Law Firm Webinars: How to Plan, Promote and Follow Up Webinars That Win Work

Webinars suit some objectives better than others:

A webinar is a means, not an end. If the honest answer to "what should happen afterwards?" is "nothing in particular", it is probably the wrong format.

Before choosing a topic, decide two things.

Who is it for? Be specific: "finance directors at mid-sized manufacturing businesses in the Midlands", not "business clients". A precise audience shapes the topic, the speakers, the promotion and the follow-up.

What should happen afterwards? Pick one or two outcomes, for example:

• meetings with prospective clients facing the issue discussed
• introductions to new contacts at existing clients, to support cross-selling
• a reason to re-engage referrers the firm has not spoken to for a while
• positioning a newly promoted or lateral partner with the market
• material the firm can reuse in content and directory submissions

The outcome decides how you measure success. A webinar that reaches 25 of the right people and leads to four meetings has done more than one that attracts 200 attendees and leads to none.

Busy clients attend webinars that help them do something. Strong topics usually have at least one of these qualities:

• Timely. A new law, regulation, decision or deadline that affects the audience now.
• Practical. "What finance teams need to do before the year end", not "recent developments in tax law".
• Specific to a sector or role. Content built around one audience's problems is more useful than a general overview.
• Answering a question clients keep asking. If several clients have raised the same issue, others are probably wondering about it too.

A simple test: could the title appear in the subject line of an email the audience would want to open? "The failure to prevent fraud offence: what finance directors need to have in place" passes. "Corporate crime update" does not.

Keep it short. For most client audiences, 30 to 45 minutes including questions respects their time and keeps attention. If the subject needs more, consider a series.

Two or three speakers. One partner presenting alone for an hour is hard to watch. A conversation between two or three people, led by a moderator, is easier to follow.

Include a voice from outside the firm where it helps. A client, an in-house lawyer, an accountant, a former regulator or an industry body adds credibility and widens the audience. Co-hosting with a referrer, such as an accountancy firm or a professional association, can introduce both organisations to each other's contacts. Our guide to how to get new clients for a law firm explains why referrer relationships deserve this kind of investment.

Give the moderator a real role. A good moderator keeps time, asks the questions the audience is likely to have and brings in audience questions.

Rehearse. A technical run-through a few days before, with every speaker on the platform they will use, prevents most problems. Agree who covers which points and how hand-overs will work.

Shorter lead times can work for urgent topics, such as an unexpected regulatory change, where speed matters more than reach.

The best audiences usually come from the firm's own relationships, not from broad advertising:

• Personal invitations from partners. A short, personal note from a partner to the clients and referrers who should be there is more effective than any marketing email.
• The firm's contact lists, segmented by practice, sector and role, so only relevant contacts are invited.
• Speakers' LinkedIn. Posts from the speakers about why the topic matters, followed by a reminder close to the date. Our guide to how lawyers should use LinkedIn covers how partners can do this naturally.
• Co-hosts and associations, who can promote the webinar to their own members and contacts.
• The firm's website, with an events page and a link from relevant practice pages and articles.
• Targeted paid promotion, such as LinkedIn advertising aimed at a defined audience, where the topic justifies it.

Invitations and the consent rules

Email invitations are direct marketing, so the usual rules apply:

• Corporate contacts. Under PECR, marketing emails can usually be sent to people at companies and LLPs, provided they can opt out and they have not objected. UK GDPR still applies to their personal data.
• Individuals. Sole traders, some partnerships and private individuals are treated differently and generally need to have consented, unless they are existing clients who have been given a chance to opt out.
• Members of the public. For private client or consumer topics, SRA-regulated firms should not make unsolicited approaches to members of the public to advertise legal services. Promote these webinars through existing contacts, the website and published channels rather than cold approaches.

A good registration page is short and clear:

• the title, and who the webinar is for
• three or four things attendees will learn or be able to do
• the speakers, with photographs and links to their profiles
• date, time, length and how to join
• a short form asking only for what the firm will use, typically name, organisation, role and email
• a privacy notice explaining how the data will be used, including whether it will be shared with co-hosts
• whether the session will be recorded

An optional question such as "What would you most like the speakers to cover?" gives speakers useful material and gives partners a reason to follow up.

• Start on time and keep to the advertised length.
• Open with why the topic matters to this audience, not with the firm's credentials.
• Keep slides simple. A few key points per slide, not paragraphs of text.
• Use examples, not war stories. Anonymised scenarios illustrate the law without risking client confidentiality.
• Make the Q&A easy. Allow questions to be submitted anonymously, and have a few prepared questions ready in case the audience is slow to start.
• Make clear the session is general information, not legal advice on anyone's particular circumstances.
• End with one clear next step, such as an offer to discuss how the issue affects the attendee's business.

Many firms put all their effort into the webinar itself and treat the follow-up as an afterthought. The follow-up is where conversations, and eventually instructions, come from.

Within 24 hours, send every registrant a thank-you with the recording, the slides or a short written summary. Many registrants do not attend live, and this is often their first real contact with the content.

Within a week or two, partners should follow up personally with the attendees who matter most: those who asked questions, those from target clients and those whose registration answer suggested a live issue. A short, specific message works best: "You asked about X. Would it help to talk through how it applies to your business?"

Record everything. Registrations, attendance, questions and follow-ups should go into the firm's CRM, so the next invitation can be better targeted and the firm can see what the webinar led to. Our guide to how to choose a CRM for a law firm explains what a system should capture.

Reuse the content. One webinar can become an article, a client briefing, several LinkedIn posts, FAQs for a practice page and evidence of thought leadership in a directory submission. Our legal content marketing team often turns one session into several pieces.

Judge a webinar against the outcome set at the start, not by attendance alone:

Instructions from a webinar often arrive months later, through a contact who attended and kept the firm in mind. Recording attendance in the CRM is what makes that connection visible.

For SRA-regulated firms, webinars and their promotion are publicity:

• Accuracy. Invitations, descriptions and claims about speakers must be accurate and not misleading.
• Unsolicited approaches. Do not use webinar invitations to make unsolicited approaches to members of the public.
• Email consent. Follow PECR and UK GDPR for invitations and follow-up.
• Confidentiality. Use anonymised examples, and do not identify clients or matters without consent.
• General information. Make clear that the content is not advice on individual circumstances.
• Co-hosts. Be transparent about any data shared with co-hosts, and make sure arrangements with referrers comply with the SRA's rules on referrals.

• No defined audience. Inviting everyone produces an audience of no one in particular.
• A topic that is really a sales pitch. Clients attend for insight, not for a presentation about the firm.
• Too long, too many slides. An hour of dense slides loses most of the audience.
• Promotion left to one email. Without personal invitations and reminders, registrations disappoint.
• No rehearsal. Technical problems in the first five minutes undermine everything that follows.
• Judging success by attendance. The right 20 people are worth more than the wrong 200.
• No follow-up. The most common and most costly mistake.
• Content used once. The recording sits on a page nobody visits.