We published the 2021 UK Legal Thought Leadership Index this week, and one of the key findings is that there has been an explosion of thought leadership among the UK top law firms in the last 12 months. As a result of Covid -19, law firms have adopted remote working and communication with clients has become predominantly virtual. When you can't be in the room with your clients, sharing knowledge and expertise, through regular thought leadership can be a great way to remain front of mind.

Our research found that the top 100 firm created 37,397 individual blogs, articles & insights during 2020. The last time we carried out this research in 2019 we looked across the top 200 and collectively they only produce 33,823 insights between them.

On the whole, larger firms produce more thought leadership, but there are a core of smaller firms punching above their weight with high numbers of posts per author. These firms are driving quality thought leadership within their niche.

It is no longer enough to tell potential clients how good you are – you need to show it too. Firms have nothing to fear and everything to gain by putting their expertise in the public domain, and there is often a direct correlation between this activity and enquiry levels.

Particularly in the early days of the pandemic, firms were able to assist their clients and the wider business community hugely by ramping up their insights on the legal implications, with many creating dedicated knowledge hubs.

People buy expertise, but they also buy people. The savvy use of social media to share insights about both the law and the firm is a great way to sell yourself to potential clients, and it need not be a time-consuming exercise.

The report is available for free download here or, if you'd like to find out how your firm in specific compares with your peers, you can request a personalised version (also for free).