Review of Legal Tech Branding 2019 - 2020

How law firms are using branding & content to help them distinguish their own stories in New Law.

Joining the Journey How law firms branding their tech and innovation have progressed in 2020

Review of Legal Tech Branding 2019 – 2020

Soukias Jones Design

We are a small group of experts specialising in branding for professional services.

It’s an area we know well, one in which we can genuinely help our clients. We work for lawyers, accountants, consultants and advisers – and over the past 20 years, we’ve helped many firms, globally and locally, to create new brands, refresh existing ones and develop content and campaigns.

Our services

Your Brand

Corporate ID and Design

Editorial and Content

Print and Presentations

Digital and Social

Film and Animation

Website

Professional services clients include:

Definitions We use the following definitions for categorising brands into different types of architecture: Monolithic: This is the default category for professional services firms, using the awareness and credibility of the main corporate brand (Hogan Lovells, for example) to bundle a group of tech and resourcing solutions. A variant is for firms to draw on sub-branding to distinguish legal delivery from legal expertise often using naming (as with Ashurst Advance). Endorsed: In contrast to sub-branding, a separately endorsed brand becomes the hero. Usually incorporates the masterbrand but in a reduced way and the sub-brand becomes more dominant but may have elements such as fonts or colours that relate to each other (BCLP Cubed, for example). Branded: In this model, at the opposite end of the scale from the monolithic strategy, a stand-alone separate brand is established with little or no reference to the masterbrand or sub-brand. Gravity Stack is a good example. Owned by Reed Smith, the brand is free of the many associations of Big Law and the leadership team has the flex to position Gravity Stack (with its own name and visual identity) as it sees fit.

Baker McKenzie Baker Tilly DFK International KPMG Haines Watts Hogan Lovells Kirkland Ellis King & Spalding Mishcon de Reya White & Case William Fry Willis Tower Watson

More firms enter the journey

Lawyers are no longer the judges of their own performance. Instead, buyers are making their own decisions, armed with access to information and the ability to choose afresh. While Big Four firms and Alternative Legal Service Providers (ALSPs) are benefitting, others need to step up their pace. Evidence suggests that bigger UK firms are increasingly using branding to demonstrate how they can create better outcomes for clients. Some, especially mid-tier firms and large US firms, have been slower to get on board.

Top 30 UK firms

In the last 12 to 18 months, we’ve seen an increasing number of Top UK 30 firms use branding and content to distinguish how they deliver legal services. Sub-branding is growing, with around 60% of law firms (18 firms) now following the trend to separate their legal practice from their legal delivery. On top of the two firms adopting a branded approach (Condor and Konexo), 20 out of 30 firms overall (66%) now brand their platform of solutions and products. We anticipate this approach continuing, and becoming a stepping-stone for more stand-alone brands as the market in the next five to 10 years moves from using tech for automation to more transformational change. Even so, 33% of the Top 30 UK firms have so far failed to join the journey, or have done so on only a limited basis. During the pandemic, the rate and pace of change has slowed. Pre-pandemic, we saw new brands launched including BPLP Cubed, Konexo, Kennedys iQ and DLA Piper’s Law&. Other firms focused on strengthening their positioning and launching new solutions. This year, however, most firms have been using time during the Covid-19 lockdowns to upgrade content and websites, and to support their clients through the pandemic. Among UK firms in the Top 30-60, there continue to be differing rates of adoption of legal branding. Only 10 firms (33%) have started this journey, and over the past year there have been no significant changes. Notably, Lewis Silkin, Mishcon de Reya, TLT and Shoosmiths have used the time to launch new brands and strengthen existing ones.

93% (28 firms) Use monolithic approach to branding tech 60% (18 firms) Use sub-branding for platform of solutions 33% (10 firms) Include no or little reference to tech narrative

Top 30 – 60 UK firms

66% (20 firms) Include no or little reference to using tech

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Review of Legal Tech Branding 2019 – 2020

More firms enter the journey– cont

Firms operating in the US market also seem reluctant to start the journey. Big firms undoubtedly have solutions and expertise (Baretz and Brunelle* reported that 35 Am Law 100 firms provide alternative legal services), but most have demonstrated little appetite to use branding and content to highlight their capabilities. A couple of new brands bucked this trend: Reinvent by Baker McKenzie and Gravity Stack from Reed Smith. Outside of law practices, the ALSP market continued its migration from ‘alternative’ to ‘business of law’. Elevate led by renaming itself a ‘law company’, while Axiom Managed Services used a new name, Factor, to reaffirm its vision to be the centre of transactional legal work.

Legal tech branding: Five good examples

Over the past 12 months or so, five firms have pushed the envelope, they include:

1 / Allen & Overy Building on its approach of using research led thought leadership to validate its expertise, the firm published its findings from 90 in-house leaders into how they are tackling change and transformation (The A&O legal innovation benchmarking report).

And then there are the Big Four.

The Big Four have the brands to die for. A recent survey¹ found that 69% of law firms saw Deloitte, PwC, KPMG and EY as major threats to their market share, while in 2019 Acritas’ Global Alternative Legal Brand Index listed the Big Four accountants in its top five places. This won’t stop. Nor, too, should law firms stop innovating and developing their brands.

