Legal Marketing & Consulting

California state bar launches a new effort to fight notario fraud

In 2013, a deal on immigration reform seemed imminent in Congress. So imminent, in fact, that law enforcement in California started noticing an uptick in immigration law scams.

"One of the examples of what we saw was attorneys who are publicizing that if you give us $500 now, ... we can begin your immigration paperwork now; and once immigration reform passes, you will be at the front of the line," says David Torres, a member of the State Bar of California's board of trustees. "Those types of promises are obviously false."

Sep 1, 2015 6:45 AM CDT

Blogging is big with BigLaw firms

Graphic by Stephen Ravenscraft This article originally appeared in the September 2015 issue of the ABA Journal with this headline: “BigLaw Blogs: Content marketing blogging continues to grow among the nation’s largest firms.”

Sep 1, 2015 1:40 AM CDT

Crowdfunding can be a great way to finance your case—or destroy it

Hollywood directors use it to bankroll movies. Musicians do it to finance records. A man named Zack Danger Brown raised $55,000 this way to make potato salad. We’re talking about crowdfunding. The concept of crowdfunding is thought to have been invented in 2006, but has quickly become a popular way…

Sep 1, 2015 1:30 AM CDT

Early adopters take new .law domains

Some prominent BigLaw firms are among the early adopters of the new .law domain name extension. DLA Piper; Russell and Goldstein; and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom have each already reserved their domain names. Minds + Machines, the owner of the .law domain extension, started taking orders July 30,…

Aug 10, 2015 9:00 AM CDT

BigLaw firm’s alleged promises to client in hiring talks were puffery, judge says in tossing claims

A company that fired its law firm, then accepted a $4 million settlement from the U.S. Department of Defense, can’t sue the firm on the ground the settlement should have been $10 million, a federal judge has ruled. The decision (PDF) last week by U.S. District Judge Richard Leon of…

Aug 3, 2015 7:19 AM CDT

Lawyer is flattered by toddler’s obsession with his TV ads

Lawyer Morris Bart’s biggest fan may also be his smallest fan. Grayson Dobra, 2, is so obsessed with the New Orleans personal injury lawyer that his mother made Bart the theme of the boy’s birthday party in January, report the Advocate and the Wall Street Journal Law Blog. Dobra’s birthday…

Jul 29, 2015 9:52 AM CDT

Interested in a .law domain name? Watch for these dates

The company overseeing the distribution of the new .law domain has announced two important dates for those interested in acquiring an Internet address with the suffix. Minds + Machines has the exclusive license to operate the new .law domain from the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. The company…

Jul 16, 2015 6:15 AM CDT

Is popular verein structure jeopardizing big firms? Dentons challenges conflict-of-interest ruling

In a move that could have huge repercussions for several of the largest worldwide law firms, Dentons is challenging a U.S. International Trade Commission judge’s decision booting them off an intellectual property case over a conflict of interest. On Wednesday, Law360 reported that the megafirm had filed a motion for…

Jul 10, 2015 6:15 AM CDT

Law firm mergers continue at a blazing pace, survey says

The pace has slowed since the first quarter of 2015, but law firm mergers are nonetheless taking place at a record rate, a survey says. A total of 19 were announced in the U.S. during the second quarter of 2015. With the 29 that were announced in the first quarter…

Jul 6, 2015 2:55 PM CDT

Crowdsourcing legal research website adds writing tool that ‘could be a game-changer’

The free legal research website Casetext, which uses crowdsourcing to annotate cases, has launched a new writing tool that publishes lawyers’ articles and links them to cases they cite. The new LegalPad application “could be a game-changer in how lawyers publish and share articles about the law,” according to LawSites…

Jul 2, 2015 5:45 AM CDT

Stolen bronze baseball statues had made law firm a local landmark

Arriving at work Tuesday morning at their Pennsville, New Jersey, law office, partners Don Masten and Walter Ray noticed the problem at almost the same time. Two bronze statues of baseball players that have decorated the lawn in front of the building for about a decade were gone. In addition…

Jun 16, 2015 3:50 PM CDT

New bar association focuses on marijuana

Lawyers who represent the cannabis industry have formed a national bar association with the goal of providing members both networking and educational opportunities. The founding board members of what is known as the National Cannabis Bar Association include Shabnam Malek, Lara Leslie DeCaro and Amanda Conley, all of whom practice…

Jun 10, 2015 7:00 AM CDT

Lawyer’s skull and crossbones logo gets her evicted

An Oklahoma City lawyer says she was evicted from her office space because she put an unusual skull and crossbones logo on her window. Criminal defense lawyer Joi McClendon tells KOCO.com she thinks the logo is “fun.” Her landlord, however, didn’t like its association with death, piracy and poison. McClendon’s…

May 20, 2015 6:51 AM CDT

Leaders of top 15 most profitable law firms aren’t on Twitter

A few law firm leaders maintain their own accounts on Twitter, but they apparently are in the minority. At the top 15 most profitable law firms, there appear to be no managing partners or firm chairpersons with active Twitter accounts, according to Bloomberg BNA’s BigLaw Business. Leaders of two other…

May 20, 2015 5:45 AM CDT

What will lawyers be doing in 5 to 10 years?

Coming into Las Vegas to attend Avvo’s sixth annual Lawyernomics conference, I was bombarded with concert billboards, including ones for the latest extended residencies. It used to be if you were doing a residency in Las Vegas, your career was circling the drain. Artists like Celine Dion, Britney Spears, Elton…

May 18, 2015 8:30 AM CDT