InsideLegal

Ignite Law 2012: Now (LexThink.1)

Posted on April 21, 2011 by InsideLegal

Matt Homann with LexThink LLC, a legal innovation consultancy, and JoAnna Forshee with InsideLegal.com, the insider’s guide to doing business in legal technology, produced Ignite Law 2012, an interactive and thought-provoking mind-sharing event focused on “serving the 21st century client better”. In 2012, the event was re-branded to LexThink.1, a name which reflects not only the way lawyers bill (in 1/10 hour increments), but also the six minutes each presenter is given to speak. Ignite Law featured 16 six-minute presentations given by the legal industry’s leading minds and innovators.

Ignite Law was inspired by the Ignite event format; a fast-paced, high-energy evening of five-minute talks by people who have an idea. While Ignite events are now being hosted globally and focused on building local city-wide connections, Ignite Law is specific to the legal community hence the six minute presentation time, reflecting the way lawyers bill (in 1/10 hour increments).

Below is more information on the third Ignite Law, 2012 – now named LexThink.1.

Photos from LexThink.1

InsideLegal Post: LexThink.1

LexThink.1 Main Sponsors – Clio & ABA LPM/TECHSHOW

LexThink.1 Speaker Lineup

LexThink.1 2012Videos

You can view the intro video by Matt here and below are the links to the videos of this year’s presentations. Enjoy!

Mark Britton – Back to the Future

Richard Granat – Legal Industry Startups: An Overview

Roe Frazer – Being a Web 2.0 Lawyer in the “Thank You Economy”

Will Hornsby – Ignite This! Five Ethics Rules That Should Be Incinerated

Ruth Carter – Flash Mob Law

Jason E. Dyer – Where Canasta and Counsel Collide

Eric Hunter – Moving Towards 100% Web

Jay Shepherd – One Word That Will Reinvent How You Serve Clients

Matt Spiegel – Don’t Just Communicate …

James F. Ring – Ending Cheap Talk in Legal Bargaining

Steve Best – Passion

Matt Homann – Client Service Design

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Industry Thought Leaders Convene to Discuss the Future of Law Practice – Ignite Law

Posted on April 18, 2011 by InsideLegal

By JoAnna Forshee, CEO, InsideLegal

About a year and a half ago, Matt Homann of LexThink and BlawgThink fame (an ‘un-conference’ InsideLegal produced for Matt and Dennis Kennedy in 2005) called me up starting the conversation with "JoAnna, I have an idea". Anyone who knows Matt, knows that he is full of them (ideas that is), especially ones that buck the trend and go against the grain when it comes to 'typical' lawyer events and conferences. Matt is the originator of the 'un-conference' and that is exactly the concept behind Ignite Law, a 2+ hour event featuring highly accomplished legal industry speakers and their ability (or inability) to deliver 'the future of law practice' within 6 minute (with slides auto-advancing every 18 seconds) presentations.

With this ‘highly flammable’ idea in mind, InsideLegal and LexThink produced Ignite Law 2010 last March coinciding with the American Bar Association’s (ABA) Annual TECHSHOW. Based on stellar feedback and overwhelming audience reaction and participation (all 150 available seats were quickly filled and we had a waitlist), we decided to launch Ignite Law 2.0 this year, again piggy-backing off ABA’s TECHSHOW, which was celebrating its 25^th year anniversary of providing legal technology education and innovation to law firms.

What a difference a year makes…Ignite Law 2.0

As is customary with new product releases, introducing an updated version of anything assumes you have new 'stuff' (features, functions, benefits, content!) to offer. As evidenced last Sunday night at Ignite Law 2011 (2.0), the speakers and the 250+ audience members made sure our new product lived up to the hype of the original Ignite last March.

Below are some thoughts about what made 2011 so special:

ABA TECHSHOW support: As previously mentioned, 2011 marks the 25th year anniversary of TECHSHOW so it provided a perfect connection with this year's Ignite program. Not only did the ABA Law Practice Management (LPM) section provide the venue and all related meeting amenities (thanks Cindy Galvan), TECHSHOW's chair Paul Unger championed Ignite Law amongst conference attendees and was a willing participant in driving record attendance and pre-event buzz. Lending their financial support were Clio’s CEO Jack Newton, an Ignite 2010 speaker, and Rocket Lawyer’s Founder and Chairman, Charley Moore. The energy and flow of ideas and innovations shared during the 4,320 seconds of Ignite talks (not to mention ample networking pre and post), provided the ideal kick-off to the 3-day TECHSHOW technology agenda designed to educate and inspire attendees.

