CMO Series EP172 - Nicholas Barrows of Trowers & Hamlins on Blending AI with Human Creativity to Drive Deeper Client Connections

Charles:  AI and automation offer exciting opportunities for legal marketers to connect the dots across multiple data points and drive deeper client engagement. But where does human creativity fit into this picture? In today's episode of the CMO Series podcast, I'm thrilled to welcome Nicholas Barrows, director of Marketing at Trowers and Hamlins. Nicholas will take us through the evolving intersection of AI data and creativity in marketing and business development. He'll share how AI is transforming the way law firms engage with clients. Dive into their data-driven campaigns like Rethinking Regeneration, and discuss the role of human creativity in promoting greater client engagement.

Charlie: The CMO Series podcast is brought to you by Passle, the creators of CrossPitch AI, which makes cross-selling happen. Switch it on and try it today by visiting passle.net. Now back to the podcast. 

Charles: Welcome to the podcast, Nicholas. 

Nicholas: Thank you very much. Delighted to be here. 

Charles: Excellent. So when we spoke before, we talked about how AI is supporting what law firm marketeers are up to. One of the themes we settled on was how AI is driving huge efficiencies. So Nicholas, how have you seen AI and data change the way we engage with clients in marketing and BD? And where does human creativity still come into play? 

Nicholas: Well, I think first of all, I think there's always going to be a place for human creativity. We are complex and sometimes seemingly irrational beings, and that means we have a different way of thinking to the technologies. Now, I think technologies are great tools to use and I think the question is how are we going to work with AI agents, with what they're good at, and the humans, what we are good at. So I think from a client engagement perspective, what AI agents or tools, bots give us is often insight. And that insight can be, can drive understanding about our clients, about the things that they're doing, the things that are around them. But it enables conversations really. And I think it's the AI has the potential. But I think we're just at the very beginning of it. I think it has the potential to really give us powerful information at our fingertips that is always going to improve and always going to get better. And I think for professional advisors, as with other professional services, it's the application of your advice that is important. I think you can look up conditions about a particular matter or the way something about a particular law, but it's how it's applied, who it's applied to, and often it's all about the context. So I think there are enormous opportunities for the client side and then on the marketing and BD side, because it's basically about how we understand our clients and how we get under the bonnet and have the right information. I do think, there we are at risk of a bit like with any innovation, you get very excited about this new, exciting thing. I think we really have to make sure that we concentrate on quality and quality of the information rather than the volume. That data and insight is only powerful if it's true and accurate. So I think we need to make sure that we are in the driving seat of this relationship with AI agents and we are driving that change in how it's used as opposed to sitting there and waiting for these waves of poor insight and poor information to, to cloud our judgment and to send us off in the wrong directions.

Charles: Yeah, I think that's something I've heard quite a lot actually with speaking to legal marketers. AI is good because it can do some of the heavy lifting, but you still need to have a good bit of oversight and make sure what you're feeding into it is the right sort of things. When we spoke before, you mentioned about how you've been using AI to analyze dispute data. Can you share more on how you've leveraged AI and automation to uncover new opportunities and drive your BD efforts? 

Nicholas: So, on the legal side, just to cover that off. So as with lots of other law firms and advisors, we're using tech. We have branded our or given Towers, evolve as the name that we use to, to encompass our approach to use machine learning, gen AI, document automation, data analytics, and all of those sort of the plethora of tools that are available. And that is often around might be about particular matters, but I think is increasingly about building up a broader and wider picture of what a client is doing, and how they operate, and how we can best advise them. So the tech is used across the whole business, including disputes teams, and. That's about looking at having a greater insight into what a client is doing because the more insight we have, the more we understand about their disputes and how they're doing it, then the better we can advise them. And from a BD perspective, we're using a tool called Solomonic, which is a litigation intelligence tool. Now other firms use this as well. It's a basically a big database of claims, actions, and outcomes in the UK high court. And from BD perspective, we, you know, using it in the BD team to look at the sort of disputes that different clients are facing because you get an insight into perhaps where they might be facing challenges and how that sort of dispute avoidance advice can be given or, or where they might benefit from advice in a particular area. So often getting that view behind into what's happening in an organization is the sort of thing that data and AI analyze data is really good at.  

Charles: And when we spoke before, you also talked about your Rethinking Regeneration campaign. Specifically, how are you using technology and data to drive client engagement? Where does creativity come in? 

Nicholas: So, as a law firm, we have certain types of data, but we often need to go out to look at data that gives a different perspective on a market. And the Rethinking Regen campaign was one of a series of campaigns we've worked on for close to a decade now, which was focused on our audiences in the real estate sector. In fact, we won the Excellence in Thought Leadership and best in theme for brand at the Professional Services Management Excellence Awards this year.

Charles: Congratulations. 

Nicholas: Thank you very much. Its predecessor back in 2017 also won a similar award. I think we're quite proud of what we achieve with these different process. So, this campaign was combining economic prosperity data and demographic data from a business called Evaluate Locate, along with sentiment data from a business called Commonplace. So sentiment data is data collected about any physical change, be it road calming, physical development of a scheme. And that data, so Commonplace have  an AI tool that analyzes, that, evaluate, locate, combined that data out. We work with them to combine the two data sets. I think is what really set it apart, because you can have examples of the two sets of data, but when you combine them, that's then when it really, I think, started to make people sit up and think, oh, hang on a minute. That's a different way of looking at it. I mean, in big, in the big scheme of things, I think when AI is able to connect to multiple data sets, that's really valuable and that's the same as if you are bringing to humans perspective on a particular issue. So, that led to a campaign that we rang with in media where we had events across the country and we presented, data around those particular, it could be a sector, it could be a geography, and it was about challenging some of the preconceptions that might exist. And it was great engagement. It enabled us to engage with existing clients, but to get closer to prospective clients because we were saying something different. The law underpins everything that those clients are doing and every process that we're talking about. But the starting point wasn't legal data. It was very different data. But that doesn't mean to say that we aren't in a position to present it. 

