Posted on 28 March 2012
Design Planning, Integrated Marketing, Social Media
Just over 2 years ago we published an article on Law firm Social Media, in which we explained how law firms should approach social media with a focus on creating compelling content that others would want to share online. We used the example of the TED conference and provided a model for how law firms could implement the idea using online video.
Last week, we were delighted to discover that City firm Berwin Leighton Paisner has implemented a major new feature of their website that follows our model.
This is how it looks at the time of writing:
BLP Global Perspectives sees the firm’s partners discussing key issues of the day. The videos follow a simple formula with a question displayed on the screen, followed by a talking head style video clip of a single partner or small group of partners providing the answer.
The videos last between 4 and 5 minutes and the production quality is high. The site uses JWPlayer, a popular and low-cost video player, available for commercial use for a one-off license fee of around 59 EUR.
While there is lots to praise about BLP’s effort, we think the firm could derive greater value from their investment by including more features to drive traffic through content sharing and visitor interaction.
Our Top Tips for Future Improvement
Provide a Clear Overview of the Videos Available
We’d like to see the site make it easier for visitors to find video content that interests them. This could be achieved through the use of index page for the Global Perspectives feature showing the full range of videos available, perhaps with the option to filter by practice area, lawyer, etc.
Encourage Content Sharing
BLP could generate quality web traffic by providing easy methods for visitors to share the video content through social networks. Social sharing buttons take minutes to implement so the ROI is huge, and they have the added benefit of providing a metric for measuring the popularity of each video, which could aid the future development of popular content.
Engage Visitors
Providing a comments section would allow deeper visitor engagement and build loyalty. Many firms use the excuse that they are concerned about liability arising from visitor comments, but we suspect the fear that nobody will post a comment is probably closer to the truth! Be brave and spark a discussion. You can always have your own lawyers post a few comments to get the ball rolling.
Recommendations: An Artist’s Impression
1. Make it Personal
Give key biographical details about the person speaking. If it’s one of your lawyers then don’t forget to include contact details as a way of generating leads. BLP have got this under control already.
2. Encourage Sharing
Social media buttons enable visitors to quickly share your content on a wide variety of different websites. Building custom buttons is straight forward for a web developer or use services like AddThis that give you cut and paste code for this functionality.
3. Enable and Encourage Debate
The debating aspect is just like the comments feature you find on most blogs. Most systems allow you to screen comments before they go live in order to keep control over what is said by others on your site.
First write your community guidelines and link to them at the top of the comments section. The aim is to encourage serious intellectual discussion, so it is useful to be able to point to a set of rules if someone steps out of line.
4. Build a Relationship
The reason for publishing the videos over a period of time is that it keeps people coming back to see what’s new. Use an email sign-up form to collect leads and to alert people when new content becomes available.
Posted on 17 June 2011
Design Planning, Innovation
Many of the newest and most exciting development in digital communications emerge through consumer markets and it can be difficult to know when and how to apply them in the corporate environment commercial law firms operate in.
By maintaining an systematic innovation pipeline, law firms can ensure they keep ahead of the market while avoiding expensive mistakes that arise from investing in cutting edge technology that may turn out to be a nothing more that a fad. In this post I’d like to share a model you can use to make sure your pipeline keeps your firm ahead of the curve.
1. Awareness building
Build an maintain a list of emerging technologies and concepts. We recommend a simple glossary style list that can be shared as a resource for every member of the firm. Ideas will typically be added to the list as soon as the emerge and usually before they have reached any market.
2. Repurposing
Monitor for signs of emerging technologies hitting the market place. Task your best thinkers with writing short proposals for how to repurpose these new ideas to meet the needs of law firms and their clients. At this stage, proposals should be written with an open-mind and do not necessarily need to be completely realistic.
3. Evaluate
As new technologies show signs of success, add a dose of realism to the ideas generated in stage 2 and work out the challenges that would need to be overcome in order to bring them to life.
4. Prototype
As new technology prove market appeal, develop prototypes that apply the technology to the law firm setting. If you have followed the pipeline this far you should be months if not years ahead of most other law firms who only to considering ideas at this stage. Circulate prototypes internally to gather feedback.
5. Realise
Successful prototypes can be shared with the firm and presented for approval. It is easier to build consensus when you have something for people to interact with, rather that asking them to sign-up to vague concepts. Those that gain approval can be launched as new products and services.
6. Monitor and Review
Establish goals and work out how to monitor success. Review new services weekly to begin with tapering to monthly or quarterly as they become more established.
7. Refine or Withdraw
Refine ideas when your review process shows they are no longer meeting the needs of clients or other stakeholders. Kill ideas quickly when their cost is greater than the earned benefits they achieve. Cost saving made by withdrawing under-performing services can be invested back into product development.
Posted on 4 January 2011
Design Planning
You can spend hours crafting and refining the aims and objective for your firm’s new website, but when it comes down to it, there are only five that really matter:
Increase the number of enquiries
How many of the people who visit your new site go on to make contact to discuss engaging the firm?
Increase the quality of enquiries
Does the new website deliver enquiries from people who meet your criteria for an ideal client in terms of budget, authority to purchase, need for services you offer, time frame and cultural fit?
Increase number of enquiries converted to clients
Of the enquiries that meet your quality criteria, how many then go on to actually engage the firm’s services?
Increase revenue per client
Are new clients spending more money with your firm since the new website went live?
Increase client loyalty
Is client turnover reduced?
