Four tips to remember when preparing your legal press release highlighting new lawyers

By Geri L. Dreiling, Esq.

For most law firms, hiring a new attorney is a significant development. It is a sizable investment that sends a positive message about your firm’s growth and ability to serve your client base.

Many law firms send press releases to a variety of legal and mainstream publications announcing their new hires. The practice serves two purposes:

• It is a nice welcoming gesture that gets the new relationship off on the right track.
• It is an inexpensive way to generate publicity for the firm.

If you are considering announcing a new hire, be sure your press release submission meets these four criteria.

1.  Keep it short.

As I mentioned in Press Release Writing Tips Part II, I recommend keeping the release under 400 words. Press releases are business communications, and your readers, busy journalists, will appreciate your ability to get to the point.

2.  Identify educational institutions and graduation dates.

In addition to sending the press release to local, legal and bar publications, consider submitting it to the new hire’s alumni magazines. Most college and law school alumni magazines include a class notes sections that highlights recent alumnus achievements. Alumni magazine editors generally ask that the release identify educational institutions, degrees received and years of graduation. Including these details allows the editor to more easily verify the information.

3.  Include a high-resolution photograph.

A photo of the new hire is a good way to complement the text. However, if the photo will appear in print, it needs to be of high resolution — 300 pixels per inch (300 dpi) or greater.

For Windows’ users, to figure out whether you have a high-resolution image, right-click on the photo and select Properties. You may have to select Advanced Properties, but you will eventually obtain the resolution information.

Many digital cameras have as their default setting 72 dpi, a low resolution that is great for the Internet and websites but terrible for print. To learn how to produce a high-resolution image, read this eHow article by Sharon Mcelwee.

You can also hire a professional photographer who will supply both high- and low-resolution images. At Legal Media Matters, we recommend using a professional photographer. For more information on why a professional photographer is an important ally when it comes to creating an image for your law firm and for tips on making the most of a professional shoot, read Legal Marketing: 4 Photo Shoot Tips.

4. Insert a paragraph describing the firm’s practice area.

Use the press release to promote the firm in addition to spotlighting the new hire. Make sure the last paragraph of the press release identifies the firm’s location and areas of practice. Although the complete information will most likely not make it into the final version that appears in the publication, you have used the opportunity to educate the reporters and editors responsible for modifying the content for their publication about your firm. That could translate into interview requests in the future when a reporter is looking for legal experts.

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At Legal Media Matters, we provide legal public relations, law firm marketing and attorney website content writing services.

Jumpstart your content writing by leveraging these free resources

By Geri L. Dreiling, Esq.

On Tuesday, I highlighted three approaches I use when I’m feeling stuck and can’t seem to come up with content ideas for my own blog or the blawgs of my clients.

To get the ideas flowing once again, I discussed:

• Listing frequently asked questions
• Using keywords identified by Google Analytics
• Setting up Google Alerts

Here are three more free research and intelligence-gathering tools you can use to guide your legal blog content writing efforts and boost your traffic.

1.  Use Wordtracker to identify keyword questions

Wordtracker''s Keyword Questions is a nifty tool. Enter a single or short keyword phrase and you’ll receive a list of questions that people type into search engines. Use those questions to come up with blog topics. You’ll also want to use the question in your headlines.

For example, I typed in the search term “personal injury.” The questions Wordtracker identified included:

• Is a personal injury settlement community property?
• What is the average personal injury settlement?
• What to expect in personal injury mediation?
• What personal injury attorney handles dog bites in Tucson area?

2. Use Google Insights for Search to identify breakout searches.

Google Insights is a tool that allows you to look at search trends over time, then highlights predictions for the future. It allows you to track newspaper headlines and identifies not only the top search queries related to your keywords but also rising or breakout searches. It’s not unlike enjoying a great new restaurant before the rave reviews are printed: The breakout terms allow you to avoid the rush of the crowd and get the best seat in a soon-to-be-popular venue.

Once again, I typed in the search term “personal injury.” I limited the query to the state of Georgia. It identified seven breakout searches, including:

• Atlanta injury lawyer
• Personal injury cases
• Personal injury claims
• Personal injury settlements

3.  Use Google Sets to identify lists of words related to your practice area

Google Sets allows you to create a list of words related to your keywords. You can use the list generated as a word-association game to get the creative process going. Once again, you’ll have new words that you’ll want to incorporate into the post to make it more likely that prospective clients will find you.