2 / BCLP Cubed Created the sub-brand name of ‘Cubed’ and used the visual theme of ‘cubes’ to a help articulate its proposition of three (legal advice, volume legal deliver and legal operations support).

3 / Kennedys iQ Used a bold statement and visual approach to get cut through (‘Kennedys, without lawyers’).

4 / Linklaters Developed a trainee-led podcast series Linkubator, a novel approach to delivering legal tech content.

5 / Shoosmiths Created ‘The New How’ (#NewHow) to package its range of products, solutions and content. Refreshingly different.

* Baretz & Brunelle ‘Home Court Advantage’ - The Am Law 100’s Move into Alternative Legal Services (October 2020). www. baretzbrunelle.com ¹ Elephants in the Room: The Big Four’s Expansion in the Legal Services Market (ALM Intelligence, 2017)

What does the journey look like?

Back in June 2019, we published ‘How law firms brand innovation and lawtech’, which reviewed websites, press releases and related articles to see how Top 30 UK law firms ( from The Lawyers UK 200, 2018) are branding their tech and innovation. We found a mixed picture. Most of the biggest firms were branding their tech stacks, innovation and resourcing solutions in a variety of ways, many combining masterbrands and content. Yet more than half of firms in the Top 30 weren’t, including heavyweights such as DLA Piper and Hogan Lovells.

Approaching the end of 2020, we decided to take another look to see where firms are on the branding journey. This time, we expanded our review to look at different parts of the tech ecosystem (including mid-sized firms, large US firms, ALSPs and the Big Four) and gain context. Our review covers what is broadly defined as ‘new law’ (New Law), a term increasingly used to describe any non-traditional method of delivering legal services and covering areas including technology, alternative resourcing, managed services, innovation, advisory services and alternative fee arrangements. In this review, we identified a number of challenges for firms navigating the branding journey. During the past 18 months, in our quarterly newsletter BrandTech, we addressed several of these challenges (these articles are included here). One topic is that of internal communications. The internal sell is arguably the most important part of any branding adventure but, by nature, is not necessarily easy to evaluate by looking at websites and searching the internet. All firms face the challenge of winning internal hearts and minds and creating a culture conducive for tech development and innovation. A snapshot of how Linklaters approaches this subject is the focus of our article on pages 20 - 21. In compiling this review, our aim is to give a glimpse into how different firms approach branding tech, and share our own insights. This has enabled us to draw-out five ideas for helping firms on the journey (page 15). Whether you are already on the journey, keen to move quicker, or in a different direction or still at planning stage, we hope this will prove a useful reference point in helping you move forward.

For further information, please contact: Grahame Jones grahame@soukiasjones.co.uk 07961 357 358 www.soukiasjones.co.uk

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Review of Legal Tech Branding 2019 – 2020

Top 30 UK law firms

Corporate branding still dominates

Strengthening the offer Firms have used lockdown time to rationalise and expand their brands; and, make them easier to understand. Allen & Overy re-grouped its mix of solutions within six easy to understand groupings. Linklaters too regrouped its solutions under Technology & Process, Partnership & Collaboration and People & Culture. Like-wise for Clifford Chance who realigned its innovation strategy around Create, Applied Solution and Best Delivery. Beyond this, firms strengthened their branding. Allen & Overy realigned Peerpoint and Fuse using the sign-off ‘By Allen & Overy’. Linklaters repositioned Nakhoda as its technology brand and launched Legal Operations and Re:Link (a separate brand for flexible resourcing). Ashurst made its Ashurst Advance Delivery and Ashurst Advance Digital the two main pillars for Ashurst Advance Innovation; and Norton Rose Transform added Legal Operations Consultancy to its mix of services. In October, Clifford Chance Applied Solutions launched its online tool Cross Border Publisher: Data Protection, adding CC Dr@ft, Cross-Border Publisher: Banking Confidentiality, SMCR Manager, and Continuing Obligations: Debt Securities to its portfolio of products. Such a mixed bag of names (descriptive, abstract and acronym-based) however, could hinder products’ adoption if partners and/or clients are not clear about what each one does, and how they fit together. As firms expand their toolboxes of solutions, it’s increasingly important they make good decisions about positioning and naming groups and sub-groups in branding tech (see our article ‘Simplifying tech naming’ on page 24). Pinsent Masons, too, regrouped its solutions. It recently launched a new practice, Advanced Delivery, to combine its expertise in the areas of people, process and technology. The name is popular, used by Allen & Overy, Ashurst and in part by WBD. Others use the same categories, often just as lists. By contrast, BCLP – with its BCLP Cubed sub-brand – broke away from the pack to use the idea of ‘three’ to develop elements of its brand identity (with a name, logo and positioning line). Cubes aren’t unique, but give BCLP a neat visual metaphor to build awareness internally and externally. Developing this core idea to illustrate three elements can elevate any ‘listing’ into something more compelling and exciting.

