Marketing & IT: A Profitable Marriage

Cooperation and collaboration were key themes of a Friday [March 16] panel at the Legal Marketing Association's annual conference, held this year in Dallas. The panelists on "Marketing & IT? You Can't Have One Without the Other" explored how to create a partnership between the two law firm units that too often treat each other as adversaries.

The lively panel included two pairs of CIO/marketers who literally work across the street from each other in Cleveland: CIO Sam Shipley and director of marketing Alexis Dankovich (far right), of Ulmer & Berne; and CIO Karen Anzuini (middle) and senior marketing communications manager Julie Gurney (far left), of Benesch. I served as moderator of the panel, which drew about 100 attendees on the final day of the annual marketing conference.

Benesch has seven offices and 180 attorneys; Ulmer the same number of attorneys and four offices.

The proximity of the Cleveland offices was obviously a significant help for panel presentation; the four speakers obviously did their homework (and rehearsals) far better than most panelists at most conferences -- and the result was a smoothly integrated and highly interactive presentation.

They engaged the audience with a clever introduction comparing how marketing and IT "hear" proposed projects -- such as when marketing says it wants to do "blast" emails and client alerts, IT immediately assumes the entire firm's email will be blacklisted by every recipient; or when marketing wants to upgrade the firm's branding, IT panics over all the changes that will have to be made to templates, letterheads, etc.

The key to success, said the panelists, is to define and focus on the goals of the firm's "internal clients." Focus on the opportunities, and don't fight over who is going to get credit for the project. By collaborating, marketing and IT can identify and prioritize projects, to help them "grow into business" and enhance the firm's client engagements.

This approach, the panel suggested, also helps both the marketers and IT staff to be perceived as valuable contributors helping the firm reach its goals.

Among the takeaway:

* IT and marketing should review their budgets together before submitting to upper management, especial big budget items.

* Establish quarterly meetings between IT and marketing.

* Agree to project plans and timing.

* IT should turn to marketing as early adopters of new technology; they can help evangelize the initiative within the firm.

* Involve IT early in project planning, when defining objectives and scope.

Among projects that will benefit from IT/marketing collaboration:

* Developing applications for mobile devices

* Practice Group business development tools

* Business intelligence

* Legal project management.

* Using QR codes (that users directly to websites) to distribute information at conferences, etc.

Case Studies

The  Benesch team discussed how it developed "Apportunity," a recruiting app, after being inspired when Anzuini was handed an iPad to choose her wine at a restaurant.The app uses push notifications to alert job seekers when new Benesch jobs are posted.

Shipley discussed how Ulmer created an add-on to its Cole Valley Software ContactEase client relationship management system, to help the firm increase the speed of its "realization" (accounts receiveable). When an attorney is on the phone with a client, his or her computer screen will instantly show the AR balance and past due amount, allowing the lawyer to remind the client to send a check. Read more about this project in our expanded story on the Law Technology News website, here.

Images: Monica Bay

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Read more here.