Larry Bodine's LawMarketing Blog

The Myth of Client Pain

I have to disagree with Michael McLaughlin, a principal with Deloitte Consulting LLP, when he blogs about "The Myth of Client Pain."  He is so wrong.  According to Mike:

"Sales literature is full of advice to find a client's "pain" as the first step to sales success. We're advised to ask prospective clients inane questions like: What keeps you awake at night? What are your pain points? And, if you had a magic wand, what problem would you solve? Please, spare me."

Mike says the pain approach "proclaim(s) that the consultant is fishing for answers" and "not all clients are looking for "pain" remedies. Maybe they want to raise the bar on overall company performance, or they just the need to improve some aspect of the business."

Boy is he missing the point.  He forgets that the typical professional firm goes to market by saying "me, me, me! Look at me! Our people are so smart, we have all these services to sell you, and have a history of our firm on our Web site."  Many professioanl firms market themselves by enegetic self-hyping, and doing all the talking and none of the listening.

The reasons to focus on a clients "pain" or "trauma" are that:

• You need to learn what the client needs, what is keeping them up a night.
• Clients only hire a law, accounting or management consulting firm when they have a personal and urgent problem that makes them need to hire you.  If you know a client's pain, then you know the trigger that will get you new business.
• If you ask questions about the client's business, they may tell you that they're borrowing to make payroll, or that their sales manager just quit and took the salesmen to a competing company, or that a crew from 60 Minutes is at the reception desk and they're demanding an interview.  This is all "pain."  Once you learn this information, you can offer a solution to their problem.

Sorry Mikey: no pain, no sale.

Compensating Sales Jobs

Many professional firms are starting to hire business developers (a.k.a. sales people).  The trend is so big that a convention for legal sales people will be held in Boston on June 13-15: LSSO's annual "Raindance" conference.  And I know from my own experience consulting for law, accounting and consulting firms, that they want to add business development to their marketing efforts.

The hangup every time in creating a sales position is "how do we compensate the sales person?"  I know of a business developer for a 10-person California law firm who is paid $150,000 plus a 10% bonus.  Most professional firms would choke on paying that much.  Often the partners' annual draw isn't that high.

I found on Harry Joiner's blog "Proven Ways to Get New Customers" a link to an excellent 8-page PDF that provides the answers.  Entitled "Determining the Right Salary / Incentive Ratio for Your Sales Jobs," the article is written by sales compensation experts Jerry Colletti and Mary Fiss, authors of Compensating New Sales Roles.

Click here to download Compensating Sales Jobs.

Click here to download the Worksheet "Factors Determining the Salary/Incentive Ratio"

The article reveals that the average compensation package is 70% salary, 30% bonus. But if the business developer has a significant influence on the client's buying decision, you should increase the bonus to a 50/50% mix.  Conversely, if the sales person in only one of many factors affecting the buying decision, a package with a 90/10% ratio is appropriate.

The article even goes so far as to analyze what personality types fit best given the nature and compensation of different sales jobs.  Recruiter Harry Joiner says the article is as good as anything you'll read in the Harvard Business Review.

Webinar: How To Keep Clients And Sell Them More Work

Invite your management and marketing committees to attend this live Web program On June 16. Your clients are your most precious professional asset. But it is tougher than ever to keep your clients, strengthen your relationship with them and find additional ways to serve them. Mike Cummings and I will show you the best practices in building client relationships, marketing to your clients and selling additional services.

Learn the best practices in building world class client relationships, marketing to your clients and selling additional services. Attend this Web seminar and learn how the best client account leaders in the professions excel. You will learn:

• What makes a company see you as a strategic advisor - and not just a good technician?
• What are the best ways to package and promote your idea for new services?
• What are the biggest relationship risks and danger signals?

Consider your most important client relationships and answer these questions:

1) Do your clients view you as a valued business advisor?
2) Are they open and eager to hear how you can serve them on a continuing basis?
3) What were the most important business results that you produced for them?
4) Do they go out of their way to provide you with referrals to new clients?
5) How do you stack up against their other professional advisors?
6) What is your step by step game plan to build your relationship with them?

All attendees who register before the early-bird deadline will get a FREE copy of 365 Marketing Meditations -- Daily Lessons for Marketing & Communications Professionals by Richard S. Levick and Larry Smith. "A quick read, or digested one day at a time as intended, it is filled with marketing insights that are often overlooked or just simply forgotten amidst our crazy daily workplace schedules" -- review in Professional Marketing magazine. If you register on or before June 9, 2005, you will not only get a $25 discount, you will also get a copy of 365 Marketing Mediations.

