Dion Algeri is a partner and Creative Director at Great Jakes. For over twenty years, he has been an innovator and thought leader in legal marketing and law firm websites. In that time, he has repeatedly demonstrated an ability to translate his understanding of the legal marketplace into cutting-edge website features.

I recently had the pleasure of sitting down with Dion to discuss how law firm bios have evolved throughout his career and where they are headed. Dion also shared his insights on how to create a compelling biography, and what bio functionalities are essential for every law firm. 

In the past, most law firm business development was local, often conducted over dinner and drinks. Those days are over. Thanks to better communication technologies, like websites, social media, and Zoom calls, geography has become practically irrelevant when it comes to hiring lawyers. 

In short, companies are willing to hire lawyers thousands of miles away as long as they have the exact right skills and experience. So, legal marketing is now about connecting with people you may never meet face to face. Now, the game is mostly about demonstrating specialized expertise.

Attorney bios are infinitely more important today. Back in the old days, bios were often an afterthought. Lawyers would print them out and hand them to prospective clients after a face-to-face meeting.

In today’s world, an attorney’s website bio is the first (and sometimes, the only) place people turn to get information about them. With this added importance, the expectations for bios have become substantially greater.

Now, people expect bios to be much more than just a resume. They expect a complete compendium of a lawyer's qualifications, including substantiating materials like case studies, articles, presentations, and videos. As a result, bios are so much more robust than ever before.

As bios grew and traffic increased, we realized that the one-size-fits-all template that law firms had used needed to be rethought. That led us to develop the Attorney Microsite approach.

Our philosophy is that successful bios are those that foster meaningful visitor engagement. So, we designed the Attorney Microsite to maximize engagement.

The Attorney Microsite is a highly flexible bio format that treats each attorney's bio like a small, multi-page website that fits seamlessly within the firm’s larger website. Each attorney’s bio can be configured to have any number of pages and display any content needed to appeal to a particular lawyer’s targeted niche.

The introduction of this bio format is a huge leap forward from the rigid, static one-page bios that are common on so many law firm websites. The system's versatility means that marketers can say, “Yes! We can make that happen” when attorneys request unique or oddball content be added to their bios.

Because it’s crafted more like a little website than a traditional bio, the Attorney Microsite is a much bigger marketing platform than the traditional one-page bio. It also has highly flexible, drag-and-drop CMS controls that allow you to customize a bio to have the precise message and substantiating information that an attorney’s target market wants to see.

For example, say a litigator has two distinct aspects of their practice: real estate litigation and environmental litigation. Within that lawyer’s bio, separate tabs for each specialty could be deployed, making it easier for visitors to understand their specific experience and expertise in each area. 

We’ve seen attorneys use this functionality to highlight their pro bono work, out-of-the-office activities, and even share information in foreign languages. The flexibility is unparalleled.

At first, we assumed that the youngest, most internet-savvy attorneys would be the first adopters. But it was actually the older, more experienced lawyers who intuitively got it. They understood what additional information needed to be conveyed. 

For example, one of the early microsite enthusiasts was a trusts and estates lawyer who believed making a personal connection with her prospective clients was the key to business development. So, she included a “Beyond the Office” tab featuring photos of her family travelling the world. It included a photo of her with an elephant on safari, which was just wild to see.

There’s definitely greater user engagement. On average, we found that page views increase by 25% when firms adopt Attorney Microsites. In cases where attorneys had lots of compelling content to share—like articles, case studies, and blog posts—they received much more traffic. In some cases, we recorded well over 100% increases in page views.

Algorithm-driven content teasing is at the very top of my list. A law firm’s best reputation-enhancing content (e.g., blog posts, articles, or case studies) is often buried deep within the website. Algorithm-driven content teasing solves this problem by automatically teasing your best, most relevant content on the bios. This keeps visitors engaged. In my opinion, this feature is a game-changer.

Also, sidebar teasing is a very powerful way to engage visitors. A well-built bio should allow you to manage this space so that you can draw attention to the most important information with call-outs, photos, videos, and content teasers. A great example of a bio that takes advantage of sidebar widgets is Judith Poller, an attorney at Pryor Cashman.

Bio formats are evolving. For ages, multi-page bios have used a horizontal navigation structure. While this format works great, one downside is that it requires users to actively click from one tab to another to see additional information. 

To reduce the number of clicks, we recently introduced a vertical navigation format that stacks the various bio tabs. To see all of an attorney’s content, you can simply scroll the page. Not only does this new format reduce the number of clicks, but it also increases user engagement. Additionally, we’ve found that people like the novelty of a new format.

In my experience, keys to an effective bio include:

• A clear, focused message.
  Attorneys should declare themselves to be the authority in a specific niche of the law.

• Substantiation. 
  Lawyers need to back up their claims of expertise with specific examples. High-quality content that clearly speaks to your message is a must. Case studies are great. And thought leadership is even better. A well-produced video is always great to include.

• Lead generation.
  Drive visitors to download a whitepaper or sign up for a newsletter right from the bio. This is a great way to nurture and engage prospective clients.

Yes. Don’t be afraid to use pictures! Content on law firm bios is often text-heavy and thus can appear gray and boring-looking. So, keep visitors engaged by adding some teaser photos. Or infographics. Or pull quotes. Anything to add visual relief. It’s worth the investment.

Lastly, I can’t help but touch on engagement again. That’s the goal. The best bios make finding and consuming an attorney’s reputation-enhancing content easy. Therefore, it’s vital that your website’s functionality and design foster that. A bio that engages visitors is a bio that successfully develops business.