The monolithic approach to branding tech and innovation is still popular, with 93% of firms taking this approach (down from 97% last time we reviewed the market). Only two – Eversheds Sutherland and Fieldfisher – broke free from this model and developed separate brands (Konexo and Condor respectively). They join a small group of firms from outside the UK who have created separate brands for their technology, innovation and related services: these include Reinvent from Baker McKenzie, Nextlaw from Dentons, Gravity Stack from Reed Smith, and several others from the US including Encompass from Nelson Mullins, Tritura from Faegre Drinker, and the planned Recurve from Greenberg Traurig. Understandably, the use of a well-known corporate brand is reassuring. In the past 18 months, however, several firms have used naming to create distance between their legal expertise and legal delivery – 60% of Top 30 UK firms (18) now use this strategy. The approach to using names however, varies between the generic ‘Alternative Legal Services’ (Herbert Smith Freehills) to something more specific and bespoke, Law& (DLA) for example. DLA Piper’s Law&, Pinsent Masons Vario and Simmons & Simmons Wavelength joined this group in the last 18 months. In addition, a few new sub-brands were launched but positioned further from the masterbrand (BCLP Cubed, DWF Mindcrest and Kennedys iQ, for example). They join a select group of endorsed sub-brands (twoBirds and NRF Transform). However, it’s an area that’s not black and white. There are no neat brand categories. Linklaters, for example, launched separate brands for technology and resourcing (Nakhoda and Re:Link) but positions its wider capabilities under the Linklaters brand. Allen & Overy follows a hybrid approach too, as do others. The challenge is to ensure that a mixed approach is carefully managed (using brand architecture) to avoid the development of a smorgasbord of solutions and products: this can become impenetrable not only to clients but also to partners (see our article ‘Brand Architecture: it’s no joke’ on pages 22 -23).

Developing joint ventures and fostering new ideas through collaboration is part and parcel of the legal tech landscape, and partnering within the ecosystem to share new ideas is a popular way to go. DAC Beachcroft is the latest firm to launch a research and development hub, Innovation Lab. Joint ventures can throw up different approaches: Norton Rose Fulbright and Syke Legal Engineering’s new strategic alliance is branded NRF | SYKE. Bird & Bird has gone further with bidding experts ShineX to create the brand Foothold (read more in our article ‘Buddying up’ on page 27). Creating a compelling story DWF has used the last few months to strengthen its proposition. By articulating its purpose (‘transforming legal services through our people, for our clients’), the firm sets out its stall to be a disruptor, pivoting on its legal teams, managed services and ‘connected’ services. Similarly, Linklaters has been successful in establishing its purpose (‘delivering legal certainty in a changing world’) as the cornerstone of its narrative. Both have dug deep to create a distinctive message, but others are less successful. CMS defaulted to generic claims (‘innovation underlies everything we do’) while Stephenson Harwood’s claim says almost nothing (‘it’s not just the quality of our legal advice that our clients rely on, it’s how we work with our clients that helps us stand out from the crowd’). As more and more buyers take the time to scrutinise differing approaches, achieving distinction and success will mean developing a persuasive story supported by proof-points. The way to develop a compelling narrative is the topic of our article ‘Selling your story’ on page 25.

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Review of Legal Tech Branding 2019 – 2020

Top 30 UK law firms– cont

Few firms still keeping quite Despite all the momentum for change, a full third (33%) of the UK’s Top 30 law firms (10) have not yet joined the journey to brand their tech, or have taken only a few steps. Some firms (Hogan Lovells, Gowling WLG, Irwin Mitchell, Macfarlanes, Taylor Wessing and Withers, for example) have yet to add to their websites an overarching tech and innovation proposition to draw together approaches and solutions. Despite promoting Clyde Code, Clyde & Co fails to contextualise its commitment by detailing its overall approach. So too DAC Beachcroft and Simmons & Simmons: despite the latter’s involvement with Simmons & Simmons Adaptive and Simmons & Simmons Wavelength, it has yet to pull together all aspects with an overarching narrative to describe how its range of solutions and products can benefit clients.

Making content work harder In the early months of lockdown, some firms spent time focusing on upgrading their content. Clyde & Co added new content for its smart contracting platform Clyde Code. CMS did similar, bringing to the surface credentials that were previously filed deep within the bowels of its corporate site, and adding ‘Innovation’ to its main navigation. Some firms refreshed their content in line with new websites (Pinsent Masons and Slaughter & May, for example). Allen & Overy’s thought leadership approach was seen in 2014 with ‘Unbundling a market’; more recently it came up with ’The A&O Legal Innovation Benchmarking Report’, which presents research into legal innovation based on interactions with more than 90 in-house leaders. Although thought leadership still plays a key role in how most firms brand their tech, surprisingly few (other than Clyde & Co with its ‘Glass Report 2020’ investigating the trends and developments affecting legal leaders, including a section on technology and innovation) have adopted a research-led approach to thought leadership. Clifford Chance Applied Solutions stepped up its content and developed its blogging platform (Transformation through tech) to distribute tech related content from more than 45 contributors. So too Slaughter & May, featuring a similar number of contributors for its blogging publishing platform The Lens. Meanwhile, DWF has developed its Brave New Law programme, a thought leadership platform for GCs that explores the future of law in a series of interactive workshops (virtual and physical) as well as in articles and interviews. In addition, DWF Ventures created a short film featuring its Legal Design Challenge: a day-long exercise using collaboration to develop contracting solutions. Ashurst Advance also took advantage of film content to showcase its Legal Hackathon. Film and animation have gained popularity as modes of communication in the last 18 months. Addleshaw Goddard, BCLP Cubed, Clyde Code, DAC Beachcroft and Slaughter & May have all added animated or filmed content to their sites. In the audio space, Linklaters launched its own podcast series, Linkubator, a trainee-led programme for discussing the latest trends and topics in legal technology and innovation. Nextlaw added more content to its Ignite podcast series, while Allen & Overy used a podcast to discuss the topic ‘How should the in-house function respond to the forces disrupting its operating model?’.