Speaker talent and talk/topic relevance: 25 topics were originally submitted for Ignite, with 12 being selected via online voting. 1,131 total votes were cast and the final agenda was announced. The 12 speakers represented a who's who of legal influencers including legal technology icon Dennis Kennedy, PMA-extraordinaire Jim Calloway, past TECHSHOW and incoming LPM chair Tom Mighell, small firm champion Carolyn Elefant, ‘Mac-loving Lawyer’ and founder of MILOfest, Victor Medina, law firm social media and blog exert, Kevin O’Keefe, and legal knowledge systems architect (and the smartest guy in the room most of the time!) Marc Lauritsen. The faculty, all multi-degreed JDs and seasoned speakers, combined for more than 245 presentations last year, so it was a bit of a surprise that many of them considered prepping for a 'mere’ 6 minute talk one of the toughest speaking challenges they had faced. Several other speakers were TECHSHOW first timers, but no strangers to the lime light including Jay Shepherd, a Boston-based small firm owner turned pricing consultant; Eric Cooperstein, a well respected ethics consultant and practitioner, and Daniel Schwartz, law firm litigation partner and legal blogger. Rounding out the speaker roster and returning to present from 2010, were legal vendor Kevin Chern and Will Hornsby, ABA’s guru of legal ethics and attorney marketing.

Ignite format: Giving speakers 6 minutes to share their vision of the future of law practice and technology can leave audiences wanting more or on the flip side jumping for joy since they only have to endure 6 minutes. Luckily, our speaker line-up and topic selection could not have been more appropriate and, as a result, all 12 speakers did a phenomenal job in delivering their talks. Not only were they driven by the trickiness of the 6 minute, 18 seconds per slide format, but the audience consisting of 250+ legal thought leaders, practitioners and media helped them step up their game. Speaking of the audience …roughly 50% represented law firms, a majority of them solo/small firm attorneys; 20% included vendors, mostly senior management folks curious about this new program and format; 12% were consultants, respected technologists and law firm management consultants; and the remaining attendance included associations, media, and government legal.

The main course…the future of law practice

The Ignite speakers (including MC Matt Homann's Ignite intro that set the bar very high) spent a lot of time and energy delivering what they considered germane to the future of law practice. While videos and Ignite pictures will be posted to InsideLegal and the Ignite Law site within the next few weeks, we opted to provide a twitter-inspired summary (in 140 characters or thereabouts) of some of the Ignite Law talks:

Matt Homann (@MattHomann): Measure your investments in technology via metrics that matter to your clients. Your ROI depends on your clients' satisfaction with you.

Carolyn Elefant (@carolynelefant): Client-Attorney privilege is the purple cow of the legal profession. "It's our unique value proposition so honor it, enforce it, and leverage it".

Dennis Kennedy (@denniskennedy): When it comes to innovation, reverse your assumptions … to change the game, you need to change the frame … these are all basics of a functioning freemium model.

Eric Cooperstein (@ethics_maven): Leverage social media and online transparency to build client relationships. Get back to the 'small town lawyering' mentality of knowing everything about your clients and vice versa.

Jay Shepherd (@jayshep): Legal's problem … we sell activities when we should be selling knowledge. We are selling and measuring the wrong thing.

Will Hornsby (@willhornsby): And the ABA Survey says …over 46% of respondents who need a lawyer for personal legal matters rely on their social networks (friends, family and colleagues), not social media (LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter). Also, only 34% mentioned they would contact a lawyer they knew or had used before, suggesting that client service has been a low priority for the profession.

Jim Calloway (@jimcalloway): "What would Grandma do" when it comes to modern communication etiquette. When in doubt, don't pick up the phone. When you do, remember you don’t automatically have a lawyer ‘cone of silence’ and people can hear you. Build systems to communicate with clients. Set expectations and apply common sense; go retro and occasionally include a hand-written thank you note.

Marc Lauritsen (@marclauritsen): The profession is endangered. Law schools are in trouble. New lawyers are unprepared for economic and technological reality. The solution … help law students learn about code by learning to code – apps for justice that can help practitioners work smarter and empower self-helpers.

