Trial by media

Most of us accept that it’s important for law firms to have a good reputation, and that a poor or damaged reputation is likely to affect a firm’s ability to generate new instructions. But how many law firm leaders actively consider how to build, manage and protect their firm’s reputation? If you haven’t already, now is the perfect time to start proactively managing your law firm’s reputation. 

As the profession continues to embrace new ways of working – artificial intelligence, legal tech and the continual growth of all things online – it’s easy to get caught up in the nuances of ‘everything else’ and forget about the importance of how your firm presents itself to the wider world. But reputation matters. 

The good news is it’s never too late to embrace reputation management to deliver results. The bad news is that – like anything worthwhile – doing so requires time, energy and consistency.

What is reputation?

First of all, what do we mean by reputation? Well, it’s as simple as what people say about you when you’re not in the room. More broadly, the Cambridge Dictionary defines it as: “The opinion that people in general have about someone or something, or how much respect or admiration someone or something receives, based on past behaviour or character.”  

Why is it important?

At the risk of stating the obvious, reputation is one of the first things that a potential client – or former client, referrer, potential referrer or potential key hire – is likely to consider when they are thinking about engaging with your firm.

There are a number of ways they can do this. If they’ve heard of your firm, they may have a gut feeling about you. If they haven’t, they’re likely to:

• search for you on the internet
• look for you on social media 
• ask friends, family, colleagues or business associates for an opinion

Hopefully this prompts you to think about exactly where these individuals can ‘see’ your firm (and how it’s presented). The good news is that many of these touchpoints are wholly, or at least partially, manageable and within your control.

How can you manage your law firm’s reputation?

Before we turn to tactics, the first thing to consider when proactively managing your firm’s reputation is your growth strategy – in other words, your plan. Your reputation strategy needs to support this.

Your growth strategy should ideally include goals, so start by reminding yourself of these. You then need to think about what you can do from a strategic perspective to help you achieve these goals. For example, do you need to sell more to your existing clients? Do you need to attract more in-bound enquiries? Do you need to improve your conversion rate? These commitments will inform your top-level strategy.

The next step is to consider your target audiences – who do you need to focus on, speak to and engage with to deliver your strategy and reach your goals? 

Target audiences will typically include some of the following:

• potential clients
• current clients
• former or lapsed clients
• employees
• future strategic hires
• referrers and potential referrers

Once you understand and can identify your target audiences, you can then start to consider which tactics to deploy. Ideally, you’ll have a maximum of five target audiences.

You should also give some thought to your key messages – what do you need to say to your target audiences and/or what do you want them to think about you? Again, three to five is typical.

Remember that it’s okay to be Marmite. It’s easy to make the mistake of trying to appeal to everyone, when actually it’s much more effective to target a smaller, more engaged audience that’s more likely to instruct you when the time comes. Creating a niche for your firm can be an incredibly powerful move.

The next stage is understanding that managing your reputation is all about harnessing public relations. 

What is public relations?

The Chartered Institute of Public Relations defines public relations (PR) as follows: “Public relations is about reputation – the result of what you do, what you say and what others say about you. [It] is the discipline which looks after reputation, with the aim of earning understanding and support and influencing opinion and behaviour. It is the planned and sustained effort to establish and maintain goodwill and mutual understanding between an organisation and its publics.”

Put simply, PR is about using your reputation to influence opinion and behaviour. For the purpose of this article, it’s about using PR tactics to sell more of your services. It can also be used effectively for attracting and retaining team members, for repairing a damaged reputation and, of course, for personal branding purposes.

How can you apply PR tactics in your firm?

Now that you’ve reviewed your growth goals, decided your strategic perspective and identified your target audiences and key messages, it’s time to turn to tactics. In brief, tactics are what you actually ‘do’ to reach your goals, and they can include things like media relations, content, social media, awards, legal directories, reviews, newsletters and events. 

Media relations

One of the most effective PR tools available is media relations. This is the skill of engaging with the media to get in front of your target audiences and increase your reach. You can do this in the following ways:

• Identify ‘good news’ stories about your firm – from appointment and promotion releases to environmental, social and governance stories, financial results and more. 
• Undertake ‘newsjacking’ – positioning your experts as spokespeople during emerging stories.
• Sell-in story ideas to key trade publications and the consumer press.
• Undertake campaign-led activities where you have high-profile business-to-consumer work. (This sort of work often revolves around clinical negligence, personal injury or inquest matters.)

The reason media relations is so powerful is that it’s ‘earned’ – you don’t pay for it, and it places your lawyers as experts at the heart of a story. It also allows your firm to reach a far greater portion of your target audiences than you’d be able to achieve via your own channels. 

Website and social media

Combining your media relations activities with other tactics broadens your reach. Sharing coverage on social media channels ensures that these stories are not only seen by your existing audiences, but also (if those audiences engage with the story, which they often do) by audiences far beyond your immediate reach. Push the story further by encouraging your colleagues to share these posts or create their own.

Creating content on other channels, including your blog and relevant newsletters, ensures that additional audiences can access the coverage. This also enables you to control the narrative and introduce any key messages that didn’t reach the final media coverage. 

Posting this type of content on your website may attract new audiences searching for legal issues related to the story, because effective blog content can and does influence the success of your search engine optimisation (SEO). It’s always worthwhile seeking expert support to ensure that the back end of your website is set up effectively to enable and support your SEO strategy. 

You also need to think strategically about the traffic (or as I prefer to say, people) that you want to attract, remembering always that the best content is written with human beings in mind. Spam-type SEO may result in increased clicks, but if they don’t convert, they’re simply vanity clicks with no purpose.

Newsletters and events

Pushing the story proactively via your newsletters may also prompt enquiries, assuming of course that your content is carefully planned to align with identified or potential client needs relating to that story.

Although they may be perceived as old fashioned, newsletters (and, for that matter, events) are still incredibly effective tools for engaging your target audiences and influencing them to take the next step towards an instruction. The best newsletters and events are driven by a deep understanding of what your clients and prospects need, want and appreciate – so, again, take the time to really understand who your target audiences are and what they want from their law firm of choice.

Other PR tactics

Other PR tactics that can be very effective include legal directories rankings. Some love them, some hate them, but whatever your opinion, one thing is certain: they’re not going anywhere. Legal directories rankings provide independent ‘kitemarks’ and help your target audiences see that you offer a high-quality service. That said, they’re not – as with any tactic – for every firm; nor does every firm need them. When you do the strategic work on your goals, strategy, target audience and key messages, it should be clear whether you need to build legal directories into your plan.

Award shortlistings and wins can also enhance your reputation. The key is ensuring that you only enter reputable awards and that your other channels work hard for you in promoting your shortlists and wins. Remember that you typically have a year to shout about an award, so make sure your communications include it in your messaging for the whole 12 months to reap maximum reputational benefits.

Food for thought

Hopefully this very brief foray into reputation management, and what it involves, has given you food for thought. If you’d like more information about how to effectively manage your firm’s reputation, do take a look at the Law Firm Leaders’ Reputation Playbook.