Date: June 16, 2005
Time:
Noon to 1:30 PM Eastern time
11 AM to 12:30 PM Central time
10 AM to 11:30 AM Mountain time
9 AM to 10:30 AM Pacific time
6 PM to 7:20 PM London time

Cost:
Don't hesitate. Get the early bird discount price of $250 US ($150 US for PM Forum Members) if you register on or before Thursday June 9, 2005 -- and get the free copy of 365 Marketing Meditations!

After June 9 the registration fee will be $275 US ($175 US for PM Forum Members).

Register:
Click here to register for this event online. Or contact Membership Director Laura Kresich -- 773.978.5558 or Lkresich@prodigy.net-- and she will be delighted to register you.

Topics Include:

1. How Clients View Their Relationships With You
2. How Buying Decisions Are Made
3. How Clients Determine If They Are Delighted With Your Service
4. The Client Relationship Hierarchy
5. The Threshold for Becoming A Personal Counselor or a Valued Business Advisor
6. Case Studies: The Best Practices Of Marketing To Your Clients
7. How To Identify Additional Service Opportunities
8. The Relationship Emotional Bank Account
9. How Quality of Relationships Impact Fees, Referrals and Sales of Additional Services
10. The Biggest Mistakes Professionals Make in Dealing With their Clients
11. How To “Sell” The Client On Expanding The Working Relationship

Each Attendee will *also* receive a copy of the Mastering Client Relationships Toolkit

For the past 20 years, we have trained and consulted with the best relationship managers in the professions. In addition, over the past year, we have conducted over 50 in-depth interviews with senior decision makers at both Fortune 1000 and middle market companies.

Put that knowledge to work with the Toolkit: Mastering Client Relationships – for Professionals. This 100-page toolkit takes you systematically through what you need to know and what steps you need to take for an effective Client Relationship Plan. It includes checklists and action planning tools to:

1. What Do Clients Value in Their Professional Advisors?

- Thinking Like the Client: First, you learn how to think like one of your clients; we guide you through an understanding of what clients value.
- The Relationship Hierarchy: Reviews the hierarchical qualities of Client Relationships from the client perspective and examines the hurdles you must overcome to rise to valued business advisor.

2. How Are You Doing with Your Current Clients?

- The Client Relationship Audit: Guides you to identifying who your most important clients are, where your risks are with them, and where you stand in the relationship.
- Brainstorming Missing Services: Takes you through a proven process for translating potential sources of business pain into opportunities for you.

3. What Actions Must You Take to Master Key Relationships and Sell More Services?

- Best Practices in Client Marketing: Reviews proven best practices options for marketing your value and capabilities to your top clients.
- The Action Plan: Our planning templates let you determine the specific steps you will take to master relationships with your most important clients.

After working with the Planning Toolkit you will completely understand the client perspective, identify specifically your most valuable and vulnerable clients, and then select the most appropriate actions to take...so you can sell more work, extend the relationship, and avoid losing the client in the future.

Click here to register.

A Lawyer Enters the Blogosphere

The ABA's Law Practice magazine will feature a year in the life of a brand new blogger in every other issue.  The idea is to identify a small firm or solo lawyer who will be willing to be our test pilot for a year.

We've asked Andrew Ewalt, a sole practitioner in Storrs, CT, to be the volunteer and the magazine appointed me to be his coach.  Andrew has agreed to launch and maintain a legal blog for at least one year.  You can find his blog at http://andrewewaltslawblog.blogs.com/.

Email me at Lbodine@lawmarketing.com and tell us what you think so far.  What could we be doing better? What steps have we missed?  How can we turn this blog into a client magnet for Andrew.

For Andrew, starting up was no sweat.  “It was easy.  I’m computer-savvy enough to see a button on line and click it to see what it does,” said the sole practitioner.  He also has a Web site at http://www.ewaltlaw.com/.

Even though he admits to spending 18 hours a day in front of a computer, Andrew is not a hair-tinted technogeek.  This is a serious lawyer who practices in probate & estate administration, life and estate planning, business law, taxation law, elder law, bankruptcy, and residential and commercial real estate.

