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Four qualities your lawyers must have to succeed with your legal marketing blog

Manuel Pueyo · Sep 3, 2020 ·

Good web content can make you stand out and “outsmart” your competitors. Your editorial team must have (or acquire) certain skills in order to get there

Empathy

There are thousands of websites out there. If you really want to stand out, you need smarter content. Smart content is solves an issue for the reader. Your lawyers need to be able to identify problems that your target audience has. Your lawyers need to write words that solve that problem. We call this empathy and we agree with this 100% Sarah Richards.

Human writing is on demand more than ever. Especially writing that is accessible. Your lawyers must be able to identify and use words that get them closer to whoever you want to touch.Insert tweet

Good writing is greater on demand than ever: one that brings people together #contentwriting https://t.co/ZtYTwGfdVm

— Manuel Pueyo (@manuelpueyo) February 21, 2019

Technical Skills: the web is here to stay

Your lawyers must be able to understand the difference between a normal document and a web document. HTML basics need to be appreciated and understood:

*hyper links,lists

*headings,

*basic SEO keywords and

*other markup language specs

Method and discipline: practice makes it perfect

Ann Handley, the author of the book “Everybody Writes” calls this your Writing GPS. A method (like a GPS) gives you orientation on where to go and what to do next. Writing is a craft and every writer must have a stablished method to create a text.

This process often goes from an idea to planning your text, to writing it, to uploading it, to the Content Management System, maintaining it after publication etc. Here we are talking about having a step by step method that guides you throughout this process.

Once you repeat this method long enough, the process of writing becomes so much easier. I always quote here K Anders Ericson. Experts are made, not born: it is the quantity and the quality of the repetition of your method that will make you an expert.

Content ops: collaborate even if it hurts

Your lawyers should be team workers as well. They are not lonely runners, but they understand that their writing is inserted into a bigger system: a well oiled editorial production machine. Welcome to the world of Content Operations.

I am Manuel from BigKids and I want to help you with this. That is why we have teamed up with Larcier to run the course Creer du Contenu Digital Interessant in which we are going to talk about writing methods, how to attract people with content and the beauty of the web as a publishing medium.

Legal Content as a Valuable Business Asset: Some concrete examples

Manuel Pueyo · Jul 27, 2020 ·

Magic happens when you valorise your content. You turn knowledge that your company has but is invisible into something tangible that has amazing business value for your organization.

In this post, I would like to show how the content that you put on your website can be an amazing opportunity, not only to attract clients, but also to deliver better services. Content becomes a strategic business asset for your organization.

Modelovereenkomsten, or the principle of giving legal content for free and getting something in return

Modelovereenkomsten is a new service offered by law firm IntoLaw.

With this new service, they offer everyone the possibility to download a professional model of a contract in an editable “word” document for free. Whaat!!? Yes you hear it well, they are actually giving out some of the firm’s key 🗝️ knowledge for free. If, as a client, you want more, for instance you want to have 30 minutes chat with one lawyer, then you pay a small fee or more if you want higher customization of your contract.

The checkout process is similar to many e-commerce sites. You can search via keywords the type of contract you are looking for. You can also go through an automated workflow asking you questions and guiding you towards the contract(s) that covers your needs. When you find it, you add your contract to a cart and go through a purchase journey that incorporates some offers

They also collect your email and ask you some additional questions via the checkout process that probably will be used to profile you for marketing purposes in the future.
They also offer you similar contracts to the one you are interested in.

This service helps Intolaw to fulfill their social mission/have a positive impact in society and at the same time attract potential customers.

Mlexmarketinsight: generating legal content is the business value

They make money in a different way. Mlexmarketinsight’s value proposition is literally information (=content) sent by email. Customers pay and then they get their newsletters called Daily Briefing directly sent with the latest insights and analysis on regulatory changes, official statements and upcoming events. They also send articles written by them and press releases.

The key activity of Mlexmarketinsight is to follow changes in the sector, reporting and delivering information to paying subscribers. Channels are digital and the additional cost of getting a new client is almost zero because the additional charges for creating and sending a newsletter to 1 or to 1000 people is zero.

A privacy statement that looks good and is easy to understand and accept

Last year I had the chance to meet Lieke Beelen, she is a legal designer & founder of Visualcontracts. At this year’s Visual Contracts meetup she talked about turning legal contracts from “necessary evil” to an “object of design” = something that has a value.

And here you have an example of that: Apple privacy statement with belgian clients.

Legal contracts and technical specs are, traditionally, complicated to read for average citizens. Nobody enjoys reading them and they are often signed with blind eyes.

This can be changed, here we have an example of legal contracts and technical specs that have been simplified, beautified and explained.

When I read this web I even feel curious to know more about Apple technology and how the privacy rights are displayed in each of the apps. In general, I am not a fan of Apple as a company, but I see that this moves the needle towards more clients trusting their products and, as a consequence, increasing sales.

What do all those examples have in common?

Content leaves the marketing department. It is not only a legal copy writing, a “comms” asset to attract clients, but it becomes essential in the relationship that a company has with its clients.
Content meets a need.
From pure Blogging for Lawyers to actually paying attention to the user experience
You can actually identify some content that is not being properly valorised: it can be turned into an essential part of the way you design your legal service.

Content is knowledge and here at BigKids we help you to turn your worker’s knowledge into useful digital content. By interviewing people (your lawyers) in order to analyze their successes, challenges, practices, perceptions. We identify legal trends and we document those insights in a digital format: text, audio, video. Those digital assets can be used at any time to deliver better service or promote and amplify your legal service offer.

We are content coaches

Manuel Pueyo · Apr 16, 2020 ·

Our mission in life is to help teams to create, publish and manage their web content “assets” & do it efficiently.

What does a content coach do?

