legal marketing

Law firm website content: an interesting way to get closer to your ideal client

Manuel Pueyo · Aug 17, 2021 ·

Digital is not a thing. It’s a way of doing things. Websites are not goods. It’s not like a ping-pong table🏓, you pay, you put it on your office and the project is done. When you decide to get a website going you are starting a system in which you put a set of actors and tools in continuous motion. This means, there is a beginning but there is not an end to the project.

I see a lot of law firms creating beautiful websites, but poor on content . It looks like they want a vitrine, a showcase🗿 but they don’t want to embrace web technology as a storage of value and as an enabler of a good legal service. They buy websites like they buy ping-pong tables, they don’t want to get their best actors involved in content creation.

As a lawyer you need to understand that if you are not currently creating content you are missing an opportunity to get closer to your ideal clients and ensure your law firm will be relevant in the next 10 years.

What is law firm website content ?

Law firm website content is about giving your legal knowledge a new home🏠. A new place where to live, travel and connect with the outside world.

Your lawyers know about many aspects of the law, it’s application in courts and tribunals, and tips on how to apply it in real life. This knowledge should not be kept for the coffee conversations with your other lawyer colleagues.

When you write it or draw it, when you record it in audiovisual format and you upload it on the web it’s called content. And content flies.

Since this is valuable, you want to store that knowledge in a house you own, organize it under your own rules, not only in third party silos you can’t control (LinkedIn, Facebook,etc).

The web is a place you can use to, safely and securely, store this valuable knowledge. The content is a storage of your value as a lawyer.

Why is it a good moment for law firms to start creating content?

There are many reasons in August 2021 for law firms to start taking seriously content creation

Content creation strengthens your user centric muscles 🧠

At the top of the agenda of law firms today is improving their legal service. This could be done by applying legal design which is the application of service design to the legal field.

But lawyers are not designers. They have never been trained so that they have to learn it in the flow of work. Content creation can be a good start to be thinking like a designer by writing as a designer.

When you think like a designer one of your top priorities is to ensure that what you do serves a function, it solves a problem of someone out there. Good content solves a problem and fulfil the intent of what your users are seeking is the only way to go.

Google is promoting more than ever good content

Google also wants you to think like a designer. With machine learning and neuro linguistic programming (NLP), Google computers are getting really good at understanding what is the intent behind people’s searches. What is the problem they have? Finding the solution is Google’s job, and for you as content creator there is no shortcut but to deliver solutions to your clients.

Legal systems are under stronger pressure to deliver accessible text in a simple language

States are far from being able to deliver that promise of legal text that is more accessible. It’s going to be the job of the lawyer to actually make that transition from complex to simple (accessible) so that their citizens can “consume” the law. Web content is not the only, one but a good place to start that transition.

Rise of self-service models for law

By 2030 ‘everyone has a “free” lawyer at their disposal, similar to Siri’. Selfservice models will have a huge impact on the market. This is already visible today, look at the LegalZoom IPO and recent funding for RocketLawyer. By creating “structured” content placing your knowledge in accessible web format you are starting to create future proof content that can be flexible and adapted to any future apps and tools.

Good content accelerates your digital transformation

When you decide to get a website you are starting a system in which you put a set of actors and tools in continuous motion. Content needs a production rhythm. A good flow.

When you start to regularly create content for the web you need to put in place team processes: an editorial production workflow that is going to , hopefully, make your team question, in a positive way, how you are all working together. You are going to need to adopt new digital tools and practices and this challenge is going to accelerate your team digital transformation maturity.

And remember this

Awareness: more eyeballs on your law firm

Finally, it is a good moment to create content if you want your brand to be more visible. You can read this amazing story of a Scandinavian law firm that started to create content and increased the visitor of their website by 600%.

How to create content ?

Content is hard work. It’s political. It requires vision alignment with your partners. It involves decision making at different levels inside the organization. It requires an orchestration of tools, people and processes working in line as an editorial factory🏭. This is the discipline called content operations.

We suggest involving every department in the content creation process: since the best content is the one who solves a need from your client, you need to hear specially from the departments that are closer to the client what are the clients expectations and problems. But this is not something they are used to do : your lawyers don’t think in terms of content opportunities. You are going to need to change some habits.

Include different profiles, involve a coach: it often takes two people to write a good piece of content. Why is that? Because your lawyers they need practice to get to write an article that is free from jargon and written for online readers 👀💻.

