Conference/Webinar Session Re-caps

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On Friday, we had an excellent, excellent panel following lunch with some truly brilliant people – moderator Nancy Mangan of Wicker Park Group chatted with Paul Malanowski (@pmalanowski) of Saul Ewing, Melanie Green (@melaniegreen) of Faegre Baker Daniels, and Dave Bruns (@dbruns) of Farella Braun + Martel about some of the innovative things they do to combat the most prevalent problems in business development. 

Whether you’re at a large firm, or a small firm (or a service provider), there were a lot of tips in here that we can use to better drive business development. 

Key Takeaway: Talk to your Clients

When I use the word "clients" here, it has different meanings for different people: 

  • For attorneys, it’s your clients. 
  • For marketers, it’s your attorneys. 
  • For service providers, it’s your clients. 

Continue Reading Takeaways from “Quick Fixes: Innovative Solutions in Law Firm Business Development”

The very last session I went to before our wrap up at LMA14 was "Can the C-Suite Lead the Social Media Law Firm?" with presenters Deborah Grabein (@dgrabein) of Andrews Kurth and Michael Hertz (@michaelhertz) of White & Case and moderator Kevin O’Keefe (@kevinokeefe) of LexBlog. 

The description of the session in the conference book reads:

While Fortune 500 executives are beginning to leverage social media, law firm executives are lagging." 

Two C-Level decision makers (not practicing lawyers) in Am Law 200 firms made the decision in the fall of 2013 to start using social media, personally . They wished to experience how their use of social media could help change the perceptions of their brand, better equip them to lead their marketing and business development teams, and help them guide individual lawyers in their use of social." 

With five months of strategic consulting and coaching, these executives became active content creators and social media contributors on blogs, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google+."

Learn about the personal and firm wide challenges and rewards these law firm executives experienced, and will continue to experience in their personal use of social media." 

Continue Reading Key Takeaways from “Can the C-Suite Lead the Social Media Law Firm?”

Yesterday, we discussed the first part of the excellent webinar with David Ackert & Jonathan Fitzgarrald on LinkedIn 2.0. When chatting last night with my fellow SIG leaders, Nancy asked me why it was I considered this to be the best session we’d had. She wondered if it was because they got into the "how" of using LinkedIn as opposed to the "why." 

My answer to her was that it was the 2.0 nature of it – it’s safe to assume that those participating in a social media group like ours would be those most likely to have already bought into the idea of social media, and are more focused on how to sell it to their attorneys and its practical use. Even more than that, pretty much everyone has a LinkedIn profile these days – but the idea of setting objectives and fine tuning your strategy to meet those objectives is something that’s really useful to both attorneys, and the marketing professionals trying to get them to use LinkedIn for business development.  

It also doesn’t hurt that Jonathan and David are not only excellent presenters, but also extremely knowledgeable – both when it comes to using LinkedIn and working with attorneys. 

So, if you’re a part of the LMA and have the opportunity to see the recording of the session once it’s circulated, make sure that you do so! Now let’s get into Part II…

Continue Reading LinkedIn 2.0: Efficient Strategies for Busy Lawyers – A Webinar Recap (Part II)

Apparently, this is the week for excellent webinars, because I had the privilege of attending another amazing one this afternoon. The LMA’s Social Media Shared Interest Group offered LinkedIn 2.0: Efficient Strategies for Busy Lawyers, featuring presenters David Ackert (@DavidAckert) of The Ackert Advisory and Jonathan Fitzgarrald (@JRFitzgarrald) of Greenberg Glusker, moderated by our own Nancy Myrland (@nancymyrland) of Myrland Marketing & Social Media. 

Before I get into the meat of the session (and boy, was it meaty!), I want to make sure to note that if you’d like to join the Legal Marketing Association, you can take a look at the options and categories for membership over here. 

And if you’re already a member of the LMA, and want to join the Social Media SIG (we’re cool, I promise!), you can join through the LMA website here. LMA members can also join our Facebook and LinkedIn groups (whether or not you officially belong to the SIG). Continue Reading LinkedIn 2.0: Efficient Strategies for Busy Lawyers – A Webinar Recap (Part I)

When I heard that Kevin McKeown (@kevinmckeown) of LexBlog and Marketing Brain Fodder’s Eric Fletcher (@ericfletcher) would be giving a webinar together, I knew I couldn’t miss it. So despite battling a low-grade migraine today, I tuned in, and definitely wasn’t disappointed. 

