Marketing Tech: Four Technology Trends Changing Law Firm Marketing and Business

We are used to reading technology trend lists. But those lists invariably discuss how trends affect the much larger retail and consumer market. Although mobile shopping and electronic wallets are expected to grow significantly this year, neither will have any noticeable impact on law firms or the practice of law. What, then, are the technology trends that law firms should pay attention to and how will they uniquely impact the legal industry?

In evaluating technologies, law firms need to look at several issues:

• Do the technologies help them win new clients?
• Do the technologies help them increase business with existing clients?
• Do the technologies help them build brand presence in certain sectors?
• Do the technologies help them deliver better service?
• Where do the technologies fit in with what other firms are already doing? Are they important enough to displace other activities?
• Do the technologies have an “upside”? In other words, will the technology get firms more clients faster?
• Do the technologies have a “downside”? In other words, will firms have to implement the technology just to maintain their current competitive position?

Personal Brand v. Firm Brand

Over the last five years, we have seen an explosion of social media technologies that have helped individuals connect virtually in an effective manner. For example, some have likened Twitter to a global cocktail party where individuals can listen in and participate in millions of conversations.

The profile of an individual is sometime called a personal brand as opposed to the more traditional brand of a product, company or firm. In some sense, our LinkedIn profiles are a living resume promoting our own personal brands.

Unlike products ” where brand and features dominate ” clients say that they select lawyers not law firms. More accurately, perhaps, the law firm brand is important in the decision-making process, but ultimately the connection with the lawyer seals the engagement. This should not be that surprising as the concept of firm brand is relatively new. Firms traditionally were named for their partners ” the collective band of each partner” s personal brand. Only when firms got too large to name all partners did the brand become impersonal. Large law firms today are more like sports teams that have the tension between promoting the personal brands of their star players versus the team brand.

Social media clearly promotes the individual brand ahead of the firm or company brand. The individual is the point of engagement and when the individual changes companies, the brand equity goes with the individual. It stands to reason that these technologies should help the legal profession even more that they help product-driven industries since clients ultimately hire an individual.

Platform Shifts Create Different Leaders

When broadcast TV was king, the three major networks ” ABC, CBS and NBC ” were the all-important brands. With the emergence and eventual dominance of cable, new players that capitalized on the new distribution medium ” CNN, MTV, HBO, etc. ” became important players. Similar outcomes will go to those firms that learn to take advantage of the new online and social media that are becoming the dominant form of marketing and communication.

According to a survey conducted by Adrian Dayton in early 2011, an AmLaw 200 attorney is nearly three times more likely to blog than an AmLaw 100 attorney. In the firms of the AmLaw 100, there are more than 84,000 lawyers and only 130 law blogs. The AmLaw 101-200 firms have fewer than 30,000 total attorneys creating 182 blogs.

An Integrated Existence

Some would say that the separation of one”s work day from one”s private life is an artifact of the industrial age. The reality is that we don”t leave work at home ” we take it with us and fit it in when we can. While this is true from almost all work, it is especially true for lawyers who are “always on” and always accessible through smart phones and mobile e-mail. This mirrors the “always on/always available” existence that social networks on and online presence provide. Without judging whether this is a good thing, it stands to reason that these tools, that reflect the way attorneys work, should be helpful to attorneys.