2008 Winners shoWcase

Best of Show

Your Honor

AwArds

2

Getting 5,000 lawyers in 70 countries to pay attention to any-thing like an ad campaign defines the words “ultimate challenge,” according to Lma’s Your honor judges. Yet that is just what this multi-media campaign delivered by the international Lawyers Network (iLN) set out to do. it has met with “super Bowl” success so far, and the judges have honored this program with Best of show for its boldly creative and deft approach.

No newsprint ads, no direct mail, no press releases or inter-views…this campaign takes a radically different visual twist. With a goal to convince the 85% less-active lawyers in the international Lawyers Network to become active, the campaign needed a simple message with a stop-you-in-your-tracks visual to hook the target audience of bright, overworked and time-cramped lawyer members. and the budget was limited.

“We needed to grab them quickly with a powerful, unexpected image and tell our entire story within five seconds – and get them to talk about it with their peers,” according to iLN spokespeople.

how to do it? the creators came up with ideas for life-sized, out-of-the-box designs made of sticky plastic that could be applied to a variety of surfaces without damage. these would be two-dimensional figures so large and theatrical they startled

Best of Show: International Lawyers Network

Art and artifice combine for Best of Show: International Lawyers Network’s Multi-Media Campaign

3

the passer-by and made him or her stop, take note and tell someone else.

the final selection of adhesive-backed images took shape as people of various nationalities and career modes, out-of-pro-portion and representative hats, and renderings of exotic travel destinations. these “trompe l’oeil,” or visual deceits, would be applied to bathroom mirrors, elevator doors, even interior walls of a building or law office.

the hats, a representative sample of international headdresses, were applied to restroom mirrors and positioned high enough to “fit” the heads of the onlookers. the message, “imagine you need a lawyer in (that representative country),” gave clarity to the surprise, out-of-context reflection in the mirror.

illusory “people” affixed to mir-rors smiled at bathroom visitors, reminding them that “the iLN is always with you, worldwide. www.iLN.com.” these sticky images resembled people from all over the world.

there were more. a set of elevator doors – cloaked in plastic sheeting adorned with words and images reminiscent of various countries (camels for egypt, for example) – reminded the onlooker of his or her membership in international Lawyers Network. mock, life-sized doorways, slightly ajar and leading to exotic, mock locales, were “affixed” to various interior walls.

initial approval was thunderous, nearly 100%. “our first presen-tation was in istanbul, to the european regional meeting,” said the group’s representative. “these lawyers are conservative; marketing is not something they have adopted as readily as U.s. firms have. the presentation to 50 attorneys from 35 european

and asian countries led to an excited discussion and far-reaching ideas about other applications for the products.”

the following meeting in Phoenix gained the same swell of enthusiasm – complete buy-in by the group and a desire to send the materials electronically to kick off the program.

the campaign’s entire budget was a fraction of a global print/media/ad undertaking of comparable scope: $20,000 took care of interviews, research, creative development and production.

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4. mULtimeDia CamPaiGN

First Place: Goldberg Simpson

Movement, Agility Key to Campaign

starting from a blank slate – no marketing materials at all – Goldberg simpson was challenged to create something that would establish it as not only a great firm but a standout. to compound the challenge there was little synergy within the 30-member firm, combining conventional business lawyers and tragic personal injury specialists; high-dollar divorces and high-volume house closings, international adoption specialists and front-page criminal attorneys. this seemingly mismatched Louisville outfit badly needed the cohesion of a brand. the firm took the bait.

What resulted caught the eye of the Your honor judges who bestowed the first-place award for multi-media Campaign to Goldberg & simpson.

an intense research phase identified key commonalities within the firm: energy, leadership, creativity and a type a business attitude. With that in mind, marketing products first developed included a new logo and tag line, “a law firm that really moves.” New ad materials and website images showed creativity and action – men, animals, women running, jogging, riding ahead of the pack.

Web copy reflected agility and a willingness to move: “Clients tell us we’re different from those big, lumbering downtown law firms. We move. We don’t bog down our clients’ business plans with process, procrastination and endless reconsidera-tion. We help our clients make timely decisions and then move swiftly to put those decisions into effect.”

in another unusual move, silhouettes of different athletic images -- e.g. horse racer, basketball player, runner – were cut out of the firm’s new logo to demonstrate the firm’s deft and targeted approach.

Distribution channels included more traditional - newspapers, magazines, community sponsorships – and more creative - manicures that featured logo-painted nails, floaty pens, and running-man billboards, unusual for a corporate law firm.

the reaction and success were immediate. Within two weeks of launching stage one, the firm began receiving the type of resumes they’d targeted for firm membership.

accomplishments were impressive on any scale, but especially with the allocated budget. the entire campaign, including message, creative work and production of logo and identity materials, billboard, pens, direct mailers, announcements, web site, ballet-related materials, etc. – all were produced for less than $100,000.

A Law Firm that Really Moves.

TM

SM

FrontLINESINTELLIGENCE, INSIGHTS & TACTICS FOR YOUR LAW PRACTICE

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LAW PRACTICE

January/February 2008 Law Practice 9

INSIDE What Really Works 10 • Trends 12 • ABA TECHSHOW Q&A 16 • Ask Bill 18 • Strategy 19 • LPM News & Events 20

W H A T R E A L LY W O R K S ?

All the right moves.Not all firms can aligntheir marketing withtheir practice areas.Some gallop to the fore by branding theirculture and styleinstead. How? With amessage that conveystheir personality—and impeccable execution. Floaty penshelp, too. Lots and lots of floaty pens. Turn the page to learn thestrategy behind GoldbergSimpson’s aggressive andquirky campaign.

When your firm and your lawyers

are creative and dynamic but

the practice mix is fluid and

eclectic, what value proposition do you sell? Your overall style and

innovative approach is the key—but the message and execution

must be consistent and thorough.

BY ROSSFISHMAN

What REALLY WorksFrontLINES

Branding a Firm’s Progressive Personality

LAW PRACTICE

and estate matters, while defending headline-grabbing criminal cases. It’slike a restaurant that serves lobster andchicken nuggets … and sushi and grits.The mix makes no logical sense—untilyou realize that the synergy is notbetween the practice areas, but thelawyers themselves. They’re all hard-charging, Type-A personalities. In eacharea, they either lead the pack or theydon’t bother practicing there.

In addition, management views thefirm as a business and, in professionalservices, the best businesses have thebest people. So Goldberg Simpson putsequal emphasis on attracting and retain-ing top professionals, which means astrong focus on building a defined culture—and having fun. They’re high-energy, but not high-strung. Loud-mouth jerks or raging egos are quicklyshown the door.

MARKETING GOALS The firm wanted acampaign to increase its visibility andname recognition, one that would differentiate it by conveying itsstrengths and thereby drive new busi-ness and improve lateral hiring. Buthow do you brand a firm as eclectic asthis one? Clearly you can’t focus on aspecific practice area—but you can

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10 January/February 2008 Law Practice

WHO Goldberg Simpson, a 30-lawyer firmin Louisville, KY.