Charles: So you mentioned before there that the project has been going for some time, you're Rethinking Regeneration. Sorry, going off script here a little bit, but when did you decide to use  those sort of AI tools and that additional information into that campaign? 'cause obviously you weren't doing that 10 years ago when the campaign started.

Nicholas: No, not at all. And the data that we used in previous campaigns came from probably more traditional sources, like YouGov data or looking at different, uh, information that was available in the sector. This we started, it was December, so the campaign ran for 2024, so we started this in the autumn of 2023. And we wanted to find different data sets that would illustrate the focus that because the government at the time was driving a conversation and lots of developers and investors were talking about regeneration as a, the sort of the conversation point of the moment. And so we went looking, it was with a media, who we've worked with for a long time. So they're a PR advisor, but I think they helped us to develop, and Duncan Lamb, who founded EvaluateLocate or was one of the co-founders, EvaluateLocate, have known him for a long time. So again, human contacts I think bringing together the ideas and the creativity. And then the whole process of the campaign was about us collaborating with these different data partners because it wasn't about us saying, this is the question. These are the answers. This is how we're going to get to it. It really was a question of, we want to say something that's different. What can you bring to the table? 

Charles: And I guess the outcome is you came out with something that was really interesting to your clients and people that you're trying to work with, so it sounds like it was a big success. 

Nicholas: Yeah, it was. It's the sort of thing I would love to do more of, and it's the type of thing that I think differentiates professional advisors from each other, and I think it's the type of thing that will be the differentiating factor when the AI agents can do so much of what everyone else is doing. It's the type of thing that I think will really set us apart. 

Charles: And in terms of campaigns, every campaign has its hurdles. What were some of the challenges you faced with this one and how did you overcome them?

Nicholas: So I think one of the challenges I alluded to was that often, you always want another set of data. You always want another perspective. There's always another thing that you could be looking at. You can get a bit lost. So I think it's important to have a really clear idea of why and how you want to engage with people and what's going to interest them, and also you test it on those different audiences. We informally asked people, asked our contacts and said, is this interesting? Does this give you a perspective? Which opens up a different thought process or conversation. So I think it's keeping it within that, the scope of what you are wanting to achieve and not going down a data rabbit hole that you could, you could illustrate a million things, but it's about presenting something which makes people stop and think.

Charles: So it's the point in the podcast where we jump into the quick fire round. So Nicholas, this is a chance to ask you a few questions so the listeners can know a bit more about you and what you are into. The first question I've got is, what are you currently listening to? This could be music, podcast, audiobook.

Nicholas: So my, I listen to a lot of podcasts, but I'd say BBC podcasts are my go-to mainly because of the highest standard of journalism and that you can actually believe what you're listening to, but I think the comedy podcasts are what I go to when I want to switch off. So breaking the news, the Naked Week, evil Genius, that type of thing. Absolutely my pleasure. 

Charles: Brilliant. I'll have to check those out. What's the best piece of advice you've ever received?

Nicholas: This was one piece of advice, which was always do your best. Now, always doing your best could mean a lot of things, but I've always interpreted as thinking, what could I do better? Because to do your best, you have to keep changing. So nobody knows everything. Everyone could do something better. So be a master of your own destiny, not a passenger, and work out what you can do better.

Charles:  I like that. I guess that's in line with, with never staying still. Just keep moving forward. Keep looking for ways to improve. What a book or resource you recommend anyone in your field?

Nicholas: So one I read recently was The Culture Map by Erin Mayer. It's all about cultural differences across different countries and if you like learning about people in different countries and how they think, it's very insightful and entertaining. Some people might get upset by some of the conclusions, but it is thought through and it is well researched. Then the next one, which is on my reading list, which I've bought but I haven't read yet, and it's The Art of Statistics by David Spigel Halter, and it's all about looking at statistics and how you derive knowledge from data. Again, how you spot patterns and understand things. 

Charles: I've got two interesting reads there. What is the best way to unwind after a busy day?

Nicholas: Is having dinner with my husband and friends or family at home, not in a restaurant. I think the power of breaking bread with the people you love, I think is there's no better tonic to a busy day.

Charles: And who's doing the cooking? Is that you? 

Nicholas: I have to confess, my husband does more cooking than I do. I cook at the weekend. 

Charles: What's your favorite place to visit and why?

Nicholas: Helsinki in Finland. It's a city where I basically started my adult life. So I went there when I was 18 and it formed a significant part of my twenties, my formative twenties.I love spending time there, seeing friends, seeing family, walking by around the city, walking by the sea. I love it. 

Charles: I'll have to put that on my bucket list of travel places and check it out. To wrap up the podcast, Nicholas, we like to get one piece of advice. So for you that is for those looking to blend AI with creative client engagement approach, what's the one piece of advice you would give?

Nicholas: Less can be more and focus on quality rather than volume? Because the ideas that I think cut through will only be powerful if they are accurate and based on true data. And I think we, AI could and is enabling a whole snowstorm of content that we could easily get lost in. And I think it would be how you stay focused to your brief and really maintain that quality of content.

Charles: Yeah, I like that. That makes sense. Don't get lost in the snowstorm of content. Focus on your brief. Focus on reaching that point of, how did you put it earlier? Like a message that makes people sit up and look and take notice. Brill, thanks for today, Nicholas. 

Nicholas: Great, thank you.

Charles: Brill.