Speaking Engagements

Need a way to tell your clients one of your attorneys is going to giving a talk or participating on a panel in a practice area you believe your client may be interested in. A law firm portal is a great way to do this - you can add a bulletin board item or an upcoming event identifying the speaker, location and time of the event. Even if the client can not attend, a law firm can convey the fact they have a skilled and knowledgeable practice group with such messages.

A law firm might also wish to post meeting summaries or transcripts as a way of providing some historical benefit to the public speaking appearance of the firm's attorney. This also can be done via a law firm portal by adding a document or bulletin board item to the system.

New attorney announcement

Has your firm just hired a powerhouse attorney in a new practice area? How are you going to tell your clients about this?

We all know some of the usual ways -- newspaper and website announcements, word of mouth, perhaps a mailed article. But, using a law firm portal is yet another way to do this. The marketing department of a law firm can post a document or bulletin board notice outlining the arrival of the new attorney. And, what is even more powerful is the fact you can customize these announcements on a client specific basis if you wish. If you want to break through into new practice groups with particular clients, this is a terrific way to do so!!!

Client-specific marketing

The referenced article on the LPMforum.com site (New York State Bar Association) describing various client-specific marketing strategies is of interest. The article describes many techniques commonly used or available.

The article, at times, talks about posting newsletters and other information electronically, mostly on a law firm's website. But many of the ideas for content within the article, items such as newsletters, seminar materials, press releases, annoucements when cases are won, recent hires, office moves, etc..., are also items that certainly are of interest to your existing clients and can and should be brought to their attention.

Client-specific law firm portals are excellent ways to publish this type of information to your existing client base and accomplish some specific, targeted marketing to some potential areas of expansion for your firm.

Events

Has your firm been selected to speak at an event? Are you sponsoring an event? Will your law firm be referenced in a presentation which will be given at an upcoming event?

If so, wouldn't it be nice to have a mechanism to notify all of your clients about this upcoming broadcast of your law firm's capabilities? Many firms do this by publishing press releases which are mailed to clients or posted on a law firm public website. But the mailing is costly and who really knows if the public website is regularly visited by your clients (it probably is not).

If a law firm has an electronic communications strategy which includes disseminating information to clients via secure portals (either case management portals or marketing oriented portals) these types of announcements can be posted on such sites. This helps get the maximum possible amount of exposure and benefit from the positive firm publicity generated at these events.

Software-assisted self-service

This is a concept which is frequently used on intranets (so employees can access data, process HR transactions, etc..) but is also useful on law firm portals.

Law firms can make information and functions available to their clients (such as invoice receipt, registration for events, etc.) in a way which can make the processing of the transactions more efficient (since it requires less, or no, human time to collect and process a request for information).

Law firms will find that their clients will appreciate and enjoy using self-service systems which allow them to get immediate assistance and response on transactional items.

PDF Invoice Files

Recently on Technolawyer there was a posting about a software package that creates invoice PDF files for $99. It appears to be a useful product.

Once these invoices are created, why not post them on a law firm portal site for your clients. If you do this, and the clients opt to access the invoices electronically, a law firm can then highlight some of their other capabilities or marketing materials. This could lead to increased business opportunities for law firms.

4 P's

How can law firm portals help law firms with the essentials of marketing - price, promotion, placement, product.

Not sure how they can help with price or product (although legal extranets might be able to help there - providing better communication and information sharing capability at a lower overall cost), but it is clear how they can help with promotion and placement.

Law firm portals can help to direct your clients to your marketing materials which are currently on your public web site. For many, this can help to transform the perception of your firm from a firm which specializes in one practice area (say, insurance law) into a perception of a firm with many different capabilities (adding, for example, product liability and employment and contracts and mergers/acquisitions to your expertise set).

If a law firm can do this with an existing clients, it creates a great opportunity to grow and expand business very easily within their current set of clients (which also, by the way, is helping a firm gain new business while also limiting marketing expenses).

KM within Law Firms - Challenges

This link provides one with a good summary of some of the challenges facing those implementing knowledge management programs within law firms. They allude to many issues, perhaps the most interesting issue being that it is not only technology which is a great challenge to building systems and methodologies to sharing useful information across the enterprise. Willingness to share information as well as a common understanding of the justification and business reasons for sharing information also are cited as critical success factors. What is the lesson learned: KM is far more than simply a technical project.

Hope you enjoy this perspective.

Law Firm Portal Article

I recommend this excellent article from the firm marketing center website on law firm portals, the features they can provide, and how they deliver value to organizations.