Tom Mighell (@tommighell): Imagine a post-PC law practice … the iPad and other tablets are a lot like the microwave … first we had no idea how to use it or why and now we can't live without it.

As of this writing, Ignite Law 2011 is a week behind us and ABA TECHSHOW, the 25th year edition, is also ‘in the books’. However, the energy, buzz and most importantly the ideas and inspiration ignited on Sunday will fuel our industry moving forward, at least we hope, until the next edition of Ignite.

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About JoAnna

JoAnna Forshee is the CEO of InsideLegal.com, an insider’s guide to doing business in legal technology, and has spent the last 12 years working with legal technologists, consultants, vendors and media – spanning roles as legal industry event producer, legal industry advisor, social media guru and PR/marketing agency founder (Envision Agency). She can be reached at jf@InsideLegal.com and on twitter at @InsideLegal.

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ABA TECHSHOW 2011 Agenda Word Cloud

Posted on April 11, 2011 by InsideLegal

The 25th Anniversary edition of ABA TECHSHOW has officially kicked-off. There are a lot of things in store on day one, including a welcome from TECHSHOW Chair, Paul Unger, a lunch time keynote by Larry Lessig of Harvard, and the Silver Jubilee Celebration Monday night.

To get things started, we are posting this word cloud of the agenda (click on it to enlarge). This gives you a good idea which topics are important and being focused on over the course of the next 3 days. Surprised how big 'mac' is? …

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College of Law Practice Management Seeks 2011 InnovAction Awards Nominations

Posted on March 30, 2011 by InsideLegal

The College of Law Practice Management (COLPM), an international organization that recognizes excellence in law practice management, is calling for entries for its 2011 InnovAction Awards. This is a world-wide search for lawyers, law firms, law departments and others in the legal services field that have invented or successfully applied new business practices to the delivery of legal services.

The goal of the InnovAction Awards is to demonstrate to the legal community what can be created when dedicated professionals with big ideas and strong convictions are determined to make a difference.“We are seeking and recognizing creativity and new ways of thinking in legal services delivery,” said COLPM president K. William Gibson, attorney and mediator. “We know that a great deal of innovative thinking is helping solve the business challenges faced by law firms in today’s changing market. We want to focus the legal profession on these extraordinary achievements.”

“It’s our goal to reward the innovation already taking place, and to encourage more innovation in the business of practicing law across the profession,” said Jordan Furlong, chair of the 2011 Awards and partner with Edge International Consulting. “We believe it helps lawyers and firms to rise above the on-going challenges in the economy.”

“There are some exciting changes for the 2011 InnovAction Awards,” Furlong continued. “When the College created the awards in 2004, innovation in the legal profession developed slowly, if at all. The pace of change in the legal marketplace during the last seven years has been unprecedented. The Awards traditionally have recognized innovation that has ‘never been done before,’ but in today’s rapidly changing environment, we feel that isn’t enough. We will focus on equally challenging criteria that more accurately reflect today’s legal marketplace.”

2011 InnovAction Award nominations are due by June 1 and winners will be encouraged to receive their InnovAction Awards in person at the 2011 Futures Conference held in conjunction with the College’s Annual Meeting in Chicago, IL on October 28 – 29, 2011. Winners will be invited to make a presentation regarding their innovations as part of the conference.

In its first six years, the InnovAction program has awarded entities from six countries around the world including Axiom, New York, NY; DLA Piper US, Washington, DC; The Law Chambers of Nicholas Critelli, P.C., Des Moines, IA; Mallesons Stephen Jacques, Sydney, Australia; Masons, Glasgow, Scotland; New Family Organization, Tel Aviv, Israel; Novus Law, Chicago, IL; Practical Law Company, New York, NY; Pro Bono Net, New York, NY; Raskin Peter Rubin & Simon, LLP, Los Angeles, CA; Simpson Grierson, Auckland, New Zealand; Wragge & Co., Birmingham, England.

Editors Note: InsideLegal is a Platinum sponsor of the InnovAction Awards.

