Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Legal Tech Trends for 2007

I’m a little behind in my reading!  I just came across the April 2007 Dennis Kenedy article in Law Technology Today titled Seven Legal Technology Trends for 2007: Widening the Digital Divide in Law Practice.

I was particularly interested in the lawyer websites section of the article:

B. Blocking and Tackling – Creating a Helpful Web Presence.
Not much has happened in the world of lawyer websites for many years. In fact, you can read the articles I wrote on the subject in the late 1990s and find that most of the same principles and techniques still apply. Yes, blogs have come into play in some exciting ways, but only a small percentage of lawyers have blogs, although with great impact and results.

The vast majority of lawyers have websites that are dated, unattractive, not regularly maintained, and not especially relevant to their target audience. Law firm websites, as a general rule, also make it difficult to get contact information and other basic information.

In 2007, we will see a somewhat surprising move by law firms to spruce up and revamp their websites in light of the growing role of the Internet in the way people shop for and purchase services. In most cases, we will not be talking about introducing some kind of Web 2.0 presence, rather a focus on the basic blocking and tackling necessary to have an effective website. There will be a great focus on traffic and analysis of numbers on the website. We will see more blogs, podcasts and video on law firm sites, but largely integrated into existing sites, with a greater emphasis on publishing information relevant to the likely audience and with a concern for giving the website a contemporary look and feel.

I agree with 99% of what Dennis has to say, with the exception of the introduction of a Web 2.0 presence for lawyers.  Our Websites are entirely Web 2.0 animals! As Dennis points out, most lawyers will not be early adopters—but it only takes a handful to get the ball rolling.