'Ad Agency' Law Firm's Business Booms; $50 Million Campaign Envisioned
Although it’s ubiquitous on the nation’s airwaves, Jim Sokolove’s law firm tries almost no cases.
Instead, in a feat of marketing prowess that has earned the firm a feature article in Advertising Age, the Massachusetts attorney makes a living operating his Sokolove Law plaintiffs firm as “almost strictly as an operator’s call board,” the magazine writes. Prospective clients call, the firm refers them to one of its hundreds of national affiliates, and when the case settles or goes to verdict the Boston-based law firm gets a cut of the contingency fee.
“We’re acting as an [ad] agency, but we’re very much a law firm—only much more profitable,” says Michael Skoler, who serves as chief executive officer of Sokolove Law.
Exactly how profitable, he and others associated with the firm won’t say. But its mantra, “Sokolove means success,” is perhaps best demonstrated by the size of its record-breaking legal advertising budget, the magazine writes.
From $3 million in 2004, the Sokolove firm’s advertising expenditures had grown to $20 million last year and are still increasing at a rapid clip. Skoler estimates that the total will rise another 25 percent this year, and eventually will hit the $50 million mark.
Additional coverage:
Boston Globe: “Sokolove firm has new name, big expansion plans”
ABAJournal.com: “Biggest-Advertising Lawyer Spent $20M in 2007”
Updated at 3 p.m. on March 24 to add link to subsequent Boston Globe article.