BACKGROUND Goldberg Simpson is a midsize law firm by the standards of theLouisville market. It competes aggressivelywith the city’s large firms—although itisn’t really built along a traditional full-service model. This firm is more like acollection of opportunistic boutiques: agroup of small, efficiently run, largelyindependent practices brought togetherunder one roof by some dynamic leaders.

Sure, the firm has the typical range ofbusiness-oriented legal services, includingsophisticated corporate and litigationpractices. But it also closes 3,000 residen-tial real estate deals per year; has an insur-ance-defense practice down the hall froma catastrophic personal injury plaintiff ’spractice; and handles high-dollar divorcesand high-profile adoptions. It also represents wealthy families in trust

WWW.LAWPRACTICE.ORG WWW.LAWPRACTICE.ORG

LAW FIRM MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS

January/February 2008 Law Practice 11

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market the culture and personality.We wanted to show the business

community that Goldberg Simpson isa young, vibrant, very cool businessfirm, a smart choice for executivesseeking sophisticated services providedin an agile, personal, cost-effectivemanner. For laterals, we wanted toshowcase the firm’s unique culture sothat top lawyers feeling frustratedworking in stuffy firms would seeGoldberg Simpson as the alternative.We wanted to convey the firm’s senseof excitement, that it’screative and progres-sive—a firm on themove, where the mostinteresting and inno-vative things are hap-pening.

The tag line toconvey the firm’soverall style and innovative, fast-paced approach became clear.Goldberg Simpson is: “A law firm thatreally moves.”

IMPLEMENTATION We started by revisingthe firm’s bland logo to a bold and col-orful one conveying the “moves”theme. And we also created an addi-tional half-dozen versions with cutout silhouettes of things thatmove—including racehorses, jetplanes, arrows, motorcycles and evenrunning lawyers. To create interest andreinforce the brand, every lawyer’spack of business cards alternates withdifferent versions of the logo.

We developed advertisements that,among other images, showed a suitedlawyer as a smiling jockey on a race-

horse or wearing race helmets by thewater-cooler. These ads are supportedby a series of running-lawyer billboardsalong the main highways headingdowntown, helping to promote thefirm’s relocation to a hot suburban cor-ridor with the giant caption “Wemoved so you wouldn’t have to.”

To have additional fun with the“moves” theme, we created floaty penswith the image of a running lawyerthat were so hot we’ve had to reorder.We changed the firm’s Web site to

show the smiling managing partnerrunning, while a small runner movesin the corner. Interior pages repeat thehorse and helmet ads, and retouchedheadshots place the lawyers in front ofhorse races and running tracks.

To further generate conversation, inthe summer we glued GoldbergSimpson logos to hollow cicada shellsthat clung to downtown trees. It was arare once-every-17-years opportunity.

Having a “moves” theme offers theopportunity to further stir up thecampaign to create a splash that thecity will talk about. So to visibly andmemorably connect the firm to“movement,” we are hiring smallgroups of high school sports teams towalk around downtown Louisvillewearing Goldberg Simpson T-shirts

Y Workswhile doing things that “really move”—dribbling basketballs, tossing volley-balls, carrying field hockey sticks, rid-ing bicycles and more. Every time youturn a corner at lunchtime, you’ll seeanother happy sports team dribble,jump, hit, toss or play something.

RESULTS We hadn’t fully launched thecampaign before the results began toshow. The local newspapers wrote anumber of articles, and the firm attractedtwo more best-of-class partners who

admitted the ads andbillboards brought thefirm to their attentionand persuaded them to join.

There’s a palpableexcitement coursingthrough the firm.With Goldberg

Simpson on the town’s collective lips,all the firm’s employees see how muchgreener the grass is here. Now that thefirm owns a clear theme, ongoing exe-cutions are easy and all the firm’s mem-bers are looking for new “moves” ideas.One idea that was a natural for themwas to become a primary sponsor ofboth the local triathlon and theMoscow Ballet’s Louisville tour—weeven created a ballerina logo for thepromotional materials, as well as printad materials showing dancing lawyers.High-quality resumes are pouring in, asnew people seek to jump on board thespeeding Goldberg Simpson train. LP

Ross Fishman (www.rossfishmanmarketing.com) specializes in marketing training and creating differentiation programs for law firms worldwide.

WWW.LAWPRACTICE.ORG

WHO Noland Hamerly Etienne & Hoss, a20-lawyer firm in Salinas, California

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVE Noland Hamerly wasa skilled but unremarkable full-servicefirm. It had never done any marketing,and now aggressive new competitors weremoving into town. The firm wanted todevelop more business by increasing itsvisibility as a high-quality business lawfirm in its core geographic market, theSalinas Valley. To drive new revenuequickly, it needed something that wouldhave an immediate impact.

MARKETING GOALS A tight budget requiredmaking some tough decisions aboutallocating resources. Marketing broadlyto the business community as a high-quality full-service law firm would be acostly and long-term process—it was toogeneral a message. This firm neededsomething unique.

Through the windows of the firm’soffices, mile after mile of rich farmlandwas visible. Green fields of broccoli, arti-chokes and lettuce stretched as far as youcould see. I asked whether they had anyagriculture clients. Of course they did.Every local firm did. It was the region’sdominant industry. And NolandHamerly had a long history in thatindustry—many of the firm’s founders

Industry marketing is an effective way to

differentiate your services. Of course,

by focusing on this level, you are mar-

keting to a smaller audience. But by marketing more deeply, you develop

the kind of close relationships that generate business more quickly.

BY ROSSFISHMAN

What REALLY WorksFrontLINES

Narrowing Marketing Efforts to a Single Industry

LAW PRACTICE

were deep in dirt. Moreover, no otherfirm had staked out the territory as theleading agriculture-oriented law firmin the area.

So instead of broad and shallow, wedecided to go deep and narrow, develop-ing a focused industry-based campaigntargeting a specific audience: the SalinasValley’s fruit and produce growers, ship-pers and ranchers. Making NolandHamerly the go-to firm for them wouldbring in significant new business.

RESEARCH AND IMPLEMENTATION Ourresearch showed that this community—one of the nation’s most vibrant agri-cultural areas—has significant and var-ied legal needs. Plus, an internal studyfound that it was already the firm’slargest industry group, even though thefirm had not actively marketed to it yet.

So we created “The Lettuce Lawyers,” a memorable, easy-to-spelland alliterative title, to make it feelmore like a tangible thing. Next webought both lettucelaw.com and lettucelawyers.com to make it easy tofind the practice online.

Now we simply needed to use a rangeof tools to show the firm’s intimate con-nection with the industry. We started bydesigning a unique logo and stationeryfor the ag practice, modifying the firm’s

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8 December 2007 Law Practice

LAW FIRM MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS

December 2007 Law Practice 9

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existing logo by morphing its tradition-al ampersand into a green sprout. (Seepage 8.) And for agriculture-specificbusiness cards, we developed a double-entendre “Together We Grow” tag line.

The core of the campaign was a col-lection of creative advertisementsshowing the lawyers dressed in suits in

distributed lettuce seed packets withthe new logo as business cards; andcreated client giveaways, includinglogo’d bib overalls.

