5 Common Mistakes in International Directories

Learn how to avoid these mistakes in Legal Directories

International directories such as Chambers and Partners and The Legal 500 have become a more than significant part of the marketing work for law firms. Coordinating case selection, referrals, reviews and even translations entails many non-billable hours of work for lawyers and their support teams. Moreover, according to a 2018 report by an independent agency, those law firms that achieve a place in the rankings get a 20% increase in conversion after submitting a proposal and improvements in the firm’s reputation.

The potential return means that, year after year, firms continue to invest a great deal of resources in this sector. After months of dedication, not getting a recognition or mention can generate great frustration. Therefore, it is important to identify the most common mistakes that firms make when submitting their submissions to the different directories.

How to improve the Law firm’s position in the renowned international directories? These recommendations will help Law firms avoid the common mistakes in International Directories

1. Work highlights. Some law firms think that it is enough to make a selection of cases once and then repeat these work highlights year after year. Our personal experience working at companies like Chambers reveals that this is a mistake, as the directories look for evidence of new work over the years, demonstrating that the department remains current and active. In addition, the cases presented should be relevant to the practice area you are applying for.
2. Referees. The presentation of the referee’s spreadsheet is key. On numerous occasions, clients of the firm are presented with whom they have had no contact in the past twelve months. This gives a bad impression to the directories, since it may mean that the department has no recent relevant clients who can give good references of the lawyers who work there.
3. Timely submission. Editorial submissions and the list of referees must be submitted on or, if possible, before the deadline. Directory research teams work to strict deadlines and have only a few weeks to review the hundreds of documents they receive. Submitting them later than this date can potentially mean that clients are not contacted and the decision on a possible ranking is based solely on feedback from colleagues.
4. Perseverance. There are firms that do an extensive job of gathering cases, information about the team, submit a good list of clients, and then do not get ranked. This causes them to get discouraged and not to apply for a couple of years or, directly, to give up. This is not recommended. This work should be done every year and prepared in advance of each deadline. The directories collect historical information and it is possible that the first year there may not be enough data to obtain recognition, but the next year there will be.
5. Translations. These documents must be submitted in professional English. An automatic translation system is not enough: legal terms can be very different in English and Spanish. It should be borne in mind that those analyzing the documents do not always have legal experience, so it is recommended to use as straightforward English as possible, using specialized professional help and taking into account the subtleties of the language.

Avoiding these errors will go a long way toward improving directory rankings, an issue that causes so many headaches for firms of all sizes and specialties.

If you want to read the full article and discover other common mistakes in international directories, click here.

Gericó Associates is the first Legal Marketing and Legal Communication consultancy firm in Europe and Latin America. If you are interested in receiving more information, please don’t hesitate to let us know. Contact us!