Learning to love the directories--and make them love you back.

• Author: Savage, Nigel

What is a legal directory? Ask any U.S. law firm 10 years ago, and the answer would have been "Martindale."

Times have changed. The rise of sophisticated, qualitative research-based guides over the past decade has redefined the term "legal directory," and the market leaders--Chambers and Legal 500--have become annual fixtures on law firm marketing calendars. Gaining recognition for your practices and attorneys has become a central part of a legal marketer's responsibilities. As the main directories' cachet increases and more firms strive to achieve the rankings they feel they deserve, the bar for entry is set even higher.

The questions, however, remain: Is all the effort worth it? Do clients read directories? Can't we just make it all stop? The hackneyed "clients don't read directories" argument is both somewhat naive and--increasingly--untrue. For example, it is increasingly commonplace for clients to ask law firms to list their directory rankings in RFPs. If you're not ranked but your competitors are, clients will notice and may want to know why.

Any client worth his or her salt will, of course, use numerous sources to select the right legal counsel. Rankings aren't the deciding factor, but they are increasingly becoming a deciding factor. Also, Chambers and Legal 500 have recently made great efforts to engage with corporate clients--with positive results.

Further, the usefulness of the directory process goes beyond simply hoping that a client will spot your name in a ranking and pick up the phone. The leading directories pride themselves on gathering firsthand feedback from clients and--here's the useful part--pepper their editorial coverage of law firms with choice client quotes. Marketers shouldn't view this client feedback in isolation, but instead use it across their entire marketing program.

Consider a quote from a client saying, "This firm's M&A practice beats all rivals hands down; its lawyers are the smartest I've ever come across." Where else do you get that level of independent, publicly available feedback, renewed every year, other than during the directory research process? These are the nuggets that should be included in all your marketing materials: your website, your pitches, your press releases and so on. Don't just let them sit there on the directory website. Make...