At the LMA Conference in Florida last weekend I was lucky enough to sit in on a session hosted by Mary K Young Consultant with Zeughauser Group looking at The Business of Law.  Mary K was joined by Ralph Allen COO Stroock, Kimberly Rennick CMBDO at Allen & Overy, and Jason Bovis Chief Strategy Officer at Pillsbury.

The panel covered heaps of great content which will keep me busy writing posts for weeks, but I wanted to share with you a strategic campaign that Jason from Pillsbury talked us through.

Jason said that "law firms need to be rigorous in working out where they compete."  He explained that the period of disruption we are living through offers law firms the opportunity to innovate - offering new avenues to retain and attract clients and talent.  With this in mind, Pillsbury identified sub-industries and submarkets in which they can lead.  

Industry focus is key, but Jason said the need is then to segment.  He shared a great campaign that Pillsbury launched recently in the energy space.  They decided to focus not just on energy transformation but specifically on Hydrogen as a segment.  They want to be the go-to experts in this area of law.

The questions Pillsbury asked themselves when choosing to focus on hydrogen energy opportunities were:

• Do we have substance - real knowledge in this area?
• Can we move at speed?
• Can we have an impact?

They answered yes to all these and went straight to develop a digital campaign and launched the public resource www.thehydrogenmap.com -  a regularly updated compendium of global low-carbon hydrogen projects and their status.  

This is a fantastic piece of destination 'Hero' Content.  Pillsbury executed this digital resource with substance, speed and impact and - according to Jason - it has been extremely effective at providing a platform from which Pillsbury attorneys launched their legal services in this space.  

Finally, and importantly, Jason explained it was just as important to promote this campaign internally as externally. Internal Comms were crucial and it had to be repetitive to have an impact.  They ran webinars, practice group meetings and published internal newsletters to promote their focus on hydrogen-related law.  

Jason said "You must be successful internally to be successful externally" when it comes to communications".  Absolutely!