Happy New Year to all our subscribers!
The team here at LNTV HQ would like to take this opportunity to congratulate LNTV Expert Panel Member for the Family channel, Anne-Marie Hutchinson OBE (@lawabduction), a partner at London firm Dawson Cornwell (@Dawson-Cornwell), on being made honorary Queen’s Counsel.
Well deserved, and a great start to 2016!
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/queens-counsel-in-england-wales-2015-to-2016
http://www.dawsoncornwell.com/en/about_amh.html
Here at LNTV HQ we are starting to work our last few days before closing the doors on another great year, which saw us deliver 78 excellent continuing professional development/executive education television programmes to hundreds of subscribers, interview more that 150 legal experts including Mr Justice Coulson, upload our programme highlights to YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmxZF_16AYBqklYdMeDqybw), continue to engage with our subscribers on Twitter (@LegalNetworkTV), and welcome two new Writer/Presenters to the LNTV family.
We return refreshed on 4th January, already excited at the plans we have for 2016.
So a big thank you to all our subscribers, readers, and followers – it’s been a great year, and we can’t wait to follow it up with an even better one.
Wishing you the very best for the holiday season, and we hope 2016 brings you everything you hope for.
From all at LNTV HQ.
In response to just how popular last week’s post ‘Marketing Your Firm’ (https://lntvinsight.wordpress.com/2015/11/20/marketing-your-firm/) proved to be, we thought we’d follow it up with another further brief extract from that same forthcoming programme ‘Marketing your Firm’ in the Practice Management & Compliance channel. This time the extract comes from our interview with Ian Stephens, Managing Partner of Saffron Brand Consultants, who talked to us about branding (http://saffron-consultants.com/approach/ian-stephens/)
Interviewer: Talk us through how you go about creating a brand.
Ian Stephens: Well, at the heart of a brand process there are four steps, the first one is what we call discover, so that’s about market research, both understanding what your clients might want and do want. Understanding who you are, what you do, how you do it. So it’s basically the market research end of things. Second step is what we call define, so working out from all those possible things what actually is your strategy. So you define your brand strategy, what message you want to take out to the world. The third stage is design, and that doesn’t only mean visual identity, it means how do we design the service, the experience that we want our clients to have of this service? And then the last one, often the most difficult, is deploy, so how do we make that all happen in the real world as opposed to the PowerPoint presentations we’ve been working with up until now. So a four step process which can be done over weeks or months or even years, but at the heart of it you’re still following that four point process.
Interviewer: So what do you need to think about when assessing the market in which you operate and your role within it?
Ian Stephens: Well, the legal market is a very big and diverse and global market, so there are lots places to be in that market. So part of the research and the defined stage is very important to choose your territory, to choose your story. And there are three, there are three, if you like, overlapping circles, one is what do your clients need, because they’re actually going to pay for something they need, not just what you think they need, so ask them. Those things may be what you think they are, they may be something else. The second thing is what are you good at, and that’s not such a stupid question because you can’t be great at everything and there might be, for whatever reason, you’re particularly entrepreneurial or you’re particularly good at an area of law, you’re particularly good at a type of situation. And then the last one is what can other people do less well than you? And you’re not looking for something unique that nobody else can touch, but you’re looking for emphasis, so you’re trying to find things that clients genuinely do need and that you are, to some extent incredibly able to deliver, and then ideally something that not very many other people can do. Get all those three right and then you start to have a proposition as we might call it, that is quite valuable.
Interviewer: And once you’ve settled on your brand, how do you go about managing it?
Ian Stephens: Well, this is the really tough bit because, actually, defining a story is not so complicated as actually making that real, because a law firm of even 50 people, you’ve got 50 personalities to deal with, 50 human beings to deal with, a law firm of 10,000 people, you multiple that so many times. And so the big challenge in implementing your strategy is to actually deploy it with ruthless precision across all the touchpoints of what we call the client journey, how you manage that client experience at every single touchpoint so that it’s in line with your brand values, and that where things are not in line with those brand values you have to try to take steps to correct them.
