The Write Rainmaker

Forget Everything You Learned in Law School About How to Write

I have read probably thousands of pages of briefs and motions in my 28 years in the legal profession and in all that time, I’ve had to drink a lot of caffeinated beverages to avoid falling asleep. (Well… except for the cases regarding accusations of sexual harassment. Those briefs were usually pretty interesting.)

Attorneys learn in law school that it’s important to argue the merits of a case with the latest case law cites, using clear and cogent arguments, and being as dry and factual as possible. Nobody wins by making the judge laugh, usually.

However, writing for a website or for the internet means that an attorney has to appeal to a wider audience. (If all of your clients are other attorneys, or all your cases are referred by other attorneys, you can stop reading now, thanks.)

The main rule for persuasive writing is: Know your audience.

Your website needs to be considered one long piece of persuasive writing, because it is – it’s supposed to persuade potential clients to pick up the phone and call you.

Since I started writing for attorney websites several years ago, I have encountered a lot of resistance to the notion that attorneys need to alter their writing style to appeal to more folks. I have worked around attorneys for years and speak Legalese, but I spend most of my free time with non-attorneys, so this seemed crystal clear to me.

I was working for an attorney a few years ago who really didn’t believe me when I told him he needed to cut the legalese and write for normal people, when it came to his website. I think he didn’t even understand my use of the word “normal” because his normal was so different from mine. He was married to an attorney. He socialized with attorney friends. He talked to attorneys, paralegals, and legal secretaries all day in the office. He spent very little time conversing with or writing to non-legal professionals. He had forgotten that there is a huge world out there filled with people who do not understand attorney-speak, a/k/a Legalese.

I worked at a newspaper years ago and I will always remember the Managing Editor telling me that most newspapers are written for a fifth grade reading level. That's because they want to appeal to the widest possible readership.

There is an aphorism I like a lot and it goes like this: People will forget what you say. They will forget what you do. They will never forget how you make them feel. If your website is full of long sentences, long paragraphs, and big words, you run the risk of making people feel stupid.

To be more precise: if a non-lawyer reads your website or blog and the main emotions they feel are negative, they will stop reading. If they have to read a very long sentence with 3 dependent clauses and a lot of multi-syllable words they are going to feel frustrated and/or angry about having to grab a dictionary or stop and Google the long words. They may have to read the sentence twice, slowly, to grasp the actual meaning.

Also, if your paragraph has more than 6 sentences and looks like a big block of words, many readers will not even attempt it.

So… if you make people feel that they must wade into a bunch of words, and really work intellectually to grasp the meaning, they usually won’t. They will go back to their Google search and go to the next lawyer website, and see if that one makes them feel intelligent or if it makes them feel stupid.

Writing online is not formal. You can have a paragraph with one sentence.

You can use italics to make a point.

Unlike a pleading, you can stick in photos in the middle of your article - and you should.

And you can start a sentence with AND. You can write sentence fragments, to make a point. Just don’t go too far off the reservation.

A website with grammatical or usage errors - which are all too common – looks bad. This is a sentence I pulled off an attorney website:

As your cases progresses, it will be presented to the team as new issues arise and critical events occur.

Awkward? Yep. There is also a noun/verb agreement error, “cases… it.” But that’s just one example of stupid errors I’ve seen on the first page of a law firm website. Here’s another one.

If an attorney leaves who is a name partner, fix the entire website. For instance, your firm is called Smith Johnson & Harrison. Mr. Harrison leaves. The firm becomes Smith & Johnson. Yet, all the website articles refer to “Smith Johnson & Harrison.” For instance: “At Smith Johnson & Harrison we are dedicated to helping you get the compensation you deserve.” A potential client will read that and think, where is this Mr. Harrison? It looks sloppy and unprofessional.

 

The optimum way to write for your website or blog is to make sure you know your audience, and write for them, in a clear and appealing way.

Since the first page of your firm website is that first impression most potential clients get, it’s super important that the main emotions you evoke in the reader are not puzzlement or annoyance. How to know what emotions are evoked? Easy. You don’t have to hire a marketing firm to help you with this. Just ask 5 friends who are not attorneys [and not your employees] to take a look at your website and tell you their impressions, in an honest and constructive way. You may be surprised by what you hear.

You need to periodically check and re-check your website copy and your blogs to make sure you are not using Legalese and you are writing clean, concise, easily understood prose. Make sure the keywords don’t make the prose sound twisted. Correct any grammar, punctuation, or usage errors.