Firms ranked 30 to 60

Low adoption of branding Among law firms ranked 30 to 60, use of technology has not achieved the same degree of penetration as in bigger counterparts (Top 30). Given their positioning, resources and costs, perhaps it’s hardly surprising that two thirds of firms (66%, or 20 in total) feature no content to highlight tech, innovation and resourcing credentials. We reviewed this a year ago, and it seems there has been little change. As firms look to build on pandemic-driven momentum for using technology, perhaps this will move the needle. Of 10 firms that in the past year have surfaced their approach, just a handful are going further. Mishcon de Reya for example, has added to its portfolio of non-legal services under the MDR Group brand by launching MDRxTech (a provider of digital solutions). TLT brought together its solutions under TLT Future Law, introducing the strapline ‘Changing the future of law’. TLT Future Law is now the descriptor for its portfolio of solutions: TLT One, Procurement & Contract Management, TLT Applied, Regulatory Affairs, TLT Intelligent Drafting and TLT Legal Sifter. Lewis Silkin has continued to expand its non-legal services (such as rockhopper, Data CheckPoint and Eleven) by launching LS Unlock and LS Presents, two platforms offering services to help firms through the pandemic. Shoosmiths, meanwhile, built on its Connected Services sub-brand, launching a brand for its range of tech products named, intriguingly, The New How (#NewHow). This cleverly builds on the idea of providing new ways to deliver services. The narrative is refreshingly different, too: ‘We’re all used to focusing on what and how. ‘What’ is spotting that risk, drafting that clause, doing that deal. What is here to stay. But ‘how’ is up for grabs, and at Shoosmiths, we care a lot about ‘how’. So we changed ‘how’. There’s a new ‘how’ in town. Smarter, faster, better’. The animated content to accompany this is also fresh.

Others such as BLM Innovations, Mills & Reeve and Weightmans expanded their hubs of content. Burges Salmon ran its second internal B-Innovative Week, a day-long programme of thought leadership, including a tech fair, coding workshops and high-profile guest speakers. Keoghs, the insurance firm, is expanding its AI online tool Lauri to other areas such as medical reporting. Outside the top 60, Taylor Vinters continued to build momentum in promoting innovation and using tech by launching its stand-alone AI-enabled brand RAPID for contract reviews, and strengthening its commitment to innovation using the Idea Drop platform.

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Review of Legal Tech Branding 2019 – 2020

ALSPs

US firms

Hiding away A recent report from consultants Baretz and Brunelle reported that 35 Am Law 100 firms are providing alternative legal services. Yet a review of sites of large US international firms reveals that most appear to be trailing the technology curve of UK equivalents. It may not be possible to build a full picture of activities just by searching firms’ websites, but these do give clues. Heavyweights such as Clearly Gottlieb, Latham & Watkins, Kirkland & Ellis, Skadden, Simpson Thatcher, and Weil and White & Case say nothing (or next to nothing) about branding tech. There are few press releases or references to awards, and none come close to branding their tech on the scale of the biggest UK firms. Just a select few heavyweights have moved down the branding pathway, including Baker McKenzie and Reed Smith. Recently, Baker McKenzie strengthened its positioning by launching a firm-wide innovation arm and teamed up with artificial intelligence specialist Spark Beyond to help it run its flagship project. Reinvent will act as an umbrella for its New Law programmes, sharing branding with Frankfurt-based technology hub Reinvent Law, which it set up in 2018. Reed Smith established Reed Smith Global Services for its legal services delivery, but with Gravity Stack, has moved away from its eponymous branding. With a separate name and visual identity, this is the firm’s technology arm. A fresh name means this stand-alone business has the flex to manage and position itself, free from the associations and cultural constraints of a Big Law firm. Other examples from US firms include Encompass (Nelson Mullins), Tritura (Faegre Drinker) and KP Labs (from Keesal Propulsion Labs). See page 17 for a fuller list.

Challenges in building distinction

A line-in-the-sand moment came in November 2018, when Elevate became the first of the big New Law players to rebrand itself as a ‘law company’. In doing so, arguably it became the first major player to redefine market perceptions about alternative provision and the business of law. This year, others have strengthened their positioning. Some examples include DWF’s acquisition of Mindcrest; Axiom Managed Services’ rebrand to Factor; high-ranking appointments at Elevate; and United Lex’s acquisition of Paul Hastings’ eDiscovery capabilities. Most of these, if not all, have continued to look the same and say similar things. Perhaps this is understandable: after all, it provides corporate reassurance. But under the bonnet, ALSPs are different from law firms, and from the Big Four. Arguably their culture and focus, free from the baggage of partnership, offer greater flex for different – and perhaps better – positioning. Many have yet to capitalise on this opportunity. Factor has become one of the first to step out of the shadows. Rebranded in January from Axiom Managed Services, it eschewed the label ‘law company’ and has instead built a clear proposition on being at the centre of transactional legal work (‘where clients spend a lot of their time’ as it is eager to claim). It has a name and copy lines to support this proposition. Moreover, its tone of voice gives the firm a modern, leading- edge feel, just right for the mobile digital world and fitting its claim that ‘Factor represents Legal Innovation 2.0’.