The firm’s LettuceLaw.com micro-site boasts luscious images oflocal landscapes, as well as the adver-tising imagery. In addition, eventhough the agriculture practice wasthe primary marketing push, weupdated the general firm site with acomplementary design. This was bothto showcase the firm as a high-endprovider and to show the lawyers whoweren’t representing the agriculturalsector that their marketing needswere not being neglected.

RESULTS The broadcast marketing tac-tics grew momentum and visibility,supporting the lawyers’ face-to-faceactivities as they focused in on localagriculture trade groups and beganwriting articles, speaking and net-working. And when the ads launchedin the California trade magazines,almost immediately clients and com-petitors took significant notice. Thebuzz grew in the local agriculturecommunity, and judges even men-tioned the ads in court.

The entire campaign to lock thefirm into a market-leader positionhas brought in new agricultureclients, while also delighting existingclients, who are sending the firmmore business as a result.

Ross Fishman (www.rossfishmanmarketing.com) specializes in marketing training and creating dif-ferentiation programs for law firms worldwide. AFellow of the College of Law PracticeManagement, he is an inaugural member of theLegal Marketing Association's Hall of Fame.

WorksWhat Do We Do?Ideas You Can UseClients crave industry expertise, but it’shard for them to find—which means that ifyou can develop expertise in an industryand demonstrate that through your mar-keting, you can build significant business.

The goal is to become an industryinsider and know more about the industrythan any other lawyer. So you need to getactive and visible, by regularly attendingindustry meetings, writing for trade publi-cations, speaking at industry conferences,joining committees and working tobecome a leader. Soon you’ll be recog-nized in industry circles as the lawyer whoknows their business, their concerns, theirjargon. It’s not only great marketing; it alsomakes you a better, more value-addedlawyer.

Select an industry where you have ahead start. Does your spouse have a jobwhere you have an established network?Do you have an outside interest that youcan blend with your practice? Do youhave clients you enjoy who are in a smallindustry? Where is there growth potentialor an area that is currently ignored orunderserved by other law firms?

Whatever you select, you should enjoythe industry and the people who work in itbecause you’re going to have to spend alot of time inside that industry.

The more involved with it you become,the more you learn, and the more you learn, the more valuable you become.Once you get some traction, you’ll findthat prospects talk among themselvesabout your knowledge, leading to newbusiness and more referrals. —Ross Fishman

agriculture settings—as the AmericanGothic farmers (a la the Grant Woodpainting), casually parking their tractorin front of the firm, lifting NHE&Hlettuce crates and the like.

We also created tools to encouragethe media to write about the firm,using free publicity to expand thecampaign’s reach and credibility. Forexample, we created firm-specificAmerican Gothic-style USPS stamps;

American Gothic-style postage stampswere one tool used to help position thefirm—and draw free publicity.

FrontLINESINTELLIGENCE, INSIGHTS & TACTICS FOR YOUR LAW PRACTICE

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LAW PRACTICE

July/August 2007 Law Practice 7

W H A T R E A L LY W O R K S ?

WHAT WORKS?So you want to grow your firmby opening an office in a newstate and city with an aggressivegrowth market where you havelow name recognition. You needto recruit top local lawyers—andyou need to do it fast. Thinkextremely bold materials thatwill whack your market over thehead. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Turn the page to read What Really Works to learn how CarltonFields cuts through the clutter in the Atlanta legal market.

INSIDE FRONTLINES People & Places 10 • Trends Report 12 • Strategy 13 • Ask Bill 14 • LPM News and Events 16

WHO Carlton Fields, a 250-lawyer full-service firm.BACKGROUND Established in 1901,Carlton Fields is one of Florida’s oldestlaw firms. It is also one of the state’slargest, with offices in Tampa, Orlando,Tallahassee, West Palm Beach, St.Petersburg and Miami. It had calleditself “The Florida Firm” since 1992.But when it developed a growth planthat including opening offices outsideof the state, beginning with Atlanta,Carlton Fields found that it had arecruiting problem.

To comprise the ranks of its plannedoffice, the firm’s aggressivegrowth goals targeted high-level partners at top Atlantafirms. The firm had signed alease for significant officespace that it needed to fillwith top local lawyers quick-ly. However, despite the factthat Carlton Fields was a ter-rific firm with high quality-of-life scores in AmLaw sur-veys, it was having troublegetting its headhunter callsreturned because of its lowlocal name recognition.

Initial research disclosedthat another problem wasthat dozens of prominent

Your campaign will be dead on

arrival if what you need is imme-

diate impact and try to a splash

with a mediocre series of ads that trickle out one at a time. Solution:

Front-load for massive visibility.

BY ROSSFISHMAN

What REALLY WorksFrontLINES

Recruiting in a New Market with Shock and Awe Tactics

LAW PRACTICE

national and regional firms had alsoopened Atlanta offices recently, althoughmost of them had limited, if any, localname recognition either. The new firmsseemed similar, if not interchangeable,and few of them were really fighting toget noticed.

So although Atlanta was an aggressivelegal market, the firm had an outstand-ing opportunity to one-up the othernewcomers—if it could leverage its rep-utation and quality-of-life ratings.MARKETING GOAL: Carlton Fields neededsignificant name recognition amonghighly skilled Atlanta partner-levellawyers within weeks. The project begannear the beginning of recruiting season.The objectives were to (1) inform thelateral targets of the firm’s dominance inthe Florida market for credibility, and(2) showcase its friendly work environ-ment. And because Atlanta is such alarge and saturated market, the cam-paign materials needed to be extremelybold to cut through the clutter.RESEARCH: We interviewed headhunters,lawyers who had accepted or rejected thefirm’s job offers, prospects, consultantsand other parties to pinpoint the mar-keting challenges and obstacles to suc-cess. The firm then conducted marketresearch to identify its competitors andlearn more about the invasion of new

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8 July/August 2007 Law Practice

out-of-state firms.IMPLEMENTATION: We developed threeprimary messages: (1) Credibility, (2)Work Environment and (3) Recruiting.We then created a four-ad series ofhumorous, colorful, eye-catching adsthat used both visual stereotypes ofFlorida (e.g., sunburns, beaches andalligators) and connected the firm’sroots with similarly iconic imagery thatconveyed the concept of either “lawyer”or “Atlanta” (e.g., a giant Georgia peachand the city’s downtown).

Firms often trickle out their cam-paigns evenly over a long period oftime, such as one ad each month for ayear. Instead, we chose a shock-and-awestrategy—front-loading the advertisingplacement, thereby overwhelming theAtlanta legal market with the impact inthe early weeks.

To reach the campaign’s broad audi-ence, we decided that a single publica-tion was the most appropriate advertis-ing vehicle—specifically because therewas a very well-read local legal publica-tion, the Fulton County Daily Report.Most of the target audience read thispublication and we had to hit thosereaders quickly with ads that causedthem to (1) take notice and (2) remem-ber the firm name, the message and whatit offered. We wanted to make a bigsplash instantly—in case another com-petitor saw what we were doing anddecided to do it, too.DIFFERENTIATION: In the first weeks of thelaunch, we ran two or three half-page ortwo-third-page ads two or three days perweek on consecutive odd-numberedpages near the front of the newspaper(e.g., pages 3, 5 and 7), so readers turn-ing the pages saw the ads in sequence,

one right after the other, multiplyingthe campaign’s early impact. We negoti-ated a good deal with the publication,and the shocking red color caused theads to jump off the page. If you read thepaper, you couldn’t miss the ads. Not achance. We reduced them in quantityand frequency after the first few weeks,after the initial impact was achieved.

