here, when you were doing this and doing this branding and all this other stuff, and you launched it, you know, what has really been the response that

 

Roy Sexton 23:25

It was overwhelming. They were minor hiccups. And what I love about my boss is just a Roy, just take a pause, it’s fine, don’t don’t catastrophize it’s gonna be fine. Just We’ll get through it. It’s not a big deal. So sometimes you gotta listen on the things that don’t matter, really like the font of that email, and give. And then you have the big win. And by God, everybody loved the stuff that mattered the brand, they were so hungry for it. They had felt included, we done enough lead up to it, they knew it was coming, they loved the look, they felt elevated, that’s what you want with a brand. They felt like the brand that they’d had and inherited. And again, these were four or five different separate firms that have come together, Clark Hill inherited an old Clark Hill brand that even Clark Hills unlike anymore, seven felt like they needed new clothes for school. They so you gave them something fresh. And the video that was embedded with all these faces from all over the country, again, my boss’s wisdom, because I was like, well, let’s just have two or three people. Let’s make this easy. And she was No, no, Roy, we got to figure out how to get to six different locations and have a lot of people interviewed. She was right. Because people saw themselves in the story. And the response we got internally was exactly what we wanted. People quieted down. Their obsession was signage and all this stuff that they were driving us all crazy because they were like, Oh, you have this in hand. It gave us the credibility and all the other things to like, Oh, you guys actually know what you’re doing? Yeah, we do. And then the external response was, like I said with the video itself had 300 I think 375,000 views and the response from people outside the firm, because lawyers will never tell you that they’ll tell you when someone Outside the firm is teasing us. But they don’t tell you when they hear the good stuff. But I know they did. I know they heard from people outside going, Wow, you guys woke up, you’re doing interesting stuff. And and that’s what we wanted. You know we’re having a record year again, many law firms are having a record year again. So I can’t chalk it up to the brand and the website necessarily, but I feel like we landed a market and brand message just when we needed it at the right time to galvanize the organization to help us move forward. With strong leadership. Our CEO has been there every step of the way and supportive he was part of the brand launch, she has reinforced the things we needed him too. He’s challenged us when we needed to be challenged. My boss has seen the long game. I’ve had an incredible team of people whenever Anderson, she I feel like I’m giving an Oscar speech came in under budget way under budget, and on time, which is unheard of, and I’m very proud of that

 

Rachel  25:51

We spoke a little earlier was the importance of diversity and creating diverse teams. Can you speak a little bit about you know, what Clark Hill has done to do that, and like why it’s important?

 

Roy Sexton 26:01

Part of the DNA of the organization, our Texas offices that came online a couple years ago, Strassburger, they had a really robust program, they called it bold thrive and pride. I think we’re sort of evolving. I think affinity groups are important, but sometimes they almost think they also do some disservice. It’s like, I feel this way, sometimes all you gay people get together and go do stuff and talk and it’s like, Well, okay, but we need to, we need to demonstrate to everyone else, we have value. But those are that we brought those in and again made them part of this launch that we had attorney leaders now, not just in Texas, but across the country who are driving those efforts. Pride is obviously for our LGBTQ community. Thrive is for people of color. And then bold is our women’s initiative. But somewhat, they’re all a bit inwardly focused, because you’re trying to provide talent, tools, resources, and commiseration to people who are in those groups that work for the firm. But we’ve also started to extend that out to say, well, what are the programmatic offerings we can provide to demonstrate we’re committed to this, the education pieces, it’s, it’s gonna sound like small potatoes, but it was a big impact. Alex France on my team, she looked at the calendar and all of the events that are important both as recognition months, as well as the holidays, based on faith and culture and all those things. And so we have a an intentional message that goes on, we have an editorial calendar against that. And we’ve also used as an engagement strategy with our HR folks. So for, for example, Asian Asian American Pacific Islanders month, we had Alex and glory pack who was with us at the time, they put together little placards, we put on our social media with a story or a video component with people in their own words. And again, we didn’t live in it to attorneys, it’s paralegals, it was office managers, it was legal assistants, anybody who was in that category, or felt strongly about that and wanted to had something to offer, we made sure we were telling their stories on our digital channels. And then we circulated that internally. Now that all feels a little window dressing, you know, to get to the substantive issues our leadership team is actively looking at, how are we recruiting? Who are we putting in what roles how are we promoting and actively assessing that data to say, you know, are we using the Mansfield rubric, we don’t have enough hear or in some cases, we’ve actually been pleasantly surprised, because I think you always feel like you’re not doing enough. And then you look at some of it, and you’re like, Oh, we’re actually we’ve been more intentionally we even realized. So Linda Watson, who’s one of our attorneys has been leading that effort with HR, and they’re relatively early in that journey. But you know, they’re taking it quite seriously. When I was in health care, we went, we did something called the Malcolm Baldrige assessment, which is a quality piece, and some people do it just to win the award, we did it to actually improve. And Clarksville is doing that same thing with Mansfield, it’s like, of course, we want the recognition. But we want to use the criteria to get better. And I’m thrilled to see that, you know, I’m not involved in it other than this communication stuff I talk about, but what I’m seeing the firm do, I’m really pleased about. So

 

Rachel  29:03

I think it’s just great to highlight those things on this podcast, I think being able to learn from what others have done and be able to apply it to actually helps make change.

