Page 26 - Leaders in Legal Business - a
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Leaders in Legal Business
services like VouchedFor, which can be found at professionals.vouchedfor.co.uk. The methods
vary from site to site, but a common theme is a star rating from 1 to 5, open commentary on the
part of the user, and the right to reply for the lawyer or firm profile on the site. The publishers
have used the growing familiarity with sites such as TripAdvisor, Zagat, Amazon, and more to
introduce the legal rating service. A conservative profession is cautious in the encouragement of
this development. It is still unlikely that corporate buyers of legal services will adopt such open
forms of feedback and recommendation in the near future; however, normalization of this in other
sectors is bound to create more demands on the legal profession for active adoption.
Rankings are a by-product of the rating system for directories. They provide a simple way to engage
readers with complex data and to impose order. Many legal journals and national business journals have made
regular features out of lawyer rankings, many developing their own systems in order to help readers understand
the business services available. On the basis that any data points may be used to form a ranking, the value to a
reader lies with their perception of the usefulness of the tables. They are a good guide to the main participants in
the practice area, geography, or sector under scrutiny.
Current Challenges
The trend in the directory space is toward fragmentation. Information requirements are following the
needs of the consumer, be it professionals in business and government services, or the general public. Finding
information about lawyers’ services in context to a business or personal matter, or industry sector, and having
client reviews to help understand choice and selection is a trend likely to continue. More specialized sites on the
Internet that attract specific consumers driven from common pools of lawyer data are the most economically
effective solution for publishers. For now directories have organized, in-depth data that has advantages over
Internet search engines that display disparate information on the same topic. How long they can exist in their
current financial models is a factor for who among the buyers of legal services will be willing to pay for what.
The relatively low entry-level cost to produce an online directory is balanced by two factors: the difficulty
in collating useful information for the user that is current, accurate, and can be managed dynamically into the
future; and establishing a trusted brand by developing a user base that is relevent to sellers of legal services and
will sustain revenues in the longer term. This is especially true when it comes to products with editorial reviews.
Investment in the ratings elements has high labor costs. The ongoing challenge for directory publishers is funding
investments from revenue streams that do not compromise their ability to offer independent ratings and rankings,
it generally being accepted that the consumer does not want to pay for access to information. Online audiences
tend to be less loyal than print readerships. Greater transparency and measurement of usage online through tools
such as Google Analytics creates demand from marketing professionals on the directory publishers to ensure their
online offerings generate a relevent audience for the specific customer. Firms demand capabilities linked to their
multi-channel marketing strategy and want repurposing of content. Examples of this are the use of hyperlinking
of articles, distributed use of icons associated with the branded directory rankings, and links to websites for traffic
generation. Increasingly the directories recognize their role in providing firms and individual lawyers greater
visibility online and have developed sophistication in SEO techniques that are part of their value to marketing and
business development in law firms.
Another role directory reviews have produced is the process of assisting firms in defining themselves in
the markets in which they operate. The strategic value of having an objective measure of performance against
competitiors in any given year has given Chambers a demand to analyze data collated from feedback to firms.
Legal 500 provides data gleaned from in-house interviews as part of its Client Intelligence product. These
developments point to the changes in perception of the value of directories and evolution of the publishers seeking
to add value to their paying customers.
19
services like VouchedFor, which can be found at professionals.vouchedfor.co.uk. The methods
vary from site to site, but a common theme is a star rating from 1 to 5, open commentary on the
part of the user, and the right to reply for the lawyer or firm profile on the site. The publishers
have used the growing familiarity with sites such as TripAdvisor, Zagat, Amazon, and more to
introduce the legal rating service. A conservative profession is cautious in the encouragement of
this development. It is still unlikely that corporate buyers of legal services will adopt such open
forms of feedback and recommendation in the near future; however, normalization of this in other
sectors is bound to create more demands on the legal profession for active adoption.
Rankings are a by-product of the rating system for directories. They provide a simple way to engage
readers with complex data and to impose order. Many legal journals and national business journals have made
regular features out of lawyer rankings, many developing their own systems in order to help readers understand
the business services available. On the basis that any data points may be used to form a ranking, the value to a
reader lies with their perception of the usefulness of the tables. They are a good guide to the main participants in
the practice area, geography, or sector under scrutiny.
Current Challenges
The trend in the directory space is toward fragmentation. Information requirements are following the
needs of the consumer, be it professionals in business and government services, or the general public. Finding
information about lawyers’ services in context to a business or personal matter, or industry sector, and having
client reviews to help understand choice and selection is a trend likely to continue. More specialized sites on the
Internet that attract specific consumers driven from common pools of lawyer data are the most economically
effective solution for publishers. For now directories have organized, in-depth data that has advantages over
Internet search engines that display disparate information on the same topic. How long they can exist in their
current financial models is a factor for who among the buyers of legal services will be willing to pay for what.
The relatively low entry-level cost to produce an online directory is balanced by two factors: the difficulty
in collating useful information for the user that is current, accurate, and can be managed dynamically into the
future; and establishing a trusted brand by developing a user base that is relevent to sellers of legal services and
will sustain revenues in the longer term. This is especially true when it comes to products with editorial reviews.
Investment in the ratings elements has high labor costs. The ongoing challenge for directory publishers is funding
investments from revenue streams that do not compromise their ability to offer independent ratings and rankings,
it generally being accepted that the consumer does not want to pay for access to information. Online audiences
tend to be less loyal than print readerships. Greater transparency and measurement of usage online through tools
such as Google Analytics creates demand from marketing professionals on the directory publishers to ensure their
online offerings generate a relevent audience for the specific customer. Firms demand capabilities linked to their
multi-channel marketing strategy and want repurposing of content. Examples of this are the use of hyperlinking
of articles, distributed use of icons associated with the branded directory rankings, and links to websites for traffic
generation. Increasingly the directories recognize their role in providing firms and individual lawyers greater
visibility online and have developed sophistication in SEO techniques that are part of their value to marketing and
business development in law firms.
Another role directory reviews have produced is the process of assisting firms in defining themselves in
the markets in which they operate. The strategic value of having an objective measure of performance against
competitiors in any given year has given Chambers a demand to analyze data collated from feedback to firms.
Legal 500 provides data gleaned from in-house interviews as part of its Client Intelligence product. These
developments point to the changes in perception of the value of directories and evolution of the publishers seeking
to add value to their paying customers.
19
