TechnoLawyer

Originally published on October 4, 2011 in our free BigLaw newsletter. Instead of reading BigLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

Remember the popular advertisements for beer in which two groups argued between the relative importance of "great taste" versus "less filling"? A similar debate is brewing regarding the creation of blogs for large law firms. What is more important — great content or great design? Most law firms have lawyers capable writing great content, but few have designers in-house that can build and design good-looking blogs. Can you ignore design? Or should your blog(s) have both?

The Case for Great Content

Great content alone can make a blog successful. If you write blog posts helpful to your industry, people will read them, email them, tweet them, etc. — and the media will take notice too. Eventually, they'll end up on sites that corporate counsel use such as JD Supra, Lexology, and Legal OnRamp.

Perhaps most importantly, Google loves great content. The better your content is, the more links it will accumulate. Google's search algorithm uses more than 200 "signals" to rank web pages, but inbound links remain among the most important (the famous PageRank patent). One caveat — Google does not "value" links on social networks as highly as those on web sites so try to encourage others to link to you from their sites (easier said than done).

The Case for Great Design

People who read your blog via email or an RSS reader like Google Reader could care less about your blog's design. But many people will read your blog in a web browser, including everyone who first discovers it with a Google search. So let's explore the design issue.

You don't need to be a designer to recognize a good design. Even if only for a second, we're all conscious of the design when visiting a blog for the first time. Sometimes, the design is so good we notice for more than a second because it blows us away. And sometimes the opposite happens — we can't believe how bad it looks. This first impression is important.

A key element of blog design is user interface, which is often overlooked. A while back I was on a law blog trying to find the author. It took me several clicks before I could find his contact information. What's the point of creating a blog and gaining exposure if prospective clients can't contact you?

The layout and design of your blog is not just important but critically so. Make sure it's easy for people find your contact information. Make sure your blog gives people a positive impression (no pop-ups is a good policy with which to start).

Can You Have Both?

"Why can't you have both"? A designer at a recent conference I spoke at asked me that question. Yes, of course you can have both. As a large firm, you have an advantage. Hiring a top-notch designer won't have a material impact on your expenses unlike at a smaller firm with a much smaller marketing budget.

That said, a blog with great content that uses a prefab template will outperform a beautiful blog with a custom design that lacks great content — as long as the template makes it easy to contact the author(s).

So feel free to spend $10,000 on the design of your blog, but make sure you can create quality content on a regular basis before making that leap. After all, the leading cause of law blog failure is the failure to publish at all.

Conclusion

Blogs don't cost much money to start. Many inexpensive and free options exist. Far more important is the quality of the content and the frequency with which you add content. Publishing is a grind. Law firms are not media companies by nature so many just wing it without editorial calendars and other publishing workflow tools that they may not even realize exist.

I recommend that even large firms start conservatively. Have a basic blog built for you by a local web designer for no more than $1,500. Try blogging for six months. If you like it and think you can keep it up, make a more substantial investment.

The blogosphere is littered with failed blogs that never made it past their first couple of blog posts. Having a blog experiment fail quietly is no big deal, but having a blog fail after spending a lot of money is fodder for Above the Law and others in the large firm gossip business. If you start creating great content, people will ignore the design as long as it's not terrible. After all, you're a law firm, not a fashion magazine.

Written by Adrian Dayton of Marketing Strategy and the Law.

How to Receive BigLaw
Many large firms have good reputations for their work and bad reputations as places to work. Why? Answering this question requires digging up some dirt, but we do with the best of intentions. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, BigLaw analyzes the business practices, marketing strategies, and technologies used by the country's biggest law firms in an effort to unearth best and worst practices. The BigLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Originally published on August 16, 2011 in our free BigLaw newsletter. Instead of reading BigLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

I'll be honest. I greeted the fanfare of Google+ (pronounced Google Plus) — yet another Google social network — with a healthy dose of skepticism. Remember Google Buzz? What about Google Wave? Both had big coming out parties and neither lasted past beta. And let's not forget Dodgeball, which Google bought and then killed. But hey, Orkut is big in Brazil.

So what about Google+? Does it have what it takes to find a place among the big three — Linkedin, Facebook, and Twitter? Or will Google again drop the social ball, especially now that it needs to manage 19,000 new employees courtesy of its Motorola acquisition?

What Google+ Has Going for It

Google+ had an outstanding launch, growing in just two months to more than 25 million members despite being available only by invitation. By comparison, at the beginning of 2009 Twitter had an estimated five million members after almost three years of operation, while Facebook had around 40 million members after six years. Google+'s rapid growth increases its chances of success.