We were recently lucky enough to have Sue Stapley, a solicitor and founder of reputation management firm Sue Stapley Consulting (http://www.suestapely.com/) in our studios to discuss how best to market your law firm. Here is a brief extract from that interview, which will be released in full as part of our programme ‘Marketing your Firm’ in the Practice Management & Compliance channel:
Interviewer: Now we all have occasions when we need to make a good impression in a short space of time. What exactly is a mini-pitch or an elevator speech as it’s sometimes known?
Sue Stapley: I think they are sort of interchangeable. My understanding – and I’m not an expert on succinctness – is that it is being able to explain – in one or two sentences at the most – precisely who you are or who the organisation you are representing is or what it does. The phrase ‘elevator pitch’ came from the Americans, of course, who said you should be able to describe your business in the time it takes to travel between floors in a lift or elevator. And the opportunities probably arise most often nowadays at receptions where, I don’t know about you, but I seem to spend probably far too much time standing with an empty glass in my hand in a crowded room talking about my business to other people. And one obviously wants them to remember what it was that one said in case, at some point in the future, they might find your services of use and need to be able to contact you. It is a very succinct statement of who you are and what you do, such that they can remember enough to come back to you if they want to.
Interviewer: So what do you think it should include?
Sue Stapley: The name, and if there’s anything that makes the name more memorable, use that. I’ve been criticised several times for being nothing like serious enough, but my own name is mis-spelt regularly and sometimes mispronounced, and I simply say if you think of shapely, Stapely will probably come to mind. It’s very arrogant but it works, they remember. And one sentence which you will probably need to actually physically write down and work on to get right until it trips off the tongue without your hesitating over it and without you being feeling embarrassed about it, but if you are a small niche practice that specialises in insurance claims then that’s how you want to be seen, and you would say ‘I’m with Seek, Grabbit and Run I’m in a small niche practice that specialises in insurance claims, we’re based in Norwich’. And that’s probably all that you want people to know. That’s enough for them to remember the name, you can make a joke of it if it’s a name that has some joke potential – to make it more memorable – they need to know where you’re placed and they need to know the sector of the business that you’re in.
Interviewer: Have you got any other tips for lawyers that might be thinking about putting together a pitch?
Sue Stapley: Just a few. I think the first and most important is make yourself impossible to dislike. Remember that the client or the potential client is making a choice about a person, a human being or a team of people. Secondly, never forget the support staff, even when you have to do the walk from the lift, which may be with the PA of the person who’s interviewing you, talk to them, be friendly, be nice, they may actually have a voice in the decision-making process so it’s worth being friendly to them as well. And the PA may be the one that’s making the appointments every time you go back into the building, and if she likes you and put in a good word for you it could be helpful. Another quick one is never forget to rehearse your presentation. Just because you’re skilful lawyers and expert in your field – and I would hope you all are – don’t assume that you can do a pitch without rehearsing. Actually put yourselves in the room, get some colleagues to role play the potential client and grill you, and make sure that you go through it clearly so that you know who’s going to say what at what point in the presentation and how. And then finally, follow up: after you’ve done your presentation, hopefully well and successfully, there’ll probably be several weeks delay while they’re seeing other people or considering, you may not hear at once, but the very same day that you’ve done the presentation I would recommend either sending an e-mail or making a phone call – whichever is appropriate – thanking them for their time, saying how much you enjoyed meeting them, maybe seeing their business if you had an opportunity to do that, and how much you’d enjoyed working with them. If there were any questions that you weren’t able to answer at the pitch let them have that information, whether it’s the name of a referee or two who will talk about you positively, or whether it’s a problem that came up that you couldn’t actually offer a solution in the meeting but you’ve had a chance to think about. That demonstrates, again, your enthusiasm for working with them, and that’s always very seductive.