Posted in COLPM, Consultants, Industry Awards, Law Firm Leaders, Thought Leadership | Leave a comment

Ignite Law 2011 Final Speaker Selections

Posted on March 23, 2011 by InsideLegal

The official speaker roster for Ignite Law 2011 is set. The event, produced by LexThink CEO Matt Homann and InsideLegal's CEO JoAnna Forshee, will feature 12 speakers sharing their view on the future of law practice and law technology, delivered via 6 minute rapid-fire presentations. Presenters were chosen based on online voting results and include a ‘who’s who’ of legal technology spanning attorneys, legal software executives, legal technologists, consultants and industry bloggers. Ignite Law 2011 takes place on April 10 at the Chicago Hilton, the eve of ABA TECHSHOW.

A total of 25 speaking topics were submitted and based on 1000s of online votes cast, 12 candidates were selected (including 8 'first-timers') to share their 6-minute Ignite presentations. The final Ignite Law 2011 speaker’s list includes:

Jim Calloway – “A Failure to Communicate”

Kevin Chern – “Creating the Perfect Future: Strategic Planning for Your Law Firm and Your Life”

Eric Cooperstein – “(Lack of) Privacy 2.0: Law in the Age of Transparency”

Will Hornsby – “And the survey says…”

Dennis Kennedy – “The Freemium Practice of Law”

Stephanie Kimbro – “Call of Duty: Legal Ops: Serving DIY Clients”

Marc Lauritsen – “Apps for Justice – Code to the Rescue”

Victor Medina – “Bespoke Legal Services in an Off-The-Rack Culture”

Tom Mighell – “Preparing for the Post-PC Law Practice”

Kevin O'Keefe – “Facebook: Can it be really be used by lawyers and law firms for professional and business development? How so?”

Dan Schwartz – “The Elephant in the Room”

Jay Shepherd – “Quantum Leap: How You Will Practice Law in 2019”

Free tickets for the event are still available and can be secured here.

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Technologists Tech Tips, Louisiana Style

Posted on March 14, 2011 by InsideLegal

One of my favorite sessions at ABA TECHSHOW is 60 Tips in 60 Minutes. Usually there is a panel of 3-4 technologists and they give their favorite tech tips or sites in a rapid fire presentation. There are quite a few technologies that I use day-to-day that have come from these recommendations. Recently, we attended a session like this at the Lousiana State Bar Association's 4th Annual Solo & Small Firm Conference and decided to share just a couple of my favorites from the panel – Catherine Sanders Reach, Jim Calloway and Ernie Svenson.

Catherine Sanders Reach
Director, American Bar Association Legal Technology Resource Center

MS Office 2007 Quick Parts

Do you ever feel like you’re retyping the same e-mail/clause/phrase for the 100th time? You aren’t alone: attorneys often find themselves needing to type the same snippet of information several times per week (or even per day). Perhaps you’re informing a potential client about your fee structures and initial consultation procedures, or maybe you’re just asking a marketer to remove you from their distribution list. Either way, retyping the information eats time that would be better spent elsewhere.

In the past, common solutions to this problem included copying and pasting from a saved text document or creating complicated templates. For users of the new Microsoft Office 2007, however, there’s a better solution: Quick Parts. Office 2007’s Quick Parts feature allows you to easily and quickly save snippets of frequently used text directly in Outlook, Word, and PowerPoint and then later insert those snippets back with just a few mouse clicks. If you’ve ever considered document assembly software and dismissed it as too complicated try building clause libraries with Quick Parts.

Claim Your UserName with KnowEm

You may have no intention of ever setting up an account with eHow, Tribe or Gawkk. However, do you want someone to use your name or a variation of your name – or your child’s name – as their username in any social media/web 2.0 sites? Check to see if anyone is using your name and stake your claim if necessary with KnowEm. KnowEm will search 120 social sites for your name, brand name, or domain and tell you where it is being used. For $65 they will also register you for each of these sites to protect you from “cyber squatting and social media identity theft”. The risk may not be worth the fee, but this is an interesting exercise.

Jim Calloway
Director, Oklahoma Bar Association Law Management Assistance Program

Posting your e-mail online increases spam

However, you can avoid that by using Scr.im (BETA). The website makes the case: “convert your email address into a short, cute and safe link you can share on the web, in Twitter, forums, Craigslist, anywhere”. To use Scr.im simply type in your email address and make up a custom URL (for instance: http://scr.im/jimc). Save your email from the spambots!

