To Build Your Personal Brand, Hunt Antelopes Not Field Mice

To Build Your Personal Brand, Hunt Antelopes Not Field Mice

A lawyer with a powerful personal brand is one who is well-known and well-respected by a distinct audience. She is thought of, and sought out, when a particular type of expertise is required to solve a particular type of problem. In other words, a lawyer with a powerful personal brand is not someone who tries to be all things to all people. She knows a lot about a little, as opposed to the generalist who knows a little about a lot.

She did not attain broad brand awareness by accident. Rather, she became well-known through focused, strategic, long-term effort. She hunts antelopes, not field mice.

Special Dispatch for the Legal Marketing Association: The Importance of Brand Experience

Special Dispatch for the Legal Marketing Association: The Importance of Brand Experience

There are two types of services that lawyers can provide to clients. The first is legal service, which relates to quality of professional skill and work product. Legal service is, obviously, critically important to the success of a client relationship. But let’s face it, most clients cannot distinguish between good and great work product. Moreover, basic competence and technical proficiency are often presumed.

The second type of service lawyers provide is client service, which relates to the quality of brand experience one creates. Half of the brand equation is building a personal brand, which involves telling clients and prospective clients what to think about you. Equal, if not more, attention must be focused on creating an authentic brand experience, where your brand speaks for itself through its interaction with clients.

So what does this mean in the real world? Find out more about building a brand experience for client in a post I wrote for the Legal Marketing Association blog Strategies. Click here to read the article.

Want to learn even more? I go much deeper into the issue of brand experience in my book, One of a Kind: A Proven Path to a Profitable Legal Practice. Click here to check it out!

Break Up the “Conspiracy” By Resolving to Simplify this Year

Break Up the “Conspiracy” By Resolving to Simplify this Year

“All professions are a conspiracy against the laity,” said George Bernard Shaw. In the legal profession, the best evidence of a conspiracy is the often impenetrable density and complexity of the law. It’s almost impossible for laypersons to understand the law and its processes. Lawyers perpetuate the conspiracy through their use of jargon and legalese.

There’s been a great deal of discussion, writing and study related to the costs of using legalese. But it does not seem there’s been much progress in convincing lawyers to communicate in a simpler, more accessible way.

This week, Attorney at Work published my take on why lawyers should – more than ever before – resolve to simplify their written communication style this year.

I’m not advocating we dumb-down the profession. I’m just saying that sometimes, when appropriate, we dial it back a bit. Clients won’t think less of lawyers if they communicate in plain English. Most clients will appreciate it. Judges, too. And it all starts with simplifying the primary means through which lawyers communicate: the written word.

Check out the post on Attorney at Work’s website by clicking here.

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When it Comes to Implementing Your 2017 Marketing Plan, Go Bird by Bird

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When it Comes to Implementing Your 2017 Marketing Plan, Go Bird by Bird

This is the time of year that many lawyers and legal marketers are deep into planning for 2017 business development initiatives. It’s the time of big dreams and grand ambitions. The problem is, while the plan is transformative, it rarely gets implemented. As almost all of us know through painful personal experience, one of the biggest issues with planning is that it can be overwhelming – it’s easy to be ambitious on paper, but in practice that ambition can lead to paralysis.

One of my favorite books is Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life, by Anne Lamott. It contains many lessons on creative thinking and ways to approach your work. One of my favorite passages deals with the issue of paralysis – specifically, how to overcome the tendency we all have to get overwhelmed by the enormity of the task or challenge we are facing. Here’s Lamott’s advice, gleaned from a childhood family experience:

Thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report on birds written that he’d had three months to write, which was due the next day. We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead. Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother’s shoulder, and said, “Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.”

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The Long and Winding Road to Become a Professional Writer

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The Long and Winding Road to Become a Professional Writer

A note to readers: This post constitutes my entry in a writing competition called “Writing Contest: You Deserve to be Inspired” hosted by the Positive Writer blog. Positive Writer is one of my favorite blogs about writing – check it out if you’re looking for an excellent writing resource.

I shuffled the papers into a neat stack, stapled them, and strode confidently into my supervising attorney’s office, handing her the memorandum I had painstakingly prepared on some arcane legal issue over the last several days. I nailed it. Or so I thought.

I was a first year attorney at Skadden Arps. I fancied myself a skilled writer and communicator, but I was, in fact, neither.