 

Roy Sexton 29:12

Well, and that’s why I’ve always loved being part of LMA. I mean, I don’t know if the attorneys know this. But when we all get together we tell everybody what we’re doing. Right? Don’t do that. Well, it’s there’s what you do, and there’s how you do it. So it’s it’s always good to see what other people are doing. Because then you can take that idea and build on it. And then they can build on your idea and you just get better. You know, there’s always live in abundance, not scarcity. And so you’re right, look at what other people are doing. go think about that. We should do some of that. But let’s do it our way. Let’s take the idea and do it in our style. And then you’re not stealing from anybody so

 

Rachel  29:47

Excellent. So yeah, we’ve had a great conversation with you today. Right. We really appreciate you joining us. A special thanks to Roy Sexton from Clark Hill for joining us today.

 

Roy Sexton

Thank you for having me.


For more articles on the legal industry, visit the NLR Law Office Management section.

Top Storytelling Techniques Lawyers Need to Use in Their Marketing

In the past, marketing and advertising strategies were all about showing your ideal clients why your law firm was the one to choose. Every ad and marketing plan was focused on framing the law firm or the attorney as the hero of the story: “Let us step in and save the day!”

The problem is, your clients do not need a hero. They are the hero of their story. And law firms and attorneys across the country are only beginning to see how storytelling is going to be an integral part of their content marketing and digital marketing strategies going forward.

It’s all about relating to your ideal client and giving them the information that they really need to make decisions that work best for their family. It sounds a lot more complicated than it is. But there are several techniques that you can use to make sure that your marketing is telling compelling stories that are going to guide your ideal client to the decision that your law firm is the one that is going to help them achieve their goal.

Tip 1: Focus on Making Your Client the Hero

One of the biggest mistakes law firms are making in their marketing strategies is making themselves the hero at the expense of what the client really needs. Traditional marketing has told law firms to sell their accomplishments and achievements. Listing reason after we reason for why this law firm was the right one for that particular client. Are you bored? So is your client. And chances are, if your readers are bored, they are not going to convert into clients.

With that in mind, you need to tell stories in a way that grabs their attention and helps them see that they are the hero in their story. Instead of talking about all of your law firm’s achievements, you should be relating to your clients. What services are you providing to them that allow them to fix their legal issues and come out on top?

Leading with a firm first approach isn’t likely to be successful in today’s age. These days, your clients know that they are the hero, and they are not going to choose a law firm that they feel like they have to compete with.

Tip 2: Frame Yourself as the Guide

You still need to be able to explain to your clients in all of your different marketing strategies why your law firm is better than the competition. But you can do this in a way that does not come across as you are showing off or attempting to put the spotlight on your law firm’s biggest case results, settlements, victories, and achievements.

Instead, you should frame yourself as the guide. This is the concept of the Storybrand by Donald Miller, where the service provider is the guide who helps the client (the hero) find a solution to fix their problem. Make sure that your marketing materials are framed in a way that sets your law firm up to be the guide that will help the hero solve their problem.

Tip 3: Solve Your Ideal Client’s Pain Points

It sounds easy. Writing content and developing marketing materials that make you the guide and the reader the hero. Check. If only it were that easy. Unfortunately, developing these types of storybranded materials can be challenging. There is a fine line between showcasing the benefits of working with your firm and showing the reader how you can solve their problems. Many law firms miss the mark, and it costs them clients.

If you want to get it right, make sure you start off by thinking about the biggest pain points your client is experiencing with their legal issue. How high are their costs? Are they experiencing substantial economic and non-economic losses? Are they at risk for going to prison? Do they have complex legal issues they do not understand? These questions become more and more specific depending on the type of practice area you are in and the type of content materials that you are developing. By addressing your ideal client pain points, you can show them how your law firm will provide them with the tools they need to fix their legal issues.

Make sure to keep your content short and to the point across the board. Most readers do not have the time, patience, or inclination to read more than one or two lines. The first line should describe their pain point. The second line should describe how your solution fixes their problem. If you do it right, that is all you will need to get your prospective client to pick up the phone or fill out your website’s contact form.

Start Storytelling With Your Law Firm’s Marketing Strategies

Storytelling and storybranding are the future for law for content marketing. Gone are the days where clients chose law firms based on their achievements and successes. All lawyers are successful in the eyes of a potential client, figuratively speaking. What your clients care about is how you are going to help them solve their issue. They couldn’t care less what college you graduated from, what your Avvo rating is, or all of that volunteer work you put in while you were working for the County Clerk’s office.

You can still use these credentials and accomplishments as benefits that you provide to clients in need. But you need to be sure to do so in a way that still frames the client as the hero. How specifically does your accomplishment help them help themselves?

You need to be very careful to produce content that answers this question carefully. If you miss the mark and make yourself a hero, you have probably lost a potential client. But, if you can clearly answer this question and provide your prospective clients with the information they are looking for, at a glance, you are more likely to generate the leads you hoped to see online.

© 2021 Denver Legal Marketing LLC

For more articles on legal marketing, visit the NLR Law Office Management section

8 Tips to Boost Law Firm Marketing ROI

Marketing campaigns to generate leads are a significant investment for many law firms. In return, they expect their law firm marketing ROI tactics to produce higher client conversions and be worth the investment of time. Unfortunately, some firms lack the lead capture capability to nurture leads, wasting their marketing spend.

