Thought leadership is something that most legal marketers will be familiar with. Firms spend lots of time and effort on writing articles and updates. Here, we've tried to assemble a guide to thought leadership for legal marketers to help make this important topic clearer.

What is Thought Leadership?

While thought leadership can be defined in different ways, at its core it's about showcasing a firm's knowledge and capabilities through content marketing. If you've ever read a blog or insights section of a website, that is often where thought leadership will be found. In law firms, thought leadership has sometimes been called “client alerts“.

Deloitte defines thought leadership as: "Experts' points of view and the latest industry trends that help clients consider new ways of solving business challenges and find value in pursuing opportunities." 

McKinsey & Company describe it as: "Latest thinking on the issues that matter most in business and management." 

PwC outlines thought leadership as: “Ideas and information designed to improve how companies operate.”

While there may be different definitions, most agree that thought leadership should be helpful and insightful, offering advice on potential threats and opportunities arising from developments in law or other industries.

A great example of thought leadership in action comes from Daniel Gee here:

Why is Thought Leadership Important for Law Firms?

Thought leadership is an important marketing tactic for a huge proportion of companies. However, in legal marketing, there are a few important factors that make it more central to the way that clients perceive firms, and the way firms win and retain business.

The first is that law firms sell their knowledge. Thought leadership is an effective way to demonstrate that knowledge and capability to clients and potential clients.

The second is that individual lawyers and their personal brands (rather than just the firm's brand) are important to clients. They are buying a person's time and knowledge. Who that person is factors into the buying decision. Thought leadership, when published under the name of an individual lawyer, builds the brand of that lawyer and offers something that clients can look to when considering where to spend their money.

Finally, and most importantly, law firm clients rely on thought leadership to guide their firms through challenges and opportunities. General Counsel, those in-house lawyers responsible for their companies' legal issues (and the outside law firms they commission to help), are exposed to a huge breadth of legal and business issues and rely on thought leadership to guide them and their firms through those challenges.

In 2023, we asked 100 General Counsels at large US and UK law firms about how thought leadership impacted their perception of, and relationship with, legal suppliers. Here are some of those findings:

• 100% of GCs felt that law firms were responsible for keeping their clients and prospects informed about news and developments.
• 48% of the respondents would not work with a supplier that did not demonstrate relevant expertise.
• 61% of GCs would prioritise suppliers that keep them up to date with the latest industry developments and best practices.
• 86% of GCs review their supplier firms' websites once a month or more.

A huge part of the role of a GC is to stay up-to-date. GCs typically spend 8+ hours per week on content (a full working day). These 8 hours present an opportunity to build important relationships and position the firm as the best and first choice through high-quality thought leadership.

The video below from our CMO Series Live conference in 2023, offers a deep dive into how GCs use thought leadership and how it impacts their decision of which law firm to engage on particular matters.

Thought Leadership Best Practice (Specific to Law Firms)

Thought leadership for law firms is different to other organisations, with dozens if not hundreds of lawyers as potential authors, and the demand from General Counsel to stay up-to-date, firms need to approach thought leadership slightly differently.

At scale, effective thought leadership is less about optimising individual pieces of content and more about ensuring a steady flow of up-to-date, relevant thought leadership to clients and prospective clients.

At Passle, we've worked on doing exactly that with the top firms from across the world such as Deloitte, Freshfields, DLA Piper and Reed Smith, alongside many more to define what successful thought leadership programs do.

There are 4 key pillars of successful thought leadership:

• They offer self-service publication. This means they implement an easy way for lawyers to create thought leadership, allowing lawyers to respond quickly and feel empowered in authoring. There are two sides to this. The first is removing any complicated or inefficient barriers between lawyers and thought leadership. The second side is giving those lawyers the tools they need to make writing and publishing content easy.
• Successful thought leadership programs have clear governance practices. A clear process for thought leadership allows these firms to turn around their insights more quickly - they are the first to market - and they can make sure that nothing is published that should not be. Effective governance also reduces the burden on the marketing team, allowing them to focus on more productive activities.
• They create once and publish everywhere. Research into GCs showed that no single channel is king. By creating multiple channels for their thought leadership and repurposing content across those channels, effective thought leaders ensure a greater reach. 
• They give regular feedback to their thought leaders. Firms that struggle with thought leadership report that their authors don't value thought leadership, and don't want to be involved. Those same firms will often never have given any meaningful reports or feedback on the impact of thought leadership. Any thought leadership should be reported on in meaningful terms, the best being which clients and potential clients are reading their thought leadership.
   

Technology and Tools for Thought Leadership

These are a few examples of the tools and technologies commonly used by law/consulting firms that we work with, but there are plenty more out there.

Passle:

Thought leadership platform for PS (Professional Service) firms, making thought leadership simple, scalable and effective. Learn more in the video here.
 

CMS (Content Management System) :

A Content Management System (CMS) powers your website, enabling users without technical skills to easily create, edit, and manage a website without needing to know coding or web design.