I entered the following terms:  “personal,” “injury,” “lawyer,” and “attorney.”

The expanded list of Google Sets predictions included:

• Probate
• Legal services
• DUI
• Auto
• Car
• Truck
• Trial
• Insurance law
• Wrongful death

Of course, these tips are all helpful for Web content writing, too.

To ensure that you don’t miss out on this valuable information, subscribe to our regular e-mails or RSS feeds. You can also find Legal Media Matters on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

At Legal Media Matters, we provide legal public relations, law firm marketing and attorney website content writing services.

Feeling blocked? Follow these steps when content ideas are scarce.

By Geri L. Dreiling, Esq.

In addition to writing for my own blog, I help law firms keep up with the demands of their own blogs. That might mean anything from planning a blogging calendar to create content that conforms to their legal PR aims to writing drafts of blog content.

But even as a professional legal content writer there are occasions when I find myself blocked as I’m trying to come up with content ideas.

Here are three approaches that help me get unstuck and back on the writing track.

1. List Frequently Asked Questions

When I speak to prospective clients about law firm website writing, blog writing or legal PR work, the questions I’m asked tend to be similar despite differences in practice areas and geographical locations.

When a lawyer meets with a client or conducts an initial telephone consultation, the concerns raised are rarely novel. Clients want to know about their legal rights and options, legal procedures, the scope of the representation and the law firm’s fee structures.

I find it helpful to make a list of questions frequently raised in the initial consultation and use them to plan upcoming blog posts. Try writing down the initial questions a client raises during the meeting.  If you use  your client's terminology to frame your questions, you may improve the chances that a search engine query will lead to your blog post.

2. Use Keywords Identified by Google Analytics

Everyone should have his or her law firm’s website or blog configured with a program that measures traffic. One of the most popular free programs is Google Analytics. (In “How to install Google Analytics to measure your marketing campaigns,” Enrique Serrano provides step-by-step instructions explaining the process. )

Review the keyword phrases that are bringing visitors to your website. You can sort the phrases in a number of ways — for instance, identifying the most frequently used phrases that bring people to your site and the phrases that have received the most page views on your website. Consider writing a blog post that capitalizes on those keyword phrases.

3.  Set Up Google Alerts

If you scour the Internet in search of mainstream and legal media articles highlighting the latest news touching on your practice area, let Google Alerts do your Web surfing for you. You can enter your search parameters into Google Alerts, another free service, and receive a daily or weekly update highlighting the latest Google results on the basis of your topic or search terms.

The e-mail roundup is an efficient alert that pulls together late-breaking news and recent legal developments. Because you’re able to find out about it early, you can use the opportunity to weigh in or explain the debate on your legal blog.

These are just a few of my tried-and-true methods. Do you have any suggestions for overcoming legal content writing block? If so, I’d love to hear about them. Feel free to leave a comment to this blog post or email me at geri@legalmediamatters.com.

For our follow-up post on additional ways to generate story ideas, read "Blawg Topics: 3 More Brainstorming Tools."

To ensure that you don’t miss out on this valuable information, subscribe to our regular e-mails or RSS feeds. You can also find Legal Media Matters on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

At Legal Media Matters, we provide legal public relations, law firm marketing and attorney website content writing services.

The site’s purpose, the use of fresh content and tone often play a role in distinguishing between the two

By Geri L. Dreiling, Esq.

Last week a lawyer sent me an e-mail asking me to explain the difference between a blog and a website.

The answer is not as simple as it might seem. As methods of communicating information by way of the Internet evolve, differentiating between a website and a blog is sometimes difficult.

Here are some of the traditional distinctions between the two.

