95-Year Old Vorys Sater Joins 21st Century with New Web Site

By Larry Bodine, a Web and Marketing Consultant based in Glen Ellyn, IL. He has advised law firms on marketing strategy, individual lawyer marketing plans and Web site plans. Please see www.LarryBodine.com. He can be reached at Lbodine@LawMarketing.com and 630.942.0977.

Vorys, Sater, Seymour and Pease, a leading Ohio law firm, relaunched its FirmSite, http://www.vssp.com, recently, taking advantage of the latest thinking in Web site usability and marketing techniques. Improvements on the new site include:
  • A set of handy practice group "QuickLinks" on the left navigation bar, connecting visitors directly to the firm's areas of expertise.
  • News stories on the home page, designed to give visitors new information to read on each visit and to attract search engines, with the aim of getting higher in search engine rankings. Items include new lawyers joining the firm, interviews by the media and articles written by the attorneys.
  • Links to seminars and events on the home page on topics such as bankruptcy law and scientific considerations in real estate transactions.
  • A graphics facelift, giving the site a fresh, modern appearance.
"I'm very pleased with the results," said Andy Havens, Director of Business Development at Vorys, Sater in Columbus, Ohio.

Vorys has been in operation for 95 years and has 350 lawyers who practice in more than 100 areas of law. The firm has offices in Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Washington, D.C. and Alexandria, VA, and represents business from Fortune 500 companies to entrepreneurs in the retail, manufacturing, automotive, aerospace, financial services, pharmaceutical, chemical, construction and food industries.

Vorys began work to revamp its FirmSite last March by requesting a web site plan. I conducted a usability and marketing study of the site to see what information was most sought after, whether the text was written to attract business, and to remove impediments in the way of information that visitors wanted.

The Web site had been launched in 1997 and had been last updated in 2001. The goals of the revamp included giving clients and potential clients information they want, getting clients to stay on the site longer and to return to the site more often.

Building on the old site

The old site had a lot going for it: it was already getting good traffic with more than 5,600 visitors per month. It was also getting traffic referred from search engines including Google, Yahoo, MSN, AOL and FindLaw.

The site conformed to "directional norms" on the Web, meaning that the layout and location of navigation choices were where visitors expect to find them. The site also had "persistent navigation," meaning that navigational links were consistent from page to page, making the site easy to navigate. Content was stored in a Web database, making it easy to update, and the site had a search feature, allowing visitors to scan all the text on the site.

The Plan

The plan was based on a review of the site's traffic reports, client list, print advertising examples and a review of 15 competing law firms. The strategy behind the plan was to focus on results achieved for clients, organizing the site around client interests, and position the firm to attract high-growth companies.

The old home page displayed no news or articles, and a disclaimer appeared in a pop-up screen, which was a distraction to regular visitors. Substantive content now appears on the home page, and the disclaimer is tucked neatly out of the way in a small link.

The old site prominently featured a "Traditions" slide show, which recounted the firm's history, but had the effect of making the firm look old-fashioned. In the new site the historical information is tidily collected into a single page, "Our History and Tradition" in the About Us section. It is clear the firm is proud of its history, recounting its founding by Arthur I. Vorys, Lowry F. Sater, Augustus T. Seymour and Edward L. Pease on March 1, 1909. The section even shows a postcard signed by President Theodore Roosevelt.

Cases in Point

One impressive feature from the old site that was continued in the new site was a "Cases in Point" collection of nine client successes, demonstrating how the firm translated its guiding principles into results. For example, Cases in Point highlights:

  • A merger the firm handled when Scotts Company joined with Stern's Miracle-Gro Products
  • A corporate takeover executed on behalf of Luxottica Group S.p.A.'s successful tender offer for The United States Shoe Corporation.
  • The firm's representation of industrial clients on steering committees at major Superfund sites including Stringfellow, Tybouts Corner, ChemDyne and Fields Brook.
My research showed that the top destination for visitors was the attorney bio pages. Accordingly the bios display key information that clients want: a land address, phone, fax, email, description of the lawyer's practice and articles written - plus a photo, which humanizes the firm.

Other handy functions on the new site include "print this page" options to preserve the formatting, "email this link to a friend" to make it easy for visitors to forward pages to colleagues, and a form on the Contact Us page, allowing visitors to identify themselves and send comments to the firm.

The Search feature was vastly improved, so that on the new site the results are sorted according to what part of the site the search result is located. For example, a search on the work "banking" turned up 62 results sorted into lawyer bios, press releases and articles.

The new site presents visitors nicely-organized options when searching for practice descriptions. For example, when a visitor clicks on Practice Descriptions, the page displays a concise list of 14 choices, winnowed down from 34 service areas on the old site. Clicking on a practice like Corporate & Finance reveals a number of subsections, describing additional practices in more detail. For visitors who seek as much information as possible, there is an option to search for "Attorneys by Practice Areas," which offers 262 practice areas that cover seven printed pages.

Adding warmth

The firm added a lot of warmth to the Careers section, which is aimed primarily at law students. There are smiling pictures of Andrew Smith, chairman of the Hiring Committee, and Robert Werth, Managing Partner, sitting in shirtsleeves. Careers features several pictures of young people and gives a detailed description of what it's like to work at the firm, plus links to the campus interview schedule, and openings for associates, summer clerks and other legal positions.

In all, the new site is an effective marketing vehicle. It is built around the interests of the visitors and contains exactly the kind of information they seek. At the same time, the firm conveys its personality in the Traditions and Careers section, rounding out the site as an excellent online communication tool.

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