Free Utility for Converting File Format

Need to convert a file from one format to another? Try a visit to Zamzar which converts a file from one format to another and then emails you a link for downloading the converted file. Convert files up to 100MB from one image, document, music, or video file format to another. For instance convert .PDF to .DOC. or a .wav to an .mp3. You never know when you might need something like this!

Ernie Svenson, Esq
Svenson Law Firm, and http://www.ernietheattorney.net 

These days it’s common for people to have their contact information at the bottom of their email; it’s not as common for people to send you .vcf file that you can click on to make that contact information automatically flow into your address book. But if you get copy2contact you can plug it into your Outlook mail program and do just that. It will also extract dates and put them in your calendar. Free to try for 30 days, and then you can buy It if you find it useful. You will, if you use Microsoft Outlook.

Easiest way to compare various airline flights. Gives you a graphic representation of the alternatives, showing how much time the flight will take and how long each layover is. Hovering over various elements will show you price, layover location. Other sites may have more information but no one organizes the information better. If you find a price you like it will hook you in the airline website to book the trip. Doesn’t seem to hook into Southwest airlines, though.

Lawyers should be good communicators, and today being a “good communicator” often means knowing how to use visual tools to convey ideas. Powerpoint is a powerful tool that is often used ineffectively because people don’t know how to convey visual information. PresentationZen.com and the book by the same name, are helpful aids for those who aspire to do better in their visual presentations.

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Louisiana State Bar’s 4th Annual Small Firm Conference

Posted on February 28, 2011 by InsideLegal

We spent last Thursday and Friday at the Lousiana State Bar Association's 4th Annual Solo & Small Firm Conference networking with old tech friends and taking in several of the sessions all focused on the bare essentials of helping solos and small firms setup and run their practices – in some cases more efficiently; in other cases run at all. Metadata sessions, email encryption conversations, tech budgets for small law firms, client satisfaction and how to best share calendars with firm staff were common themes making the rounds.

The 4th Annual Solo & Small Firm Conference featured 35 educational sessions enlisting the expertise and talents of 39 speakers including legal technology veterans (dare we say superstars) Jim Calloway, Tom O'Connor and New Orleans' own Ernie Svenson. The presentation topics ranged from hands-on use of Adobe Acrobat, the perils of metadata, paperless lawyering, social networking for lawyers, and billing strategies. Jim Calloway delivered both morning keynotes focused on the 'future of solo practice' and 'secrets of client satisfaction'. Other legal thought leaders such as Michael Adams, Craig Bayer, Jack Newton and Catherine Sanders Reach joined the speakers list.

The conference ended with one of the more popular legal technology conference sessions around (borrowed from ABA TECHSHOWs of the past) '60 Tips in 60 Minutes' featuring 60 websites any solo or small firm practitioner should find useful. While we appreciated the balance of the program – many non technical sessions were hands-on and practical in nature focused on taxes, ethics, trust accounting and Louisiana divorce basics and updates, we did realize that these local bar conferences are where the 'rubber meets the road' when it comes to basic technology training and tech know-how required to run your practice. While organizations like ILTA are focused on continually elevating the legal technology bar when it comes to expertise and application, events such as the LSBA annual small firm conference appeal to the fundamental needs of all attorneys, regardless of tech knowledge.

The event had a small exhibit hall that housed its 16 sponsor companies – Gilsbar, LexisNexis, Clio, Fastcase, Fujitsu Computer Products, Gould & Lamb, Interactive E-Solutions, Law Library of Louisiana, Law Office Technology, Law Pay, Pine Grove Behavioral Health Hospital, LawTech Partners, West. By far, LawTech Parner's 'lemonade stand' booth advertising technology help for a nickel was the coolest and the attendees took advantage. They received all types of questions over the course of the 2 days.

No event in the Big Easy is complete without its social events. Thursday night saw 2 receptions – one hosted by the Young Lawyers Section of the Lousiana State Bar Association and one hosted by Clio. We weren't able to make it to the Young Lawyers Section reception although we heard it was very well attended. We did make it to the Clio Meet Up hosted by the gracious Jack Newton before heading out to dinner at Dante's Kitchen (thanks to Ernie Svenson!) with LawTech Partner's Adriana Linares and Mike Adams. All in all, it was a great conference and we enjoyed catching up with everyone.