However, I am a hair-tinted technogeek (and a lawyer to boot). I run all sorts of Web, listserv and online ventures, so I guess I qualify as the coach.

You'll see Andrew featured in the July/August issue of the magazine in a two-page spread. In each of the October/November 2005, January/February 2006, April/May 2006 and July/August 2006 issues the magazine will feature an update including:

1. Problems encountered (and solutions).
2. Lessons learned.
3. Outcomes and impact.

Many thanks to the effervescent and creative Merrilyn Astin Tarlton, Editor in Chief of Law Practice, for this assignment, and to Andy, for joining in this escapade.  Not only will we enjoy ourselves, but I plan to get him more business through the blog.

Who's Who? Who Cares!

There's been a hot discussion on the LawMarketing Listserv as to whether there's any value being in one of the "Who's Who" books.  The response has been a resounding NO.

There's Marquis Who's Who, Strathmore's Who's Who, Who's Who Online, Europa's International Who's Who, and so forth.  I responded, "Didn't it used to  be called "Wastemoremoney's Who's Who?"

"I'm assuming this is another listing that is unnecessary and carries no prestige," said Melissa L. Jones, Marketing Director of Babst, Calland, Clements and Zomnir, P.C.

Tom Kane chimed about a great article in Forbes FYI in March 1999 that debunked all of these "Who's Who" listings.  It's great ammo to show to a partner who need his prominence confirmed: http://www.forbes.com/fyi/1999/0308/063.html. "That article was a great help to me in staving off requests for lawyers' inclusion and references to "Who's Who" listings in the attorney bios when I was in-house," Tom said.

The article is great ammo to present to partners whose egos have caused them to be interested in "an honor that only a select few ever enjoy."  Being listed used to mean you had attained a significant achievement or position in your field. Not any more.  It turns out, anybody can get into Who's Who.  It now includes bowling coaches, gym teachers, undertakers, administrative assistants, landscapers and school nurses.  There are more than 100,000 entries in "Who's Who in America."

Of course, I can't remember ever looking up anybody in a Who's Who book, except for my own listing, which I first got when I was an Associate Editor at a bar association magazine.

The Who's Who publication's aren't picky about who gets into their books.  John Fox Sullivan, a member of a Who's Who board of advisors, told Forbes, "The reality is, I don't do anything."  So there are a lot of self-nominated people who haven't really accomplished much.  Nearly everyone who is nominated gets into the book. 

Afterwards the publisher works hard to sell you copy of the book for $749 ($1,595 for the Web version), and a mahogany wall plaque for $99, crystal desktop ornaments for $149, crystal bookends for $349, silver charm bracelet for $129, lapel pin for $64, Bulova watches for $195, or a leather briefcase for $199.

Whenever I saw someone touting their inclusion in Who's Who, I immediately thought "what a pathetic loser" or "what an insecure egomaniac."

If a law firm were run like Southwest

Deborah Ackerman, VP and GC of Southwest Airlines, described what a law firm would be like if it were run like SWA.

Remember that SWA has high employee productivity, low turnover, high morale, and flies 64 million passengers to 60 locations. The last time I flew on Southwest, it was great. The Chicago to Las Vegas flight had attendants wishing passengers happy birthday and passengers all singing along together. It was a fun flight.

Ackerman said a law firm run like SWA:

• Would be the low-cost producer
• Focus on clients as customers and not as a legal matter
• Have no layoffs
• Have an annual chili cook-off
• Have a tradition of fun. Halloween is a major holiday at the headquarters, and everyone comes to work in a costume, including the CEO.
• Relax the dress code.
• Be family-oriented. There is no expensive artwork on the walls of SWA. Instead there are pictures of employees with their families, pets and hobbies.
• Display "brag boards" everywhere where employees can put up notes about their own and their kids' accomplishments. Have many employee recognition programs.
• Establish an Employee Catastrophic Fund to help employees in cases of an uninsured loss or serous illness.
• Communicate in a timely fashion to employees.
• Senior partners give hugs and praise from to staff as a daily occurrence.

OK, this is a total fantasy. There will never be a law firm run like Southwest Airlines, because law firms care about partner profits, not employee happiness. The employees are there to serve the partners and help the firm make more money. Law firm goals are to move up the chart of the AmLaw profitability tables.

So call me a curmudgeon: there will never be a law firm run like Southwest, but we can dream.

2 Days Left to Register: Webinar on How to Build Your Professional Reputation

Early-bird discount extended!