Big Four

Building a new kind of legal business

Footnote In November, PwC announced it would spin off its fintech arm eBam as LikeZero. With changes to auditor independent rules, the firm felt it could grow the business more effectively outside of PwC. Could this set a trend among the Big Four to reshape their advisory businesses ahead of regulatory changes? The firm remarked: “In the current environment, PwC [is]... not really the right home to turn LikeZero into a proper global business.” It doesn’t take too much imagination to see how one or more of the Big Four could use a similar statement if they decide to do likewise for some or all of their legal delivery services businesses.

No review of the year is complete without referencing the Big Four. All strengthened their positioning for providing legal expertise and helping to deliver it through new people, services, collaborations and acquisitions. Deloitte’s acquisition of technology-based law firm Kemp Little is the latest expansion by Big Four accountants into legal services. This follows the development of Deloitte Legal’s partnership with PhD entrepreneurship programme Conception X, giving it access to cutting-edge legal research and innovation. PwC continued its expansion and entered the UK legal tech market through a new collaboration with technology firm Thought River. Meanwhile, KPMG launched Global Legal Ops Transformation Services practice team to handle large-scale business in what it claims is ‘more efficient and technologically enabled way’. All this follows EY’s two high-profile acquisitions of Riverview Law and Pangea3, both now absorbed into its managed services business and coming under the EY Law brand. There is clearly a trend for the world’s largest four auditing and advisory firms to continue and increase their advance into the field of legal services. A survey found that 69% of law firms see Deloitte, PwC, KPMG and EY as major threats to their market share. It’s easy to understand why, of course. Each can leverage an immense range and breadth of expertise to position itself firmly in the ‘business of law’: straplines include ‘experience the future of law, today’ (Deloitte Legal), ‘legal means business’ (PwC New Law Services), ‘reimagining law’ (KPMG Legal) and ‘building a better working world’ (EY Law). There is no doubt that the Big Four have the brand power to leverage this approach. All four occupied top five places in Acritas’ Global Alternative Legal Brand Index 2019.

Experience the future of law, today

Legal means business

Reimagining law

Building a better working world

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Review of Legal Tech Branding 2019 – 2020

The journey so far

Keeping close to the corporate tone

Journeying to more stand-alone brands Eighteen firms (60% of the Top 30 UK law firms) have already created sub-brands for their collections of legal tech, innovation and resourcing programmes. With digitisation accelerating, and the appetite of firms and clients for digital services and technology whetted further by the Covid-19 lockdown, it’s a trend likely to grow. Other factors include increased regulatory demands on clients, the trend for clients and firms to pursue efficiency, and the continuing strength and growth of ALSPs and the Big Four. As a result, firms are under increasing pressure to develop and expand their tech stacks, resourcing solutions, programmes for innovation, and recruitment of non-lawyers. More firms, understandably, are using sub-branding for New Law services. Leveraging a law firm’s reputation and associations when selling new services and products makes cross-selling easier, but as law firms are the premier providers of legal advice (this is what they sell), many will find it hard to jettison this association. The challenge is to find an optimal balance between association and independence. Konexo is independent. It retains a light touch and connection to the masterbrand through endorsement (‘a division of Eversheds Sutherland’). By contrast, Ashurst Advance is hardly independent but retains a strong association to the masterbrand, using Ashurst’s name and visual identity. The degree of association between firms will vary, depending on individual strategy and aspirations. Keeping everything under the same roof will become, we believe, increasingly hard. The LLP model may be proven for delivering legal services, but it is not a tried-and-trusted model to deliver technology and digital solutions. We believe that over the next five to10 years, when freed to shape their own culture, develop innovation, create marketing and pursue long-term growth without the burden of a masterbrand and its changing priorities, more and more sub-brands will evolve into strong independent New Law brands. (Read more about this subject in our article ‘Pondering how to position legal tech?’ on page 26).

Few firms have pushed out the boat. Recent new brands and refreshes are largely extensions of the masterbrand’s corporate tone. Perhaps Kennedys iQ moved further away, using a large animated eye and ‘Kennedys, without the lawyers’. BCLP Cubed, with its idea of ‘three’ and cube animation, was also more adventurous, but the new stand-alone brand Konexo retains the same tone as its parent Eversheds Sutherland. Despite its tech-sounding name, Gravity Stack takes its cue from Reed Smith, and other brands (Fieldfisher’s Condor, DLA Piper’s Law&, Baker McKenzie’s Reinvent and Dentons’ Nextlaw) share an undeniably corporate feel. Hats off to Shoosmiths. Its new brand (or initiative) The New How (#NewHow) is refreshingly different. Its tone and style are certainly more consumer than big corporate law.

We’re all used to focusing on what & how. What is spotting that risk, drafting that clause, doing that deal. What is here to stay. But how is up for grabs... and at Shoosmiths, we care a lot about how. So, we changed how. There’s a new how in town... Smarter, faster, better.