For high marketing ROI, a law firm must-have tools and resources in place to effectively capture leads and convert them into clients. Here are 8 tips to boost law firm marketing ROI.

What is ROI?

ROI is a performance measure that evaluates the efficiency and profitability of an investment, such as marketing spend. Usually, ROI is calculated by dividing the benefit of the investment – such as leads generated – by the cost of the investment.

In some cases, ROI can be a complex calculation that considers many investments of time, effort, and money. Realistically, a lot goes into a conversion, such as attracting a new lead or signing a client, but it’s best to focus on the specific and measurable benefits with the costs for a simple ROI result.

1. Set a Standard for Law Firm Marketing ROI

Calculating ROI can be complex, but there are acceptable ranges for what an ROI should be. This provides a standard to measure future efforts against.

Your law firm marketing ROI strategy should try to set a target prior to the marketing spend, then see if the campaign reflects that target. If expectations and ROI don’t match, it’s time to reevaluate the ROI calculation, the marketing efforts, the intake process, or all three.

2. Find the Right ROI Calculation Method

Law firms should calculate ROI using the following method:

Total the investment:

Investment = Implementation Cost + Cash Cost

Calculate the net annual savings:

Net Annual Savings = Annual Savings – Annual Expenses

Calculate the ROI:

Annual ROI = Net Annual Savings / Investment

This is a standard calculation, but some firms may lack the raw data necessary or have too much uncertainty. In these cases, the marketing ROI can be simplified by creating test groups to remove as many variables as possible. Use “like-for-like” comparisons to see which efforts yield results and which don’t.

3. Hire Intake Specialists

Law firms can be busy places, so it’s possible for new leads to get lost in the shuffle. Receptionists often have long to-do lists and can’t dedicate the time and attention to nurturing leads.

Prospective clients reach out to a law firm and expect a quick response and expert consultations. If that doesn’t happen, they’ll keep searching for a firm that caters to their needs. Intake specialists can ensure each client is given the attention they need in a professional and efficient way, boosting the marketing ROI all around.

4. Provide Immediate Responses

Legal troubles can be stressful, so clients calling a law firm want a live response that eases their concern and gives them peace of mind about the process. When a client calls a law firm and gets a dedicated team to handle their case consultation, they no longer feel the need to shop around for another firm.

Professional legal call centers can give prospective clients a response within 30 seconds, or fewer than three rings. They also offer live outbound calls in response to website inquiries. This response time shows prospective clients that they’re valued, boosting the chances for conversion.

5. Implement After-Hours Support

Marketing campaigns can generate high call volumes, quickly overwhelming a law firm’s team. Worse yet, if calls go to voicemail after hours, the client is likely to continue calling firms until they find one to help.

Law firms should always have a dedicated answering service for after-hours support. These trained professionals can handle the overflow and field calls to nurture leads, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Every prospective client will receive an instant response, no matter the time of day or night.

6. Keep Track of Leads

Lead tracking is likely part of the intake process, but it’s important to follow up and give every prospective client the care and attention they want. Lead tracking helps law firms follow through with leads along each phase of the customer journey, from initial awareness to conversion. The information from lead tracking can also be used to follow up at critical points and set up appointments and consultations.

Lead tracking can reveal flaws in the current intake process as well. Law firms can evaluate the intake process and identify areas for improvement, both for the larger goal and to enhance the client experience.

7. Create Convenient Contract Delivery Methods

The delivery and signing of a contract is a crucial step in converting a lead. Ideally, all qualified leads should be signed on the initial call, or they may seek help at competitors’ firms.

Convenient contract delivery methods solve this problem by sending fee agreements through text, email, or conventional mail to get documents signed quickly. This not only benefits the client and provides a stellar experience, but it increases conversion rates for the firm.

8. Embrace Legal Technology

Many tools are available for law firms to track profitability, manage client relationships, and monitor expenses, such as marketing investments. Legal technology offers powerful tools, such as expense tracking and reporting to keep up with expenses from anywhere, on any device. Legal technology may also feature client management to track and optimize the client relationship for better service and increased efficiency.

Workflow management may be included, which can help with client response protocols, client intake procedures, and lead nurturing. Depending on the features of the legal technology, law firms can take a lot of mystery and time out of the lead generation process.

©2006-2021, BILL4TIME. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Article By Bill4Time

For more articles on the legal industry, visit the NLR Law Office Management

The National Law Review Launches ‘Legal News Reach’ Podcast, Featuring Experts in the Legal Marketing Industry

The National Law Review is excited to announce the launch of Legal News Reach, a new bi-weekly podcast that features guests with expertise in legal marketing, SEO, law firm best practices, and more. Hosted by NLR’s Editorial Manager Rachel Popa, and Web Content Specialist Jessica Scheck, Legal News Reach highlights for listeners the latest legal marketing strategies to help them stand out and stand firm in the legal industry.

The first season of the podcast focuses on topics such as hiring and marketing in the legal industry, legal marketing budgets post COVID-19, the attorney-client relationship, diversity and inclusion initiatives (D&I) and law firm pro bono initiatives.

In the inaugural episode, Rachel and Jess discussed marketing tactics for law firms in the post-COVID work environment with Melanie Trudeau, Director of New Business & Digital Strategies at Jaffe PR.