Because of a glitch our online registration form, some people were unable to register online. We found the bug and fixed it. As our makegood to you, we are holding the price at $275 US ($250 US for PM Forum Members).

You have two ways to register:

Click here to sign up now for this event on the Web. the program is in two days

Contact Membership Director Laura Kresich -- (Tel) 773) 978-5558, (Fax) 773) 978-5558 or  Lkresich@prodigy.net -- and she will be delighted to register you.

FACULTY: Larry Bodine and Michael Cummings
DATE: May 19, 2005 (this Thursday); Noon - 01:30 PM (Eastern time)
LOCATION: On the Web
TO REGISTER: Contact Laura Kresich at (Tel) 773) 978-5558, (Fax) 773) 978-5558 or Lkresich@prodigy.net

What you will learn:

This seminar is Part Two of our earlier program, "Composing Your Personal Marketing Plan for 2005," which attracted 200 attendees. In Thursday's program, you will learn how the best business generators achieve the status of a celebrated expert. You will learn both WHAT to do and HOW to do it. You will know how to build your reputation on a step by step basis.

ALL ATTENDEES will receive a FREE copy of Best Practices in Personal Branding, a PDF book. This valuable reference co-authored by Michael G. Cummings reveals the secrets of: Building Your Reputation Through Public Speaking Building Your Reputation Through Writing Articles Creating Your Personal Marketing Plan and Management System Getting Outside Help How To Create Brochures That Sell How To Use Newsletters Effectively How To Get Press Releases Published How To Create Advertising That Makes Money Getting Clients Through Direct Marketing How To Conduct Seminars That Result In New Business How To Use Trade Shows To Reach A Target Market How To Create A Brand That Gets Clients In The Door Leveraging The Power Of The Web To Build Your Practice Developing A Firm Marketing Plan Starting Or Re-invigorating A Marketing Function

1. Defining your personal brand and professional reputation
2. Using the notion of client “trauma” to define your marketing messages
3. Multiplication Marketing: Building your professional reputation using multiple marketing channels
4. Creating your personal marketing arsenal
5. Case study of a complete personal marketing campaign
6. How to market your clients
7. Stimulating word of mouth marketing
8. Speaking and conducting seminars to sell business
9. How to write articles and get published
10. How to write “letters/e-mails” that sell business
11. The essentials of leveraging the Web

Clients don't want generalists, they want to hire celebrated experts. Learn how to build your professional reputation and attract new business and new revenue.

Time: Noon to 1:30 PM Eastern time
11 AM to 12:30 PM Central time (observing daylight savings time)
10 AM to 11:30 AM Mountain time
9 AM to 10:30 AM Pacific time
6 PM to 7:20 PM London time

Click here to register for this event online. Or contact Membership Director Laura Kresich -- (Tel) 773) 978-5558, (Fax) 773) 978-5558 or Lkresich@prodigy.net-- and she will be delighted to register you.

How would you like to have your ideal prospective clients routinely seeking you out?

Are your prospective clients “pre-sold” on working with you based on their knowledge of your expertise, credentials and track record?

How can you stand out from the crowded professional field and separate yourself from the competition?

What are you doing on a consistent, systematic basis to build your reputation in the business community?

Building your personal brand: The top producers in the professions tend to be celebrated experts in their selected fields of expertise. They know that their personal brand and professional reputation are precious business building assets. So, they invest time, build their marketing skills and proactively, consistently and systematically build the kind of reputation that makes money – by leveraging the full compliment of personal marketing tools at their disposal.

The good news is that you can become a celebrated expert – by employing the best practices in personal marketing in the same way that the rainmakers do. The bad news is that most professionals either don’t proactively build their reputation or fail the use all the tools at their disposal.

Don't hesitate. The program is coming up in two days.

Click here to sign up for this event online. Or contact Membership Director Laura Kresich -- (Tel) 773) 978-5558, (Fax) 773) 978-5558 or Lkresich@prodigy.net-- and she will be delighted to register you.

Market Yourself with Postage Stamps of Your Pets

According to Tim Stanley, Stamps.com Photo Stamps are coming back. The URL is http://photo.stamps.com. 

PhotoStamps let you take your own photographs and turn them into real U.S. postage. To create PhotoStamps all you need to do is upload a photo, customize it using their easy-to-use interface, then place your order. Stamps.com, the company behind PhotoStamps, has been a USPS-approved provider of on-line postage since 1999.