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Ignite Law (TECH): The Future of Law Technology Event

Posted on February 25, 2011 by InsideLegal

Updates:

JoAnna Forshee, CEO of InsideLegal, and Matt Homann of LexThink, are partnering again to produce Ignite Law 2011, to be held in Chicago Sunday, April 10, on the eve of this year's ABA TECHSHOW (April 11-13, 2011) and produced by the Law Practice Management section of the ABA. 2010's inaugural Ignite Law included 16 presentations covering a broad spectrum of law topics including advertising and ethics, information management, agile development, client service, and marketing. This year, to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the ABA TECHSHOW, Ignite Law will again assemble the brightest legal and legal technology minds and practitioners to muse about the future of legal technology delivered via six minute rapid fire presentations.

With a successful inaugural event under our belt, Matt and I anticipate fierce competition for the 12 presentation slots, especially since legal technology luminaries including Dennis Kennedy and Jim Calloway have expressed their desire to share and present their views. The submission process is open to all players in the legal community – consultants, media, vendors, law firms, and associations – and the topics submitted are then voted on by the community. While there's already a lot of buzz building for the second act, the official call for presentations – open to all via an online submission process – is now in the works and will be available at the Ignite Law website on Monday, February 28th.

Over the next 6 weeks, anyone interested in Ignite Law 2011 should stay connected with InsideLegal and the [non]billable hour blogs for updates. Thanks to ABA LPM's partnership, Ignite Law 2011 will be expanded to accommodate at least 250 attendees (vs. 150 last year). Among the pre-event content, we will publish all presentation submissions (including online voting) and profile various presenters as well as videos and coverage from the 2010 event.

Posted in Events, Future of Law Firm, InsideLegal Courses, Speaking Opportunities, Thought Leadership | Leave a comment

ILTA: Recent News & Announcements

Posted on February 25, 2011 by InsideLegal

InsideLegal spent some time with the ILTA conference and sessions team at LegalTech New York and wanted to share some of the recent scoop and announcements …

ILTA INSIGHT UK

ILTA will again be producing the INSIGHT 2011 event in London April 5th. INSIGHT will offer two tracks – The Business of Law 2020 and Law Technology 2020. The sessions offered tie into Law 2020, an ILTA multi-year, multi-platform educational programming initiative focusing on the ways in which law firms will have to adapt in order to thrive over the next decade. You can view the complete agenda online.

As always, INSIGHT is free and open to law firm or law department professionals. You can register here or by e-mail to Peggy Wechsler, ILTA’s Program Director.

Editors Note: InsideLegal is again a sponsor of INSIGHT UK and we look forward to this program this year. Last year will be hard to top. Great sessions and great people…

STAFF CHANGES

ILTA is excited to anounce some new internal organizational changes that will allow them to better tackle their new initiatives and their constant pursuit to top themselves with each Annual Conference. Peggy Wechsler remains as Program Director but will concentrate more on strategic planning, including focusing on vendor, alliance, and press relationships. TJ Johnson, who has been will ILTA since 2003 has been promoted to Program Manager of Conferences. You may not be familiar with TJ, but she is the lady behind the logistics of the conference, from the educational program to the details. You may have seen her running around the conference with a headset. In her new role, she will take over moreof the planning from Peggy of special events outside of the annual conference, i.e. INSIGHT and ILTA’s track at LegalTech. Another ILTA team member, Deb HImsel, has been promoted to Program Manager of Core Education. Deb will direct the coordination of all the regional meetings, roadshows and webinars (and other new media) in this new role. Gaynor Senyszyn, who previous served as ILTA’s Peer Group Coordinator, is moving over to Conference Coordinator to provide support to TJ and the conference planning committee.

A new team member, Kristy Cole, is joining ILTA as Communications Specialist and will be working with Executive Director and Editor, Randi Mayes, on ILTA's publication Peer to Peer and its popular whitepaper series. Kristy has spent the last five years as IS Communication Administrator and Web Content Editor for Mayer Brown so the ILTA content is very familiar to her.

ILTA PEER AWARDS

ILTA's 2011 Distinguished Peer Awards program, announced earlier this month, recognizes outstanding achievements in organizational and individual excellence involving areas of focus covered by ILTA's peer groups. Vendors and consultants will also be recognized, for superior achievements in thought leadership and innovation. The rather simple nomination and application process encourage ILTA members and vendors to nominate themselves, peers or their organization by the April 30th deadline.