“A few things I would like to see stick around would be giving some more autonomy to attorneys to just do their work effectively from a home office. They don’t have to spend all that time getting ready to go to work, and juggling childcare. If you can create a lot more flexibility in the work environment, that’s going to make firms competitive,” Ms. Trudeau said.

To adjust to the challenges of COVID-19, the legal industry pivoted and made adjustments as to how they delivered their services and how attorneys work. However, as the pandemic continues, law firms that remain flexible will find it easier to stand out from their competitors. Legal News Reach provides a platform for legal professionals to learn from the top experts in the industry, as well as showcase their own expertise. Episodes are published and featured on the National Law Review website, which today is one of the highest volume business law publications in the US after over 10 years of steady growth.

“Law firm marketers have a wealth of knowledge and experience that’s often unique to the legal industry. Legal News Reach provides a forum for them to share their insights, discuss industry trends, and showcase examples of real-world experience,” Ms. Trudeau said.

Pivoting to changes brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic carried over into the second episode of the podcast, with Rachel and Jess discussing the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on legal marketing budgets with Guy Alvarez, Founder and Chief Engagement Officer of Good2bSocial.

“What we’re seeing is really a shift in terms of budget from the real world into the virtual world. And as a result, we’re seeing law firms spend a lot of their budget on digital marketing, ways that they can enhance their website, and how they can communicate to their clients and prospects their knowledge, their experience and basically stay top of mind and develop strategic relationships,” Mr. Alvarez said.

Prior to the pandemic, many firms focused on live events, conferences and trade events. Now that meeting in person is more difficult, firms are pivoting to hosting more webinars and podcasts. Both lawyers and legal marketers can pick up tips from legal marketing leaders on Legal News Reach on how to stay connected with their clients, and highlight their firm’s unique value proposition.

“The National Law Review’s Legal News Reach podcast is a great platform for lawyers and legal marketers to learn the latest trends affecting the industry,” Mr. Alvarez said.

In the third episode of the Legal News Reach podcast, Rachel and Jess spoke with Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz President and Chief Operating Officer Jennifer Keller, and Chief Marketing and Business Development Officer Adam Severson about law firm management, D&I initiatives and attorney-client relationship building.

“I think from the law firm management perspective, there’s a lot of interesting work going on right now in analyzing the changes in law firm management the last 18 months have brought us. I think what you’re going to see looking 5 to 10 years ahead is younger, more diverse teams of leadership in firms,” Ms. Keller said.

“D&I is one of those areas that I think we all recognize that we can all be better. It’s an area that I think has been important for everybody. Without a clear roadmap and some specificity to it, we’re not going to get to where we need to be as a firm and candidly, as an industry,” Mr. Severson said.

Despite the challenges brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, many law firms found silver linings as well, embracing new diversity initiatives that will have an impact for years to come. Legal News Reach builds off the National’s Law Review’s audience of over 2 million legal and business professionals to highlight the best practices of leading-edge law firms.

“It was great to be featured in the Legal News Reach podcast to share some of the great things Baker Donelson is doing. The National Law Review’s audience has tremendous reach so it was great to be highlighted,” Mr. Severson said.

The first four episodes of the first season of Legal News Reach are currently available on natlawreview.com, as well as major podcast platforms such as SpotifyApple PodcastsGoogle PodcastsBreaker, Anchor.fmPocket CastsRadio PublicSoundcloud and more. Listeners can also find Legal News Reach podcast clips on the National Law Review YouTube channel. The first season of the podcast includes 10 episodes, with the second season planned to launch in 2022.

For more articles on legal marketing, visit the NLR Law Office Management section.

Law Firm Culture After COVID-19 with McCarter & English [PODCAST]

How has law firm culture changed in the world post-COVID-19? Rachel and Jessica discuss that and DEI with Bernadette DeCelle with McCarter & English law firm.

Read on for a transcript of our conversation, transcribed by AI:

 

Rachel
Hello and welcome to legal news reach, the official podcast for the National Law Review. Stay tuned for a discussion on the latest trends in legal marketing, SEO law firm best practices and more.

Rachel

I’m Rachel, Editorial Manager for the National Law Review.

Jess
And I’m Jessica, a web content specialist. And we’re the CO hosts for legal news reach

Rachel
Today Bernadette DeCelle Senior Director of Client Development and Marketing for McCarter and English joins us for a discussion on law firm culture COVID-19, and more. Bernadette, would you like to introduce yourself to our listeners?

Bernadette
Sure. Thank you for having me today. I’m Bernadette DeCelle. I am senior director in charge of client development and I have over 20 years in legal marketing. And before that I started as a graphic designer doing consumer product designs, quite a range of experiences over the past 20 years starting in communications and then learning business development and eventually leading teams at Weil, Gotshal, Herrick Feinstein and now at McCarter.

Rachel
Thank you for joining us today. We’re excited to get your insights. So one of the questions I want to dive in first here was we wanted to learn a little bit more about how what McCarter has done differently in terms of other law firms of its culture compared to other law firms you’ve worked with.

