Who needs a generalist law magazine these days? This is a question which we, at Solicitors Journal, are acutely aware of as we turn 150 in January.
The Journal started in 1857 as The Solicitors Journal and Reporter in the days where solicitors had no voice to channel their interests and share their experiences, well before the Law Society launched its Gazette in 1903, but it is now a very different creature. No longer a law reporting service and less militant; more about providing independent news and analysis, and about being a ‘virtual’ forum where lawyers can share their views.
Greater availability of legal information and the web have been, and continue to be, key drivers on our evolution trail.
Competitive environment
The broadsheets provide extensive and competent coverage of major legal developments every day; lawyers have largely moved away from being generalist and tend to specialise in one or two areas; and the web has moved law up the news agenda and contributed to the perception that legal information is easily available. Yet, we at Solicitors Journal still believe that there is a demand for generalist law magazines – just not in the way that it has been understood in the past hundred years.
Our starting point is that specialists do not operate in a vacuum but they also do not have time to read what they don’t believe is essential. So what sort of magazine do we have to offer that will be regarded as a ‘must read’? The magazine has a strong and growing following, but how do we retain the loyalty of our readers and attract new ones?
Focusing on practical analysis
Our answer to this question is to remain focused on what we do best, ie to provide insightful analysis of current legal developments and to offer unique added value by placing legal developments in context and securing input from experts in their fields. In practice, that means talking to those experts all the time, and in particular when writing news stories and when commissioning in-depth articles.
By the time the weekly issue of Solicitors Journal lands on door mats, most readers will be aware of what has happened, so the way we approach news and article writing is also critical. Our policy is to avoid lengthy repetition of facts or information already known to our readers, to provide just enough factual background to set the scene, and to concentrate on the practical implications. Which also means that our news writing standards must be as rigorous as those applied by the news agencies in terms of accuracy, objectivity and sharpness of analysis.
Likewise our author guidelines emphasise the need to provide analysis of the topic(s) considered rather than paraphrase the cases or legislation discussed, to write in a way which, from the first sentence, makes the article stand out from the rest and draws readers in. This is vital to ensure that readers have a consistently positive experience. And it is in everyone’s interests: ours to maintain the quality of Solicitors Journal as a “brand”, our readers whose time we know is precious, and our authors whose names we want to put in the best possible light.
Our slant must also remain practical. Our readers are practising lawyers who, much as they may otherwise be interested in academic debates, primarily expect us to provide accurate information and give them pointers about developments likely to affect their practice.
And there is another dimension to our readership, which is our geographical coverage. With readers all over England and Wales, we ‘tour’ the country throughout the year, talking to lawyers about practice in their region and publishing their comments over local legal issues.
New media, new message
The Internet is a significant driver in our development. For a magazine like Solicitors Journal which is not a news-stand publication, it has been a tremendous opportunity. It has allowed us not just to reach out to our readers faster and more efficiently but also to start delivering a different message and extend the range of services offered.
Unlike many magazines, our website, Solicitors Journal Online (see www.solicitorsjournal.com) is an autonomous source of legal news and information. It is updated every day, and throughout the day, with news stories covering the latest legal developments, all accessible free of charge, without registration (but only subscribers may access web content which is older than 7 days, as well as retrieve archived articles and post comments on the online forum).
We have recently recruited a new reporter to support our online expansion and the legal news team now produces an average of 30 news stories a week. So when legal news breaks, we can turn a story around straightaway and publish it on our website within minutes, updating it if necessary later in the day. The same editorial standards which apply to the weekly print magazine apply to online stories; web stories are just as important as print stories.
Where does that leave the “News” page in the print magazine? The stories printed in the magazine are only a fraction of those we publish online – roughly 40 per cent – selected for their greater significance to our readership. Each story selected for print publication will be trimmed and updated as required, or two stories may be merged into one, and will focus on the “value-added” comments on the consequences of the particular development or event.
Where to next?
Generating further traffic to the website is our next objective and we are in the last stages of launching an email alert service. Readers have told us that they don’t have time to read daily alerts so our email is likely to be weekly, sent out immediately after we have sent the weekly magazine to press on Wednesdays. Subscribers would then be able to access all the latest news as well as the whole content of the latest issue of the magazine online immediately. We have also had requests for RSS feeds and we will be looking into developing the service early in the new year, together with the possibility of getting CPD points online.
Increased competition has made us re-assess our position and our offering, and the web gives us a fantastic opportunity to provide more, better and more diverse information. Publishing is a dynamic environment subject to continuing pressure and constant change. Standing still is not an option but Solicitors Journal’s ambition is to remain true to its editorial values and to our readers while continuing to move with the evolving media environment.
Jean-Yves Gilg is Editor of Solicitors Journal.