In addition to the award itself, presented at the awards dinner at ILTA 2011 in August, winners will be featured on the ILTA website and in various ILTA publications.

Editors note: InsideLegal covered the inaugural ILTA Peer Awards last year and we were very impressed with not only the caliber of nominees and winners, but with the overall organization and presentation – check out the coverage from 2010.

Posted in Events, ILTA, Industry Awards, Legal UK Industry | Leave a comment

Launching a Legal Technology Product? Tips on When, Where & How

Posted on February 13, 2011 by InsideLegal

Have you ever been to a brand new restaurant (maybe even on opening night) and wondered why the place wasn't packed with patrons. Was it the food? The concept? Bad marketing? Or maybe, just maybe, it was supposed to be that way; a gutsy move by the owner to limit his restaurant's exposure early on in case something goes wrong – we tend to call this a 'soft launch'.

We have been following legal technology developments for 13 years and have seen our fair share of failed product launches, ridiculously over-hyped software introductions and way too many empty 'coming soon' promises. Is there a 'magic bullet' formula for a new product launch? Not really, but here are some pointers to keep in mind when preparing your next launch.

Call a spade a spade: Don't deceive your prospects with false promises of your new launch, what your software can do, and what feature/functions are available now – not just as a part of a sales demo. Honesty and candor in communicating your 'next gen' solution (not the last gen with a new name) goes a long way in earning trust and respect with your targets. If your technology is still in beta but the features you do have already solve various prospect problems make sure this is understood. If you don't know exact timing of general availability don't make it up or guess. It's tempting since this sadly reflects the status quo of modern software launches but this is your chance to buck that trend and actually proactively involve the people you are doing this for, sooner rather than 3 software updates later.

'Come hell or high water' is not a launch strategy: Why is it that there are more new product announcements at ILTA and LegalTech New York than at any other time during the year? Surely, all vendor R&D teams are not on the same development schedule and just happen to launch new wares in late January or late August. Of course, the reason is based on maximizing exposure at the biggest tech events in our industry, but at what cost? It seems that too many vendors get caught up in the trade show launch 'arms race' and routinely forget that having one chance to make a first impression is not just an antiquated cliche.

Shooting off fireworks AFTER New Year's will get people's attention: What do you remember about this year's New Year's firework displays? Probably not much except maybe the duds or displays that were really cheap or short. What about an impressive display in February? This would surely get noticed and receive a lot more individual exposure than the mass blasts on the 31st. Cut through the clutter and step outside the noise.

Is the tail wagging the dog? Who is driving your product innovations? Are sales & marketing dictating product features and launch dates? Is development calling the shots? Or, are your vocal clients not only providing new feature feedback, but essentially turning you into their internal R&D department? While these are all extreme scenarios and the reality lies somewhere in the middle, there's no denying that special interests and agendas often drive the bus. Be cognisant of this and develop a new product launch plan that balances your objectives and desired results versus internal and external special interests.

Has 'how' taken a back seat to 'what'? Give a sales rep 10 minutes and they will give you more product factoids and solution superlatives than you can bare, but rarely do you leave this encounter (be it at the trade show booth or separate meeting) with a keen understanding on how this bleeding edge, industry's 'only' product will help you solve the business problems which compelled you to seek out the vendor in the first place. While the popular answer to this is the product demo, the reality is that most of them fall short, way short, when it comes to demonstrating how 'our product can help you' versus this is what it could generically and theoretically accomplish.

We don't want to end this post on a cynical note so here are some take-aways to ponder before your next product launch:

WHEN: Crazy idea…Launch products when they are truly ready to release to the market. Instead of letting trade show schedules dictate your launch date find out when your apps will make the most difference for your clients, i.e, a law firm budgeting software will not be a vital tech tool after March.

WHERE: The days of having to wait on a physical event to unveil a new product are gone. Whether it's an online virtual trade show or the many readily available social media outlets, there is no need to wait on the big tech show to make a splash.

HOW: Be honest, cut the rhetoric and focus on solving real business issues and leverage the likes of Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and YouTube to engage your prospects and solicit real-time feedback and critique.

With these tips in hand, a new legal technology or service launch will hopefully once again be something to remember and get excited about.

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