Online, Tim shows some examples of Little Sheba his "Hug Pug" (http://hugpug.com) stamps from when photo stamps were available last
year: http://www.hugpug.com/sheba/sheba_stamps/.  I have to say, Tim is a mighty lovesome for his pug, but they are awful cute.

It's a relatively inexpensive way to market your firm (or puppy) through the use of Official US Postage Stamps.  I myself have no puppy, but I do have an African Gray parrot and a Greenwing Macaw.  What do you think -- should I use Harry the Macaw?

Companies Spend $500 Million Annually on Web Analytics

Spending on Web analytics will reach more than $500 million by 2006, according to JupiterResearch.  That includes many smart law, accounting and management consulting firms.

The statistic comes from an article in CMO, a magazine for corporate and product marketers.  The magazine says that most large companies shell out significant amounts of cash annually on Web analytics tools.

Refined Web analytics help marketers create a better client experience on professional firm Web sites, and can tell marketers:

• The results of markeing campaigns that involve the Web site.
• How many visitors went to a site shopping cart, but abandoned it before ordering.
• Return on investment, such as the percentage of visitors who signed up for a firm newsletter or admission to a firm seminar.

The article mentions WebTrends, a Web traffic analysis program that I tried and do not recommend.  Instead, take a look at what strategic consultant Tyrone Mowatt recommends in his article "Web Analytics: How well are you doing if you can’t gauge your progress?" on the LawMarketing Portal.

The point is that Web analytics will tell you how to tune up your Web site so it generates more leads and operates as a real marketing vehicle.  In 2002, Royal Appliances relaunched the Web site for its Dirt Devil line.  After reading scenario analysis reports from a Web analytics program, DirtDevil.com's conversion rate jumped from 12-15% to 20-23%.  Similarly, the president of the custom gift site Personal Creations, spent 30 minutes to an hour every day to view the latest analysis of activity on their Web site.  They fine-tuned the site--for example, reversing the order of the billing and shipping pages--and pushed the conversion rates up by 25%.

Tyrone Mowatt will analyze the Web logs of the LawMarketing Portal for the past three years.  The site already gets 50,000 unique visitors per month, which I am delighted with, but I'm always looking for ways to improve.  Web analytics work.

Enter Now to Be In The PM Forum/MLF 50

Now is the time to send in your entry form to be on The PM Forum/MLF 50.  This will list the Top 50 Law Firms in the areas of Marketing and Communications.  The list will be published in a Special July/August issue of Marketing The Law Firm and online on the PM Forum North America Web site.

Criteria for Selection

Law firms of 100 attorneys or more are eligible to enter.  Each firm will be required to write an essay of 750 words total (segmented by topic, e.g., if you are describing a marketing strategy, please begin your description with the category subheading—in this case “Marketing Strategy”) describing their marketing and communications program.  The following criteria will be used to evaluate each firm:

• Marketing Strategy—Formal plan (i.e., needs assessment, overall firm plan, target industries, practices area plans, proposal strategy for major engagements and new-business pipeline reports, cross marketing, individual marketing plans); an example of a success including implementation and cost; whether or not a yearly budget is created and the criteria used in creating the plan with line item examples; and examples of major new initiatives.

• Results—measurable return-on-investment in specific efforts, how expenditures on specific strategies and tactics resulted in new matters, clients or additional profits.

• Marketing Department—Staffing including “who does what” and why; size of staff; deployment of staff; CMO/Director reporting requirements; committee (if applicable); process for integrating new professionals in to the team retention efforts; professional development opportunities for the marketing staff; ratio of professionals to lawyers; and cutting-edge positions

• Communications/Public Relations/Media Relations—State objectives, strategies, planning and implementation. Where possible demonstrate integration with marketing programs. Tie results achieved to planned objectives.  Estimate budget and whether internal or public relations agency resources spearheaded the efforts. Emphasize sustained efforts and proactive approaches to communicating with target audiences using internal and external communications to influence the visibility, image and reputation of the practice or firm. Describe specific ways external and internal communications strategies were used to demonstrate the knowledge of individual practitioners and /or firm. Explain ways your firm develops ongoing relationships with the news media to stimulate media inquiries, interviews, bylined articles, case histories, speaker platforms, seminars, trade shows and community involvement. Include examples of how your firm uses its website, internal communications, web conferences, e-zines, blogs, etc. Quantify/measure results achieved contrasting pre and post program conditions

• Commitment--Marketing requirements for partners and associates, training programs, percentage of gross revenue as applied to marketing; participation of marketing partner on governing body of firm.