Bernadette
So McCarter is based in Newark, New Jersey. And I think maybe that has something to do with there’s a real lack of pretension among the lawyers, which is refreshing. There are plenty of smart people. We have 27 PhDs on the staff, and we work for very sophisticated fortune 100 clients, but you just don’t get that arrogance that maybe it’s a New York thing, I don’t know. But that sense of down-to-earth quality is really nice to be part of that kind of a collaborative team. There are no lawyers versus staff kind of mentality in our firm. Everybody collaborates together. It’s a real collective team, which is, I think, great for the clients. Because everybody gets together does whatever it takes to solve client problems, I think makes it a lot more rewarding for a lot of the lawyers here working and stuff as well.

Rachel
We want to talk a little bit more about just law firm culture and pro bono in general. So I was curious if you could speak a little bit about McCarter’s DEI initiatives and how that affects law firm culture.

Bernadette
Sure. McCarter has been very involved like most firms in expanding their lawyer ranks, especially on diversity. And they’ve been doing all types of partnerships with different organizations from sponsoring high school programs and debate programs in high schools even adopting a few high schools in each of our cities so that students see what a law career could look like. High school students spent a week in our New York office during the summer, you know, doing intern positions after 2020. And after the murder of George Floyd, it was really great to see our firm, combining the efforts of our pro bono team and our Diversity Committee to create the Social Justice Project. And that has been a great initiative, having McCarter behind ways to really dismantle structural racism. And what we’re going to do is it’s really through we’re looking at it through the lens of criminal expungements Housing and Economic Development. So there are three pillars to the Social Justice Project, which allow both lawyers and staff to do community service and pro bono projects. One of the best things I think about the social justice project has been the educational component so far, because we put on educational webinars that were open to both staff and to clients. And one of the first ones was three of our lawyers giving very powerful stories of what it was like to be a black lawyer in America and in the ratio of things that they’ve faced the hurdles that they’ve overcome, and really poignant stories, some of them had, they said they hadn’t even shared with their own families, but it’s, it was eye-opening, I think, to a lot of us who don’t understand every day what they go through just being a person of color and being treated differently.

Rachel

So how do these pro bono efforts fit into McCarter’s overall Legal Marketing Program?

Bernadette

Our pro bono program is great because it gives us a chance to partner with clients on pro bono projects. Oftentimes corporations and legal departments don’t have the same either time or structure to bring pro bono and to do pro bono internally. So it allows our team our pro bono partner to come up with ways to collaborate with clients on immigration clinics, we do things with veterans, helping them get medical things past appeals, there are things that the VA hospitals have turned down on the business development side always see pro bono as a way to reach out to clients and to do something different with them. And they welcome it helps our without our partners don’t have to do an ask, you know, in terms of getting new business, it’s just a way to work with the clients in a different way. There’s a number of clinics, we’re going to start a housing clinic soon as well. So there’s a bunch of ways we can collaborate with clients. And that’s been huge for business development purposes.

Jess

I just want to comment that I think it’s great, you guys have those initiatives. I know the general public has a really strong distrust for attorney offices in the legal industry, just in general. And the fact that you guys acknowledge and try to host those webinars on minority attorneys can really create a different kind of trust that, oh, this law firm acknowledges that this is something that exists. And I think just saying that you see that and that you want to try to be better with the initiatives you have helps people see that maybe things could change, or, you know, I want to hire this attorney because they’re not ignoring something that I’m worried about. Not me personally, but somebody who’s affected by those things.

Bernadette
I’m impressed that we’re putting our money where our mouth is basically it’s not just saying and putting a statement up on the website, we’ve also hosted two or three webinars where we invited professors from different universities, people from the University of Chicago, who are experts on either criminal reintegration and all of the problems with the prisons or on voting rights. So we’ve had some really interesting speakers from outside, we’ve decided as well to hire a full-time social justice fellow, and part of their role is to help with the educational programming, but to also work with the pro bono committee in terms of doing a lot more pro bono that’s focused on social justice issues. We had a pro bono fellow for the City of Newark, where I’m proud of the fact that we have two full-time lawyers just focused on various social justice issues. It is part of that culture that makes McCarter unique.

Jess
So to dive in on COVID. That’s kind of been a common theme with some of our other interviews with marketing and law firms. On our other episodes of this podcast, how have your guys’ communications and marketing efforts changed since the pandemic started?

Bernadette
Well, it’s been all webinars all the time, it’s really was a complete pivot to what we used to do, or which were so many in-person events, we quickly realized there was such a need for alerts and all the new rules that were coming out. Our lawyers really stepped up and created a lot of content. For the website, two of my team were working almost full time on just webinars last year, it was crazy. It really was amazing that the amount of content they created.

Jess
I’m sure that was a shift by itself. Are there any other surprises that you guys had to deal with also, because of the pandemic?

Bernadette

I was quite surprised by the number of lawyers who actually stepped up and lawyers who didn’t, in the past, write as many alerts became subject matter experts almost overnight, and really read through all those regulations and PPP loans and really became creative in their responses and ways to create short alerts that our clients could digest quickly. I was also surprised at the demand for legal work, everybody thought things would slow down, but it seemed like clients needed our expertise in different areas, Employment Insurance recovery, what they could get back from, you know, their insurance companies. So it really created demands and other areas, which was nice since the litigation, you know, slow down for a while, but then litigation did pick up again, once they figured out how to do courts do everything over zoom.

