directories

Are Directories out of favour?

Having just posted yesterday on ‘Directory and Award Submissions‘, I thought it was somewhat timely that the team at BTI Consulting published the results of a survey they have conducted with over 350 corporate counsel which showed:

Only 4% still find rankings valuable
18% like them but aren’t strongly influenced
33% are ambivalent
45% express outright disinterest

Some of the commentary is just brilliant, including this gem:

“I assume all my attorneys are ranked somewhere.”

Go check out the article. It’s a good [short] read.

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Directory season is coming!

While it may feel like we are doing directory and award submissions all year round, the formal season for directory submissions is upon us. Over the next six or so months, you can expect your partners to get you working on submissions to:

IP Stars (September – October)
Chambers (December – January)
IFLR (January – February)
WTR1000 (February – March)
Legal 500 (May – June)

So I thought it might be helpful if we take a deep dive in to the joys of whether or not to submit for that directory listing!

Should we even bother submitting?

Great question!

To be honest, if you’re just starting out and have not submitted to a directory before, then the answer is probably “no”.

The Return On Investment (ROI) – particularly now that private equity has an investment in directories such as Chambers and Best Lawyers, is low at best.

On the other hand, done right (see below for some helpful hints) you can get some useful material for your marketing collateral – such as client feedback quotes to use in capability statements and tenders.

At the end of the day though, directories have nailed the ego trips (aka endorphins) of lawyers and so the decision of whether or not to submit might be out of your control, so…

If you are going to submit, do it right: Some helpful hints

Be selective: First off, don’t go for every directory/award submission possible. Best selective and go for those where you know the research is done properly.
Don’t pay-to-play: Some directories/awards require you to pay a fee to boost your ranking or use client feedback in your marketing collateral. Resist the urge to pay for a better ranking or award!
It’s a long game: Most people [read: partners] think that by submitting a response the world will change over night and they will go from Rank 3 to Rank 1. Unless you have had a dramatic change at your firm, like a big hitting lateral hire – that is not going to happen! Shifting the dial on your directory ranking is glacial, and goes some way to explaining the comments on the ROI above. So if you are looking to invest time in directories and this is tied to your ranking rather than the brilliant client feedback you might get, then look to a 3 to 5 year timeline and make sure you cover off the partners to be profiled comment below.
Referee feedback is vital: Referee feedback is vital to the success of your submission. Get good referee feedback that can be published in the directory and you’ll reap the benefits. What does this mean? Well you’ll be tempted to put the most senior people forward as your referees (such as General Counsel or Chief Financial Officer), but that’s not always the best strategy as they are either too busy to respond to the researcher’s queries, or else have too many firms asking them to be a referee so don’t provide feedback on any. Much better to use a more junior referee who will be delighted to have been asked to provide feedback and give [hopefully] gushing feedback that can then be used by the publication and subsequently by your Marketing and Business Development team!
Case studies: Typically you can submit up to 20 case studies. If you mark all of your case studies as being “confidential”, then you won’t be listed – no matter how impressive those case studies are! Why? – again, the directory publisher will have nothing to publish. So make sure you give the directory publisher material to work with.
Referee-2-case study: Try and link the referees you provide to the case studies you are submitting. You’d be surprised by how may submissions I have seen where there are 20 referees and 20 case studies and absolutely no link between the two. You need to ask yourself what message you are sending the researcher if you are not willing to provide a referee that is linked to the case study you are submitting?
Partners to profile: You are probably thinking this is a no brainer – profile your most senior partners! But, that would be a mistake. Why? Well, in all likelihood they would have been profiled in any event. Much better for you would be to select a mix of partners from senior to junior to profile that shows your firm has in place a good succession and continuity plan – that you will be in business for the next 100 years, not just the last 100 years!
Submit on time: Yes you can get extensions, but they are not looked upon favorably so make sure you submit both your submission and referees on time.

Evaluation criteria

The evaluation criteria for most directory/award submissions are:

So what/Who cares? – Why is your case study important? What sets it apart from other deals that year? Was it the biggest deal that year? Was it the first time something like this had been done? Try and work-up a case study that answers: “So what, Who cares?”.
Validation – This is the client feedback section, so make it count. TIP: Don’t use the same referees every year, kind of looks like your practice might be a little stale!
Peer review – Most people walk past the section where you are asked to nominated peers from other firms you worked with. Again, that’s a mistake. Peer review is a really important part of the evaluation criteria. And why would it not be? – Nothing better than having a lawyer at another firm say how good a lawyer you are and how they wished you worked with them!