Their presentation focused on the top reasons to blog, and if you want to see the tweet stream that came out of the session, take a look at #LexBlogTop5. 

Not only did their presentation break down five reasons to blog, but it was broken into five sections: 

  • "Old school" networking
  • Networking is the "new normal"
  • Top 5 reasons lawyers should blog
  • Your call to action
  • Questions

Continue Reading Top Five Reasons to Blog – A Webinar Recap

Last week, I had the pleasure of attending LexBlog’s webinar "Daily Habits of Highly Effective Bloggers" with Kevin O’Keefe (@kevinokeefe). Kevin kicked off the session by saying that there is no perfect way to blog, but that over the past ten years, he’d develop some habits that work for him. 

The session covered: 

  • Essence of blogging
  • Listening tools
  • Posting
  • Complementary Social Media
  • Habits of LexBloggers

Continue Reading Daily Habits of Highly Effective Bloggers – A Webinar Recap

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of sitting in on another of the LMA’s Social Media Shared Interest Group’s webinars, this time with Adrian Lurssen of JD Supra. Adrian talked about some best practices for getting clients to read a law firm’s online content, using a case study to walk us through. 

As I’ve noted before, I won’t give away everything from the webinar, since it’s an LMA membership benefit, but there was some great advice that Adrian shared with us. 

His case study focused on the discussions surrounding the America Invents Act, for which JD Supra saw 82 firms producing content.  Of these firms, only one stood out, Pepper Hamilton. Adrian delved into the "why" of the popularity of their post, as well as defining the goals we should be pursuing as we produce content. Continue Reading Is Anybody Going to Click on That? Getting Clients to Read Law Firm Content, A Webinar Recap

One of the ILN’s member firms, Fogler Rubinoff, recently launched a new website, focused on responsive design and definitely very cutting edge for the legal profession. We invited Michael Slan to present on the site during our 2013 Annual Meeting, and Michael had some great best practices for law firms on redesigning their websites, which I’d like to share. 

Michael began by addressing some of the issues that they had with their current site, which had last been redesigned in 2005. The site itself was fine, but it had some issues: 

  • Looked like everyone else’s 
  • Required too many clicks
  • Too much scrolling
  • Inefficient layout of content
  • Text-heavy and lacked visual content

Continue Reading Law Firm Websites – Best Practices

At this year’s LMA, we were fortunate enough to have not one, but TWO sessions with General Counsel. This one took place at the end of the first day, and included a procurement guy – a first for the LMA. The session was titled "GC Focus: Project Management. Position Your Firm in Alignment With the Unique Challenges Faced by In-house Counsel." 

Panelists included Keith Isgett, the Managing Attorney-General – Global External Legal Relations, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), Justin Ergler, Sourcing Group Manager, Legal Services Procurement, GlaxoSmithKline, and Nat Slavin, Founder and Partner of Wicker Park Group, along with Moderator Alicia Brown, Director of Strategic Relationships for Bloomberg Law. 

After their introductions, Isgett kicked it off by saying that he wants to receive the best representation for the best price, and part of the "best representation" is having a good relationship with the law firm. The procurement team is there to make sure that what they’re paying for is what they receive, and that there is value there. Isgett noted that "People are still talking about discounted hourly rates, which means we’re not as far along as I’d like us to be." Continue Reading GC Focus – an LMA Annual Conference Recap

In yesterday’s post, we learned that building relationships is still of primary importance to clients – and some of the ways to do this including figuring out what benefits the client the most, and focusing on what business solutions will make them look good. 

The panelists agreed that the role of their lawyers needs to be that of strategic partners, and for their part, they need to inform outside counsel about what they need. But outside counsel can also be proactive to learn more about their clients. The panelists suggested that attorneys read company filings and public documents before they meet with them. They emphasized that outside counsel should understand their customer before asking them to be their customer. Post-matter debriefings, at no cost, are also helpful.

Continue Reading General Counsel Panel: Separate from the Pack – a Recap Part II