Jess
And I’m sure anything related to real estate and property and evictions was probably another surprise with COVID especially so it’s good. You guys had that initiative kind of already in place to help those people because that’s going to be a large trend that we see still being talked about, especially when the moratorium was still in place or

Bernadette
Right yeah, once the moratorium lifts me with I think it just lifted right it depends but some states where we are have extended it through the state not through you know, but it is gonna really create a huge crisis, I think. And that’s where our social justice fellow is going to be working with the pro bono fellow in Newark to really work on different things.

Jess
It was definitely a huge worry among people. And, you know, reaching out to attorneys, even just calling I’m sure to ask a question about it. Among those surprises that you guys had, do you still have any challenges that you’re dealing with? In the firm? Now,

Bernadette
I think, you know, keeping our lawyers engaged right now in business development activities a little more challenging, because we don’t see them, we can’t go knock on their office door, you know, they might be working more from home permanently. So it’s as much on our part to reach out to them and communicate and stay top of mind. When they see us. They’re reminded, oh, yeah, I have to write that client alert. I have to, you know, get ready for that presentation. But out of sight, out of mind, I think sometimes and that’s a definite challenge for us.

Rachel
So you spoke a little bit about the surprises brought on by the pandemic, and what you guys have been doing to sort of keep things going, I guess, moving for, like, how do you see things changing the legal industry, in terms of like these topics of like, remote work, like how to keep attorneys engaged? How will we work with people working remotely and be working in the office? I think these are things that are really on top of mind for a lot of firms right now.

Bernadette
I agree. There are so many unknowns out there. And firms are doing it in so many different ways. I’m hoping that a hybrid workforce becomes the norm. Now, I hope law firms get to that point where they realize all of the teams were amazing and productive during the pandemic, at home. So there’s no point in thinking you have to be in the office to be very productive. But I also see real shifts in technology. So my firm went to paperless billing during the pandemic, it was maybe the second month and I applaud my IT and finance department for rolling that out. It was out of necessity, I actually think they never would have gotten it done as quickly had had we been in the office. And I think they agree you know that because it was imperative because nobody wanted to be shipping out bills and having that back and forth. On paper, it really was a success. So I think you’ll see a lot more technology being rolled out a lot easier than in the past because we all know lawyers don’t like change, but technological advances for the better are welcome.

Rachel
And do you think an increasing focus on technology will help law firms be more prepared for future challenges? Like COVID or after COVID? I think one of the things that we’ve talked about in the last episode is really just how to pivot when things like this happen when like these are large disruptions occur?

Bernadette
Absolutely. I think technology’s going to really be a factor in firms that succeed. I think firms that stay nimble, you know, and lose, I think also a lot of the bureaucratic approval processes, there was no time to go through approvals. People just had to get things done. Right. They had to move forward and come up with decisions quickly, whoever was on, you know, committee call made those decisions. They didn’t wait. Slow grinding process of approvals. Staying nimble is really going to be I think, a key to a lot of law firms succeeding in the future.

Rachel
Yeah, so one thing you said earlier about how moving from paperless billing to now using virtual billing. So sort of like it was something that happened because of COVID. And like really sped it along because of COVID. I think that’s something that we’ve heard from other guests, too, that the pandemic really spurred law firms to make these changes that they had been considering for a long time, but just hadn’t had the catalyst to do it. So I think that probably has been a really big lesson as well.

Bernadette
Our IT department had to train everybody over Zoom remotely. And it was tough.

Rachel
Obviously, law firms didn’t really have much of a choice, either switch or you know, stuff doesn’t get done. So sort of like in that same vein of working remotely doing things over zoom. How has McCarter really made hybrid work arrangements work during the pandemic? And how do you think you know, other law firms can really learn from that moving forward?

Bernadette
I think the biggest thing is to trust your team. And so, again, when you have a collaborative culture already that it really helps. Our Managing Partner and our chairman did a great job communicating, especially at the beginning, when everybody was feeling really unsure and not knowing what was going to happen next, they would send almost daily emails, those daily emails and that communication and keeping people in feeling like they’re in touch, we’re really important. Our Chief Human Resources Officer also sent out one to the staff and hers were kind of funny and just kind of motivational to make people feel like they were still part of the team and in touch with each other, you know, should send out Happy Anniversary things. And I think going forward, people just have to maintain that trust in that everybody’s going to rise to the occasion, you know, everybody’s going to do their best job, whether they’re in an office or whether they’re at home, people want to perform and do well, that hasn’t changed. And that’s not going to change.

Rachel
Right. I think that is something really important to move forward with, I think, especially code has shown us that it is possible to have people working remotely. And now that, you know, I think some people have gone back to the office. But if it’s working well now, then I think you can trust that it’s going to work well in the future.

Bernadette
Yeah, we’re back in the office two days. I, you know, I think they want us to get back five days eventually. I hope, maybe four days would be nice. It feels nice to be in the office. But I sure would love to not have that commute.

Rachel
Oh, yeah. I understand that. So we also have a Q&A section here. So if you have any questions you’d like to ask us, we’d be happy to answer them.

Bernadette
Yeah, I was wondering what you guys have seen in terms of any new marketing trends that have emerged since COVID? Or even just in general, not because of the pandemic?