Helps you define your content strategy

Once you have a content strategy you need someone who ensures that the strategy is being effectively implemented by your team. We will monitor your KPIs, guide your content creation process, train your team on writing content, and generally ensure success.

Why did I decide to become a content coach?

I love to see brands that have good content. Seeing teams taking advantage of the web as a publishing medium is powerful. Good writing equals good thinking. And I like to see brands and teams that think. It takes big teams to achieve this.
Organizations and brands need to be braver. Brands need to stand out and be bold. Say what they think about things. How do they position themselves in this world in transformation. But also say what they are good at. What they like to do.
I also believe that good content we can save us from pollution= Information overload. We can make the web great again if we start designing our websites starting from the content. Good content solves people’s problems. Good content holds real value for the reader.

We are Content Strategists

Manuel Pueyo · Apr 6, 2020 ·

What is a Content Strategy ?

What is content?

In our ebook on How to Create Good Content we defined content as “knowledge in consumable formats that may include blog articles, but also videos, podcasts, social media posts, emails, webinars, info graphics, cartoons, quizzes, assessments, eBooks, tutorials, FAQs…”.

When do you need content strategy?

You need a content strategy when you meet these 2 conditions
1) Your brand / business is present online with a website.
2) You have decided to regularly update this website with content.

Why would it make sense to regularly update your website with relevant content?

It depends on the goal you are trying to achieve through content which could be probably:

Sales: the content you create helps brings more visitors to your website and see you value proposition.
Loyalty towards your users: give them valuable information.
Other purposes… for instance, you want part of your legal operations to be digitized.

What is included in a content strategy?

Websites are an ongoing processes. They are living ecosystems updated by people using digital tools. Your website changes and adapts with you and your projects. It is never a finished artifact: they are constantly tweaking and iterating.

Your team may need to become anyway an editorial factory. Like a publisher that creates produces and maintains this content. You must have planned a budget for that.

If your objective is to produce content regularly and keep it ongoing you need a strategy. This is essentially how are you going to make it happen.

A content strategy is a strategic paper that allows you to define all you need to do to go from point A to B.

Point A	Point B
My website has no content	Team regularly creates content
My website has bad content	Team regularly maintain content

Getting to point B is not an easy thing to do so you need to include elements like:

business goals
user needs
editorial mission
people and processes
governance
roles and responsabilities. what are the skills you have in house and who is going to do what
explanation of how we structure and organize this content in the Content Management System (cms)
metrics and kpis
maintenance
SEO analysis: including a keyword research, list your target keywords, local seo audit of your webstie,
Tools: cms, writing tools, analytics and seo tools, project management tools

How does a content strategist gets paid?

We are going to land in your team and try to understand your context. This is work that involves time reading your business strategy & comms strategy, meeting different team members to understand what they do, facilitating meetings and strategic conversations with your team.

At the end of the process you will get a Strategy Paper.

This usually takes about 8 to 10 calendar days of work.

Writing smart content for the Web: train your lawyers to create really good content

Manuel Pueyo · Feb 12, 2020 ·

With the internet providing the most powerful means of distribution, design has become the most effective mean of differentiation.

There are billions of pages on the internet. To do better than your competitors, you simply need smarter content.

Smart content is usable. It doesn’t only provide the information people need but makes that information easy to access, understand, and act upon. It has audience-appropriate terminology and literacy level, clear and consistent formatting and presentation.

In this course, we will walk, hand in hand, with your team members on a journey
towards creating smart content by finding the words that will help them achieve
professional objectives. Finding the words, that your clients use and understand.

Who is this workshop for?

Law firms. But also professional service sector teams (accountant, insurances, institutions, NGO) who are investing in digital content as an strategic business asset. They want to get more results out of their web content and they want to train their employees on how to write for the web.

Is your law firm investing strategically in web content as a marketing or business asset? Then this workshop might be for you:

For your lawyers writing for the web, improving their productivity, efficiency and effectiveness.
For your communication and business development team.

What is the size of the law firm?

A team of minimum 7 members who are committed to writing and putting in place an editorial strategy for their website.

Spoiler Alert ! An inbound content strategy involves a lot of work and time. In order to stand out from the crowd you are going to have to write creative usable content on a regular basis for a long period of time. This is expensive to produce and no short term outcomes can be expected .

Training Purpose

To make lawyers sharp marketers and better web writers.
Help them to write legal texts that are simple, accessible and more engaging.
Raise awareness about the importance of design and creative web content as the key to “stand out” from your competitors.

Learning Objectives

After this training participants will be able to:
Improve their professional writing process: What are the different phases that I could go through as a writer to draft a text?
Discover new ways to do research on audience needs.
Understand how people read on websites and mobile devices and how this is different from print.
Discover the main principles of web writing. How to fully benefit from the resources that the web offers you as writer/editor: bullets,links, catchy headline, headings, CTA

Keywords

content design, userneeds, jobstories, ux writing, content strategies,

Agenda

Full day course from 9:00 to 17:00
Parts:
1)Intro
How digital is transforming your work?
Content is part of your service content is part of the user experience
What is good content?
2)How people read on screens?
3)Writing Method (efficient and effective)
4)Exercise / Play
Use your creativity to write your headlines with constraints.
5)Principles of web writing
6)Keeping Standards

Participants will have to write their own full blog article to be reviewed by the trainer in one week.

Sources and Books

Content Design. Sarah Richards

Killer Web Content. Gerry McGovern

Content Strategies for the Web. Kristina Halvorson

Designing Connected Content. Mike Atherton. Carrie Hane

On writing well. William Zinser

Everybody writes: Handley

Costs

Get in touch directly with the trainer (manuelpueyo@bigkidscontent.com) We will
make you a tailored budget proposal that suits your office.

Practical Info

Number of people:8

Training will be in English