Connecting Lawyers With People, For Good, Since 2003

“Connecting lawyers with people, for good, since 2003,” feels like a much nicer – or least more mature – mantra than “We build blogs for the lawyers.” The latter from when we kicked things off at LexBlog in November, 2003.

The Internet is about connecting with people in a real and intimate way. Always has been, always will be.

There’s no such thing as differentiating between a “virtual world” and a “face-to-face” world.” One world, different mediums of engagement. Engagement leading to intimate relationships of trust.

The last two weeks I heard again about the latent legal market in the United States. First at Clio Con and this week at LMA Annual.

Depending on the survey, seventy-five to eighty-five percent of people with a legal issue – and who may be able to afford a lawyer – do not use a lawyer.

The big reasons are that they don’t trust lawyers, they don’t know what lawyers do and, even if they did, they don’t know how to find a good lawyer.

Shows you that despite lawyers, collectively, spending billions of dollars on advertising and marketing – directories, SEO, content marketing, Google AdWords, Google my Business, hiring marcom professionals, and more – lawyers are not connecting with their market.

Market meaning people, whether consumer, corporate executive, in-house counsel, small business person or another lawyer.

“Connecting” with people in an intimate fashion so they know you as “the lawyer” in a niche who cares about what they do and who they to do it for – and stays abreast of developments in their field – is how you reach this latent legal market.

Since 2003, I’ve felt blogging to be a remedy to the chasm between lawyers and people. A chasm that denies milllions of legal services and leaves hundreds of thousands of lawyers living hand to mouth.

But, for whatever reason, I’ve not always felt comfortable wearing a mantra for blogging proclaiming a higher purpose on my sleeve.

Building blogs for lawyers, legal blogs and strategic consulting, managed WordPress platform for the law, networking through the Internet, digital media solutions for the law and legal blog community. All tag lines or glib phrases describing what we do.

None of them felt right. ”Blah, blah, blah.”

They were tactics, not a mission.

None felt like something team members would proudly say when responding to a family member who asked over Thanksgiving dinner where they worked.

“LexBlog, we connect lawyers with people, for good,” sounds nice as a team member passes the cranberries across the table.

I don’t know that we need to be repeating our mantra – our purpose – everywhere. But we sure as heck should know why we exist, why we get up each morning and why we spend more time at LexBlog than with our families.

Rather than talking tactics with team members, something I am known to notoriously hate and suck at, I need to be talking the why.

I’ve always liked Clio’s mission of “transforming the practice of law, for good.” And in pursuit of that mission, developing seamless solutions so that lawyers can connect with people and deliver legal services so as to help lawyers reach this huge latent legal market.

For good, meaning not only to help people, but for once and for all – after all the well intentioned talk of others to do so.

It’s this mission that drives Clio’s team members, keeps their team members and lands smart, passionate, gritty and driven new team members.

And which lands new customers. Customers who want to work with a partner focused on something bigger than themselves. A partner focused on the greater good.

So with with Jack consenting and telling me a one off just means more are joining the cause, I’m going to start wearing the mantra of “connecting lawyers with people, for good.”

And talking about our cause with my team members and partners.

As a community of legal bloggers, not just LexBlog, we can connect lawyers with people, for good.