In the past decade, the number of law firm rankings, lists and awards has exploded. Calls for submissions bombard lawyers and legal marketers — with new ones added seemingly every day.
Depending on the size of the firm, it can be a full-time job to find rankings, sort out the frauds and scams, choose which to go for and then draft winning nominations. This process can feel like a distraction — pulling focus from the core responsibilities of in-house legal marketers and the lawyers they serve. Yet, these rankings can be important for a firm’s overall marketing efforts.
That’s where we come in. Whether it’s deciding if a firm should undertake the time-consuming task of a Chambers submission, or submit a lawyer for the local business journal’s “rising star” lawyers list, we provide a strategic framework to help make sense of it all.
It’s all about the strategy
When confronted with the many law firm rankings, lists and awards, it’s tempting to submit to every last one in order to stay competitive. This is particularly true if rival firms are making those lists. That is not strategic, however, and will end up wasting everyone’s valuable time.
Just like our other work for law firms involving content marketing or public relations, we always start any rankings project with a sound strategy. Our experienced professionals ask questions about a law firm’s marketing goals, key audiences, differentiators and more — and that drives everything that comes next.
Finding the right lists and sorting out the frauds and scams
Armed with our strategy, we then assist clients with the task of sorting through opportunities to identify which ones tick the right boxes. We then track those and alert clients well in advance of due dates and provide submission guidelines and criteria.
We also identify frauds and scams masquerading as legitimate opportunities. Clients frequently forward us emails from “awards” that are really just money grabs, and we advise on whether they are legitimate and worthwhile pursuing. Having our strategy in place helps with this, too, as we almost always have identified the legitimate opportunities well in advance.
Preparing a knock-out submission
Drafting a law firm ranking, list or award nomination is both art and science. It’s also more than just meeting the basic criteria. That’s where you start, but you also have to take into consideration who’s reviewing submissions, how many they have to sort through, what other nominees are likely to focus on and more.
It’s also important that each submission tells a story. It’s this narrative that provides a reviewer, editor or awards committee member a path through the nomination and calls to their attention exactly the details they need. We do the work for them so our clients shine. This is something that firms often miss when preparing submissions, and it can count against them.
Our experience speaks for itself
In our years of doing this work, members of the Reputation Ink team have worked on every legitimate law firm ranking, list and award. Some of these include:
- American City Business Journal (Bizjournal) local lists and rankings (40 Under 40, Rising Star Lawyers, Women of Influence, Best of the Bar)
- Benchmark Litigation
- Best Lawyers in America
- Chambers and Partners
- Florida Trend Legal Elite
- Law360 lists (Practice Groups of the Year, MVPs of the Year, Rising Stars)
- Lawdragon
- Legal 500
- Martindale-Hubbell
- Regional legal trades (Texas Lawyer, Crain’s New York, Daily Journal, New York Law Journal, Business Alabama, Daily Business Review and more)
- Super Lawyers
- The National Law Journal lists and awards (“Trailblazers” series, Pro Bono Hot List, Midsize Hot List)
- The American Lawyer lists and awards (Legal Department of the Year, Dealmakers of the Year)
- Vault
- Working Mother’s “Best Law Firms for Women”
Reputation Ink will calm your rankings chaos
If you want to bring order and strategy to the law firm rankings, lists and awards process, we can help! Members of our experienced team have spent decades taking away the stress, worry and drudgery of this task. So, get in touch and let us help you.