Tag: Law firm technology

Three Ways to Get Lawyers to Fall In Love with Marketing Technology

While it may (or may not) be shocking that 50% of marriages end in divorce, what may be a more jarring statistic is how 77% of lawyers have experienced a failed technology implementation. And while some may take a second or even third chance at marriage, you rarely get a second chance at a marketing technology implementation, especially at a law firm.

Today’s legal industry is hyper-competitive, firms are asking attorneys to learn new skills and adopt new technology like artificial intelligence, eMarketing, or experience management systems. So, lawyers should be eager to embrace any MarTech that could help them gain an advantage, right? Unfortunately, fewer than 40% of lawyers use a CRM, and only slightly more than a quarter of them use it for sales pipeline management.

When considering lawyers’ love/hate relationship with their firm’s marketing technology infrastructure, it is important to consider the lawyer’s perspective when it comes to change management and technology adoption. By nature, lawyers are skeptical, hypercritical, risk-averse, and reluctant to change. These attributes are certainly beneficial for practicing law, but not so much for encouraging marketing technology adoption. This is why it can sometimes feel like you are herding cats, except these cats are extremely smart, have opposable thumbs, and argue for sport.

While lawyers and technology might not seem like a match made in heaven, you can follow these steps to ensure greater adoption and utilization of your marketing technology:

1. Needs Assessment

The beauty of technology is that it can do so many things, the problem with technology is… it can do so many things. For technology to succeed it has to adequately satisfy the end users’ needs. Because each firm has its own set of unique needs, technology selection should start with a needs assessment. Interviews should be conducted with key stakeholders to determine your organization’s specific needs and requirements.

As a follow-up to the needs assessment, interview user groups like attorneys, partners and even their assistants, to understand their needs and requirements, and understand their day-to-day processes and problems. These groups each define value differently, meaning that each group will have its own unique needs or set of requirements. Making these users part of the process upfront will increase the likelihood they’ll adopt the technology later on.

2. Communicate

Like any good love affair, a successful technology deployment requires extensive communication. Attorneys must be convinced that the technology will not only benefit the firm, but them individually. It can be helpful to take the time to craft a formal communication plan -starting with an announcement coming from firm leadership outlining the system’s benefits. Realistic expectations should be set, not only for the system but also for user requirements.

Next, establish, document, and distribute any processes and procedures necessary to support the implementation. Most importantly, sharing is caring, so always communicate when goals have been reached or solicit feedback from the end users.

3. Resources

All good relationships require attention. Oftentimes, firms forget to account for the long-term costs associated with a technology deployment. For a successful technology deployment, firms must dedicate necessary resources including time, money, and people. It also takes the coordinated efforts of everyone in the firm, so be sure to invite everyone who may need to be involved, such as:

  • Technical support to assist with implementation and integrations
  • Training programs with outlined criteria for different user groups
  • Data stewards (internal or outsourced) to make sure data is clean, correct and complete
  • The marketing and business development departments that will be tasked with developing and executing a communication strategy
  • Firm leadership and key attorneys whose support can be used to drive adoption

© Copyright 2024 CLIENTSFirst Consulting

by: Christina R. Fritsch JD of CLIENTSFirst Consulting

For more news on Legal Marketing, visit the NLR Law Office Management section.

Spearheading Technological Change and Innovation: The Role of the Legal Marketer

Technology is changing the landscape of the legal worldLaw firm technology client service, and making it possible for law firms to achieve new heights in terms of client service, transparency, and making smart, data driven choices.  Roland Vogl, Executive Director of Stanford Program in Law, Science and Technology (LST), will be the keynote speaker at the LMA Technology Conference in San Francisco in October.

Vogl says, “Currently, technology is coming to the law from all sides.  It’s making the law more efficient for all stakeholders, it’s giving lawyers a better understanding of what’s relevant for a particular case, and they can use new technologies to be more empirical and data-driven about their decision making.  It gives lawyers a way to make internal processes more efficient, and deliver their services to their clients more efficiently.”  There is a lot of potential with technology in the law, however, the road is not sunshine and roses.  Significant challenges must be faced down to reap the rewards of technology in law firms, and Vogl believes legal marketing professionals are uniquely positioned to advocate and strategize for the appropriate technologies for their law firms.

He elaborates, “It’s challenging for law firms to figure out what technologies to embrace. Firms need to determine what they need, what their clients need, and how to use technology to add value in the most efficient way.”  Many attorneys are not interested in solving this problem, as Vogl points out: “Lawyers don’t really want to run businesses, they want to practice law. The best way to package or bundle or make their legal expertise available and accessible to create a data informed work product is not a lawyer’s priority.”

Vogl thinks that Legal Marketers are the ones who can help bring firms up to date technologically. Legal marketers, according to Vogl, are the “internal evangelizers of the firm.”  He says, “The legal marketer works as a liaison between the client and the law firm, and knows what the client expects.  Legal marketers can help identify which technologies law firms should use based on their knowledge of  what clients want.”  Additionally, legal marketers can serve as “tech scouts” in order to keep the lawyers in the firm aware of how the industry is changing.  Vogl says, “Marketers can keep the lawyers in the firm informed about how the practice is changing and how technology is driving that change, and what the law firm can do, adjustments the law firm can make to try and modernize their practice.”  Finally, part of the job of a legal marketer is to differentiate the firm from other firms.  One way firms can define themselves is on how they use technology.  Vogl says, “a way to differentiate to the outside world is whether a firm is a modern firm that uses modern project management tools.”

Making these changes can be an intense process, because in many instances firms are not only adopting new technologies, but also new work procedures.  Vogl says, “The partnership structure makes it very hard to embrace new technologies and new business models and work processes.”

In some ways, creating the environment that’s conducive to change is like nurturing a grassroots movement; it can take time to win hearts and minds in the notoriously conservative law firm environment.  To take on this challenge Vogl suggests a team committed to change.  He says, “It’s important to create a task force, a group of lawyers who see the importance of change–working in conjunction with the marketers–to create a catalyst for change and facilitate conversations within the firm.”  In many ways, the need for change is a constant conversation where early adopters need to campaign and get other members of the firm to see the wisdom of their view.  Vogl says, “you have to bring other lawyers along to get critical mass to push the changes through.”

Another way to pursue change, once the firm leadership is on board, is to use the firm’s structure by practice group as an advantage.  Vogl suggests having individual practice groups adopt new technologies and procedures first to demonstrate their benefits. Firm-wide change is difficult, so starting with one practice group can make the change more palatable. Vogl says, “To create firm-wide change, you need to market the change internally to the firm.  Do events, create materials, educate the rest of the firm about how it works, and how it has worked for early adopters, and celebrate successes.”  A final piece of the puzzle for the marketer comes after the change has been implemented.  Once the firm has made the changes and is delivering what the client wants, Vogl suggests the marketer “project those changes to the outside world to make a compelling story for other, prospective clients.”

Even though the road towards embracing technology is convoluted, and there are many challenges ahead, the potential is exciting.  Vogl suggests firms and marketers “Think big, but start small” as they advocate for change in their law firms.

ARTICLE BY Eilene Spear of The National Law Review / The National Law Forum LLC

Copyright ©2016 National Law Forum, LLC