Rachel
Yeah, so we sort of already touched on two of the ones in our conversation so far. But I think one thing that we’ve definitely seen is the sort of switch to virtual events, and also this really big influx of more firms doing webinars and things like that, we specifically have a place on our website where our publishing clients can share their webinars with us. And I think, you know, we’ve had a pretty full schedule of things that people are putting on basically, since last March, when things really started to get really crazy. And I think also, one of the things that I think has been really important Since COVID started is just the focus on social media, lots of people being more active on LinkedIn, people staying connected with their clients and other followers on Twitter. I think that’s a really great way. You know, if you can’t meet in person, you know, you can’t network in person, like just staying connected, when people just can’t physically be in the same room together, I think has been really important.

Bernadette
We’ve been posting a lot more on social media ourselves, it’s a good way to stay in touch. Do you see technology like artificial intelligence? How do you see that in the marketing space changing?

Jess
Well, it’s interesting, because you already mentioned that you guys just switched to electronic billing. And I think that’s been one of the first changes law firms have made with AI, it’s already a difficult task as a firm to keep your clients updated to make sure attorneys are submitting their billables. And if there’s a way to automate that, that just takes maybe one task, but it makes a huge difference. Sometimes when you have such a heavy workload. I know in small ways firms usually have, you know, their chat bots on the websites. So somebody is going on their site has a question, it’ll usually try to divert them to a different way that might be helpful, you know, instead of having a person have to monitor that, or maybe it could bring down some of the call volume. I think some of the concerns that attorneys have when it comes to implementing more technology is, you know, this huge concern with cybersecurity. We see that a lot when it comes to business. A lot of our clients write about that, just because I mean, the more in depth you get with technology, the more you intertwine your business with it, you are opening yourself up to more risks, especially with a law firm, you know, you have very sensitive information, attorney client privilege, you really don’t want someone to hack, even if you’re a smaller firm. So I think some people are really resistant to that part. And I think everybody’s always afraid of technology replacing people. So support staff, if you have AI that can look up case law. There’s a law clerk you didn’t need in your office that can help you with that or your paralegal. So,

Bernadette
Well, one of the heads of our emergent growth practice only says that young lawyers need to be coders because, you know, even just in contract law, there’s a lot of AI starting to do the basic template and contracts. So there goes the junior lawyers work they might need to be coders instead of lawyers.

Jess
I worked at a law firm when COVID first started. And one of the big, I think the first change they made was getting people to be electronic notaries just because everybody was now either in office or not in office. So it’s not technically AI, per se. But just having that, I guess they use something similar to blockchain, to know that someone’s signed it at this specific time on this computer to make sure it’s just as legitimate as in person signature. So that’s kind of been interesting as well, I think can be for the better, though. Now you can reach clients anywhere.

Bernadette
I totally agree, I think there’s gonna be a lot of good changes. But as we all know that lawyers don’t like that they don’t adapt so quickly. So maybe the adaption rate will be quicker. And they’ll say that it’s not so bad after all.

Rachel
Another sort of technology adjacent thing that we’ve been seeing is just lawyers feeling more empowered having more readership analytics available to them, we of course, offer a platform of analytics to our publishing clients. But one of the things that we’ve heard from other people is that, you know, since people are working remotely, especially from like a legal marketing perspective, like just having that information, that data at your fingertips, like sort of informs lawyers on in terms of like how their content is doing, and, you know, trends that they can follow, and things like that. So that’s been another thing that we’ve noticed,

Bernadette
Those kinds of analytics are really helpful, especially for us to say, this is what you should be writing about, you know, with so many great firms out there. And that’s what I try to get my lawyers to understand to differentiate yourself is pretty difficult because there are so many smart, talented lawyers what to you to recommend to, you know, to differentiate themselves on a platform like the National Law Review, how did they go about that?

Rachel
So a few things that we often recommend to people who publish with us is to post regularly. So if you’re going to launch a new blog, don’t just like post one thing on it, and then like, not touch it again, for six months. So that’s, that’s also important. Another thing is to post timely content. So if there’s like a new decision out of I don’t know, the Biden administration, or the EPA or something like that, like right on it ASAP. And basically, as soon as that decision comes out, otherwise, you know, if it’s already been out for a couple weeks, it may not be as successful as article, it was posted pretty quick to win the decision happened. And then also, like, just another thing in terms of like, us being a news website, if at all possible, we try to encourage our clients to publish articles, you know, in the afternoon, like earlier in the day, rather than like, 5pm on a Friday, you know, because often, you know, people just won’t see it. And, um, you know, you put all this effort into something and you know, no one really looks at it. So those are just like a few, just like sort of basic timing, things that we find is useful. And then like moving forward from that, in terms of how the content is format is also important. So we find that like strong use of keywords, bullet points, header status questions, just trying to imagine the piece of content in terms of how your audience will actually find it. So you know, if they’re looking for information on California Employment Law, like trying to imagine the questions they have, and try to work that into your articles, you’ll be more likely to find it that way. And then also, you know, like a wide array of different pieces of content. So a lot of our clients, they don’t just do blog posts, they also do videos and podcasts, things like that, just so they even tie the two together, where have an article that has a video component, or if they post a podcast that also include the transcripts, just sort of making content go farther, and just making it as diverse as possible. And then other thing is just like to make it personal and to sort of tailor it to your audience like trying to imagine who’s going to be reading this, and how can you make it as digestible and relevant as possible. As always, as we discussed earlier, just having a presence on social media, getting your work out there and finding your audience in your platform have all been really important, useful things you find for clients to do.