While Google+ has a number of interesting features, the most intuitive and useful is Circles. Think "circle of friends" in which you have a circle of work buddies, a circle of friends from law school, a circle of people that you haven't seen since grade school but who always want to comment on your posts, etc.

Currently, I think of the big three as three circles — Facebook is very personal, Twitter is for content sharing with professionals, and Linkedin is for all my serious business contacts.

Google+ Circles makes a compelling argument: "You can have all three here in one service, and keep them separate."

What Google+ Has Going Against It

Let's face it — Google+ is late to the party. Although the tech community may be fast to move from Geocities to Friendster to MySpace to Facebook to Friendfeed, we really don't know if the average joe — prospective clients of yours in particular — will switch to a new social network.

Take my father for example. He is 63 years old and logs into Facebook every evening. Sort of. He logs into my Mom's account because he doesn't really like the idea of belonging to a social network. Google+ is going to have a difficult time assimilating many of the older generation that came kicking and screaming to Facebook. Have you ever tried to help convince an elderly person it's time to move into an assisted living center? It's near impossible. Facebook is just as "sticky" for most people as an elderly person's home.

My Recommendation for Midsize and Large Law Firms

Join Google+ and learn how to use it (let me know if you need an invite). Remember the contrarian rule of marketing? Go where your competitors aren't. If you practice intellectual property or environmental law, or work with technology companies (especially startups), your prospective clients are already hanging out on Google+, but not many lawyers have taken the time to do the same. When legal questions and issues arise, you will be well suited to demonstrate your expertise and build some new relationships.

Written by Adrian Dayton of Marketing Strategy and the Law.

How to Receive BigLaw
Many large firms have good reputations for their work and bad reputations as places to work. Why? Answering this question requires digging up some dirt, but we do with the best of intentions. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, BigLaw analyzes the business practices, marketing strategies, and technologies used by the country's biggest law firms in an effort to unearth best and worst practices. The BigLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Originally published on July 12, 2011 in our free BigLaw newsletter. Instead of reading BigLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

The excitement over social media has grown to a fever pitch. LinkedIn recently became a public company, and has absolutely exploded with over 100 million members. Facebook has become ubiquitous as this infographic by Business Insider demonstrates, and will likely become a public company next year.

But when Apple announced which platform it had chosen to integrate into its iOS 5 mobile operating system it bypaseed both Facebook and LinkedIn, going instead with Twitter. So what is it about Twitter? Why would a service that losers use to narrate their mundane lives be deemed so important that the world's most valuable company would permit it to reside at the heart of its crown jewel? Let's take a closer look.

Twitter Is Public

Have you ever attended a cocktail party and noticed that you picked the wrong group with whom to chat? You look over your shoulder and see another group laughing and having much more fun. What would it be like if you could run a simple search to find out who was talking about something interesting, and then join that conversation? That's one of the primary benefits of Twitter — anybody can listen in on conversations of interest. You're not trapped by your "friends."

But aren't most tweets boring, self-centered and mundane? Many of them are, but so are most of the conversations at cocktail parties, the difference being that on Twitter you have more choices. It isn't like Facebook where you have to be friends or pseudo-friends to have a conversation. It isn't like LinkedIn where you need to provide details on past work relationships before you can eavesdrop. Twitter is public, meaning anybody can listen in on any conversation. Better yet, developers can build applications on top of Twitter to better organize that information for law firms and other constituencies.

It's kind of ironic that Apple, which has a closed and formal process for creating iPhone apps and having them approved, has embraced Twitter, which has a decidedly different philosophy. Twitter's openess provides incentive for serendipity and entrepreneurship as it invites people to play with its data. It worked out for the developers of TweetDeck, which created a better way of organizing the Twitter stream. As a result, this gang of 14 employees just sold its business to Twitter for $40 million dollars. Twitter and its community of users are better off because of this openness.

Twitter Is About Sharing Content

Why does all this openness matter to lawyers? There are two ways to add value and gain credibility online. The first is to find and share valuable content. I call these people "collectors." Anybody can be a collector. The second group are those who actually create valuable content in form of articles, podcasts, white papers, videos, etc. The vast majority of social media users are incapable of creating truly helpful content. Lawyers on the other hand have the unique ability to communicate. Thus, Twitter is of great benefit to lawyers willing to create content and let everyone know it exists.