A huge thank you to Sue for making the time to come and be filmed answering our questions, we know the finished programme will be a great one and useful to all those that watch it.
Until next time…
Recently we were lucky enough to have wonderful Peter Williams of Falco Legal Training in the studio to discuss the minimum energy efficiency standard and the Heat Network Regulations as part of our upcoming Property channel programme, ‘Green Issues for Landlords and Tenants’. Here is an exert from that forthcoming interview:
Interviewer: What is the central aim behind the introduction of the Energy Efficiency Regulations 2015?
Peter Williams: The purpose of these Regulations is to cut down the amount of energy used in the UK. UK carbon emissions 25% of those are thought to be domestic houses and another 12% commercial buildings, and the aim is to target tenanted buildings, which is a fair proportion of the building stock as a whole. And the Energy Act 2011 contains provisions that require the Secretary of State to make Regulations to ensure that this happens.
Interviewer: Can you explain the way in which the minimum energy efficiency standard is going to operate?
Peter Williams: Yes. The Regulations that provide for this were made under the Energy Act 2011 and the Secretary of State was required to make these, and the standard has to come in to effect no later than April 2018. So the Regulations operate in two different ways. First of all, they say that landlords are not permitted to grant leases, both of residential and commercial property, of property with an energy rating of less than E, unless they’ve carried out works that are cost effective to improve the energy efficiency of the property, or one of the exemptions applies. So that’s the first. And the second one is that from a later date, which is 2020 for domestic properties and 2023 for commercial properties, landlords won’t be allowed to continue to let properties, which means that they’ll have to carry out works to improve the energy efficiency of property that is already let.
Interviewer: The minimum energy efficiency standard applies to both domestic and non-domestic private rented property. Why in practice is this not going to be workable in relation to domestic property?
Peter Williams: This is to do with Green Deal funding. Landlords have to carry out cost-effective energy efficiency improvements, and the way that’s defined in the Regulations is that it’s works for which the landlord can obtain Green Deal funding. And that means taking advantage of the government’s Green Deal, which is borrowing money for energy efficiency improvements which is then paid back through a levy on the electricity bill. And the Green Deal runs with the property so that it can be passed on between different owners. Now landlords are only required in domestic properties to carry out works for which Green Deal funding is available, but relatively recently, the middle of 2015, the government withdrew all Green Deal funding. It had been available, but the government announced that no further funding was going to be made available. And therefore it’s unclear now how landlords are going to be able to carry out any cost effective improvements when Green Deal funding is no longer available. So we’re waiting for some sort of announcement from the Department of Energy and Climate change, which is the responsible government department for this as to how they think this is going to work in the context of domestic properties.
Interviewer: Focusing on non-domestic private rented properties then, which properties are going to be covered by the standard?
Peter Williams: Right, so we’re looking at commercial properties principally now, and that’s defined in the legislation as any property that isn’t a dwelling, so dwellings are fairly self explanatory. There will be borderline cases, but we can look at them individually as and when they arise. But generally, therefore, we’re looking at commercial properties which are being let. There are exclusions for very long leases, so leases of 99 years or more from the date when they were granted are exempt, and also very short lets are exempt as well, so that’s leases of six months or less, unless the tenant has already been in there for 12 months, which is an anti-avoidance provision, obviously. Now the only properties that are covered are those that have a valid energy performance certificate, or EPC. So obviously all properties now need an EPC for the next letting, but there will be some properties where there may be no EPCs, even though leases have been granted. And also there are some properties for which EPCs are not needed at all, listed buildings is a classic example where we think that no EPCs are needed. So generally, if you don’t need an EPC then you’re not within the minimum energy efficiency standard regulations.
It was great to finally have Peter in the studio after making contact at an SRA event looking at the future of Continuing Professional Development, and we are grateful to him for giving up his time to come and speak to us on this important subject for landlords and tenants of all properties.
Until next time…
LNTV insight 