• Advertising and Visual Communications—Approach, implementation and one example of a return on investment.

• Web site and firm blogs—Development, look and feel, leads and clients from visitors and clients, increase in traffic or search engine ranking.

• Client Service Programs— goal setting, client service teams, client surveys, metrics and ROI.

• Outreach—Community activities, pro bono and diversity programs that utilize marketing strategy and communications.

Submissions are due by June 3, 2005.  All submissions should be sent via email only to Elizabeth Anne “Betiayn” Tursi, Editor-in-Chief, Marketing The Law Firm at elizabethtursi@aol.com.  Any collateral materials accompanying the essay must also be in a format that can be transmitted via email.  No entries will be accepted that are sent via mail or fax to Law Journal Newsletters.

The PM FORUM/MLF 50 Advisory Board will review all submissions.  After a thorough and complete review of each submission, the Advisory Board will discuss the merits of all entries and then begin the process of creating the PM FORUM/MLF 50.  The final list will be published in a special July/August issue of Marketing The Law Firm and on the PM Forum North America Web site, at www.PMForumNA.org.

MLF Advisory Board

• Co-Chair, Elizabeth Anne “Betiayn” Tursi, Editor-in-Chief, Marketing The Law Firm/Founder and Director Law Journal Newsletters Web Audio Conference Division
• Co-Chair, Larry Bodine, Executive Director, PM Forum North America
• Jay Jaffe, President and CEO, Jaffe Associates, Inc., Washington, D.C.
• Eva Wisnik, President, Jennifer Johnson, Director of Recruitment and Special Projects, Wisnik Career Enterprises, Inc., New York City
• Robert Wilson, Owner, Wilson Associates, Dallas, Texas
• Jack Ruane, Principal, Transform Group, Wheaton, Illinois
• Andy Havens, President, Sanestorm Marketing, Columbus, Ohio.

I.P. Blog Wins Business Award – and New Clients

The law firm of Dunlap, Codding & Rogers is a little unorthodox. First, they specialize in intellectual property law, but aren’t headquartered in New York or Silicon Valley. Instead, this 18-person firm makes its home in Oklahoma City, OK—hardly a hotbed of technological innovation.

Another peculiar thing about Dunlap, Codding & Rogers is that they’ve got a popular “blawg.” Companies that blog are still the exception to the rule. Law firms—those staid, old world institutions—that blog are nearly unheard of.

The blog at Dunlap, Codding & Rogers is called PHOSITA. The name comes from a legal acronym relating to patents: “Person having ordinary skill in the art.” The blog was started in late 2003 by Douglas Sorocco, a partner and patent attorney at the firm.

PHOSITA was recently voted best law blog for the Business Blogging Awards, a kind of online Oscars for the corporate blogging community. These kind of online awards can serve as valuable traffic-builders for blogs. As a result of its victory, PHOSITA visitors have increased roughly 60% in the last two months. With growth like that, this Oklahoma law firm may not remain small for long.

To read the entire article from the May issue of Professional Marketing magazine, visit the PM Forum Web site.

Don't Be Fooled by Law Firm Hype

This is the alarum from Nat Slavin, publisher of Corporate Legal Times, in his column on page 6 of the May 2005 issue for all those gullible corporate general counsel out there.

"..you should be asking yourself: Is the firm overselling itself? Most likely the answer is yes," Nat writes, underscoring the irresistible power we sly and craft marketing folk exercise.

He rings a warning bell that law firms will even claim they offer one-stop shopping, if that will close the sale.  "If you are looking for a firm with expertise in a specific area of the country, the same partners will argue that their roots are in that region," he writes, exposing those cunning lawyers.

Corporate Legal Times is filled with law firm advertising, so he knows what he's talking about.  The monthly magazine has a circulation of 40,000 in-house counsel and others in the legal profession, according to their BPA statement.  Readers include 13,585 General Counsel/Vice President/Chief Legal officers who are no doubt easily blinded by law firm marketing.  Another 20,688 readers are other in-house counsel, presumably easily-misled underlings.  Nat has seen the cagey and clever tactics marketing tactics in print in his own magazine.