Law Firm Website

Generally a law firm’s website contains static sections with descriptions of the types of legal services offered. It includes basic information explaining who your firm is and what it does:

• A home page introducing the firm to potential clients
• A practice areas page listing the types of cases the firm handles. The website may also contain several subpages that explain the types of cases in further detail
• An attorney page containing the biographical information of members of the firm
• A contact page with the firm’s telephone number and address and an online contact form

Law Firm Blog

A blog is generally an easy-to-update collection of short articles known as posts.  Blogs are updated frequently, and visitors tend to read the newest posts. Common topics on law blogs, or blawgs, include:

• New or recent court decisions or rulings that affect the firm’s practice area
• Current events that involve the firm’s practice area
• Answers to clients’ frequently asked questions
• Legislative developments
• Opinion or editorial comments about legal news or trends

The Blurring Line Between Blogs and Websites

Increasingly firms are embedding blogs in their websites under the same domain. An embedded blog helps keep a law firm’s website supplied with fresh content, which provides some search engine advantages.

Firms are also using blog engines, or content management systems, as the skeleton on which a website is built. Content management systems such as WordPress and Joomla! are user friendly; when they are adapted for use on a law firm’s website, updating the website becomes much easier.

Choosing the Best Option for Your Firm

For firms on a limited financial budget or with limited human resources to devote to maintaining a blog, a website should be the priority. It will allow potential clients to gather more information about your firm and provide quick access to contact information. An outdated blog that does not have any recent posts could undermine your firm's legal marketing efforts.

To ensure that you don’t miss out on this valuable information, subscribe to our regular e-mails or RSS feeds. You can also find Legal Media Matters on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

At Legal Media Matters, we provide legal public relations, law firm marketing and attorney website content writing services.

Three reasons to limit a release to around 400 words

By Geri L. Dreiling, Esq.

A few weeks ago I highlighted some of the basic elements lawyers should include in a press release in "Legal Press Release Writing Tips." Those elements are:

• Headline and subhead
• Nut graph
• Details that allow a reporter to verify the information contained in the release
• Description of the firm

One of the items not on the list but that I briefly mentioned was the recommendation to keep the release to about 400 words. A few of my readers e-mailed and asked why. In this blog entry, I’ll cover three reasons behind my 400-word suggestion.

1. Cost

Many of my clients’ press releases are circulated by way of a wire service that charges a flat fee for the first 400 words. For each additional 100 words, the cost increases by $75.

2. Concrete Target

A specific word count provides a better benchmark than the nebulous “keep it short.” For lawyers, accustomed to writing lengthy briefs and pleadings, “short” may translate into a three-page press release rather than the one-page, 400-word release.

But tight writing can be very difficult. Don’t underestimate the time it takes to draft a carefully crafted release. In a wry comment about the unique challenges of concise writing, Mark Twain famously noted, “I didn’t have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.”

3. Readers’ Time

It would be nice if people took stacks of my press releases to the pool with them to enjoy as leisure reading — but I don’t think that’s going to happen.

Legal press releases are business communications. The readers include journalists, potential clients and other lawyers who are in a hurry and need to absorb the main messages quickly.

Like all rules, the 400-word recommendation can be broken, but this should be done only sparingly — the exception rather than the rule.

To ensure that you don’t miss out on this valuable information, subscribe to our regular e-mails or RSS feeds. You can also find Legal Media Matters on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

At Legal Media Matters, we provide legal public relations, law firm marketing and attorney website content writing services.

Our weekly roundup of legal news links, legal PR client news and story ideas

By Geri L. Dreiling, Esq.

We’re heading into the second major U.S. holiday of the summer, the Fourth of July. Many businesses will be closed on Monday. I won’t be posting a blog entry on July 5, but here are a few stories to check out over the three-day weekend.

LMM Client News

A $1.5 million personal injury settlement obtained by Jim Lemonds and Andrea McNairy of St. Louis-based Brown & Crouppen and Greg Roberts of The Roberts Law Firm was highlighted in this week’s Missouri Lawyers Weekly.

Spencer Farris of The S.E. Farris Law Firm received the Missouri Association of Trial Attorneys’ President’s Award, which is given annually to an attorney whose efforts help Missouri citizens gain access to the civil justice system.

Notable Links for Lawyers

My Top Ten Rules for Job Search Success

Richard Russeth, the wise counselor behind The Last Generalist, shares his top 10 rules to follow if you’re in the job market. In addition to reminding readers that it takes work to find work, noting that doing some volunteer work at least once a week will give you a sense of accomplishment and encouraging us to say thank you, he gives us this quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson: “Be silly. Be honest. Be kind.”