We also reprinted them as 8.5 x 11-inch glossy handouts and mailed themdirectly to lateral prospects at select tar-get firms. Therefore, the hottest targetsnot only saw the campaign materials inprint, but also saw them landing ontheir desks.RESULTS: Anecdotal evidence indicatedthat the campaign attained massive visi-bility in the Atlanta legal community.Every Atlanta lawyer we surveyedremembered the ads and commentedapprovingly on the content. Mostimportantly, they remembered the mes-sage—the name of the firm, its Floridaroots, and that it was seeking laterals.Research with local headhunters indi-cated that the recognition problem wascompletely solved. The success rate ofheadhunter calls more than doubled,and in-person recruiting success tripled.And the entire campaign cost less thanhalf of one headhunter fee.

The next year, the campaign ranagain and we added another couple ofversions to the mix.

Carlton Fields’s Atlanta office nowhas 21 top-quality lawyers.LP

Ross Fishman (www.rossfishman.com) specializes in marketing training and creating differentiation programs for law firms worldwide. A Fellow of theCollege of Law Practice Management, he is an inaugural member of the Legal MarketingAssociation's Hall of Fame.

What Do We Do?Ideas You Can UseGood campaigns will make you money, but they’re costly—which puts them in aprecarious position in a firm’s budget.For example, firms typically buy a “13x”advertising rate in monthly magazines,which is the point of frequency wherethe multiple-placement discount begins.Then the firms run their ads once eachmonth, which seems perfectly logical.After three to four months, though, thebean counters who live in every firm willstart asking, “What clients have theseads generated?”

In other words, “Since the ads start-ed running, how many CEOs we havenever had contact with have called ourreceptionists and said, ‘I saw your adand would like to hire one of your attor-neys, any attorney, to take my companypublic’”? At less-sophisticated firms, ifyou answer “None,” or “I don’t know,” theconsequence is that the campaign isthen probably teetering on life supportdead, if not officially dead.

Powerful, potentially effective pro-grams often die young, before they’vehad a chance to succeed, and theefforts and opportunity for greatness aresquandered. Once dead, the opportunitywon’t come back around for at leastanother five years, or at the next man-agement turnover at the earliest. Forcampaigns to succeed in firms that donot have lots of marketing experience, orhave potentially short attention spans,you need to create a big buzz, fast. Thebest option is to market the heck out ofit early and create a big buzz as soon aspossible, so people can feel the differ-ence. Spend much of the money earlyand whack your market over the headwith your campaign. — Ross Fishman

LAW FIRM MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS Works

July/August 2007 Law Practice 9

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WHO Laner Muchin, a 40-lawyerChicago-based labor and employment firm exclusively repre-senting management.STRATEGIC OBJECTIVE For decades, clientshave complained about their lawyers’lack of responsiveness. Nonetheless,very few firms have actual policiesregarding returning phone calls, andthose that exist weakly suggest thatclient calls be returned within 24hours. But the lawyers violate thosepolicies, and no one in management

does anything. Frustrated clientsquietly take their business

elsewhere.It’s a vastly different

story at Laner,Muchin, Dombrow,Becker, Levin andTominberg, a laborand employment firmthat was established in

1945. In all the years ofits existence, the firm’s

lawyers have returnedphone calls within two hours.

Yes, two hours. Remarkable.This outstanding responsiveness

serves as the hub of a marketing cam-paign that began two years ago, when

Most firms have lawyers who

are known for the stacks of

unreturned message slips gather-

ing dust on their secretaries’ desks. So if you return client calls faster than

the rest, you have a real differentiator to promote. One great way to do it:

Put something on the prospects’ desks that will keep you front of mind.

BY ROSSFISHMAN

What REALLY WorksFrontLINES

Distinctive Give-aways to Reinforce a Winning Message

LAW PRACTICE

we developed a series of brochures, adcampaigns and direct-mail pieces topush the message to the firm’s market.We changed the firm’s logo to incorpo-rate a stylized clock and conceived thetag line“Two hours. Period.”

We also wrote the “Laner MuchinChallenge,” which created a first-response competition with prospects’existing lawyers. It challenges people toleave a message for their lawyers, thencall Laner Muchin to see who returnsthe call first. If the callers’ currentlawyer does, Laner Muchin loses, andso must donate $100 to the callers’favorite charity and buy them lunch.(Get it? For just $100 Laner Muchingets to take some other firm’s presum-ably dissatisfied client out to lunch.)

The campaign had helped generatemillions of dollars of fresh revenuefrom brand-new clients. But to contin-ue growing, the firm needed to push itsmessage to more new prospects. Andwe needed something extra for the second phase.MARKETING GOAL In communicating withprospects, we wanted to show LanerMuchin as the alternative for otherfirms’ clients when they feel unappreci-ated by their skilled-but-unresponsive

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8 September 2007 Law Practice

lawyers. The phase-two objectives wereto generate awareness and in-personmeetings with human resources VPs attop Chicago companies, while also creat-ing a casual, friendly reason to follow upwith them. We decided to do a give-away gift, to put a year-round reminderof the two-hour phone-response prom-ise on top prospects’ desks. And so theycould reach the firm easily, we wantedthe reminder to include contact infor-mation, the firm’s clock logo and the tagline of “Two hours. Period.”RESEARCH AND IMPLEMENTATION We extensively surveyed the existingresearch and studies and talked toclients and in-house counsel regardingwhat service issues were most impor-tant to them. This verified our beliefthat responsiveness remains among theattributes most valued in lawyers.Elsewhere, responsiveness was declaredthe most important thing a firm can doto improve its client relationships, apartfrom reducing cost. We elected to grab“responsiveness” as our differentiator,to accompany the firm’s tag line.

After a visibility-enhancing ad cam-paign, we wanted to focus the next stepnarrowly toward our 100 hottestprospects. For months, we looked foran appropriate mailer to spread thetwo-hour response message and causemore of them to take “The LanerMuchin Challenge.” We looked atcountless promotional stopwatches andother items, finally finding a striking,foot-tall, hand-blown hourglass. At $50each, however, they were outside ourbudget. Then research uncovered acloseout retailer offering the hour-glasses at just $12 a piece. We wentstore-to-store to buy their entire

remaining stock. We prioritized ourtop prospects and delivered the hour-glasses with a letter that invited themto take the “Laner Muchin Challenge.”DIFFERENTIATION In part, the campaignletter asks prospects to turn the hour-glass over; leave a message asking theircurrent lawyer to return their call;leave the same message for one ofLaner Muchin’s lawyers; then whenthe hourglass runs out, turn it overagain and see who has called back firstby the end of the second hour. Thus,the hourglass serves as a tangible toolto implement the challenge.