Should AI be writing your directory submission for you?

Now, if you have read this far, and want to know whether there are any benefits in AI helping you draft (at least in the first instance) your directory submission, then take a look at an article I contributed to earlier this year on: ‘Why AI should be writing your directory and award submissions‘ [Note: you’ll need to provide an email to get this. If you don’t want to do that, DM me].

And finally

As always, get in touch if you need help with your directory submissions or if you just need them peer reviewed.

And if you are submitting – best of luck!

Richard & GSJ

*this post was first published to my LinkedIn account as a BD Tips Wednesday post

I know the Burberry brand but that doesn’t mean I buy from them

I know the iconic luxury goods brand ‘Burberry’. Established in 1856, Burberry have been clothing the rich and famous pretty much continuously since. In Sydney they have a flagship store at 343 George Street. Here’s the kicker though: I have never knowingly bought anything from Burberry.

While this may all sound fascinating, you could well be asking yourself about now what this has to do with the selling of legal services? And it wouldn’t be an unreasonable thought too.

So without further ado, let’s move on to the issue at hand.

Last week saw the publication of the Acritas Global Elite Law Firm Brand Index 2014 to much fanfare. As Acritas themselves proclaim, the Index:

“…reveals the firms which are adapting most successfully to the changing market and winning client loyalty and favorability as a result.”

And while this would seem to be a pretty compelling reason to analyse the Index more closely by itself, managingpartner.com goes on to comment, according to the results of the Index, that:

“Multinational clients are more likely to instruct law firms which have a strong multi-jurisdictional presence and capabilities and a collaboratively working style and value focus”.

All I can say is – “Wow!”. If this is truly the case, then it goes without saying that the Index should be considered one of the most important and compelling benchmarks in the industry and it needs to be in the reading list of every managing partner, business development director and head of finance. Because the simple fact is, if my firm isn’t on and near the top of this list, I need to be very concerned.

But, before the panic starts to set in, how is the Index compiled?

Ahh, well here is where it seems to start falling apart. According to the Acritas website,

“The Sharpelegal Global Elite Brand Index is determined through four open-ended questions from the full survey to find out from general counsel:

the first law firms to come to mind

the firms most considered for multi-jurisdictional deals

the firms they feel most favorable towards

the firms most considered for multi-jurisdictional litigation.”

Did you notice that there was/is not a single open-ended question to the effect:

Did you actually buy legal services from this firm?, or
If you bought legal services from this firm, in how many different jurisdictions did you buy them in?, or
Did you use the same firm of lawyers in multiple jurisdictions in one transaction during the course of the last 12 months?

And therein lies the problem with the Index: while it is certainly really nice for my ego that my firm is one of the most recognised legal brands in the world (and just to be clear, I don’t actually work for the firm that came out top in the Index by some margin -Baker & McKenzie), the simple fact is that this doesn’t pay the bills.

Which brings me back to Burberry, a brand I most certainly know, would consider buying from (if I won the lottery), and feel very favourable to, but from whom I’ve never actually purchased anything…

That’s another fine mess we’ve gotten into!

“That’s another fine mess you’ve gotten me into!” – Oliver Hardy

A lot has been written in the past few weeks on Dentons* decision to no longer publish ‘meaningless‘ (their word, not mine) annual Profits Per Equity Partner (PEP) figures, the latest of which “Partners divided on reliability of PEP and need for transparency” was published on the legalweek.com website last Friday.

While I have a level of sympathy with Dentons argument – and the reality is that PEP figures really are meaningless to all but those who work in the firm, at the same time I do feel that the makings of this situation are those of the law firms themselves.

To expand, in the days prior to LLP status, law firms avoided the press – both legal and non-legal – like the plague. Then publications such as Martindale-Hubbell, Chambers and Asia Pacific Legal 500 started to gain traction and firms started to disclose the business/deals they had undertaken in the past 12 months in the hopes of getting good listings/rankings. In most cases this was done without firms asking their clients if they put any credit in these rankings and their feedback on the benefits of such a strategy.

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