Dentons Mini case-study

Five ideas to positively shape perceptions 1 / Develop a brand architecture Before you introduce new solutions, it’s useful to address (or re-evaluate) your brand architecture: provides a blueprint for the relationship (naming and visual identity) of your mix of businesses, solutions and products both now and in future. Without supporting guidelines, the end result could be confusion. 2 / Be compelling The marketplace is noisy, so create a compelling narrative that will set you apart. Work hard to distinguish what you offer. Referencing how the firm’s purpose shapes your approach, will help in this. Use proof-points to entice and showcase. Think about how you can include awards, accolades, impressive facts and stats, testimonials, case studies and opinion pieces. What’s more, make it easy for clients to find what they’re looking for, and what they want to achieve. Clear signposting, page links, content hubs and starting your proposition from the homepage can all help. 3 / Use compelling content to engage Part of evidencing your expertise, use your insights and thought leadership to create and share strategic content of value. Film, animated content and webinars are all popular. Few firms however, are using research based though-leadership to provide a rich stream

Dentons has developed a clear association between its masterbrand and its portfolio of sub-brands, using an endorsement (‘by Dentons’ and ‘in association with’), and the firm’s corporate purple. Dentons entered the legal tech market back in 2015, launching the stand-alone brand Nextlaw Labs (legal business accelerator). The firm claimed then: ‘The market has talked about Big Law and New Law, but we want to be Next Law’. From this foray, the firm created a portfolio of challenger sub-brands under the Nextlaw name: Nextlaw Ventures (venture capital focused on early stage legal tech); Nextlaw Referral Network (legal referral network); Nextlaw Public Affairs (public affairs and PR); and Nextlaw In-House Solutions (advisory on business of law).

of campaignable content. 4 / Educate internally

Legal technology and resourcing are complex areas. It’s important for partners and other fee-income earners to understand them, so that they can communicate how they can solve client issues. Internally, and on a continuing basis, make sure you are asking the right questions. 5 / Involve branding and marketing To set up the right brand strategy and manage it effectively. Help define a distinct proposition and establish the right content and channels, you’ll need ongoing branding and marketing expertise to achieve cut-through, both internally and externally.

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Appendix

New Law / Captive ALSP brands ( from law firms)

1 / Stand-alone brands Branded platforms for delivering legal services

3 / Endorsed brands Endorsed branded platforms for delivering legal services

Condor (Fieldfisher) Konexo (Eversheds Sutherland)

BCLP Cubed (BCLP) Twobirds Client Solutions (Bird & Bird) DWF Mindset (DWF) Kennedys iQ (Kennedys) Norton Rose Transform (Norton Rose Fulbright)

2 / Sub-brands Sub-branded platforms for delivering legal services AG ID (Addleshaw Goddard) Advance Delivery & Solutions (Allen & Overy) Ashurst Advance Delivery & Ashurst Advance Digital (Ashurst) CMS Managed Legal Services & CMS Design (CMS) Clifford Chance Applied Solutions & Clifford Chance Create (Clifford Chance) Law& (DLA) Connected Innovation (Freshfields) Alternative Legal Services (Herbert Smith Freehills) Linklaters Nakhoda (Linklaters) Osborne Clarke Solutions (Osborne Clarke) Pinsent Masons Vario (Pinsent Masons) Simmons & Simmons Wavelength (Simmons & Simmons) WBD Advance (Womble Bond Dickinson)

4 / Narratives The following firms fail to include on their websites a narrative that describes their overarching approach and services for delivery of legal services, despite (some) having solutions to talk about.

Clyde & Co DAC Beachcoft HFW* Hogan Lovells Irwin Mitchell* Macfarlanes*

Simmons & Simmons Stephenson Harwood Taylor Wessing* Watson Farley & Williams* Withers*

* Firms failing to include any content detailing tech and innovation capabilities.

5 / Brands in specific areas (include)

6 / US firms

Innovation Hubs & Design: DWF Ventures Fuse (Allen & Overy) Freshfields Hub and Freshfields Labs Collaborate and Fast Forward (Slaughter & May) Innovations Lab (DAC Beachcroft) MDR Lab (Mishcon de Reya) *

Captive ALSPs: Cognicion (Hunton Andrews Kurth) De Novo (David Wright Tremaine) Discovery Counsel Services (McGuire Woods) Discovery Solutions (Wilmer Hale) e-merge (Troutman)

Encompass (Nelson Mullins) InCuBaker (Baker Hostetler)

* Outside Top 30

KP Labs (Keesal Propulsion Labs Osler Works (Osler Hoskin Harcourt) SixFifty (Wilson Sonsini)

Resourcing: AG Integrate (Addleshaw Goddard) Condor Flight (Condor) Exchange (Norton Rose Transform) Flex (Bird & Bird) Peerpoint (Allen & Overy) Re:Link (Linklaters) Simmons & Simmons Adaptive Vario (Pinsent Masons) Advisory: AGConsulting (Addleshaw Goddard) DWF 360 Oxygy (Bird & Bird)

Review of Legal Tech Branding 2019 – 2020

A series of articles published in BrandTech, our quarterly newsletter of news and views in legal tech branding . Articles

60 seconds with Francesca Bortoli at Linklaters (published Winter 2020)

Linklaters has a strong reputation for excellence in innovation and technology. Francesca (‘Fran’) Bortoli is part of its innovation team, helping to drive the narrative internally and externally. We talked with Fran about her insights into marketing and communications.