At the same time, sitting on theprospect’s desk it acts as a dailyreminder of the firm—and its positionas the alternative when you’re frustratedthat your existing employment lawyerdoesn’t call back quickly enough.RESULTS The reaction to the mailingshas been overwhelming, with a 50 to60 percent response rate! (You simplyhave to call when you receive this sig-nificant, expensive-looking hourglass.)In initial tests, 25 to 30 percent of thehourglasses sent to non-clientprospects led directly to in-personmeetings—and 25 to 30 percent moregenerated phone calls from the recipi-ents, many of which have requestedmore information about the firm. Themailings also give Laner Muchin areason to follow up with recipientswho have not communicated directlywith the firm.

All from a $12 hourglass. LP

Ross Fishman (www.rossfishman.com) specializes in marketing training and creating differentiation programs for law firms worldwide. A Fellow of theCollege of Law Practice Management, he is an inaugural member of the Legal MarketingAssociation's Hall of Fame.

LAW FIRM MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS Works

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What Do We Do?Ideas You Can UseConceiving a useful, creative give-awayis difficult for law firms. There are onlyso many logo mugs, mouse pads,pens, baseball caps, umbrellas, T-shirtsand golf balls that clients can stand—and we hear that most of them gettossed. It’s even harder to find one thatleverages the firm’s brand message.

But you are building your brand andawareness if you can create somethinginteresting or useful that sits on theclients’ desks and acts as a constantreminder of the firm and what differenti-ates it from its competitors.

For example, Chicago’s LevenfeldPearlstein cleverly sent small logo’dracecars when marketing its “Built forSpeed” campaign.

Three-lawyer Scandaglia & Ryanmailed a popular Ty Inc. Beanie Babybear as part of a mailing announcingthe hire of Ty’s former general counsel.

In lieu of business cards, 20-lawyerNoland, Hamerly, Etienne and Hossdistributed logo’d seed packets as part of the marketing of its agriculturallaw-focused “Lettuce Lawyers” campaign.

The point is,you don’t wantto settle for thesame old thing aseveryone else.Push yourmarketingpeople andpromotion-al compa-ny to con-ceive of some-thing different.

—Ross Fishman

FrontLINESINTELLIGENCE, INSIGHTS & TACTICS FOR YOUR LAW PRACTICE

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W H A T R E A L LY W O R K S ?

What works? Too many firmsrely on safe, bland marketing—and wonder why it fails. Boringmarketing takes forever to gaintraction. Wildly innovative mes-sages, visuals and activities getattention more quickly, at amuch lower cost. Of course, it’s also harder to persuadelawyers to try those things.What happens when a firmdoes break out and tries something new?Turn the page for our new column,What Really Works, and get thestory behind Shefsky & Froelich’sfull-service identity makeover.

INSIDE FRONTLINES Trends Report 12 • Benchmark 13 • Ask Bill 14 • Strategy 15 • LPM News and Events 16

You can’t differentiate full-service,

midsize law firms. They all look

alike. They all do the same thing, the

same way. Heck, half of their lawyers used to work for competitors, so all

their marketing gets muddled into the middle. Unless …

BY ROSSFISHMAN

What REALLY WorksFrontLINES

Identity Update for a Full-Service Firm

LAW PRACTICE

had increased significantly and animpressive group of new senior part-ners had enhanced the firm’s practiceand reputation. The clients were nowlarger, more-sophisticated companies.

The firm’s charismatic founders haddeveloped great individual relation-ships and so hadn’t invested in market-ing the general firm. More recent rain-makers were individually renownedand so the marketplace was not awareof the firm’s current composition. Thefirm was not well-known, and thosewho knew of it had a decade-old view.It was losing work to less-skilled butbetter-known firms. Good clients weretelling the lawyers that they couldn'thire them for larger matters becausethe firm wasn’t high-profile enough.

We needed to do something thatcaused the marketplace to view S&Fdifferently, to leverage its historicallycreative reputation, but in a way thatmoved the firm up a tier in perception.We needed a new identity, a new message, and a visual treatment thatsupported it.

The challenge with full-service firmsis how to distinguish them from thecountless other seemingly skilled, look-alike firms. “We're smart” isn't differen-tiating. Neither are claims that the firm

Shefsky & Froelich: PuttingImagination to WorkWHO Shefsky & Froelich, a 70-lawyerfull-service Chicago firm.

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVE Shefsky & Froelichhistorically had a reputation as a busi-ness-oriented firm representing small,entrepreneurial clients. In recent years,though, the firm had gone upscale in itsclient base and its senior partners. Thepercentage of large, institutional clients

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8 June 2007 Law Practice

Caption text heredescribing imageryusedCaption text heredescribing Caption texthere describing imageryusedimagery used

is skilled, service- or client-oriented,dedicated, ethical, excellent or any ofthe countless generic platitudes firmsmumble when they have nothing to say.How often do we hear clients plead,“Gosh, if only I could find an ethical,dedicated law firm”? Not very.

We needed something strong,fresh and unique. And with a limitedbudget, we needed to do it boldlyenough that people would quickly takenotice. This meant a complete imageoverhaul, from logo to Web site tobrochure. Boring marketing takes for-ever to gain traction. Wildly innovativemessages, visuals and activities getattention more quickly, at a much lowercost. Of course, it’s also harder to per-suade the lawyers to try those things.

MARKETING GOAL The audience was bothinternal and external. We needed toshow the lawyers how they wereunique and also explain it toprospects. Volvos are safe. Baker &McKenzie is global. My wife is fun.What word could this firm stand for?

RESEARCH AND PLANNING We interviewednearly the entire firm, listening forthemes. We gleaned that S&F lawyershave a unique focus on finding nontra-ditional solutions to clients’ problems.

They’d always been this way. CidFroelich recalls the early days—withfew clients but plenty of time—sittingaround thinking up brand-new solu-tions to tough problems. After theydeveloped a solution to some interest-ing problem, they’d figure out whothey knew who had that problem,then call and tell them what they’ddiscovered, and often get hired. Clever.

IMPLEMENTATION One word that came uprepeatedly during the interviews was“imagination.” It was how S&F lawyersdevelop new solutions to tough prob-lems. Imagination is a strong word. Itsays “creativity” in a more interestingway, and it was a word we could own.

DIFFERENTIATION We trashed the originalskyline-burdened Web site and createdImaginationLaw.com. Bell-bottomswere in style when their logo wasdesigned, so it needed to be refreshed,and we conceived “Imagination atWork” as the tagline. Just before welaunched, General Electric began usingit! There was no real risk of confusion,but marketing partner Allan Slagel stillpreferred to use our second choice,“Putting Imagination to Work.”

RESULTS It gave them a message to goto market with. There’s a new springin the lawyers’ steps, and the firm isgrowing and attracting more toplawyers and clients. AdministratorGeorganne Binnie was integral to there-branding and talks with prideabout how the cool new image hasimproved the firm’s recruiting, too.

Clients love it, and other Chicagofirms admit to borrowing the Web sitedesign. It differentiates the firm inhead-to-head competitions and helpedbring in a multi-million-dollar case in anational RFP. This marketing thing—itjust might catch on. LP

Ross Fishman (www.rossfishman.com) specializes inmarketing training and creating differentiation pro-grams for law firms worldwide. A Fellow of theCollege of Law Practice Management, he is an inau-gural member of the Legal Marketing Association'sHall of Fame.

