Perhaps more than any other element of the legal marketing mix, the home page is the firm’s calling card and the channel through which its personality can be projected to potential clients and recruits. Done well, it encapsulates the tone and key propositions of the firm, suggesting that there’s much worthwhile to be had if one explores beyond. Done badly, though, it can easily suggest a firm bankrupt of ideas, cluttered and confused by the digital age.
So – who’s hitting home runs on their home page?
Partly because of the flak the re-brand generated, I thought I’d take a look at Nabarro’s. (As opposed to Nabarros’, of course.) There’s much I admire here. They’ve had the courage to nail their colours to a key idea, and used their intelligence to explain what that idea actually means to clients and employees.
Nabarro, it tells us, is all about clarity. What does that mean? Well, it means a ‘no-nonsense approach’ which results in a number of articulated benefits. The copy itself is pleasantly clear, too – and the addition of an endorsement by the Plain English Campaign is a touch which works well in the circumstances. (Bet some of the partners railed at the ‘Marketingness’ of it, though.)
Where the clarity disappears a little, however, is the pictures.
As consumers of advertising in particular, we learn how to combine headlines and visuals to create a composite meaning that is somehow more than the sum of its parts. But here, the pictures often seem tricksy and only tangentially related to the sentiment of the headline.
A couple staring into a fountain? A bloke with a light shade for his head? Cyclists covered in privet? A woman walking above a glass ceiling? A chap checking emails in a massive portico?
They’re all nice images, the kind which vaguely suggest intelligence and which designers love pulling off generic photo sites for ‘corporate’ clients. But do they really, really add to the concept of clarity?
I’ve been in meetings where this site has been held in really high regard. I think you’re right, it runs out of steam a little with it’s photography but it’s amazing how much people buy in to the ‘Clarity Matters’ principal. I think Nabarro is one of those rare firms that has managed to tap into a reasonably uncommon vision.
But law firms are notoriously difficult organisations from which to get a consensus on brand values or ethos.
The Nabarro site hangs together quite well but they have it easy you should try managing a dual audience strategy for law firms that provide a service for both corporates and private client.
Getting the imagery right then can be even more tricky.