You could argue that Twitter isn't a social network at all. The majority of the tweets shared are links to content on other Web sites. The lame or boring information gets ignored while the truly exceptional information gets passed on — retweeted. Twitter is an information exchange. Those who understand it take information and put it in front of thought leaders and influencers who can further amplify it in ways you can't imagine. Your information!

Can't you just share information by email? Yes but there's less chance of it "going viral" unless you're a bona-fide email publisher like TechnoLawyer. With Twitter, there are no degrees of separation so your information can be passed directly to individuals you may have never met. If your content is very good, Twitter can become a powerful ally in getting your message out.

Why does sharing matter? Many law firms have this part all wrong. They think of sharing on Twitter as a way for them to publish. Just another way to talk about themselves. That's just one facet. The true value of Twitter lies in its ability to help lawyers research and find great information that they can either share via email with their high value contacts or write about on their blog or Web site. Sharing means you can find information online quickly, and then use it to demonstrate your expertise.

Twitter's Learning Curve Requires Commitment

After reading this issue of BigLaw, you may think — "Time to jump on Twitter!" A word of warning. Twitter is not easy to learn. It's easy to sign up. It's easy to send a single tweet, but it is not easy to get going beyond that. As a result, Twitter suffers from a phenomenon in which people join Twitter, send their first tweet, sign off, and never try it again. To get over this hump you need to spend time every day for a couple of weeks to get the hang of it. It is a powerful tool, it's worth spending a few hours to get there.

The marriage between Apple (with about 200 million iOS devices sold) and Twitter (with about 20 million active accounts) makes sense for both sides, but more importantly it assures the longevity of Twitter. If you were waiting for the smoke to clear to decide whether or not Twitter was worth figuring out, the time has come. Get over your issues with tweets, retweets, tweet-ups, and all the other silly words associated with Twitter and give it a chance. Apple has spoken.

How to Receive BigLaw
Many large firms have good reputations for their work and bad reputations as places to work. Why? Answering this question requires digging up some dirt, but we do with the best of intentions. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, BigLaw analyzes the business practices, marketing strategies, and technologies used by the country's biggest law firms in an effort to unearth best and worst practices. The BigLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Originally published on May 24, 2011 in our free BigLaw newsletter. Instead of reading BigLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

The prevailing wisdom among law firms regarding social media goes a little like this: "LinkedIn is a great professional network so we should have as many of our lawyers on there as possible. Twitter has only minor relevance, and Facebook we should avoid altogether." I hate these broad sweeping statements because they show little thought for how people — clients and prospective clients in particular — use these tools on a daily basis.

Facebook Is a Dinner Party, Not a Billboard

Facebook is extremely useful to help build existing relationships. Is it too personal? Absolutely. But that's the point. When you have worked with a client for years don't the relationships tend to get a little more personal? Don't you want to know when your biggest client's children graduate from high school or perform in the school play? These types of relationships are incredibly valuable and go beyond business. It is likely these people send work to you in part because they sincerely like you and you sincerely enjoy working with them.

Is Facebook the ideal place to link to your latest thought leadership blog post on the area of law in which you specialize? No. Facebook is like is a dinner party where we have invited only people we know, like, and trust. If a door-to-door salesperson rings the doorbell during a dinner party, we aren't just annoyed, we are completely turned off by his timing. Don't be that guy on Facebook — unless you want to be defriended, or worse, hidden from your friends' feed.

So What About Facebook Fan Pages?

Shouldn't your law firm have a Facebook presence? Ask yourself this: "What's the point?" Are your clients demanding to find information about you on Facebook versus your Web site or email newsletter (see my last BigLaw column)? When they are looking for their children's latest grand-baby pictures, do they also want to read about who just made partner at your law firm, or about the new office that your firm opened?

Context matters. People don't spend time on Facebook to learn about such information. Of course, exceptions to the rule always exist. Facebook has been shown to be effective in recruiting and to a lesser extent in areas of law that are more retail in nature like family law, personal injury law, trusts and estates, and workers compensation.

Marketing firms and public relations agencies promote Facebook fan pages because it is something they can do for you. However, the most valuable component of social media — sincere interaction — cannot be outsourced. It has to be performed by the lawyers themselves. Therein lies Facebook's usage case — personally connecting and interacting with people you know and like. It can help you and your colleagues stay top of mind with clients, not quite like in-person lunches or a phone call will, but in a way that is less time-consuming yet still be meaningful.