BrandTech: Currently your role is Senior Client Innovation Adviser. So what are your day-to-day responsibilities? Fran: I focus on innovation-driven marketing and business development initiatives and opportunities, and amplify our firm’s innovation messaging both internally and with our clients. For example, • I work with our marketing, business development and pitch teams to ensure that we provide a tailored response to clients with innovation woven throughout; • I liaise with our PR team to showcase our innovation initiatives to the market (on com, social medial channels and conferences); and • I deliver tailored innovation sessions to up-skill our lawyers and business professionals so that they feel empowered, through the use of case studies and stories from across our network, to show the value innovation brings to their client relationships and legal work. BrandTech: Your background is in marketing. How does this help with your present role? Fran: There is a clear overlap between business development and innovation; they can’t operate in isolation. I help join the dots to make sure we provide a bespoke, tailored response to our clients.

I understand how the different functions in marketing operate, know when to bring them in when required, and know how their different clients like to receive information. I also worked in practice marketing for three years, working with lawyers from four different practice groups, so I understand exactly how they work and the different demands from their clients. BrandTech: You are part of the innovation team. How does the group champion innovation and tech? Fran: Our team is excited and curious about technology. We see it as something that guides, speeds and supports us, and our clients. The tech doesn’t replace our people: it allows our people to spend more time on strategic and interesting tasks. We invest and champion the tech when we clearly see the benefits this brings to the end user. We work very closely with our technology experts in the firm to ensure we select technology and then work closely with our Practice Innovation and Efficiency (PIE) teams and innovation lawyers to design onboarding and training programmes that maximise adoption, thus ensuring we get the best return on investment. BrandTech: Getting partners’ buy-in to tech and innovation is a big challenge for any firm. Can you share any techniques or stories in which you (literally) saw the light bulb come on! Fran: Adjusting to a new way of working during Covid-19 has seen a huge increase in adoption of our global WebEx platform, with people using a headset for calls and video calls. Previously, some partners didn’t trust the platform and preferred to use their traditional desk phones. Through having to use it to continue working, they’ve built trust in the technology and seen the benefits it brings to their internal and client interactions. We have found that having adapted to working in lockdown, our lawyers are now totally open to trying new things – so we have taken that opportunity to share many of the tech tools we would look to bring into the firm in the coming months/future years, use

their time to help benchmark solutions against each other and run pilots. There is so much more engagement now and we should be harnessing that openness to trying new things. For all the grief lawyers get about being slow to adopt change, they have done that literally overnight and while still delivering excellent client service! BrandTech: Would you agree internal communications are fundamental to driving external perceptions and attitudes among clients and other stakeholders? Fran: Internal communications is a MUST! Your firm could have every piece of technology available on the market but if you don’t communicate to your people why they should use the technology and explain how it will save them time or allow them to wow their client, you will never see adoption. It’s also important to tailor internal communications to different audiences: how a trainee thinks about legal design is different to how a partner thinks about legal design. Success stories are key to impact. People need to hear evidence to believe in something, or feel empowered to share an idea. Failures and lessons learned are key in communications. The best solutions are those that are refined. Sharing challenges faced can help someone else when they approach something similar. BrandTech: Firms are embracing tech differently. What are your top three tips for success for firms starting the journey? Fran: Work with your end users to make sure you are building and using technology that works for them all. Give your people time to use technology to build their own experience. Only then will they feel the benefits it can bring. Finally, don’t get distracted when a new ‘shiny bauble’ piece of technology comes out as the solution to everything. Identify the problem you want to solve then find a tech solution to fulfil that need.

Brand architecture: it’s no joke (published Summer 2020)

Then along came technology and changed the status quo.

Perhaps you’ve heard the one about a traveller asking a local for directions, only to receive the response: “If you want to go there, I wouldn’t start from here.” A few legal marketers and technology managers might be thinking they would have started their journeys differently, too! The place you start from can make all the difference in terms of eventual success. Conversely, starting from the wrong place can increase the difficulty of reaching your intended destination. A quick glance at the innovation section of the websites of some big law firms – showing a decidedly smorgasbord approach to tech products and services – suggests there may be bumps and obstacles in the road ahead. Expect it to get bumpier. Digitisation is accelerating, and big firms are ramping up efforts to help clients manage their regulatory requirements digitally. Inevitably, this will lead to more products, service lines and (potentially) practice groups. Without effective brand management, the task of assisting clients by creating clarity and understanding around how each part fits together is set to get harder. So, how did we get to this position? Many factors contribute, but one key theme is the absence of a robust strategy for brand architecture: in other words, a coherent approach for defining the relationship between the corporate brand, sub-brands, products, product variants and acquired businesses. Prior to the emergence of tech, law firms (as with most firms in professional services) hardly required a strategy at all. Many defaulted to using the corporate brand for everything: after all, one name was easier for partners and clients to identify with, and made it easier for partners to cross-sell, and for the firm to manage and develop brand awareness.

