The 2010 Your Honor Awards: showcasing the best of the best in legal marketing.

• Author: Johnson, Jennifer
• Position: Dicta

As we gear up for another season of recognizing the creativity, execution and achievement of legal marketing through LMA's Your Honor Awards, we want to invite you to participate. With 18 categories from which to choose, including a new "Marketing on a Shoestring" category, there is a place for every firm--small to large--to shine.

Not only is there a chance for visibility at the LMA Annual Conference, where we will showcase all finalist entries and present awards to first-place winners in front of their peers, there are amazing opportunities for you to use the award(s) as a way to raise your firm's prestige level, both internally and externally. Joseph B. "Bo" Dempster, managing partner of Poyner Spruill LLP and 2009 first-place winner, says, "Poyner Spruill's participation in the 2009 Your Honor Awards generated a lot of excitement among our lawyers and staff and some great recognition from our clients. It was a welcome affirmation of what we've done with our rebranding and positioning."

According to Stephanie Solakian Goldstein, chief marketing officer of WilmerHale and 2009 Your Honor Awards first-place winner, "The LMA Your Honor Awards provide firms with third-party validation of the great work coming out of our marketing departments that may otherwise go unnoticed." In talking to past winners, internal recognition is a common theme. Linda Sparn, director of marketing & business development at Schulte, Roth & Zabel, agrees. "The recognition the team has received from the lawyers and other business staff has been great. We are now introduced as being part of the firm's 'award-winning marketing team.' How great is that?"

Winning a Your Honor Award can provide a meaningful way to communicate and increase awareness with clients. With categories from "Identity" to "Community Relations," winners can capitalize on this recognition by using it as a platform for client development. "We look forward to entering our most creative marketing projects...