Subscribe

Alyn-Weiss and Associates Blog

Keep up with our blog to learn the latest news in marketing for lawyers.

Friday, April 16, 2010

This blog has moved

This blog is now located at http://blog.themarketinggurus.com/. You will be automatically redirected in 30 seconds, or you may click here. For feed subscribers, please update your feed subscriptions to http://blog.themarketinggurus.com/feeds/posts/default.

posted by benbcraig at 11:50 AM

Friday, April 9, 2010

Would you walk away from $70M

We get a lot of questions about whether or not its worthwhile to participate in social networks such as LinkedIn. Our advice is always, "yes, do it, do it now. "
Proof that it works. We're in LA this week speaking about marketing effectiveness and best practices in marketing at an annual meeting of a national law firm network. I met a corporate lawyer who got a $70m international transaction from LinkedIn.
Here's how it worked: The international client did a Google search for a corporate lawyer with experience working with companies who have operations in Asia. The lawyer's LinkedIn profile showed-up in the search results. The client reviews the lawyer's profile and finds out everything he needs to know about the lawyer to hire him. The lawyer runs 3 LinkedIn groups, participates in other industry related groups, he has his blog linked to his LinkedIn account he updates his status and he asks for and makes recommendations... consistently. So, is it worthwhile to participate in social networks such as LinkedIn? Yes. Do it, do it now.

Labels: , ,

posted by Jessica Jaramillo at 12:28 AM

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Value of Non-Traditonal Marketing Roles

It is unreasonable to expect every lawyer in your firm to market in the same traditional way-- acting as a "hunter" and attending events, serving on committees, making speeches, fundraising and teaching continuing professional education. But that does not mean every lawyer in your firm cannot contribute, and significantly, to business development. Every lawyer can contribute in a way that is comfortable to them to a law firm marketing plan. Attorney and marketing consultant Stacy West Clark describes this as finding "critically important behind-the-scenes roles" for partners and associates who are unwilling or unable to market publicly. As we all know, many lawyers are disinterested in a book of their own business. What can those lawyers do? Write articles, blog posts, speeches, seminar presentations; develop prospect databases and contact schedules for working through them; evaluate trade and community groups and activity within each; monitor, evaluate and update your Web site; monitor competitors' marketing; update and manage client and referral lists. These are critical and mighty contributions to marketing. And, the lawyers who can do them best are (too) often encouraged and given training and support to do other things. Of course, like the efforts of the traditional rainmaker these "behind-the-scenes" efforts by your less public lawyers needs to recognized in your compensation plan.

Labels: , ,

posted by Bob Weiss at 3:55 PM

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Some firms surprised to learn they do not own their Web sites

Many law firms upgrading their Web sites are surprised to learn they do not own their online assets. They are forced to pay their original designer and hosting company substantial additional (often nonnegotiable) fees when they want to make a change in who hosts, designs and optimizes a new Web site. The expensive alternative for many has been to start over from scratch with only their content salvageable from their original site. Law firms are not alone in discovering this. Friends of ours in construction, accounting and other professional services firms have run into this problem. In each case, the firms had decided to use new designers to replace sites functioning passively as online brochures (so-called Web 1.0 sites.) The new sites are to generate leads and compete for viewership on the Internet (so-called Web 2.0 sites). In short, you want to make sure your firm owns all of its digital assets. This helps you manage costs and gives you maximum control of your law firm marketing. You want to have a site with programming code that is "open source", not custom, one supported by a large, active and public development community. This allows you to hire anyone you want to work on the site-- not just your original designer and programmer. Examples of open source are Drupal and Joomla. Here's a great article listing the questions to ask anyone you are hiring to create a Web site, and give details of why you should. The shift away traditional media and advertising is inexorable (and is confirmed by our latest national marketing effectiveness survey of law firms). As firms make ever larger investments of time and money in their digital assets the proper handling these transactions is increasingly critical.