Essential Tools for SEO on a Budget

Analyzing your site with the use of Google’s free Webmaster Tools, researching keywords and obtaining inbound links are three strategies suggested by ReadWriteBiz’s John Paul Titlow for improving your website’s performance.

Keeping Your Online Reputation Up to Par

Rob Stretch’s guest post on The Saint Louis Social Media & Tech Report reminds businesses to monitor their online reputations, remain active on the Internet by using several different methods for reaching customers and remaining engaged on social media sites.

Six Ways to Manage International Relationships Online

Zachary Sniderman’s post on American Express OPEN Forum and Mashable is handy for anyone who conducts business internationally. Suggestions for researching basic country information, a time zone converter, translation help and quick faux pas checks to help avoid embarrassing etiquette breaches are just a few of the links provided.

To ensure that you don’t miss out on this valuable information, subscribe to our regular e-mails or RSS feeds. You can also find Legal Media Matters on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

At Legal Media Matters, we provide legal public relations, law firm marketing and attorney website content writing services.

A professional design and typo-free, frequently updated legal content top the list

By Geri L. Dreiling, Esq.

What makes a law firm website a good one from the perspective of a potential client?

In 2002, the Stanford University’s Persuasive Technology Lab released the Stanford Guidelines for Web Credibility.  Based on three years of research involving more than 4,500 subjects, these guidelines are useful not only when it comes to planning a website but also in measuring the effectiveness of your firm’s current website.

Here are the guidelines, adapted for use by law firms.

1. Make it easy for people to gauge your website’s accuracy. Provide third-party links to support your information.
2. Demonstrate that there’s a real law firm behind your website. Include your phone number, a physical address and representative client lists or links to news articles about your firm.
3. Highlight your law firm’s services and the expertise of your attorneys. In addition to providing information on undergraduate and law degrees, include the honors and awards an attorney has received and the articles he or she has written.
4. Show that honest and trustworthy people are affiliated with the firm and its site. Use the attorney profile page not only to highlight a lawyer’s expertise but also to allow the potential client to connect with the lawyer as a person and a problem-solver.
5. Make it easy to contact your law firm. Is your contact page clearly visible? Do you provide multiple ways for clients to contact the firm?
6. Does your law firm’s website appear professional? Forty-seven percent of website visitors base their evaluation of a site’s credibility on its appearance. A poor visual design, bad layout, formatting errors, typographical errors and amateurish images can hurt a website’s credibility.
7. Provide a website that is both useful and easy to use. Are your pages informative? Will potential clients find them educational? Can potential clients find the information they’re seeking easily?
8. Frequently update your law firm website’s content. Offering outdated content is like showing up in court wearing a tomato-red polyester suit and your best pair of white dress shoes: Your law firm’s website will stand out, all right — but not in a good way.
9. Use restraint when offering promotional content. Prospective clients don’t expect to see third-party advertising on an attorney website.
10. Avoid errors of all types, no matter how inconsequential they might seem to you. Does your website contain typographic errors, grammar errors or broken links?

At Legal Media Matters, we use our know-how to help your law firm’s website get positive notice. We create attorney bio pages; provide fresh, useful, easy-to-understand content that will attract the attention of potential clients and keep your website current; and offer copyediting services.

For more information, contact us by filling out our online contact form, e-mailing geri@legalmediamatters.com or calling 314-520-3897 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              314-520-3897      end_of_the_skype_highlighting.

To ensure that you don’t miss out on this valuable information, subscribe to our regular e-mails or RSS feeds. You can also find Legal Media Matters on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

At Legal Media Matters, we provide legal public relations, law firm marketing and attorney website content writing services.

Use legal PR to reach your clients’ trusted advisors

By Geri L. Dreiling, Esq.

Yesterday I gave presentation to a group of students enrolled in a mediation training course offered by St. Louis attorney and mediator Marta Papa. The topic: how to promote your mediation practice.

In addition to volunteering information, I came away with some new ideas.

One of the PR ideas I highlighted is the importance of promoting one’s mediation practice to referral sources — trusted advisors whose recommendation carries great weight when it comes to the selection of an attorney or mediator.

