For all those small firms (these guys and gals have less than 20 attorneys) that cry about being too little to have a professional presence, Barran Liebman shows that it can be done rather painlessly. This employment firm’s site is still a little sparse on content, but the site is young and there is room to grow. Love the electronic alerts—that are featured in html, but also available to print or save as a word doc or pdf.
In narrowing down this review category to 25, I was going to knock Caplin off because IMA has spent so much time on Hubbard One web sites these last few months (in reviewing the 250). But that would be missing the point. You do not need to be big to market big. The focus is on “tax” and that is made clear right quick. Enough detail to go beyond brochure ware; not too large a site that maintenance becomes too much of a chore.
Some of the site is just plain ugly. The frames are gosh-awful. The content is rich. It is a plaintiff’s firm geared toward many consumer visitors. The “In the News”, featuring everything from audio/video to magazine articles goes a long way in detailing the firm’s history and experience. One of the goals of these 25 reviews is to show some good things that smaller firms can do to take advantage of the World Wide Web. Casey is a great example.
Attorney Javier Arroyo wants to be “your Maryland law firm”. While the home page is a little too “all over the place”, he does manage to accomplish a whole lot on one little web site. He avoids one big, small firm mistake—which is to present yourself as so GP that there does not appear to be any single focus of expertise. He targets four hot areas in the consumer legal space—bankruptcy, immigration, criminal defense and traffic/dui. The home page also offers up the DC Metro stop to exit, and where to park your car. Let’s call this a living, breathing billboard. Loved the Debt Calculator.
As is the case with almost any solo site, there are areas that could use some depth and improvement. However, Mr. Jassin has done a very good job in developing “copylaw” as his domain—literally and figuratively. The articles and forms sections have some great stuff. Promoting and selling his books through the site and a link to Amazon is perfect. If it was my site, I might put a few bucks into a database-driven site, with some search fucntionality. Might offer those forms in a nice PDF as well, with my firm name and logo splashed all over it. Those kinds of things.