What Do We Do?Ideas You Can UseConceiving a unique message is hard.Executing it creatively is even harder.Convincing lawyers to let you launch it is thehardest part. Long ago, I’d storm into alawyer’s office with an idea that was guaran-teed to make the firm rich and famous. Andthey'd recoil in horror. It was so obviously abrilliant idea, why didn’t they see that? Whydo law marketers routinely complain thattheir lawyers get in the way?

Here’s what I’ve learned. Lawyers aresmart, but most haven’t had marketing class-es. So if you want to try something new,educate them first, before showing them theidea. Springing powerful new ideas on alawyer is the easiest way to hear “no.” (Theywere expecting gavels and globes and youshowed them … this?)

Teach the difference between good andbad, between safe and effective, betweendull and powerful. Help them see what catch-es their eyes and what doesn’t. And thenshow examples of the extraordinary market-ing used by high-end firms. Once you haveprepared them to accept great work, makeyour recommendations. That’s what works.

The safe answer is always “no.” The hard-er answer is, “Okay, let's try it.”

If a brilliant idea is rejected by smart peo-ple, it wasn’t sold effectively. — Ross Fishman

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FrontLINESINTELLIGENCE, INSIGHTS & TACTICS FOR YOUR LAW PRACTICE

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October/November 2007 Law Practice 9

INSIDE FRONTLINES What Really Works 10 • Trends Report 14 • LPM News and Events 16 • Five Things 18

W H A T R E A L LY W O R K S ?

This is no time for stagefright. Too many firms shyaway from using head-turning,art and text in their advertising for fear of tarn-ishing their image and drawingthe ire of ethics boards. But good drama can draw attention and results—and build a stronger brand.Turn the page for What ReallyWorks, and get the story behindWilliams Parker’s dramatic leap into advertising.

WHO Williams Parker, a 48-lawyer full-service firm in SarasotaBACKGROUND Williams Parker HarrisonDietz & Getzen is a highly skilled full-service firm in Sarasota, Florida. It has astrong estate planning practice and an eld-erly client base of wealthy retired peopleand local business owners. The firm his-torically avoided external marketing,

When your competitors get

assertive with their advertising,

you can’t just sit back mired in

old-school attitudes. It’s time to raise the curtains, act based on new

thinking, and go for center stage with your marketing.

BY ROSSFISHMAN

What REALLY WorksFrontLINES

Dramatic Flair Grabs the Applause in Advertising

LAW PRACTICE

believing it to be demeaning to the firmand the profession. For a smaller city,Sarasota prides itself on its remarkablystrong cultural and arts communities,and the firm’s marketing activitiesinvolved mostly charitable giving andcommunity board activities.

Although Williams Parker is thelargest firm based in Sarasota, its marketresearch began to show that smaller,younger, more aggressive competitorswere increasingly better known and hadstarted image advertising. Fortunately,their advertising was bland—but it waslikely just a matter of time before thequality improved and the ads started togain traction.

If Williams Parker didn’t becomemore aggressive, and fast, it risked losingmarket share to the upstarts. But therewould be significant challenges to over-come. This was a conservative firm cul-ture that disliked marketing and advertis-ing. Any campaign would have to complywith Florida’s marketing ethics rules,which are the nation’s most restrictiveand prohibit most types of creativeadvertising. Plus, the firm owned its ownthree-story office building and had runout of offices, so it could not physicallyadd more lawyers—it could only achieverevenue growth by generating higher-dollar, premium business.

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MARKETING GOALS The firm had hiredPam Ringquist, a talented marketingdirector, giving it a strategic edge. Shewanted to use creative image advertis-ing and other branding initiatives toincrease the firm’s name recognitionlocally, grow new and repeat business,and drive traffic to the Web site toincrease profitability. Of course,because the firm’s attorneys felt thatimage advertising was unprofessional,and that their elderly clients would per-ceive it as either negative or desperate,it meant that we had two distinct audi-ences—internal and external—thatneeded to be satisfied before the cam-paign could be declared successful. Wewould need to start cautiously andbuild success in steps.PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTATION Oneobvious problem to address early wasthat the firm still used all five names,all the time, which doesn’t give thereader or listener something to grabonto. Long names invariably getslurred, creating blurry proper nounsthat sound like “williamsparkerharrisondietzandgetzen.” That’s justtoo much to work with, especiallywhen the firm has a strong, memo-rable, easy-to-pronounce street namelike Williams Parker.

It is always problematic to recom-mend redesigning a firm’s logo toemphasize a shorter colloquial namebecause some loyal supporters in thefirm can view it as diminishing the latter named partners. When askedpersonally, though, they generouslysupported the marketing use ofWilliams Parker. This made the re-branding easier and more effective,

probability and told them that wewould likely win on appeal. Which isexactly what happened.

We launched with an attractive butrelatively conservative ad. The headlinereads “Leave the drama here” and usesa vibrant blue theater scene as a sim-ple, eye-catching background. Thisleverages Sarasota’s strong theater andcultural activities, as well as the inter-ests of the firm’s elderly target audi-ence. The subhead reads “TrustWilliams Parker to protect you, yourbusiness and your family.” The secondad in the series shows a delicate balleri-na bowing to the audience, headlined“From the opening act to the last.”

These ads were placed weekly inthe local business newspaper and alsomonthly in two local glossy maga-zines. One also ran as a moving ban-ner ad on the Sarasota Chamber ofCommerce Web site.RESULTS Running for just eightmonths and $50,000, the campaignhelped grow annual revenue by $2 million (14 percent), while grow-ing attorney headcount by just onelawyer. It also increased the uniquevisitors coming to the firm’s Web siteby 700 percent. The buzz made PamRingquist’s public relations effortseven more successful, and the firmhas been featured more often in news-paper articles. What’s more, the cam-paign’s initial success led to the once-resistant lawyers asking to use morestriking graphics in the next ads! LP

See page 12 for ethics compliance advice.

Ross Fishman (www.rossfishmanmarketing.com) specializes in marketing training and creating differentiation programs for law firms worldwide.

and we ultimately updated the logo toreinforce the shorter name.

To identify the message appropri-ate for the target market, we inter-viewed all the firm’s attorneys andanalyzed its proprietary marketresearch. We selected the theme oftrust, which addresses the needs andconcerns of the firm’s wealthy andelderly target audience, while blend-ing with the orientation of its domi-nant estate planning and businesspractices. We also created a tag line of“The Art of Law” to convey the firm’shigh-end legal skills and connectionto the cultural community. It was amessage the firm could rally around.

We still had to persuade the firm’slawyers that it was appropriate forthem to advertise, educating themabout the new developments in lawfirm marketing, as well as Florida’srevised ethics rules and how theywere being applied. Then we put thiscampaign in context, showing how itwould be most likely to achieve theirmarketing goals. We showed a rangeof campaign options conveying“trust,” from aggressive to more con-servative. The presentation calmedmany fears.