As I discussed in my YouTube video, traditional marketing involves the attorney using PR efforts to reach the client directly.

But referral marketing is a three-step approach, best exemplified in this diagram.

Papa took it a step further and shared one of her favorite referral marketing strategies. She makes it her goal to meet three referral sources each week for lunch. A problem that has legal ramifications also often has a financial, medical or emotional component.

A family lawyer, Papa had an extensive list of professionals whose work complemented her practice, including:

• Certified public accountants
• Mortgage brokers
• Physicians
• Psychiatrists
• Financial advisors
• Stockbrokers
• Insurance agent
• Real estate agents
• Clergy
• Business evaluators

She approached the professionals not from the standpoint of how they could send cases to her but instead in terms of how the professionals could help her clients. Some of her clients needed the services of professionals, and they looked to Papa for recommendations.

Take-Away Tips:

1. Identify professionals outside the legal community who also help your clients deal with the underlying issues that gave rise to the legal problem.
2. Meet for coffee or lunch as a way to introduce yourself, learn about a professional’s business and describe your practice.
3. Remember that referral marketing must be a two-way street. Don’t ask for help without offering assistance.

To ensure that you don’t miss out on this valuable information, subscribe to our regular e-mails or RSS feeds. You can also find Legal Media Matters on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

At Legal Media Matters, we provide legal public relations, law firm marketing and attorney website content writing services.

Our weekly roundup of legal news links, legal PR client news and story ideas

By Geri L. Dreiling, Esq.

There are several ways to promote your practice. On Monday I discussed why you should include your referral base in your firm’s PR outreach efforts. On Wednesday I noted that legal press releases are a good way to reach out to clients, add fresh content to your website and get inbound links.

Seminars, honors and awards are another way to increase your visibility, strengthen your firm’s brand and generate publicity for your firm.

In this week’s roundup I want to take a moment to congratulate three law firm clients for their recent achievements and outreach efforts.

LMM Client News

The Bar Association of Metropolitan St. Louis recently bestowed on John Campbell of The Simon Law Firm the John C. Shepherd Professionalism Award, which is given each year to a young lawyer who exemplifies the tenets of the profession.

David Zevan of Zevan & Davidson received the Missouri Association of Trial Attorneys’ Thomas G. Strong Trial Attorney Award, which is given annually to an attorney whose advocacy skills in difficult cases demonstrate great skill and passion for the injured, who has handled complex cases with some frequency and who has a reputation for professionalism, ethics and integrity.

Marta J. Papa is offering her 40-hour divorce mediation training course. It began June 23 and will wrap up on June 27.  The training includes demonstrations, lectures, role-play and coaching.

Notable Links for Lawyers

The Right PR Strategy for a Company Crisis

Against the backdrop of the Toyota and BP meltdowns, three PR veterans interviewed by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Henry Unger weigh in on the best practices for companies facing crises. In addition to the need for crisis-simulation exercises and clear designation of who is authorized to deliver a unified message, the experts emphasize the need to bring PR experts to the table alongside operations, legal and financial advisors.

At Buffalo News, New Rules for Online Comments

This week, The Buffalo News announced that it would require everyone who posts a comment on its website to first provide his or her name, place of residence and phone number. Jeremy W. Peters of The New York Times reports that similar information is required of people who submit letters to the editor to the Times. The commenter’s name and hometown appear along with the comment.

Twitter Lets You Automatically Follow Facebook Friends

Twitter has announced two major upgrades to its Facebook and LinkedIn applications, Mashable’s Ben Parr reports. The apps allow you to see which of your friends or connections are on Twitter. However, the Facebook Twitter app wasn’t working properly on June 24; according to the last available information, Facebook was working to resolve the problem.

How to Get Started Blogging

Grammar Girl has a great post filled with useful blogging tips. She walks the reader through the important process of defining the audience and discusses how to build confidence as a blogger.

Social Media Risks

Over at Slaw, business lawyer David Canton lists the factors that lead to bad social media policy decisions and writes that some forget that the old rules still apply to new media. A comment that shouldn’t be made in person or in an e-mail is also likely to be inappropriate as a blog post. He also notes the powerful role of perception: People tend to underestimate the risks associated with familiar technologies and processes and overestimate the risks associated with the unfamiliar — such as social media.

