Last week, we had the pleasure of welcoming my friend, Gina Rubel, of Furia Rubel, as our webinar presenter for the ILN’s marketing group. Gina had a fabulous presentation dedicated to the topic of integrated approaches to law firm marketing and public relations, and the attendees agreed that it was excellent. 

I won’t do my usual lengthy recap here, because Gina will be using some of the same insights in her upcoming panel presentation at the LMA’s 2013 Annual Conference (and I’m attending her session, so I’ll recap it then).  But I do want to give all of you a taste of what’s to come, to encourage everyone who’ll be at LMA13 to see Gina’s panel at 11am on Tuesday, April 9th. (ILN members and marketers can email me directly for a copy of the presentation)

Gina noted early in the presentation that when marketing a law firm, there are several fundamental questions to answer, regardless of the size of the firm – these surround topics such as goals, audience, messaging, tactics and ROI. 

Using real world examples, Gina led us through the overlap of branding, public relations, advertising, sales/marketing and web/interactive, always focused on how to reach the target audience and remain consistent. Each one of these marketing aspects is important, and she spoke about them individually to flesh out what they mean, and how to use each one of them in line with the answers to the fundamental questions mentioned above, which we’ve already answered about our own firms. 

Each of these areas also breaks down into various components, which are important to consider. For example, branding is about name, image and message, while public relations can include things such as client communications, reputation management, crisis communications, and more. Throughout all of them, Gina emphasized the need for consistency and showed examples of how she has worked with some of her clients to achieve that.  

Throughout the presentation, the message was to be strategic and consistent – with all marketing whether it’s the firm’s brochure and website, or an individual attorney’s social media "voice." Gina offered some interesting suggestions on how to leveraging existing marketing pieces and attorney work to both offer content in multiple ways, and maintain consistency across all marketing efforts. She touched on a few areas that I hadn’t considered before, and gave the audience a lot to think about, particularly in the area of firm websites, blogs and other web/interactive tools. So I certainly recommend checking out her LMA panel, and if you’re not able to attend, staying tuned to this space for my full recap! 

(image courtesy of Furia Rubel)