Think Friend, Not Fan

For now, most large law firms will keep using LinkedIn because it's safe, use Twitter as a purely self-promotional feed, and for the most part ignore Facebook because they aren't quite sure where it fits. Facebook makes sense for individual lawyers connecting with the people in legal departments with whom they have become real-life friends or at least acquaintances. I doubt I'll ever start "friending" the fan pages of law firms. Then again, maybe that's just me.

Written by Adrian Dayton of Marketing Strategy and the Law.

How to Receive BigLaw
Many large firms have good reputations for their work and bad reputations as places to work. Why? Answering this question requires digging up some dirt, but we do with the best of intentions. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, BigLaw analyzes the business practices, marketing strategies, and technologies used by the country's biggest law firms in an effort to unearth best and worst practices. The BigLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Originally published on April 26, 2011 in our free BigLaw newsletter. Instead of reading BigLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

A few months back I wrote an article for the legal tabloid Above the Law entitled Email Marketing and the Power of Permission. The article resulted in a backlash from lawyer bloggers, which I didn't understand at the time. Upon reflection, I now have a clear understanding of the problem. First, many lawyer bloggers publish for fun as a hobby. Second, they don't understand the power of email marketing. Since you receive BigLaw, you have a better appreciation for email's strengths, but even you may underestimate its potential to help your firm achieve its marketing goals.

The Marketing Funnel

Lets start with the easy part first. Is your law blog just a hobby? If so, that's fine, but don't have any illusions about its ability to help you build a book of business. It may bring you occasional exposure, but it requires a true publishing strategy to build a meaningful blog that will help you attract clients, speaking invitations, press, etc. The biggest weakness of a law blog is that it is often the first exposure for a potential client, but it doesn't provide the follow-up that is essential to what marketers call "conversion."

Let's think about the classic marketing funnel. At the top of the cone you have first exposure, at the bottom you have general counsel that are hiring you. New blog posts can get new prospects into your funnel, but it requires a strategy to keep them there and eventually contact you.

Now some of you may be thinking: What if they come back to the blog multiple times? What if they add the RSS feed to Google Reader and read my blog until they are convinced I'm awesome and hire me? That could happen, but it would require that your readers use blogs and social media like you do. They don't. Most general counsel and even associate counsel are Baby Boomers and Gen Xers who spend most of their day staring at email.

The Bottom Line: Email Is Still Essential

Now before you get upset and start shouting, "we get way too much email" and "how dare you encourage us to flood prospective clients with more email" please pause for a moment and think about the email newsletters that you receive.

Could you live without most newsletters? I can. If I notice a newsletter that I don't open for a couple of months in a row, I unsubscribe.

But can you live without all newsletters? I can't. I read several email newsletters faithfully (including this one) because they provide helpful content unavailable elsewhere.

The cure for boring and unhelpful email and newsletters is not NO EMAIL, but instead better, more targeted email. In fact, because you're sending content to people, an email newsletter has an even higher bar for quality than your law blog. Think concise, well-edited material that is extremely specific, timely, and relevant.

It isn't easy to create this type of content, but once you have people on your email list you have moved them further down the funnel en route to becoming clients. If they unsubscribe from your list, that's okay. Those who remain — and remain engaged, which you can measure in various ways — are finding value in what you have to share.

Pay Attention to Your Analytics

As intimated above, you need to measure engagement. Marketing geeks like me use the term "analytics."

Who is opening your email newsletters? Who is forwarding them? Who is clicking on links in your newsletters? Email is an extremely valuable communications tool, but only when you optimize based on the data you obtain. You don't know who is reading your blog (unless they contact you or comment), but you can tell exactly who is reading your email.

If you want to get started using email marketing in a large firm environment, there are some great tools out there. The best I have come across is a program called Campaigner. A product called Tikit eMarketing is also popular.

Those of you in smaller firms who happen to subscribe to BigLaw can use very inexpensive products like AWeber (which I personally used to get my lists started) and Constant Contact (which also works well).

Press Send Now

If email marketing is not currently part of your marketing program, its time to fix that. It's not a lolly-pop solution though. It requires a new process and execution. It will be worth your time and effort. You don't need to take my word for it though. The analytics will tell the story. You will see who is and who isn't reading what you send out. Email will keep your prospects engaged until they die (opt-out) or buy.

Written by Adrian Dayton of Marketing Strategy and the Law.