Story Ideas for Business, Consumer and Law

Reporters, Writers and Bloggers

Legal Liability for Online Comments

The announcement by The Buffalo News that it would no longer accept anonymous comments is the latest chapter in the vigorous debate over liability concerns stemming from unfettered speech.

Those worried about curbs on speech oppose any comment restrictions. Media outlets report that some attorneys are also advocating against controls because poor controls might expose a paper to greater defamation and slander liability than no controls at all. (This is similar to the legal reasoning applied to the dilemma of removing snow from a business parking lot. It is better to let the snow accumulate than to do a substandard job of trying to remove it, or so the reasoning goes.)

On the other side are journalists who believe that the old standards that required the newspapers to verify information submitted with a letter to the editor should apply. There are also many who are weary of reading racist, inappropriate, flamethrowing or rage-filled missives.

The tensions between these points of views and how media outlets are handling them could be a good subject for exploration.

To ensure that you don’t miss out on this valuable information, subscribe to our regular e-mails or RSS feeds. You can also find Legal Media Matters on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

At Legal Media Matters, we provide legal public relations, law firm marketing and attorney website content writing services.

Be sure to include these basic elements in your law firm’s next release

Geri L. Dreiling, Esq.

In law school, students learn how to write legal memos for partners, prepare briefs for judges and draw up contracts for clients. But not  many ever imagine there will come a time when they must know how to write a press release for the media. Increasingly, though, attorneys are doing just that — yet few have access to the built-in public relations or legal marketing departments that are routine in most large law firms.

There are many reasons behind the growing interest in circulating a press releases.

From the promotional standpoint, a legal press release is a great way to attract media attention to a recent verdict or settlement and a useful and economical vehicle for announcing new hires, awards or honors that will be picked up by local newspapers, trade publications and alumni magazines.

A legal press release also confers search engine optimization advantages. When uploaded to a law firm’s website, it provides a new page of fresh content. (With Google's recent search engine updates, fresh content has become even important.) When circulated through a site such as BusinessWire, the legal news release provides an immediate search engine boost and inbound links to the law firm’s website.

In this blog entry I’ll discuss some of the basic elements of a press release that deserve particular attention during the drafting process. You'll want to make sure you include these items in a press release that is ideally no more than 400 words.

1.   Headline and subhead

The headline should include the law firm’s name and a brief description that immediately lets the reader know the type of release he or she is reading. Does it cover a verdict or suit filing, or announce the hiring of a new associate? The subhead should provide further detail.

In addition, the reader should be able to scan the heading and subhead to obtain a concise synopsis of the remainder of the release.

For SEO purposes, the headline and subhead are an ideal place to insert keywords. In addition to the firm’s name, be sure to include practice area keywords.

2.  The nut graph

The nut graph, the first paragraph of the release, concisely explains the news value of the story. It sums up the entire point of the release in a sentence. Writing the nut graph can feel counterintuitive to lawyers, who are trained to lay out the logic before writing the conclusion. It feels, in some respects, like delivering the punchline of a joke and then providing the setup.

3. Details that allow a reporter to easily verify the information contained in the release

A good reporter independently verifies the information contained in the legal press release. You can make his or her job easier by including a few obvious elements, especially if the release pertains to a verdict, settlement or suit filing:

• Style of the case
• Case number
• Filing date
• Verdict date
• The court in which the case was filed

4. Description of the firm

Consider the legal press release as another tool for educating the media and potential clients about your practice. Include a brief paragraph summarizing your practice areas. Hyperlink your law firm’s website and include a phone number and e-mail address.

Here’s a link to the Breaking News section of our website which contains both of the releases used for this blog post. If you would prefer to outsource your press release writing, contact Legal Media Matters; we prepare and circulate releases for law firms nationwide.

For more information, contact me by filling out the online contact form, calling or sending an e-mail to geri@legalmediamatters.com.

To ensure that you don’t miss out on this valuable information, subscribe to our regular e-mails or RSS feeds. You can also find Legal Media Matters on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

At Legal Media Matters, we provide legal public relations, law firm marketing and attorney website content writing services.