He does offer some practical tips on what to look for in a law firm, and I strongly recommend that you sly professional marketers take heed:

1. Ask for concrete examples of what the law firm has done.
2. Demand how the bells and whistles the firm is offering will help with your problem.  Find out if the value added features (extranets, newsletters, seminars, etc.) really matter.  "If the firm won't answer you questions, the go hire the firm down the street," Nat says.
3. Fill out those client surveys the firm is sending you.  And be honest with the he firm. Furthermore, follow-up and find out what the firm is doing to address your concerns.
4. Develop a preferred provider network.  Only hire the firms approved by the network. Groups of feeble little corporations can create a network more powerful than any single company.
5. Demand price breaks. Just because the corporation isn't giving the firm mountains of work, ask for a discount anyway.  Just because.

Nat generously invites you to let him know what you think by emailing him at nat@cltmag.com.

To be the No. 1 Blogger on the Web, first Work in a Camera Store

What's the secret to becoming the No. 1 best-read corporate blogger on the Web?  According to Robert Scoble, whose blog gets an astounding 3.5 million visitors per month, you must first work in a camera store and treat customers right.

Scoble was the keynote speaker at the conference "Blogging Goes Mainstream: Is Your Company Ready?" presented today in New York by the Business Development Institute.  The May 3 event attracted 150+ attendees who were corporate PR professionals, corporate marketers, PR professionals, bloggers (at least 50) and the media.

If you would like to listen to the event online, the webcast will be archived for 120 days, thanks to the Business Development Insitute and PR Newsire. You may click here to listen at any time http://www.videonewswire.com/event.asp?id=28562.

"Blogging is newest technology to help people communicate better, like the telephone," said Steve Etzler, a BDI founder.  "Blogs allow big companies like Microsoft and Chrysler provide an interactive platform with a human face on it, humanizing the company.  The communications process being turned on its head.  Good riddance to the old spin-doctor press release, and hello to the honest bloggers out there telling the truth."

Scoble is a "technology evangelist" for Microsoft and his Scobleizer blog has singlehandedly changed the face of MSFT from Darth Vader to his cheery, blond, bespectacled face.  Though a company employee, his blog is so powerful that he can criticize the company CEO, Steve Ballmer in public, and get away with it.   I spoke on a panel with Bob and told him in front of the crowd that he is so well-known, that not even Bill Gates can risk firing him.

How did reach such ethereal heights among the 1,500 bloggers who work for Microsoft?  It began when he worked in a camera store in Silicon Valley and said nice things about his main competitor.  Scoble also memorized the products and prices of his own store and his competitor.  He was an expert on cameras and would tell customers his price and his competitor's prices.  "The fact that I was an authority on the marketplace got more people to come back to my store.  They trusted me," he said.  "Being an authority means you tell the whole story. 

"I went to a winery in Sonoma Valley, and asked where else I should go.  The owner of the store created a whole map for me; I came back that night and bought a case of wine from him.  He was somebody who was excited about his product and treated me like a human being,  as opposed to someone to be marketed to."

Those are the principles he applies to his blog.  He posts from 5 to 20 times a day, and his target audience is computer geeks. "I write in a blink style, right from the head and it comes out," he said. 

After a stint with the Userland Software blogging company, he got hired by Microsoft.  Before he started out he wrote his "Corporate Weblog Manifesto."  "I wrote it as a note to myself, to remember my principles," he said.

He started out quietly, writing safe posts on topics the company wanted publicized.  Then he took some risks, and even criticized some Microsoft products.  "I did some things that I apologized for later," he said.  Luckily, MSFT has a culture that tolerates dissent and he kept his job.  He also never made stupid mistakes to get himself fired, like disclosing company financial information (like Mark Jen, ex-Google) or putting up racy pictures (like ex-Delta flight attendant Ellen Simonetti) or describing the drunks at the office holiday party (like Heather Armstrong of dooce.com).

"I was building a relationship network that will keep me employed.  It's a way of starting a new conversation and take the company in a new direction.  There's a lot of benefits from getting into this new blog world."

"Corporate culture is viewed by many as a line you cannot step over.  But actually it's a membrane that you can push," he said.  "You can push it and it'll snap back.  If you have a relationship network that's holding you in place, you won't get pushed back and you will change the corporate culture."

And he succeeded.  He changed the corporate culture at Microsoft, changed its public image and made himself the top corporate blogger in the country.