After lengthy discussions, we craftedthe advertising concepts and wereready to launch. First, though, wewould comply with every single ethicsrule and so had our ads prescreened bythe bar. We knew that the ads compliedwith the technical ethics rules but alsothat they would likely be denied any-way. Because we wanted no surprisesthat could derail the campaign inter-nally, we prepared the lawyers for this

Works

12 October/November 2007 Law Practice

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Ideas You Can Use Dealing Withthe Marketing Ethics Rules

The marketing ethics rules are silly. Okay, not the ones thatprotect uneducated lay consumers in dire straits, like per-sonal injury, divorce or criminal matters. Those are important.

But sophisticated consumers of business-oriented legal servicesdon’t need protection against law firm brochures and magazine ads.

Which is why I find it ludicrous that the ethics rules apply equally to protect (1) the 60-year-old Harvard-educated generalcounsel of a Fortune 500 company hiring her 100th law firm, and(2) a barely literate teenager who just got hit by a truck and wantsto find a PI lawyer.

But that’s just me. I’m just the guy who has to help law firmscomply with 50 states’ rules. Which all differ.

So how does a law firm ethically adver-tise in a national magazine? For absolutecompliance, the firm would have to makesure nothing in its external marketing vio-lates any clause or provision in any of the50 states’ individual rules, including takinginto consideration the day-to-day vagariesof how each state actually applies its rules.

So how do you comply? Read yourstate’s rules pertaining to theCommunication of Lawyers Services sec-tion, or generally Model Rules 7.1-7.5. (Seewww.abanet.org/adrules.) You’ll probably besurprised at what you clearly can’t do thatyou are currently doing. The most commonviolation is probably use of the word“expert” or “expertise,” which is specificallyprohibited in most states.

Most states prohibit superlatives asunsubstantiated comparisons. You canonly describe your practice in ways thatcan be quantitatively verified. For example, under Rule 7.1 youcan claim “20 years’ experience,” but you can’t say that you have“significant experience.” Technically, you can’t even say that youare a “good” or even “competent” lawyer because it implies thatother lawyers aren’t.

Call me when you find a law firm Web site that doesn’t use an adjective.

Of course, as everyone knows, there’s The Rule and thenthere’s its application. The chief counsel of the disciplinary board in one moderate state confidentially told me that he’s toobusy worrying about lawyers who commit serious infractions toworry about B2B marketing. So moderately violating the rules inthat state is probably fine. However, some states, like Florida,take a more aggressive and proactive approach. This can be aproblem for, say, a large Wisconsin law firm with a lawyerlicensed in Florida that advertises in Fortune. That lawyer’s

Florida license is at risk with every issue of the magazine.In response, conservative firms take a strict-constructionist

approach and follow every single rule to the letter. Others know-ingly flout the rules, taking the calculated risk that they probablywon’t get caught (and they’re usually right). They know that ifthey do get caught, the first action will simply be a letter from theethics board politely asking them to change their marketing tocomply. Then it’s the firm’s choice to change it and conform tothe rules, or face disciplinary charges. A few states have anadvance-screening process, where you can file what amounts toa motion to reconsider an adverse opinion.

The reality is that it’s not the clients who complain about a lawfirm’s marketing. According to the same chief counsel, he rarelygets marketing-related complaints from clients. Instead, they comeanonymously in unmarked envelopes from scared lawyers seeking

to stop a competitor’s successful campaign.Seek guidance in advance. If you think

you might be pushing, but not ripping, anenvelope, it can be helpful to preview yourmaterial with a member of your state’s dis-ciplinary agency. I recommend trying to getto know someone in advance. That way youcan sit down and explain what you aredoing and why, and how you feel it com-plies with the rules. If you take the initiative,you can muster your evidence and makeyour case up front, instead of trying to over-turn or appeal a negative ruling, which isrisky and can cause lengthy delays.

Some disciplinary counsel seem to justhate marketing, and they won’t talk to youin advance. In those situations, I’ve occa-sionally warned clients that, although ourcampaign is in compliance, it will probablybe rejected and that we’ll have to win onreconsideration. The advance warning can

keep nervous marketing committee members from panicking whenthe cease-and-desist letter arrives and also steel them for the fight.

In the alternative, I often run ideas or campaigns by WillHornsby, the ABA’s expert in lawyer advertising and marketing. Hehas an encyclopedic knowledge of most states’ rules and whethera campaign is likely to pass muster, as well as what change mightmake it more likely.

A nuanced understanding of the applicable ethics rules canhelp you avoid trouble. For example, Florida specifically permits:“(12)(K) … a photograph of the head and shoulders of the[lawyers] against a plain background consisting of a single solidcolor or a plain unadorned set of law books.” So the next timeyou’re tempted to use photos of adorned law books in your ads,check your state’s rules. And if your firm’s walls are two differentcolors in your brochure, well, heaven help you! LP

—Ross Fishman

�  Law Practice April/May 2008 WWW.LAWPRACTICE.ORG

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What REALLY WorksWhat REALLY Works

Let’s say your firm has a uniquely

entrepreneurial, aggressive, hard-

working style and culture, and you

have a multifaceted audience to reach to diversify your reputation.

To hit the target, try a roll-up-your-sleeves branding campaign.

Marketing a No-Nonsense Attitude

FISHMANBY ROSS

WHO Isaacson Rosenbaum, a 50-lawyer Denver-based business law firm.

BACKGROUND Isaacson Rosenbaum had a reputation as one of Denver’s lead-ing real estate practices. In addition, its public law and policy and conservation easement practices were among the

area’s most high-profile ones. But the firm’s more traditional practices—cor-porate, tax and litigation—were neither sizable nor well-known. While its stra-tegic plan sought to grow those groups in particular, the firm wanted a creative brand message that would support all of its practices.

What REALLY Works

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What REALLY Works LAw FIRM MARketINg COMMuNICAtIONS

The firm’s slogan at the time was a thoroughly non-differentiating “Law. Client. Community.” (Apparently “Good. Smart. Nice.” was taken already.) Unfor-tunate, because this really is a firm with a difference. These are smart, roll-up-your-sleeves-and-do-the-deal lawyers. No elitist snobs who are overbilling clients. They talk plain, and they find out how to get it done quickly, efficiently and cost-ef-fectively. They speak proudly of the times they’ve found creative shortcuts to solve client problems. They’re easy to get along with, and their clients and opponents like them. They have high standards of ethics and integrity and do lots of pro bono work and community activities.

To convey how Isaacson Rosenbaum’s lawyers stand out from the crowd, the marketing partner, Mark Grueskin, wanted an especially creative campaign.

MARKETING GOALS The objective was to in-crease the firm’s name recognition and di-versify the reputation of its lawyers among the Denver business community and high-net-worth individuals. This made for a multifaceted target audience, with some of the businesspeople being highly sophisticated corporate officers, and oth-ers being hard-driving blue-collar types.

For purposes of attracting lateral hires, the campaign also needed to ap-peal to creative, aggressive and entre-preneurial lawyers who would relish the chance to join a firm that had a more robust personality and better qual-ity of life than their current firms.