How to Receive BigLaw
Many large firms have good reputations for their work and bad reputations as places to work. Why? Answering this question requires digging up some dirt, but we do with the best of intentions. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, BigLaw analyzes the business practices, marketing strategies, and technologies used by the country's biggest law firms in an effort to unearth best and worst practices. The BigLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Originally published on April 5, 2011 in our free BigLaw newsletter. Instead of reading BigLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

Leading a large law firm is similar to steering a ship. If you navigate in the wrong direction, or don't have a clear idea of your destination you may never arrive. It is difficult but not impossible to lead when headed into the unknown (think Christopher Columbus). Creating a social media policy presents a challenge for leaders like you because you may lack the time to become completely versed in all the technology that exists. So to make it easier, I have simplified social media policies by comparing them to three classic films. Which movie does your social media policy most closely resemble?

Footloose (1984): Complete Prohibition

In Footloose, Kevin Bacon's character moves to a small, conservative town that has outlawed dancing and rock music. The town has clearly gone too far, but it isn't until the local Reverand (played by John Lithgow) sees townsfolk burning books that he realizes his policy needs a rethink.

Does this prohibition sound like your firm's policy towards social media? I remember when I first starting writing about social media over two years ago and spoke with a friend at a top law firm in Manhattan. I asked him, "What's your firm's policy towards social media?" His answer, "No social media."

You can call this the "Footloose" policy, or if you prefer the movie "Witness" the "Amish" policy, but whatever you call it, it's not an an effective policy for a modern law firm. Statistics from Greentarget, the ABA, and ALM Media all demonstrate that large communities of in-house lawyers across all ages use social media. A complete prohibition of these tools is archaic at best.

A Few Good Men (1992): Too Much Control

Led by an all-star cast of Jack Nicholson, Tom Cruise and Demi Moore A Few Good Men involves a trial in which two soldiers stand accused of murdering a fellow Marine of their unit. The two soldiers hazed a soldier who had failed to respect the chain of command by blowing the whistle on his superiors.

In the military, chain of command is extremely important to keeping our country safe. In the film (without ruining the ending for those who haven't seen it yet), the chain of command fails to protect an innocent soldier. In law firms, "chain of command" means "control the message."

"No tweets, posts or messages may be shared without approval by a partner level attorney and a review by the Public Relations, Communications, and Marketing Committee."

Does this rule sound like your firm's social media policy? I call this policy "A Few Good Men" because only a few individuals in your firm are allowed to speak or approve speech of those using social media. I've compared this policy to a cocktail party at which an associate must text the managing partner before making any comments or engaging in conversation to make sure everything he says is approved.

Such a policy would be impractical, nonsensical, and serve no purpose. You trust your associates to attend social gatherings without revealing client confidences, inadvertently creating attorney-client relationships, and violating ethics laws with regard to solicitation. So why not trust your associates online?

Perhaps the permanence of the online world terrifies you. But that's just a matter of proper training to ensure that your lawyers can handle social media.

Pirates of the Caribbean (2003): Sensible Guidelines

Just when we thought Disney was incapable of making a quality live-action movie, it surprised everyone with Pirates of the Caribbean starring none other than Johnny Depp. In this movie we learn a lot about Pirates and their code.

One interesting rule is that of "Parlay." When a prisoner invokes this code, the pirates must provide free passage to negotiate with the ship's captain. According to Captain Barbossa (played by Geoffry Rush), "the code is more what you'd call 'guidelines' than actual rules."

I hesitate to ask the world's largest law firms to take queues from pirates, but "guidelines" make way more sense than a policy that reads like a statute. Here's why. Technology is changing rapidly. As soon as a law firm's multiple committees meet to discuses, draft, re-draft, and vote to approve the social media policy it's out-of-date.

It is far more practicable to put together guidelines for any online behavior. A good social media policy will accomplish two objectives — protect the firm and empower the lawyers. A policy full of "thou shall not" language should be tempered with guidance on how to engage in social media in an effective manner.

On With the Show

So what's it going to be for your firm? Complete prohibition like in Footloose? Only allowing a one or two messengers like in A Few Good Men? Or will you teach your lawyers, provide them with guidelines, and trust that they won't organize a raiding party? As the captain, you need to make the right social media decision, or your ship may end up in Davy Jones' Locker.

Written by law firm social media expert Adrian Dayton.

How to Receive BigLaw
Many large firms have good reputations for their work and bad reputations as places to work. Why? Answering this question requires digging up some dirt, but we do with the best of intentions. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, BigLaw analyzes the business practices, marketing strategies, and technologies used by the country's biggest law firms in an effort to unearth best and worst practices. The BigLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.