Typically, tech is developed at practice, sector or country level, usually in response to a specific client problem. Developments in what tech is called and what it looks like are made at these levels, too. Often, tech is developed in isolation from other areas of the firm. The cumulative effect of this bottom- up approach can be a disjointed collection of names and identities. This makes it harder for the firm to achieve anything like clarity, synergy, and distinction. But what is brand architecture, really? Brand architecture enables a firm to define and communicate relationships between its different brands. It also shows how the corporate brand plays a part (if at all) in the marketing of products and services. This top-down approach shapes how a company communicates and markets its products, and affects the organisation of teams and the structure of budgets. Increasingly, as they structure and market their tech solutions, law and other professional services firms should be using brand architecture (long used in large, multi-branded organisations such as FMCG businesses). Most aren’t yet doing so: as they add more and more products, they will find themselves in a mess.There are three main models to help firms to organise their brands, as follows. Monolithic: This is the default category for professional services firms, using the awareness and credibility of the main corporate brand (Hogan Lovells, for example) to bundle a group of tech and resourcing solutions. A variant is for firms to draw on sub-branding to distinguish legal delivery from legal expertise (as with Ashurst Advance and BCLP Cubed). Endorsed: In contrast to sub-branding, a separately endorsed brand becomes the hero. This has a distinct identity (visually and by name) and uses the master brand’s endorsement solely as a quality stamp (Konexo, for example, is a division of Eversheds Sutherland).

Branded: In this model, at the opposite end of the scale from the monolithic strategy, a standalone separate brand is established with no reference to the master brand or sub- brand. GravityStack is a good example. Owned by Reed Smith, it makes no mention of the parent company. Since the brand is free of associations, the leadership team has the flex to position GravityStack (with its own name and visual identity) as it sees fit. Commonly, firms employ a mixture of models and approaches, and only rarely adopt a single solution when structuring corporate and product brands. Figure 1 summarises several issues to consider when deciding on the best route to follow. Don’t stop at the corporate brand As a strategy, brand architecture doesn’t (or shouldn’t) stop at the corporate level. It can help to bring structure for organising and naming client-facing tech solutions – products, services and tools. When it comes to naming, a brand architecture strategy enables firms to make sensible and rational decisions by cutting through subjective suggestions and ill-thought-out, throwaway ideas for names. It also offers a framework for the discussion and analysis of naming scenarios. What’s more, it gives a structure for acquired products, or those produced in collaboration. Another benefit that brand architecture offers is the opportunity to establish naming conventions. Types of names can include descriptive and abstract names, or those that use the firm’s initials or acronyms. It may be tempting (and even legitimate), for example, to adopt an abstract approach (creating a cool, fun, disrupter-sounding name seems like a sure way to express techno credentials). But this approach might not be the optimum route for longer-term success, for all products. Brand architecture is useful for organising products. It’s inevitable that as tech develops, we’ll see the emergence of an increasing amount of products and product variants. Upfront discussions about how best to group products will only serve to enrich and shape solutions and market understanding. The example of Allen & Overy shows what occurs when this doesn’t happen, and products and services are created in isolation. A few years ago, the firm found itself with a portfolio of tech and resourcing solutions, developed over 10 years, which lacked organisation. This made it difficult for its partners and clients to buy and sell; and so, in the absence of a brand architecture strategy, the firm developed a retrospective solution. Firstly, it packaged everything under an overarching proposition (Advanced Delivery), grouping all products into categories (Solutions, Technology or Resources). It then endorsed some solutions separately (Fuse and Peerpoint, by Allen & Overy). Because its journey did not start from a defined point, and there was no clear brand architecture, the firm risked losing sight of its destination. Making the right decision As tech and artificial intelligence solutions continue to challenge the status quo, the legal market is changing at pace. Firms now face market fragmentation, new breeds of competitors, and an ever-changing business environment.

Inevitably, more technology will spawn more products. From managing one brand, firms will need to make the transition to managing many. To cope with these pressures and complexities, firms will need to find ways to manage and structure their portfolios of product brands more strategically and efficiently. A coherent brand structure can lead to impact, clarity, synergy and leverage. Having such a structure allows a firm to avoid market weakness, confusion, disagreement, waste and missed opportunities. Remember, this is a journey. It is never too late to step back, review and rationalise your collection of brands, and to develop a blueprint for the best way forward.

The big consumer brands do it all the time.

Equally, if you are just starting out on the journey and selling one tech product or service – and if you need to decide whether to call this the same as your firm or something different – you will need to think about brand architecture. No matter where in the journey you’ve reached, the development of a brand architecture strategy can help in developing clarity, understanding alignment with the market, and making sales.

Figure 1: Selecting your brand structure

Towards a monolithic or sub-brand strategy

Does the masterbrand contribute to the offering by adding: • Positive associations to enhance the value proposition? • Credibility and visibility? • Communication efficiencies (to provide cost savings)?

Will association with the new offering strengthen the masterbrand?

Towards an endorsed or branded strategy

Is there a compelling need for a separate brand because it will: • Create new associations (and avoid replicating existing ones)? • Represent a new, different offering? • Capture new customers (or retain existing ones in the case of acquisitions)?

Will the business be able to support a new brand name?

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