In sum, this is what the campaign needed to say: We are a high-level, high-quality, sophisticated law firm with a varied practice in (1) real estate, (2) public

Ross Fishman (www.fishmanmarketing.com) specializes in marketing training and creating differentiation programs for law firms worldwide. A Fellow of the College of Law Practice Management, he is an inaugural member of the Legal Marketing Association’s Hall of Fame.

law and lobbying, (3) corporate and tax, and (4) litigation, and we have a practi-cal, roll-up-your-sleeves, get-the-job-done approach and work environment.

We wanted ideas that would speak to the firm’s unique style and culture, so that the materials would support each of the firm’s practice areas. But we also wanted something with an edge, a cou-ple of options with a sense of humor, to create a sense of interest and excitement around Denver. At the same time, this was still a law firm talking to business-people and high-net-worth individuals in a somewhat conservative environ-ment, so it had to be appropriate in tone, saying that this firm is a smart choice for businesspeople who want so-phisticated services provided in an ag-ile, personal, cost-effective manner. And for recruiting, of course, we wanted to showcase the firm’s positive culture.

IMPLEMENTATION AND RESULTS  We de-veloped a campaign around the tag line “The Business of Solutions,” a straightforward pitch to the lawyers’ no-nonsense attitude about solving client problems. Then to flesh out the firm’s unique approach to providing services, we incorporated humor-ous visuals showing an exaggerated sense of what it is like to have lawyers who do not act in a helpful, positive, solutions-driven way. We developed a three-ad campaign illustrated by im-ages of a stereotypically sour or geeky lawyer standing between the client and what they were trying to accom-plish—reaching for a towel after a shower, putting on the golf course, or trying to get money at an ATM ma-

chine—and carrying the headline “Is your lawyer always getting in the way?”

Then we added another phase to the campaign, in which we paired each ad with a second half that represented the experience of working with an Isaacson Rosenbaum lawyer who is in “The Business of Solutions”—for example, handing the client a clean towel, or holding the flag on the put-ting green—to illustrate a lawyer who is “always getting it done.”

We ran these two-part ads in busi-ness publications and legal trade journals, in which each “before” ad was followed by an “after” ad when a reader turned the page. We also turned the ads into direct-mail pieces. In ad-dition, the firm’s redesigned Web site shows the towel and ATM ads fading in and out. And it is all supported by a complementary firm brochure.

Simultaneous with the campaign’s launch, the firm sent the media a press release accompanied by white logo’d towels that were attached to reproduc-tions of the shower-and-towel ads to drum up attention. The Denver Post carried an extremely positive story about the campaign on the cover of its business section, which gener-ated significant traffic on the new Web site on the day it launched.

The launch party was fun, too, with proud speeches by firm leader-ship thanking everyone for working so hard in bringing this to market. LP

16 Law Practice July/August 2009 WWW.LAWPRACTICE.ORG

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What REALLY

Lots of firms have lawyers who

are technically skilled in tackling

clients’ legal matters, but how

many of them actually focus on

the human side of their clients’ issues, too? If you’re really invested in your

clients as people, that’s a message you can take to market.

Conveying the Personal Touch

BY ROSS

FISHMAN

WHO Aronberg, Goldgehn, Davis & Garmisa, a 30-lawyer full-service busi-ness firm in Chicago.

BACKGROUND Aronberg, Goldgehn, Davis & Garmisa is known as a friendly, laid-back law firm. It has a work-life-balance culture, where get-ting home for dinner with the family is a value and there’s no coming in on weekends for “face time.” Clients say they appreciate that Aronberg, Goldgehn lawyers aren’t pushed to bill, bill, bill. There’s a perception that, while technically the lawyers are highly skilled, they offer more personal service, a better overall experience, if you will. And for all that, they’re not more expensive than the competi-tion; actually, they’re less expensive.

The firm has a typical full-service transactional and litigation practice mix, in banking, construction, real estate, taxation and the like. But it also has a high-end divorce and family law practice, as well as health-care and es-tate planning practice groups. As nice as it is for clients, that kind of blend makes it tougher to home in on a mar-keting message that works firmwide.

But a firmwide message hadn’t been much of an issue to date, since Aronberg, Goldgehn had never re-ally done any marketing. In witness to that, it had an out-of-date logo and a version 1.0 Web site with a photo of the building and a pre-Google “Useful Links” page. The look was seriously out of touch. The partners decided that the firm needed a drastic makeover.

MARKETING GOALS The objective was to increase the firm’s name recogni-tion as a small high-quality law firm that is very skilled in serving a range of needs for Chicago-area executives of small and midsize businesses. But what theme would convey this firm’s distinctive approach and qualities?

In one-on-one interviews, the law-yers were asked a series of questions designed to elicit a theme. In describing themselves, their work and their firm, Aronberg, Goldgehn lawyers over-whelmingly used words like “friendly, collegial, congenial, family-oriented.” Although that makes it a nice culture, “we like working with each other” isn’t an especially compelling message for drawing in new business. Not many

July/August 2009 Law Practice 17WWW.LAWPRACTICE.ORG

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Ross Fishman (www.rossfishman.com) specializes in marketing training and creating differentiation programs for law firms worldwide.

clients say, “Boy, if I could just find some lawyers who enjoy working with each other, that’s the firm I’d hire!”

However, another word that came up with surprising frequency was “personal.” As in, these lawyers value close, personal relationships with cli-ents. They take their clients’ problems personally. Personal is a very good word in a service business, especially in the legal profession, where clients often complain that their firm treats them “like a file.” And it is a word that applied equally well to the firm’s busi-ness practices and family law group. Seeing how the word encapsulated the firm’s message, we decided to build the firm’s marketing around it.

IMPLEMENTATION For the tag line, we settled on “We take it personally.” The litigators, in particular, felt that this reflected their approach to represen-tations. They’re so invested in their clients’ problems, they feel like it’s their money they’re suing to recover.

Now they needed marketing materi-als to convey that message. Something to express the firm’s personal touch. Some strong visuals with a slight sense of humor to reflect the friendly, laid-back culture while also showcasing this as a high-quality firm. An audience weighs the balance heavily in favor of what they can see, so principally, we needed a stunning “look” to use as the platform on which to build the full range of materials, from brochures and ads to the Web site. We wanted the imagery to show that this is a nice firm, without seeming frivolous.

What ultimately resulted was a

collection of images strategi-cally juxtaposed to represent how there are different kinds of people in the world—and that Aronberg, Goldgehn knows and understands that fact. Some of the materials juxtapose dog people and cat people. Others reflect acoustic versus electric guitar and sports car versus minivan people. Some ask if it’s “to-MEY-to” or “to-MAH-to.” The simple headline for the images: “Everybody’s different. Does your lawyer understand that?” The caption text then in part reads: “We take the time to get to know you personally and to understand all the issues affecting you … We do

whatever it takes, the big things and the small things, to get the job done.”

All the images also now rotate through the firm’s Web site, which is newly redesigned and has a look that’s quite (you guessed it) different from its version 1.0 predecessor. And, of course, at the launch party, squishy logo’d to-mato squeeze balls were plentiful. LP

Everybody’s different.Does your lawyer understand that?

We Take It Personally.SM

agdglaw.com

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We Take It Personally.SM

agdglaw.com

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Everybody’s different.Does your lawyer understand that?

We Take It Personally.SM

agdglaw.com