Personal Branding for Lawyers: Same is Not a Strategy

Personal Branding for Lawyers: Same is Not a Strategy

Have you ever put yourself in a prospective client’s shoes? Why would he, she or it hire you? Seriously, why? I’m sure you’re a good lawyer but (a) how would a prospective client know that and, perhaps more importantly, (b) can most prospective clients, at the point of purchase, discern between an average lawyer and a good one, or even a great one?

Consciously or not, most lawyers make a choice to craft professional personas that are largely indistinguishable from others. From their new business pitch to their website bio, they purposefully look, sound, act and describe themselves in a similar manner. This poses a dilemma for clients: When confronted with a commodity, how to make a choice?

The paradox is that sellers of actual commodities do the exact opposite of lawyers. They compete fiercely on grocers’ shelves, for example, to stand out from their competition. Only by standing out, they understand, can they capture a greater share of market.

Lawyers and Law Firms: Who Owns Your Brand?

Lawyers and Law Firms: Who Owns Your Brand?

I’m not an IP lawyer. I’ve never worked on a copyright issue. But I am a lawyer and a marketer, and although I no longer practice law, I can still spot an issue when I see it. And there’s a big, glaring one lurking for many law firms who are failing to take the steps necessary to protect their brand-related intellectual property.

I raise it because it’s an important issue. We all know that intellectual property rights are an essential element of a law firm’s value and competitive edge. Law firms invest heavily in the creation and promotion of their brands. And in today’s digital and international business world, it’s harder than ever to protect and enforce IP rights.

But there’s a low hanging fruit IP issue (a simple housekeeping issue, really) that is chronically overlooked.

Gearing Up for a Great 2017

Gearing Up for a Great 2017

We’re winding down for the holidays here, but at the same time gearing up for a big, exciting 2017. I want to thank you, as one of Simply Stated’s loyal readers, for investing a bit of your time and attention to my blog this year. I hope you enjoyed reading the content as much I enjoyed producing it.

I’m really excited for what’s on tap next year. I will be sending out much more information about our upcoming initiatives at Harrington Communications in the months to come, but here’s a quick preview:

  • I will be launching an online course addressing the topic of personal branding for lawyers in February.
  • My new book, geared to first and second year lawyers and featuring insights from some of the country’s top lawyers and consultants, will be coming out next summer.
  • I’m now booking engagements to speak at law firm retreats and training workshops about topics like personal branding, building a niche practice, productivity, and social media/content marketing. If you’d like to discuss, please email me at jay@hcommunications.biz.

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Your Legal Blog is a Waste of Time Unless You’re Doing These 4 Things

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Your Legal Blog is a Waste of Time Unless You’re Doing These 4 Things

Here’s a familiar story:

  • Eager lawyer reads about the benefits of blogging and building an audience online;
  • Lawyer sets up blog, publishes a few posts and…crickets;
  • Lawyer gets discouraged and the blog withers and dies.

This is a common story, but there’s a scarier one out there. It’s about the lawyer who, against all odds and despite any traffic, soldiers on for years publishing post after post into the vast expanse of the Internet. He builds it – and keeps building it – but no one ever comes.

The first lawyer is fortunate in that he wasted relatively little time on his endeavor. The fact that he quit so soon means he was never going to make it anyway. So better to cut his losses.

The second lawyer, on the other hand, has the grit needed to become a successful blogger, but lacks the know-how. This scenario is more dangerous than the first because many lawyers toil away at legal blogs for years and years with no plan and no understanding of how to build an audience. Their determination is commendable. Their results are not. Legal blogging, done poorly, is a huge waste of time and money.

Make Better Decisions With the “Thoughtful Pause”

Make Better Decisions With the “Thoughtful Pause”

The seed of the idea for this post came from my own reflections about the early days of my legal career. November 1 holds significance for me because it’s about the time that I started “getting it” as a first year lawyer. After reflecting upon my own experience, my thoughts drifted to the many first years toiling away for the last two months at law firms across the country. I hope they are starting to get it, too.

The fortunate few are able to hit the ground running in their legal careers. Often these are people with prior work experience, who are a bit older, more mature, and who previously learned how to navigate a corporate bureaucracy. For the rest of us, though, the first few months of practicing law is a harrowing time, fraught with stress and anxiety.

The are many reasons for this. Most new lawyers have never held a “real” job. They’re getting bombarded with emails, phone calls and work assignments for the first time. They’re trying to learn the work culture. They’re starting to deal with adversaries. Everything they are doing is new, and they’re fearful of the consequences of screwing up. They’re steeped in a cauldron of uncertainty.