There are a huge number of CMS platforms available. They offer slightly different benefits and challenges:

• SiteCore - A robust digital experience platform that provides a list of features and digital marketing tools, to help businesses enhance customer engagement and deliver improved experiences at every stage of the customer journey.
• Ruby Law - A platform where users can monitor, analyse, and display the performance of structured content, link different types of content to provide more engaging and relevant experiences for site visitors, and access real-time analytics about site visitors, including goal tracking and details about both desktop and mobile users. 
• WordPress - A popular CMS that offers an easy-to-use interface and a variety of customizable themes and plugins, making it simple for individuals and businesses to create and maintain their websites. 
• Umbraco - An open-source content management system where editors can easily perform daily tasks, preview and publish content, schedule campaigns, and more using a straightforward and user-friendly interface designed for content creation and management. They can also create and manage content in various languages, for different channels, and repurpose content as needed. 

Distribution Networks:

Thought leadership needs to reach as widely as possible to be effective. Distribution networks and publishers can help content reach the right people at the right time.

• Lexology - Intelligent global legal research platform that helps you respond quickly and accurately to legal questions from around the world. Designed to help users manage risk, keep up with changes, and access expert advice. It offers insights, proactive analysis, and expert guidance from top law firms worldwide. 
• Mondaq -  A top global provider of AI-powered content marketing, data, and analytics solutions for professional services firms. Offers valuable, actionable data and insights that help clients make strategic decisions and enhance their marketing and business development efforts. The platform delivers targeted content to a senior-level audience, increasing the visibility of your content and driving more traffic to your website while ensuring that users receive important information at the right time.
• JD Supra - A global digital platform that assists law firms in using thought leadership to successfully generate new business, attract media attention, and create networking opportunities.

Email Marketing/Automation:

Companies that can help your clients and prospects get your content through email subscriptions, newsletters etc. Some examples are:

• Vuture/Marigold
• Concep
• Campaign Monitor

Other Thought Leadership Technology:

• Foleon - A platform that allows users to quickly create interactive and branded content. It features a drag-and-drop editor for B2B companies to design unique, engaging digital content experiences.
• Clearview Social - A platform that simplifies social media management with tools for easy posting, scheduling, and sharing. Features like one-click activation and AI-generated captions make content sharing effortless, while account managers provide strong support to keep teams engaged.
• Podbean - Podbean is a podcast hosting platform known for its ease of use and ability to help creators earn money. It offers features like unlimited hosting, distribution to major directories, monetization tools, live streaming, and detailed analytics. Watch Passle's CMO Series Podcasts on Podbean for content relevant to professional service firms.
• Shorthand - Shorthand is a platform for creating visually engaging and interactive digital stories, reports, and case studies, used by brands, publishers, and organisations.

Measuring the Impact of Thought Leadership

Measuring thought leadership is important for two reasons. Firstly, to understand what is happening and make improvements to make the program more effective. Secondly, to report the results to authors and other stakeholders, to ensure that the impact of thought leadership is understood.

Thought leadership generates a large number of different types of performance data. Each type of information is useful for something different. Reporting on thought leadership shouldn't be thought of as finding one perfect metric, it is about finding the right metric for the right stakeholder group.

Below are some helpful metrics to consider for your thought leadership program:

Traditional Metrics: Metrics like the number of reads, time spent on the site, and reads from various sources are all metrics commonly used by firms to measure their performance. It's hard to look at these metrics in exclusion and find meaning. These types of metrics need to be compared, either to the same data set over time or to that of another firm's blog. In 2020, we analysed over 1,000,000 pageviews to find out some key benchmarks. You can read more about that here. 

Below is the table of benchmark metrics for legal thought leadership.

Business Metrics: Nothing shows impact better than revenue won off the back of a piece of thought leadership. Tracking this isn't always straightforward, but there are several helpful ways to see who is engaging and tie that to revenue won.

• Whether key clients/prospects are subscribed and receiving a newsletter
• Whether key clients/prospects are engaging with personalized, 1-2-1 emails with thought leadership
• Whether key clients/prospects are commenting/liking content on social media

Collecting this information might not be easy or automated, but a small amount of work tying thought leadership to successfully won business is never time wasted.

There's a fantastic case study here by Linda Orton that discusses a lot of interesting tactics for thought leadership, particularly in reporting and tying thought leadership to business results.

Key Strategies for Effective Thought Leadership in Legal Marketing

To wrap up, thought leadership is a concept that most legal marketers will be familiar with. It involves showcasing a firm's expertise and insights through content marketing, such as articles, client alerts, or industry updates. 

We've provided this comprehensive guide to help legal marketers understand and effectively implement thought leadership strategies. By emphasizing the importance of thought leadership in demonstrating a law firm's knowledge, building personal brands, and guiding clients through legal challenges, we've highlighted the value it brings in winning and retaining business. With best practices like self-service publication, clear governance, broad content distribution, and impactful feedback mechanisms, law firms can optimize their thought leadership efforts to strengthen client relationships and enhance their market presence.