BUSINESS
CAREERS
LUIGI
BENETTON
Smartphone users habitually
check unread message counts.
Canny law firms can leverage that
common compulsion by putting
unread counts on their own smartphone apps, which are among
today’s most effective opt-in marketing tools.
Little wonder, given the increasing popularity of smartphones.
John Robinson quotes research
firm Gartner’s assertion that 80
per cent of North Americans will
carry smartphones by 2014 in Panvista Media Corp.’s white paper
Law Firms Going Mobile.
“In the legal space, that number
is closer to 100 per cent today,” says
Panvista’s marketing and strategy
vice-president.
The upshot? Increasing numbers of people will visit your firm’s
site from smartphones, and unless
you offer either an app or a version
of your website that is optimized
for the smartphone screen and
takes advantage of its hardware,
you’ll subject visitors to:
n;untold amounts of tedious
scrolling and zooming;
n;not being able to use smart-phone-specific hardware like GPS.
While they may be easier to
develop and maintain, mobile
websites don’t take full advantage
of smartphone hardware. (GPS,
for instance, could guide people to
a firm’s office in an unfamiliar city.)
Also, site traffic could diminish,
according to Panvista data that
suggests smartphone owners
return to apps more often than
they do to websites, and linger
longer while they’re there.
subscription basis. Clients get
ongoing maintenance, support
and any changes necessitated by
OS updates for a monthly fee.
Dhargalkar says Norton Rose, a
Panvista client, chose the second
route so it could budget for and
future-proof the app.
Neither Wood nor Dhargalkar
would share costs associated with
their firms’ apps (though Wood
claims “it was not expensive”).
views,” Panvista writes in its
white paper, “which means that
while Blackberries are more dif-
ficult to develop for, the return is
well worth the extra develop-
ment challenges.”
“For development purposes,
Blackberry has not made app cre-
ation an easy process,” the paper
explains. “There are currently 32
different (BlackBerry) devices that
vendors need to support and opti-
mize apps for. Each of these devices
requires a slightly different strat-
egy due to changing screen sizes
and hardware setups. App develop-
ment on this platform is extremely
fragile, but the resulting ability to
reach a very specific professional
audience makes it an attractive
marketing opportunity.”
Other platforms, like Google
Android and Windows Phone,
haven’t been as widely adopted
by businesses, so firms aren’t as
compelled to develop apps for
them (yet). App development
could be more difficult (and
costly) since multiple phone
manufacturers adapt the OS to
devices with different hardware,
screens and so forth, issues
which do not plague genera-
tions of Apple’s iPhone/iPod
Touch devices.
Mobile apps versus mobile sites
Stuart Wood, chief marketing
officer at Torys LLP, notes that the
firm will continue to maintain the
app (iPhone only) it produced in
2010.
“We’re comfortable with con-
tent-heavy marketing,” Wood says
of the business reasons for
developing the app. “We write
things like opinions on recent
developments in law, and we’re
always experimenting with differ-
ent ways of sharing that with our
clients.”
While Torys sees ever-larger
amounts of web traffic coming
from mobile devices, that traffic
comes from many types of devices,
so they’re migrating development
efforts to mobile versions of their
website. “We experimented with a
mobile site that looks like an app,”
Wood recalls. “We feel a lot is pos-
sible using a mobile version of our
website that would make it easier
for us to stay current with what-
ever devices are popular.”
What clients want
What does a firm shoehorn into
a smartphone app? Things that
clients, prospective clients, recruits
and referral sources want, like:
Sameer Dhargalkar admits that
even Norton Rose lawyers use its
recently released app to look up
colleagues elsewhere in the world.
“It starts up quickly, and they
always have their phones on them,”
says the director of business
development for Norton Rose OR
LLP. “It’s convenient.”
To improve the likelihood that
smartphone users will read a firm’s
new content:
n;apps can let people choose what
to download (e.g. content pertaining to certain practice areas, or
published by specific lawyers or
offices); and
n“app alerts” can show the
number of new items waiting to be
read within an app, and may exert
the same psychological tug on
smartphone owners as unread
message counts
Integrating apps into a firm’s
digital marketing strategy
Robinson recommends firms
set up digital marketing tools so
they need only post content in one
place to have it appear on all web
properties (e.g. regular web site,
mobile-optimized site, smartphone apps) rather than having to
post once per platform.
If your firm doesn’t have an app
but does publish its website using a
content management platform like
WordPress, you can find plugins
that publish your site in smart-phone-friendly formats.
Today’s mobile platforms
Firms primarily target Apple
Inc.’s iPhone and Research in
Motion Ltd.’s (RIM) BlackBerry.
Aside from being relatively easy
to develop for, increasing numbers
of lawyers carry iPhones for personal use in addition to work-issue
BlackBerrys.
But RIM remains regnant.
“The Blackberry accounts for
more than 75% of legal app page-
What does an app cost to build?
Some businesses view app
development as a one-time effort.
Others work with developers on a
Future of law firm apps
The Law Firm Mobile blog
documents emerging and potential trends in mobile apps from law
firms. Here are a few to watch for:
n;Apps can further both knowledge management and business
development. Consider the various
“Books of Jargon™” from U.S. firm
Latham & Watkins LLP, a series of
quick-loading reference “books” on
Corporate and Bank Finance, Project Finance and European Capital
Markets and Bank Finance.
n;Firms may create an app specific
to a client that both sides can use
to better collaborate on matters.
n;Tablets like Apple’s iPad and
RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook offer
richer environments than smartphones, so tablet apps may be on
the horizon. n
Law firms work on welcoming, accepting LGBT lawyers
DONALEE MOULTON
These days employee diversity
is key to a successful business. Law
firms are not interested in perpetuating the stereotype that they
are filled to the gills with white,
straight males. Firms are making
efforts to make sure lesbian, gay,
bisexual, and transgender (LBGT)
lawyers and staff are welcomed
and supported.
It’s not only the right thing to
do, it’s the smart thing to do. Creating a respectful workplace
attracts and retains both clients
and lawyers.
“Diversity has been on the TV
screens of most of the law firms,”
said Orysia Semotiuk, a partner in
McCarthy Tétrault LLP’s business
law group in Toronto. “For the
second year running, diversity has
been named one of [our] firm’s
four priorities.”
Just how important divers-
ity — and LGBT personnel — are to
the firm was evident earlier this
summer when it announced the
launch of the McCarthy Tétrault
Pride Network, believed to be the
first such organization at a national
law firm in Canada. There are five
objectives said Semotiuk, who
chairs the network.