These steps will pay off in the long run.

Make Friends With Social Media

I have worked for a lot of attorneys over the years and I have not seen one attorney in recent years who didn’t use their computer heavily. Sometimes, the computer takes over an attorney’s life.

I remember some years ago when Blackberries were the newest thing and a young attorney in my office dubbed his the “Crackberry.” He didn’t want to miss any messages from his supervising attorney because he wanted to make partner asap.

If you are old enough to have a child past the age of 12 you probably have heard yourself saying “No, you can’t sit at the dinner table with your phone next to your plate. Put it away.” (I have a 17 year old son, so I say this fairly often, unfortunately.)

My point is simply this: if you’re checking messages and emails and on the computer [iPad, iPhone. Etc.] all the time anyway, why can’t you post something on the firm Facebook page, or Tweet, or post on LinkedIn, every couple of days?

Let’s say you are in a small firm and your firm has a Facebook page. After you invite all your friends and your partners invite all their friends to “Like” the page, then what?

Learn to think in terms of Twitter and Facebook and what is going on in the firm and in the world outside. Read a couple of online newspapers every day. Be aware of what’s happening not just with your cases, but in the firm at large.

Look for articles that touch on what your firm does, and post links to the articles on the Facebook page and your Twitter feed.

For instance, if you do family law, post a link to a story about celebrity divorce.

Here are some more ideas: Somebody’s assistant had a baby? Post “Welcome to the world Barney Xavier Smith!” and a photo (with permission, of course).

New carpet in the conference room? Post a photo of it and a comment like “Love the new red carpet and it matches my eyes!”

Just won a big case? Post a brief synopsis and how much the jury awarded.

Make your Facebook page interesting and/or FUN. Yes, even if you do only wills and estates, it is possible to make your page fun.

Example: My dad was a trust banker who did estate planning. He would come home and tell us about his oddball customers all the time. One time, he had a customer who wouldn’t answer her phone, so he got concerned and went to her apartment, only to find she had been dead for several days. In summer. If he had had a Twitter account he could’ve tweeted “Good day to not eat anything else. I need to lose a few lbs. anyway.”

Another time, he had a man come into the bank and say his father had passed away and left a fortune but nobody could find it, or the will. Dad got in the car and drove up to the old shack where the man lived, way out in the country, and found the man’s money, in cash, under the mattress. Dad grew up in a tiny rural town and knew how country folks generally felt about bankers. If Facebook had existed in 1978 he could’ve posted an entry on Facebook like this:

Five Reasons My Bank is a Better Place to Store Money Than Your Mattress

1. Your mattress doesn’t pay interest.
2. There are no pretty tellers anywhere near your mattress.
3. In the bank, nobody will have to use a box cutter to get to your money.
4. No bedbugs in our bank vault, promise.
5. Your crazy uncle Jedediah can’t get to your money when it’s in our vault.

 

There is nothing wrong with using humor to attract attention. Attorneys aren’t generally known as being comedians, but think about it: you want your clients to like you and recommend you to their friends? Then lighten up.

True story: when I worked at my first paralegal job we had a partner who was in his 70’s. One day I was in the breakroom laughing, and he came in and said “This is a LAW FIRM. We don’t LAUGH here.” He was totally serious. Of course, all his clients were insurance companies. You get the picture.

Let’s say you are a real estate attorney. Go volunteer at Habitat for Humanity and actually build a house. Write about the experience. That’s worth a blog post, and a Facebook mention. Maybe even a few Tweets, i.e. “Just learned that a screwdriver is also a tool, not just a drink. Good to know. Didn’t bring any orange juice anyway.”

Charity events like that, or like a 5K Fun Run, are excellent ways to network. Wear a firm tee shirt to the event. Don’t have a firm tee shirt? Get one. Stick some business cards in your pocket.

Get an Instagram account and make photos of yourself at the charity events. Post those on Facebook and Twitter, too.

This is a link to Buzzfeed. There are a million interesting/funny/silly stories on there. Post links to Buzzfeed stories.

Are you a sole practitioner? Post a funny photo of yourself from your younger years. It will make you seem more human and approachable. [Just don't post that one of you passed out at a frat party...]

Still wary of Facebook and Twitter? Ask your teenager how to use those sites. Or borrow the neighbor’s teenager. They can show you everything practical you need to know in 10 minutes.

