ALMResearchBlog

Data Content 09

I've just returned from a conference called Data Content 09 run by Infocommerce Group.  To oversimplify, the gist of the two day conference is how companies can use data to create new products, improve current products, collect additional data or license existing data for others to use.

Being in the research and marketing business - content is king.  I know you've heard that before, so have I.  What made me actually pay attention this time is the new ways companies are using different forms of data to enhance their businesses.  User generated content, was a big topic.  Customer reviews and self-submitted profiles continue to grow - and as one participant pointed out - as they grow, the volume of information that gets collected makes them more valuable, and actually drives more user generated content.  Mobile was another big topic.  It's amazing how many iphone apps exist, and even more amazing how many people pay for them and use them.  The question of the day was not "should we develop an iphone app?  it was "what iphone app should we develop?"

How does content relate to your law firm competitive intelligence and business development? 

Well think about your CRM system;  Are you using it to it's fullest?  Capturing as much information as possible on each contact and centralizing that data so that others in the firm with the same contact can append their info? Making them all search-able by practice area, geography, company, industry etc?

How about billing and collections?  Do you know what your realization rates are?  By practice?  Or office?  That information is available in the market to benchmark and compare.  (Full disclosure:  yes, that is a survey that we sell.)

Compensation is another area. And as the market continues to be difficult, many firms are looking at aggressive compensation plans based on performance metrics other than just hours billed. 

Bottom line is that there are plenty of places to look within a law firm, or company, to find information that will either help you run more efficiently, or will create new opportunities for business.

New E-Discovery Blog

As announced by Robert Ambrogi, a new blog, EDD Update, was recently launched by “an esteemed group of e-discovery and legal technology experts,” which is a joint project of ALM’s own Law Technology News and Law.com Legal Technology. Ambrogi cites LTN editor Monica Bay and Law.com Technology editor Sean Doherty in their welcome message: "Our concept of this blog is to provide a venue where we can post breaking news, key verdicts and judicial rulings, articles from Law.com and LTN, vendor press releases, and more -- and most importantly, where our expert authors will offer their fine-honed analysis and comments." Check it out

ABA Journal Website – News, Articles, Blawgs

If you haven’t checked it out yet, be sure to see the new ABA Journal Website, which went live in the last month. There are many options, depending upon what type of news-hound you are: a daily news feed, a blawg, a directory of blawgs, and the magazine in e-form. It’s like a whole new ABA.

Survey: Skadden is the Standard-Bearer, DC Firms Lag

According to this report from the blog of our sister publication in Washington, DC, Legal Times, a new survey report published by BTI Consulting Group reveals the unsurprising news that Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom is the standard-bearer among corporate law firms. BTI’s survey asked corporate counsel, among other things, what firms were getting the most work. Their research identified eight other firms as power players in the transactions market: Baker & McKenzie; Jones Day; Mayer Brown; McDermott Will & Emery; Sidley Austin; Simpson Thacher & Bartlett; Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz; and Vinson & Elkins. As for Washington-based firms, they aren’t leading the pack, the blog writer said.

Lawyers Without Borders Seeks Book Donations

Sabrina Pacifici sent out this announcement on her blog Be Spacific: Lawyers Without Borders is seeking donations of law books for courts and lawyers in Albania and Liberia. The law library of the Supreme Court of Albania in the capital of Tirana, which is accessed by judges, practitioners, and law students, is seeking English-language major treatises, hornbooks, and other publications focusing on American law and legal institutions. Donations to Albania should be sent to Paramount Stamping and Welding, 1200 West 58th Street, Cleveland, OH 44102, with a marking that reads, Attention: Peter Kole–LAW BOOKS. Another donor has underwritten the costs of shipping to Albania from that address.

The organization is also seeking donations for the University of Liberia Louis Arthur Grimes Law School, as well as for judges, students, and lawyers in Liberia. In particular, complete sets of the AmJur series are requested. These include any edition of AmJur, AmJur Forms, and AmJur Trials. These donations should be sent to Mr. Ray Fallon, Fallon Moving and Storage, 800 Marshall Phelps Road, Building 3, Unit A, Windsor, CT 06095, with a marking that reads, Attention: Lawyers Without Borders, Book Donation Project, Liberia.

The Am Law 200 Blogosphere

It’s inevitable. A new trend comes along, and someone has to then quantify it and analyze it. We love that tendency. Blogging has definitely caught on among The Am Law 200, according to Kevin O’Keefe of Real Lawyers Have Blogs. And in a recent post, O’Keefe presented an analysis of the trend. In State of the AmLaw Blogosphere, August 2007, he writes that “of the firms on the 2006 AmLaw list (the number was a few below 200, as mergers have consolidated firms since the list first published), 39 firms were blogging. From those 39 firms, we found a total of 74 blogs. 56 of these blogs were firm branded (meaning they had the firm's logo prominently displayed on the page). 18 were not branded, indicating that the lawyer was operating their blog independently of or at a distance from their firm.” Blog topics include a huge range of practice areas. A list of firms with blogs, and links to those blogs, are provided in this post.

2500 Marketers in the Am Law 100

According to a study called Career Journal: Looking at Law Firm Marketing Depts. in 2007, authored by Eva Wisnik and Jennifer Johnson, there are more than 2,500 marketers in the Am Law 100. The study, published in the ALM Media newsletter Marketing the Law Firm, is free to subscribers and $15 for non-subscribers, but was reviewed recently by Larry Bodine on his Law Marketing Blog. Bodine noted several “tidbits” of news that emerged from the study -- Marketing directors are hiring “specialists” who are ranked between the marketing coordinator and marketing manager positions. Firms are looking to hire “Proposal Center Managers” who oversee the RFP, pitch and proposal process, and track wins and losses.  Salaries for law firm marketers are also included in the study.

TGIF: Librarians Seem to Have the Most Fun

That’s what one would think if you follow the occasional “Friday Fun” blog postings on the Law Librarian Blog. One recent Friday Fun featured a Monty Python bit in which the off-beat comics hold a Librarian Job Interview. Another features a song called Librarians Don’t Die. It’s Friday. Have fun!

Best Law Firm Recruiting Sites

Bob Ambrogi’s “Web Watch” column, in the current issue of Law Technology News, he reviews the recruiting sites of Am Law 100 firms and concludes, “ while a handful of firms use the medium to full advantage, most take a remarkably humdrum approach, and some make surprisingly clumsy missteps.” In this month’s issue (August) Ambrogi looks at some of the more innovative recruiting pages.

Most impressive, he says, is Howrey’s “Bootcamp” site. Others that received positive reviews included White & Case, Ropes & Gray, Cadwalader, Kramer Levin, Akin Gump, Morrison & Foerster, Pillsbury Winthrop, McDermott Will,  Ballard Spahr and more. Read the review here to find out what makes these firms’ recruiting sites work. Next month's column Ambrogi says he’ll cover some of the flubs, dubs and missteps found in the recruiting pages of AmLaw 100 firms.

Survey of Library and Information Science Bloggers

Meredith Farkas of the Information Wants to Be Free blog is conducting a follow-up survey to the one she conducted in 2005 of library and information science bloggers. The purpose is to track demographic characteristics of the LIS blogosphere. As she puts it, if you consider yourself a “biblioblogger,” please consider taking the survey. For details, as well as a link to the results of the 2005 survey, click here.