Ok. I’m awake. I didn’t make the first program, but I’m here at the LMA Annual Conference’s Quick Start program. Kudos to Maggie Watkins, Best Best and Krieger and Jonathan Fitzgarrald, Greenberg Glusker for putting together a standing room only program! Nat Slavin from Wicker Park Group is talking about business development and client surveys. Cheryl Bame from Bame PR is sitting to my right, reviewing some of her notes for her PR presentation. I could use a cup of coffee, but other than that, I’m excited to finally be in the middle of the conference. So, here we go with the first nugget: Our job is to make these “average” lawyers special to their clients. That’s what legal marketing is all about in a nutshell. My elevator speech is: “My job is to make lawyers look good.” And what “good” is changes from day-to-day, lawyer-to-lawyer, project-to-project. Marketing hasn’t been about brochures for YEARS. It’s more than PR, or business development. It’s about everything that makes a lawyer look good from the moment they walk into the doors of your firm, to the internal communications, and external encounters with clients, the public, the press, their peers. It’s about everything along the chain that helps to promote that attorney, to highlight their expertise, to get them ink, and, land that new client or enhance that relationship.