My point is simply this: there is no need to feel like Facebook and/or Twitter are the enemy. Get your name and your firm name on the internet as much as possible, and watch your rankings in the search engines go up.

...and just to make you feel better, here's my geeky self as a teenager - don'tcha LOVE the glasses?! I could never get my hair to do the 70's side flip either...

Attorney Popularity on the Worldwide Web

Years ago, when attorneys weren’t allowed to advertise, their main form of “client development” was socializing with potential clients, which included time on the golf course. Any associate who didn’t play golf had to learn, or be left behind by the “old boys club.”

Mini golf didn’t count. (That fact alone explains why I never went to law school.)

I know this because I’ve been working in law offices as a paralegal since 1985. I remember being puzzled by the fact that lawyers couldn’t advertise.

The world has changed a lot since I started work in a bad 80’s perm, wearing a dress with linebacker shoulder pads.

When I started as a paralegal I didn’t even have a computer on my desk.  In my last regular paralegal job [before becoming a full-time writer] I had a computer with two widescreen monitors and my own scanner.

The world has changed a bit in the last 28 years.

Whether your potential client is a small business owner or an individual, they are likely on the web, every day. They are Facebooking, and Tweeting, and Instagramming. They are all about LinkedIn and Pinterest.

You may leave work and avoid the computer like the plague the rest of the day, but your typical client probably doesn’t.

Your potential client gets t-boned on Peachtree Street, guess what they do?

They grab their iPhone or their iPad and they Google phrases like “Atlanta lawyer car accident” or “accident attorney.”

What if they need another type of attorney? They still turn to Google or Bing, if they don’t know any attorneys. They may type:

“I need a real estate lawyer in Cumming”

“bankruptcy help”

“Alpharetta divorce lawyer”

“Atlanta attorneys + CHEAP”

Now, who do you think it going to come up first in that type of search? Here’s a hint: if your law firm’s website went live three years ago and hasn’t been touched since, it won’t be your firm popping up first.

Marketing is something most lawyers do only grudgingly.  Let’s say you are a typical lawyer. You pose for a professional photo for the website, and write a brief bio that doesn’t mention anything interesting like the fact you have a bigger TV than anyone on your street, or you can make the best chili in Decatur, nope. It likely says you went to school and graduated 6^th in your class and you have represented blah blah and blah…

Your office manager sends the website guy your photo and bio, and you think whew, glad that’s done. Now I can get back to practicing law.

What most attorneys don’t realize, though, is the fact that they need to market not just their firms, but themselves. They need to be known in the cyber community.

The internet is constantly changing. New websites, new articles, new content is being added all the time, all day and all night.

The attorney who is going to come up first in that Google search? That will be the attorney who has taken the time to study ways to make sure they land at the top of the search heap.

There are lots of ways to make that happen.

Putting up a website and never adding new content is a huge mistake.  Ignoring SEO [search engine optimization] is worse.

SEO = Search Engine Optimization

SEO is critical to being found quickly on Google. Make sure whoever designed your website understands how to put in keywords – “car accident attorney” or “probate litigation specialists” or whatever – on page 1, and in the url, metadata, and page titles. Hire someone who really knows how to do that. Read the site before it goes live, though, and be sure the keywords don’t look awkward or stilted.

Your firm needs to be on Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, Twitter, and any listings of firms in your area.  Don’t know what to put on there?  How about this: Sit down and make a list of ten reasons why your firm is the best source of legal help for your clients. Tweet one reason every couple of days.

Do you read online legal publications? Why not comment on a story? Most commenters on blogs and websites are given the opportunity to put a url for their website.

What about your local newspaper, online? Most newspapers allow comments. Comment as an attorney and be sure to mention your firm. (I would avoid something too blatant like “Yeah, I saw this car on fire and thought WOW! That guy needs an attorney! Call me today at Dewey Cheatam and Howe.”)

Facebook is easy. For instance: you represent people injured in car accidents. Time Magazine runs a cover story on the newest safety equipment on cars and how it saves lives in an accident. Post a link to that story on your firm website, and say something about it.

The more your name is on the web, and the more the name of your firm is on the web, the better you will do in keyword searches.

Spending some time every week online, marketing, may not be as much fun as playing 9 holes and having a few beers afterwards. However, it can really pay off in the long run. Spend an hour online, Tweeting and Facebooking and commenting, then reward yourself with a round of golf.