Paul Hajek runs Clutton Cox – a small but far from traditional high street legal practice in Chipping Sodbury, Bristol. Digitally – they get it. Their business strategy relies on bricks with a lot of clicks, with 7,000 – 8,000 visitors a month to their website. They were early adopters of content marketing: the first firm of solicitors in 2008 to blog about conveyancing (the legal process involved in buying and selling a house).
In this guest post Paul talks explains why SlideShare – the online platform for sharing presentations and other professional content – is proving to be such a powerful marketing tool for his business.
Over to Paul.
Lawful lessons in content marketing
Paul Hajek
“What we really mean as lawyers when we talk about content marketing is simply responding to clients and prospects and their informational needs for any given problem or process.
Our legal content output still revolves around blogging but now encompasses video, infographics and ebooks. 6 months or so ago we discovered SlideShare to add to our content panoply.
We’re getting real traction and having great fun to boot.
SlideShare: new kid on the content marketing block
SlideShare has crept up the content leader board.
SlideShare was traditionally, as Doug Kessler the doyen of SlideShare noted in a recent interview, a depository “where Powerpoint decks went to die.” Enter LinkedIn who bought SlideShare in May 2012 and turned what essentially was a bit of fun into a legitimate business tool for spreading great content. At the end of 2013 SlideShare recorded 60 million unique visitors a month with 215 million page views. 15 million uploads have been registered with 400,000 being added each month.
SlideShare is now one of the top 120 sites on the Internet.
Recognition of SlideShare by the great and the good
David Meerman Scott used a SlideShare deck to promote his new book The New Rules of Sales and Service. In David’s own words:
“I’m stunned… the fastest sharing of any of my content in more than a decade of sharing free stuff on the web. The SlideShare has spread my work way beyond my own network to reach many people who have never been exposed to my ideas.”
Doug Kessler again:
“The Slideshare community adds a massive bonus to your content: millions of people who may never discover you anywhere else”
Joe Pulizzi in a post and later in his book Epic Content Marketing referenced Scott Stratten’s “Three Circles of Content Sharing.”
- The First Circle: These are the connections that are closest to us — and the strongest. These are people who share our content simply because they know and trust us. You can think of these people as our “brand fans”.
- The Second Circle: These are the friends of those in your first circle. They see our content on a regular basis because our first circle connections share it.
- The Third Circle: These are the connections of your second circle — ultimately the most valuable if you are seeking maximum content reach.
It is access to this third circle of influence that David Meerman Scott, Doug Kessler and Joe Pulizzi believe is where the true power of SlideShare lies.
SlideShare for law firms
Here at Clutton Cox we love the Slideshare sharing ethos so we can now reach prospects who have never heard about us.
SlideShare also, to an extent, frees us from the tyranny of Google organic searches which are inexorably turning up more paid results.
SlideShare is a great tool for creating visually appealing content and that can extend even to the boring and turgid, like for example a compulsory complaints procedure for a firm of solicitors.
36 Things You Won’t Get From Another Conveyancing Law Firm When You Move House was our first SlideShare presentation way back in April 2014.
To date it has reached over 6278 views.
We certainly got the flavour and created a Conveyancing Jargon Buster to demystify the conveyancing process entitled: What’s the Name of that Legal Thingy?
This deck has achieved 6000 views in just over two months and featured on the SlideShare homepage.
Great content is not just one dimensional.
We’ve turned our most read blog on the arcane rules of Chancel Repair Liability into first an Infographic and then a SlideShare deck which coincided with my appearance as the legal expert on Rip Off Britain talking about this subject.
The Last Word on Slideshare
We’re mere novices on SlideShare really but can see its potential to create great legal content and grow our reach exponentially.
But, allow me to leave the last word to Doug Kessler:
Great SlideShares are like great content in general: sharp, insightful, passionate and, above all, confident. Great SlideShares start with great ideas.
If we can create a commotion in the calm waters of the legal world then think what awaits you in your exciting worlds!
My advice? Get on board with SlideShare and soar.”
Just imagine! Thanks so much Paul. We’re proud to feature your story in the second edition of the Valuable Content Marketing book – a truly inspiring example for other small companies learn from.
If you have any questions, reflections or want to share your experience of SlideShare we’d love to hear them.
Want to learn more about SlideShare?
- Check out the Clutton Cox SlideShare stream
- David Meerman Scott and Doug Kessler talk about the value they’ve seen from SlideShare in our recent post ‘What’s the most valuable content of all?’
- We gave Doug Kessler a Valuable Content Award for his SlideShare content. Well deserved I say.
Well, if a legal firm can do it, no reason why a ‘boring’ insurance brokers can’t either! Will check out the stream and get some inspiration.
Thanks for flagging this up, even if I did have a shudder when I read ‘Chipping Sodbury’. It always gives me that reaction – far too many treks there for c****y meetings before I became a self-employed Insurance Broker!
Hi Adam. Sounds like the challenge has been set. I throw down the gauntlet to you. Look forward to the results – will you show us?