Although it is imperative that most organisations have a website and various social media accounts in 2019, many organisations are still unskilled at using these digital platforms to effectively communicate with the people they are working with.

Living Group, a creative agency based in London, Hong Kong and New York, works with law firms to bolster their online skilfulness. The group has released its Living Ratings report on the top 100 law firms in the world for 2019. The rankings in this report, now in its 24^th edition, are determined based on how substantial, accessible and intelligent a firm’s digital and brand presence are.

Of the top 10 firms listed in the report, only one, Eversheds Sutherland, was not distinguished as a ‘determined,’ instead being designated as ‘energetic,’ and in addition, 4 of the top five firms from last year’s report retained a spot in the top five this year apart from Ashurst, which fell to a still remarkable tenth overall. Finally, the law firm with the best digital presence on the planet, according to Living Group, is Winston & Strawn.

Though Duncan Shaw, co-founder of the Living Group, acknowledged overall improvement in digital presence among the top 100 law firms, he also stated there is still widespread need for improvement across several key areas, such as brand positioning, search functionality, and client services. For example, when examining client services, he says “A staggering 68% of law firms have no login area, which hardly sends a message of putting clients front and centre.”

Living Group hopes to curtail these prevalent digital shortcomings by providing individual mini case studies of each top five firm at the end of the report. Each study provides specific examples of techniques and features a successful digital firm utilises, so firms lagging can work from those examples to improve. With the tools provided in the report, and the need to compete in an era where digital presence is more important than ever before, Living Group hopes to see far fewer lacklustre firms in the next report.

The report divides the strength of each firm’s presence into two categories: engagement and evidence. Engagement considers how well a firm’s digital platforms work on a functional level through factors such as search engine quality and website speed. Evidence takes it one step further by analysing the actual content on these platforms through metrics such as visual language and strong brand positioning. From there, a firm is classified as determined, energetic, focused or lacklustre. In short, determined firms are the most adept digitally, lacklustre firms are the ineptest digitally, energetic firms have excellent evidence but unsatisfactory engagement and vice versa for focused firms.

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