JD Writing Tips: Pitching Your Hot Documents
Including documents in JD Supra’s “Hot Docs” section can be a tremendous public relations tool for you and your firm. But you need to take off your lawyer’s hat when preparing your document summary – the key to success lies in looking at your case from a journalist’s point of view. Consider these tips when planning your media pitch.
1. Think like a reporter.
This point can’t be over-emphasized. Reporters want stories they can convince their editors to publish. Whether mainstream or legal, that means they want an emerging trend, an engaging protagonist, a really important issue, or a crowd-pleasing story – preferably, some or all of the above.
Pretend you’re a freelance reporter trying to sell this story to an impatient editor. Frame it as something her readers care about – it affects them directly, impacts their community, provides competitive information, benefits (or threatens) their interests, or even tugs at their heartstrings. Help make the editor look smart, cutting-edge, and tuned in for pursuing it over other stories.
2. Mainstream or legal media?
One of the first things to decide: do you want mainstream media or the legal press? This affects the details you include in your document summary, the incentives you include to pique reporters’ interest, and the very language with which you write it.
Go with mainstream media if your matter is noteworthy for facts more than law, primarily local, and/or relevant to the community. If your matter is more interesting on the law than the facts, and has regional or even national significance, aim for the legal press instead. (In broad, general terms: go mainstream to benefit your client, legal to benefit your practice.)
3. Identify your objective.
What goal are you trying to achieve by uploading to Hot Docs? Are you looking to raise local or national awareness of an issue? Do you want to build public support for your client’s position? Are you simply looking to promote your name and practice in the media?
These are all valid objectives, and you might have others besides – the important thing is to have one. Going to the media has to be part of an overall strategy. If you’re doing it as a one-off or “on a flyer,” you won’t get the attention you want and you won’t maximize your media opportunity. Place your goal in a larger context, and plan ahead.
4. Get your client onboard.
Now is the time to go to your client and get clearance to approach the media. Tell him what you want to achieve, what type of media you’re aiming for, and what angles you wish to highlight.
In practical terms, you need to know: is your client onboard with your strategy? Does he want to approve your summary beforehand? Is he available for interviews? When, for how long, and on what topics? Is he amenable to being photographed? If not, will he supply a photo? The reporter will ask all these questions, and you won’t have time to go check with your client before deadline.
5. Choose a great title.
You might have noticed that we’re at #5 on this list and you still haven’t written a single word. This emphasizes how important it is to plan first, execute later.
Your document needs a title. Lawyers have a tendency to use titles that describe the document they’ve just posted, e.g.: “details of legal memorandum,” “complaint in adversary proceeding,” “supplemental briefing schedule.” Journalists don’t care about the technical name; they want to know the story. Use the title to tell them, in as few words as possible, why this story is worth their time.
6. Write a great lead.
JD Supra allows you to include a 2,000-character summary of every document you upload. Start with a killer lead – an opening sentence that guarantees a reporter will read on. (JD Supra will place the first 35-40 words of your summary as an excerpt on the main page – that’s all the space you’ve got to make your pitch to the journalist.) This opening line must capture reporters’ interest and motivate them to click the link and learn more. It must be precise, concise, colorful and arresting.
Use the lead (and the entire summary) to tell reporters, in a nutshell, why they should care about your case. Again, look at it from their perspective: they want details that will make an engaging or leading-edge story, so identify what’s unique, remarkable, significant, or potentially landmark about your case. If your case isn’t any of these things, don’t bother including it in “Hot Docs,” or you risk leading reporters to ignore future postings that have more relevance.
7. Don’t write like a lawyer.
You know what we mean. Avoid legal terms or jargon, even for the legal press: many legal publications employ non-lawyer journalists, or rely on non-lawyer freelancers to find interesting stories. And frankly, lawyer journalists don’t care for the technical talk either. As for the mainstream media, lawyer jargon is like tear gas – it will scatter them on impact. You are not writing a legal brief; abandon that mindset.
Craft your summary like a good press release that a reporter can simply copy-and-paste into a story – overworked writers at wire services might just do exactly that. Avoid the passive voice that lawyers often employ. Break long paragraphs into small, bite-size segments. Strip your language of any foreign phrase – certiorari, mandamus, en banc, etc. And unless your client is Julius Caesar, never use Latin.
8. Include contact information.
JD Supra provides you with a profile page to which all of your uploaded documents will be linked. Enhance your profile with contact information, including work phone, home phone, cell phone, pager, e-mail address, Blackberry address, IM address – every possible way a journalist can get in touch with you. Show reporters that you want to make it easy for them to reach you.
Example
Finally, here’s an example of a recent posting to the Hot Docs section, first as it was originally posted, and then with possible rewrites for a mainstream media and legal press audience, each in 39 words. Remember: think like a reporter and tell a story an editor would care about.
Berger v. Seattle (http://www.jdsupra.com/post/documentViewer.aspx?fid=3ebf9232-7844-455c-aded-ba8a924ea092)
Description A (original): Petition for a hearing en banc from a 9th Circuit panel decision permitting a governmental agency to require licenses in advance from individuals wishing to engage in free speech activities (busking and entertainment) in a large urban park.
Description B (mainstream): “Magic Mike” Berger can't perform tricks or make balloon animals in Seattle Center Park unless he’s registered and wears a photo ID badge. Mike is fighting to exercise his free speech rights. Interviews and action photos of Magic Mike….
Description C (legal): Are jugglers, mimes and magicians protected by the First Amendment? A fascinating case in Seattle raises issues of profound importance regarding freedom of expression in a traditional public forum, including whether public parks can be controlled by commercial interests.
Jordan Furlong is a lawyer and legal journalist specializing in law practice innovation, legal business trends, and the changing landscape of the legal profession. He is currently Editor-in-Chief of the Canadian Bar Association’s magazine National and blogs on the profession’s rapid evolution at http://law21.ca.