Improve your human listening capabilities💙. Pains and problems are not always rational. Sometimes you need to train your lawyers to listen with the heart not only with the mind.

To summarize I repeat again the same key message:

It is surprising to see how many law firms are neglecting the opportunity to grow by creating content. Don’t miss this train! content will get closer to your ideal clients and move your law firm towards modernity.

4 Reasons why your lawyers should use markdown for drafting documents

Manuel Pueyo · Jan 28, 2021 ·

As a content strategist specializing in public sector and legal firms, I have spent a large proportion of the last 15 years using Microsoft Word for drafting web content. Microsoft Word is undeniably a fantastic product and .DOCX files are likely to remain the default format for sharing and editing legal and business documents for the foreseeable future. However, when it comes to the initial drafting of legal web content in Microsoft Word, you should be aware of much better (and more user-friendly) alternatives existing in the market.

Are you a marketing or communication manager with high working standards? Do you work for a law firm and you believe that writing a qualitative, highly personalized web content is the way to achieve your goals? Do you know that writing good content is a team work effort and would like to involve your lawyers in a fluid, frictionless production work flow to succeed with your legal marketing blog? Then this post is for you.

Does sending the DOCX draft via email to your colleagues so they can incorporate their contributions and then translating it to HTML for the web upload is a common practice?

Considering some of the things listed above, I think there are many reasons why you should consider using markdown format. It is a document file format that was created for writing “simple text” and it serves as a bridge between document drafting and a web page.

Get your lawyers writing code without scaring them

We did a survey recently among lawyers and we found out that almost half of respondents were interested in learning a coding language.

In the digital era your text has to be understood by both humans and machines. But they read it differently. While humans read the words, the machines need additional help which is the so called “code” or “markup language”.

Markdown has certain features that makes the writer, when formating the text, unconsciously inserting markup language that computers understand. This requires a little training, but in a very short period of time your writers will start inserting markup language and doing it in a way that does not hinder the writing process, such as inserting hyper links, headings or lists. That can be done by simply typing characters with your keyboard.

Your lawyers will start seeing that what they write is a very simple code only visible to them as writers, and that it is not the same thing as what the user sees when the text is displayed on a web interface. I see this as an easy and less scary way to get your lawyers be introduced to programming and coding.

Never get stuck with a particular software vendor

There are two benefits of using markdown:

Conversion versatility: your markdown file can be easily converted into other types of files: html, pdf, mjml, .DOCX, you name it. In order to do that, you need to familiarize yourself with software conversion tools, for instance Pandoc.
Work with different text editors: as you can see in the video, the same file can be opened locally or in the cloud with different tools. I personally use Retext, Typora and Zettlr. But there are many more available in the market depending on your operating system. Your lawyers are free to choose the one they prefer.

Only use your fingers to write text that computers can decode

When I start drafting, I don’t need to think about the style, fonts or images. I just want to get into the writing flow, focus on the text, have a good writing experience and remove any distractions from my sight.

I don’t need, at this stage, to be interacting with an overloaded screen full of options. I just want my words to flow in an easy way that bridges my mind and the text in front of me. I also like to use my hands (and not my mouse) to introduce characters that are needed to enrich my text for web publishing: things like hyper links, bolds, headings are easily inserted with the keyboard by typing characters.

Here is a tutorial where you can learn the basics to get you started in 30 min. It takes a little practice to get familiar, but once you start, there is no way back.

In the past I used to use Microsoft Word for drafting, but I found I was offered too many features that I did not need and it complicated the writing process. I also felt that the software was too heavy and with the high risk of overloading my computer memory and crashing.

The future of fast and agile content production – writing is Markdown

I have recently discovered a set of web creation tools and cms that are really interesting and I can’t wait to test them. A combination of tools like Hugo, Netlify and Forestry totally changed the game for web creation and here is why:

there is a new wave of tools for creating websites that can load your websites faster. And they are all using markdown. Unlike WordPress, Drupal or Joomla, you don’t need a database.
Changes in content are considered commits and therefore are kept track of it’s version of using git. No more loosing track of who suggested what change. This also allows the editors and developers to speak the same language when it comes to keeping track of who is doing what on the site.
you can edit your posts in markdown and quickly push up your post as markdown documents.

I am Manuel from BigKids, digital reinvention consultant. I am passionate about bringing the teams together to create good content. I see content as a fuel for building excellent digital experience. If you would like to take part in a markdown demo, feel free to contact me or subscribe to the Places of Learning newsletter where we regularly organize meetups around those topics.

Happy typing!

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.