Phillies Scoreboard at Citizens Bank Park Sometimes the subject matter for my marketing column just hits me…like when I’m driving down I-95 in Philadelphia and see one law firm billboard after another, after another, after another. It’s the Morgan & Morgan Effect—and I write about it in the January/February 2024 issue of Law Practice, entitled, of course, The Morgan & Morgan Effect. If you are blocked from reading the column behind the ABA paywall, it is provided below in its entirety ..read more

Is law firm leadership and law firm marketing synonymous? Or better yet, should they be? I try to answer that very question in the November/December 2023 issue of Law Practice, At the Intersection of Leadership & Marketing. Please note that if the ABA paywall prevents you from accessing this column, send me an email and I’ll forward you a copy. The leaders of most law firms—sometimes a managing partner, other times a management or executive committee—are often going to have first and final say on marketing and business development decisions. If not the strategies themselves, then often the ..read more

In the July 25, 2023 edition of Law360, reporter Aebra Coe writes on How Law Firms Can Capitalize On Marketing As Demand Lags. In my interview with her, we discussed what to do with lags in demand, and the best ways to guard against it. “As many law firms see business decline amid a sluggish economy, some may cut back their marketing budgets to save on costs, however marketing experts say now is actually an important time to double down and create new business opportunities,” writes Coe. Summer is also a good time for lawyers and their firms to focus on marketing and business development, as b ..read more

Pictured (L to R): Pam McDevitt, Tom Grella, Micah Buchdahl, Walt Karnstein, Andrea Hartley On May 18th, I had the privilege of being honored by the American Bar Association’s Law Practice Division with the Samuel S. Smith Award, recognizing an individual who has demonstrated outstanding lifetime achievement in the field of law practice management. Read the ABA’s press release here ..read more

The magazine for Temple Law School Alumni Thanks to Patrick Plunkett and Dean Rachel Rebouché at the Temple University Beasley School of Law for thinking of me in contributing the “Top 10 Tips” segment of the Spring 2023 issue of Temple ESQ. In Top 10 Tips for Attorney Marketing and Business Development, I try to boil down a lot of what I do into 10 pithy things totaling around 500 words—not an easy task. My tips are not rocket science. But as I often like to say, something is better than nothing. And if lawyers struggling to figure out how to market walk away with one thing for a to-do list ..read more

In serving as an issue editor for the Marketing-themed March 2023 edition of the American Bar Association’s Law Practice Today webzine, together with my co-issue editor Jason Marsh, we tried to put together a collection of articles that would prove both timely and informative. My article contribution, Marketing Your Practice in 60 Minutes or Less, is not rocket science. But people read this stuff (click bait? Perhaps?). And it is designed more to encourage doing something, rather than simply doing nothing. Sometimes I too should follow my own advice. We’re all busy. But if we can just carve ou ..read more

In my March/April 2023 marketing column in the American Bar Association’s Law Practice Magazine, I address the pros and cons of organizational involvement in Guilt by Associations. It should come as no surprise that I tout my ABA involvement as a core component of my own business development strategy. At some point, I decided I was going to go “all in” on ABA activity—and it has been beneficial on so many fronts. For me, as an attorney, I wanted to network with other lawyers. And because my own business and practice is national in scope, a broader-based organization made more sense. As a bonus ..read more

SNL’s Point-Counterpoint Perhaps, I’ve never (co) authored an article with a smaller potential audience than the great give-and-take on the bandied-about subject of Model Rule 5.5 under the Rules of Professional Conduct. In the November 2022 edition of the American Bar Association’s online webzine, Law Practice Today (LPT), together with Charity Anastasio of the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA), we debate the viability of a revision. In Point-Counterpoint:  The Likelihood of Revising RPC 5.5, we ask and answer the question – Is the Association of Professional Lawyers’ Pro ..read more

Marketing Column In the November/December 2022 marketing column in the American Bar Association’s Law Practice Magazine, Marketing Ethics Compliance Continues to Confound, I combine a number of business development topics into one. When writing my column, I often start by thinking about what “hot” areas I’m working on at the moment. In the 21 years-plus since launching HTMLawyers, I’d say most years that the bulk of law firm clients have been on the marketing and business development guidance side; a slight amount dedicated to my related but separate ethics practice. However, in recent years ..read more

The last few years of recruiting and hiring marketing staff for law firms has certainly been interesting. On the plus side, law firms continue to invest in marketing and business development personnel. Some might argue that it is even more important as we come out of COVID and start to connect and reconnect with clients, prospective clients, and referral sources. The law firms that have retained me have been wiling to make the proper investment to hire the right people. On the minus side, depending on geographic location (I’ve placed marketers in the MidAtlantic, Northeast, Midwest, and South ..read more