Cutting Edge Marketing
The legal market is in a state of flux. The Legal Services Bill is likely to make huge changes to the way the law operates. No one knows precisely what types of legal structure will become established, or how the market will be affected. Lawyers know that their skills will still be useful, but not through what entity those will be used, or how they are best proclaimed.
^ TOPCreative marketing
We live in an age of creative and sophisticated marketing. Nowadays you could amuse yourself whilst watching a film by ticking off the various product placement and promotional deals which appear to have been undertaken. Few doubt the power and importance of marketing. If commercial clients use it, then their business sense is likely to be at least as good as that of any law firm, and may govern what they would expect from lawyers themselves.
Everyone is getting in on the act these days. You may have read recently how theatres are giving tickets to taxi cab drivers for off-peak performances, in the hope that they are likely to promote the shows to the tourists that they pick up.
^ TOPSalisbury hairdressers
It is therefore good to see that a Wiltshire firm showed creative ingenuity of which any professional marketer would have been proud. The Family Law Department approached hairdressers in Salisbury. £75 "commission" for client referrals was offered. The idea being that if a customer (be it a man or a woman) talks about domestic problems to the hairdresser (not an entirely unknown phenomenon) those who are considering divorce can be referred to the particular firm.
That seems brilliant in its simplicity. The lawyer who dreamed it up (assuming it was the product of the firm itself) considered the type of client, where the topic relevant to the firm might come up, and who might be best placed to give them a recommendation.
^ TOPTesco Law
The Legal Services Bill has been referred to as "Tesco law". On the basis that if in its final form companies are able to own businesses which provide legal services to the public (albeit that such businesses would have to be run by qualified lawyers) then supermarkets or others (banks? insurance companies?) may use the opportunity to put forward their own legal business, whether general or related to areas linked to any existing business they run. At the same time of course one might have the prospect of certain legal partnerships incorporating or in some cases floating on the stock market.
^ TOPNew competition
Either way, the traditional firm is likely to find itself competing against new sorts of institution, with access to business and marketing acumen of a sort not traditionally possessed by lawyers. In those circumstances how you market and present yourself could be absolutely critical in order to keep the flow of work coming. Particularly when competitors run by existing large businesses will have ready access to, and experience of catering for, numbers of clients. It is likely to prove to be a Darwinian struggle in which firms either evolve to the new conditions and survive, or die.
^ TOPLawyers must market themselves
It might not just be hairdressers therefore one has to consider. Lawyers may find themselves having to be creative about marketing their skills in a number of previously unforeseen ways. It will not be enough to be at the cutting edge of the law. To get clients in, in order to be able to demonstrate those legal skills, you will also have to be at the cutting edge of marketing. Whether or not that is in a hairdressing salon with a pair of scissors.