Labels: , ,

posted by Bob Weiss at 1:25 PM

Friday, February 5, 2010

Most firms report getting cases through their Web sites

Another surprising statistic has appeared as we analyze the results of our latest bi-annual survey of law firm marketing effectiveness-- 77% of the 120 corporate, transactional and defense firms reporting to us say they have received work directly through their Web site. The consumer bar-- PI, bankruptcy, whistleblower and family-- years ago figured out the Web could be a source of desirable cases. It appears the remainder of the bar is now embracing and seeing results from their online marketing. Online marketing strategy and tactics are an integral part of every law firm marketing plan. What we need to learn next is how many of these firms have gone beyond implementing basic technical search engine optimization to garner their cases.

Labels: ,

posted by Bob Weiss at 2:12 PM

Sunday, January 24, 2010

New Survey Shows Value of SEO and Online Marketing

We're compiling the results from our latest bi-annual National Marketing Effectiveness Survey of Corporate, Transactional and Defense Firms. As trends emerge from the data, we'll be issuing alerts. Here's our first: Nearly half of all firms-- a dramatic increase from two years ago-- report they are using formal search engine optimization (SEO) in an attempt to generate cases directly and by referral. And, 24% percent of the firms using SEO say they are getting desirable cases from their SEO. Online marketing, long ago effectively adopted and today considered a must by most all personal injury, consumer bankruptcy and family law practices, is now proven to be an effective tactic for business lawyers and commerical litigators, as well. SEO must be considered for the mix of tactics when writing or evaluating any law firm marketing plan.

Labels: , , ,

posted by Bob Weiss at 2:51 PM

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

How to get a new Web site quickly and within budget

We recently completed a fully-optimized entirely new Web site for a client in just 5.5 months, a record time for our team. This is particularly gratifying because we have clients and know of firms that have struggled for up to two years on their sites, and when done have been dissatisfied with both the process and the results. Here's some reason why this project went quickly and smoothly. First, the firm entrusted a small working group-- four people-- to make the design, copy and site navigation decisions. This group confirmed with it executive committee the objectives for the site before development began-- those outside the working group could ask all the questions they wanted, but were not allowed to interrupt/stop the process (participate in working group meetings). This eliminated the many mid-project discussions we've seen where lawyers not fully-engaged or on the periphery ask: "Why don't we try this?, or "Why are we doing that?". Reassessment of the strategy, revisiting design decisions dramatically delays the process and often makes the final product disjointed. When new copy was written, a memo was created for the editors. It explained that writing for the Web is not legal writing, that Web site copy is organized and must read differently to be effective. This must be clearly understood. A few people outside the working group were asked to to edit because of their expertise in a particular area. (Call me if you'd like to discuss what is in this memo.) The working groups and development team created a clear time schedule for each phase of the project. The working group and our team had regular, at least monthly, sometimes twice monthly, online meetings to review progress. We agreed, and largely held to, making the big decisions-- home page layout, navigation, images, copy-- in no more than one week. The ethics officer was kept informed and turned his reviews around quickly. Finally, we assembled engaged third-party designers and SEO experts we knew were well organized and who had experience with legal services. Yes, there were tight moments as there always are on such complicated projects. But, we got it done on time and on budget. As with any major construction project we have a punch list, but it's shrinking. In just a few weeks we have seen a solid drop in the site's bounce rate. An initial indicator we have a more functional Web presence.

Labels: , , ,

posted by Bob Weiss at 8:08 AM

Sign up to receive:
Weiss' Monthly Marketing Brief

Constant Contact Logo

For Email Marketing you can trust

"Bob is a significant force in the ABA on the subject of marketing…he is used by my firm and does a wonderful job."

-Richard B. Turnbow, Administrator, Avera & Smith, LLP

law practice today

Subscribe to the American Bar Association’s monthly e-zine on marketing, management, technology and finance which includes Weiss’ Monthly Marketing Brief.