Jess

One of the most important things to remember is that there are people out there who want the content that you guys would create, like there are people who want that information. They want your expertise. And when law firms maybe specialize in certain areas, that’s a way you can differentiate yourself and produce content that’s really valuable with any website, anything that you’re going to post on any page. If the content is relevant to an audience, and it’s informational and useful. That’s always going to do better with SEO. And just get more eyes on in general because, you know, a lot of legal information on cases and case law is not public knowledge. And the public really wants that they will eat that up at any chance they get, especially if it’s really relevant to what you know this user wants, or this visitor really is looking for specifically.

Bernadette
Do you see a lot more video? And do you see a lot more eyeballs on video on your web, on your platforms, because we’re starting to dip our toe in, but it’s a whole different world for our lawyers.

Rachel

So a lot of our clients do use video really effectively. And they have been successful with video, probably the most prominent example I have is Epstein Becker Green does, like an employment law this week video every week. And I think that’s pretty popular. And they also do a podcast, they do articles, and they’re all sort of under that same umbrella. So it’s just a way for them to sort of integrate video into the written content, and also have a podcast on it. And they have, you know, the same attorney does it every week. So it’s a way for that attorney to really be front and center.

Jess
And I think when it comes to video, you know, the biggest hurdle is when people are hesitant about it, or they’re not comfortable with video, just to remember that putting your face on someone’s screen – clients already like to talk to the attorney directly, whether it’s over the phone or in person. So having a video kind of also tones that need down or takes care of it a little bit better, I think. And if they’re a little hesitant, even just what is the question, our clients are asking a lot, and then just doing a really short video on that just to get started doesn’t have to be a whole event, or it doesn’t have to be a long video with guests. It can just be I’ve seen attorneys just sit down on a video for Facebook, like their Facebook page and just do a real quick video on a very specific topic. And I think people are so used to being visual online now that that tends to garner more interest just because they get to just sit and watch it. That or listening to something.

Bernadette
I think you’re right that people are watching a lot more video on every platform. So even for law firm websites, because people are used to it like maybe eight years ago, and they didn’t want to watch a talking head on a law firm website. But now everybody watches videos pretty much all the time.

Rachel
I think one of the other important facets of it is just like doing what the attorneys are comfortable with. So some attorneys are better talkers than they are writers. So if they’re comfortable being in front of a camera, and sort of speaking about employment law, that’s definitely something they should do. I think, you know, just really thinking of who the attorney is and who their clients are. It’s an important aspect of that.

Bernadette
And that weekly repetition is huge, because that’s one way that you really create an audience. So what are ways that you guys are hearing trends in recruiting? And how are people attracting talent, I know a tight labor market out there.

Rachel
Right. So I think one of the things that we’re definitely hearing the most, and like I said, from other guests, we’ve had on this podcast, a lot of people are finding it really hard to find good talent right now. Um, and I think one of the big trends that we’re seeing is just people wanting to keep the remote flexible working options, sort of going back to our conversation earlier, just the trust that people can work from home, and that they can basically have more control over their schedule. And if they have a really big commute, then they don’t really want to have to sit in the car be pm the train for an hour, I think a lot of people have really realized just how much sense remote work really makes. Um, and so I think firms that embrace that they, you know, are nimble and allow their employees to work remotely and have that flexible hybrid option. I think that will make a big difference. Um, I think also just up on the big trends that we’re seeing is just firms like really strong company values, like diversity inclusion initiatives, um, you know, feeling like you have a voice and that your firm does really great work, I think also helps set it apart.

Bernadette
Making sure people are heard in it during the pandemic and actually our head of human resources sent out a survey on our wellness initiatives and how well we’re doing. So I thought that was really nice today to make sure that what we’re actually doing is what people want. And again, that’s part of communication, which is the world the three of us are in so it all comes down to communicating I think.

Rachel
Yeah, and I’ve heard of other firms just staying connected with their employees sort of like what you mentioned earlier with sending out you know, e cards on anniversaries and birthdays and things like that. I think just finding ways to stay connected and making people feel appreciated is also important. I think especially now that I think because of the pandemic, like workloads are just really high. And I think people might start to feel a bit burnt out, and trying to cope as best as they can.

Bernadette
There’s been so many challenges. And on top of the increased workload is everything. You know, if you have kids at home, and all of the issues that people have been facing, you know, whether people in their family are sick, or whether it’s just been a lot for so many people, it’s important to step back and remember that we’re all we’re all human. And just to celebrate little things like birthdays and anniversaries are really important, just to be with the fact that you remember and recognize somebody’s birthday is always nice. I think we covered a lot today. Thank you. Again, I really appreciate the opportunity to be on the show and look forward to speaking with you and listening to the podcasts later.

Rachel
Yeah. Well, thank you so much for taking the time to come on today. We really appreciate it. So yeah, special thanks to Bernadette DeCelle for joining us today.

 

Copyright ©2021 National Law Forum, LLCNational Law Review, Volume XI, Number 307

Article By Rachel Popa and Jessica Scheck of The National Law Review / The National Law Forum LLC

For more articles on legal marketing, visit the NLR Law Office Management section.