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Law Firm, DC. - Admin Asst Bus Development Group

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Social Justice Community Organizing - Paid - San Francisco, CA

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Legal Writer - REMOTE

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Purdue Pharma - Settling Could Give It Negotiating Leverage

Purdue Pharma opted to settle for $270 million with Oklahoma about alleged illegal marketing of opioids.

It could have chosen to go to trial in two months - or to file for bankruptcy. Here are details from Bloomberg.

This particular settlement sends the message to plaintiffs and their lawyers that this could be what they should be aiming for.

Trials are wild cards.

And, in a bankruptcy they could wind up with relative peanuts. 

If that message is effectively communicated, Purdue could gain the upper hand in negotiating settlements.

Sure, public opinion is against the companies in the opioid loop. But the legal system is both complex and slow-moving. There is no guarantee of a win. And even if there is a win that could be appealed for years. Meanwhile, there is no money distributed to the plaintiffs.

Need affordable help strategically planning and putting together content? That ranges from blog posts and e-books to planning/scripting podcasts and creating traditional speeches. Complimentary consultation on how to generate influence and sell without paying high rates, janegenova374@gmail.com. 

 

Legal Marketing When You're Over-50

There is the great divide: The over-50 and all the younger generations.

It will increasingly impact the effectiveness of marketing, even in the highly traditional legal sector.

That's to be kept in mind with a recession seemingly on the way. During it, more than 10,250 slots can be lost.

Here is a case study of sorts from another branch of professional services: public relations. 

For many holidays, The Dilenschneider Group (DGI) creates a commentary.

It is relentlessly upbeat.

Usually it contains a laundry list of what the readers should be grateful for.

That message is published on the bible of public of public relations Odwyerpr.com. 

The founder and head of DGI is Bob Dilenschneider. His background in public relations reaches back to a time when the discipline was separate from marketing. There had been a clear line between the Dilenschneider types and the Don Drapers from "Mad Men."

Now, of course, there isn't. How public relations agencies market themselves reflects on how they might be positioning and packaging their clients' marketing - and even hands-on sales.

Those of us over-50 have to become aware of blind spots in our marketing. Otherwise, those can throw shade on our branding. Obviously how we put ourselves out there is how we are perceived.

There are several negatives associated with the holiday tactic.

One goes all the way back to Harvard marketing professor Ted Levitt. In his signature book "The Marketing Imagination," he admitted that America is ambivalent about marketing. He phrases that as "Marketing and Its Discontents." Yes, the blockbuster American economy had been built on marketing. Simultaneously, there is a deep resentment of commercial messaging. Johnny Carson captured that in his staging of bored pitches for sponsors' products.

It's not only Christmas but also all the holidays that we push back on commercialization. When Dilenschneider zeros in on holiday greetings, that can become counterproductive to the marketing mix.

Another beef is the predictability. DGI doesn't miss a holiday. And the posting is always on Odwyerpr.com. In this era of fast time, tradition can be off-putting. 

That opens the template of the holiday greeting to ridicule.

Easter is coming. The smart-aleck in me wonders: Will DGI instruct us on Holy Thursday via Odwyerpr.com to be grateful for the invention of all those marshmallow chicks?

How could I have managed to live my life without that source of extreme pleasure?

Should I reach beyond the narrow confines of my self-absorbed self and distribute the chicks, along with peanut butter stuffed bunnies, to the less fortunate?

The third issue is larger: Have holidays become so commercially exploited that we have ditched the whole concept? The exception might be Halloween. Even my four-legged son enjoys dressing up for all the parties we are invited to. More and more of us ignore President's Day Mattress sales and specials on SUVs at the car dealership. 

A takeaway about marketing for us over-50 is the need to continually assess if it's hurting our branding and revenues or a liability? A sign of our current times, LinkedIn encourages us to continue to modify our all-important profiles. 

Part of my new marketing strategy is to reposition our enterprises as West Coast firms. At the end of the summer I will relocate them to the border of California. Then, one day at a time, I will measure what marketing tactics are panning out and which to ditch. A useful read on that is Henry Cloud's "Necessary Endings."

Reflection: Are legal marketers running their strategies and tactics by associates? That perspective is a terrible thing to waste.

Need affordable help strategically planning and putting together content? That ranges from blog posts and e-books to planning/scripting podcasts and creating traditional speeches. Complimentary consultation on how to generate influence and sell without paying high rates, janegenova374@gmail.com. 

Papa Don't Preach - Trojan & Public Interest Messaging

Trojan, the brandname for the more than 70% of condoms purchased in the U.S., provides a template for public interest messaging.

Its approach is totally cool.

In addition, the positioning and packaging is smart product marketing. 

As everyone knows or should know, condoms should be used in every sexual interaction.

Heavy-handed "ought" public service announcements about that, though, are ignored. Smirk Smirk. Those Papa Don't Preach approaches can generate rebellion - that is, not using condoms. 

The current Trojans TV commercials combine engaging narrative and enticing product information.

In one, an iGen male ponders if he dare ask a girl out. There's fast shift to a visual of Trojan. The message is implicit: Hey, Bro, the more important issue is that you will use a condom.

Then there is the good news - product benefit - that Trojans have a very slim skin. That is, no real barrier to extreme pleasure.

Since law enforcement is often the front lines of public interest campaigns, it might study the Trojans template. Its parent company is Church & Dwight.

Need affordable help strategically planning and putting together content? That ranges from blog posts and e-books to planning/scripting podcasts and creating traditional speeches. Complimentary consultation on how to generate influence and sell without paying high rates, janegenova374@gmail.com. 

Stacia Hollinshead, Young IL Prosecutor, Fatal Victim of Domestic Violence

Stacia Hollinshead had kicked off her new career as a prosecutor.

After more than a decade as an intelligence analyst in the military, she had enrolled and graduated from Northern Illinois Law School. In her fresh career path she was distinguishing herself in court.

Then, as Joe Patrice reports on Abovethelaw, life intervened. Law enforcement has it that her ex shot her death in her home in Wisconsin over the weekend. The suspect is in custody.

As "Dateline" hammers, episode after episode, matters of the heart can be the most dangerous to human beings. They seem to generate their own unique version of psychosis. That is, murder can not only be committed but gotten away with.

Hollinshead leaves behind a young daughter. The child used to accompany her to the law library where she did research for her law school projects. In a sense, little one became the setting's mascot.

This blog extends deep sympathy to all whose lives Stacia Hollinshead had touched. My uncle had been murdered on the then mean streets of Jersey City, New Jersey.

 

Michael Avenatti Arrested in What US Attorney for SDNY Characterizes as Old-Fashioned Shakedown

That was fast.

The attorney who represented adult film star Stormy Daniels - Michael Avenatti - had been positioned and packaged as advocate for the powerless against the 1%. His name was everywhere in the media.

It still is. But, as of today, as nothing but a shakedown artist - and more bad things. 

CNBC reports Avenatti had been arrested in New York for an alleged extortion scheme against Nike. A co-conspirator, not arrested, is reported to be another celebrity lawyer - Mark Geragos. 

Allegedly, in what U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York - Geoffrey Berman - characterizes as an old-fashioned shakedown - Avenatti threatened to release negative information about Nike. Only a pay-out of $20 million would prevent him from doing that. In pursuing his arrest, Nike had been aided by brandname law firm Boies Schiller Flexner. 

That's what is had gone down on the east coast.

On the west coast, officials in Los Angels, who coordinated their cases with New York, also accuse Avenatti of embezzling client money to pay his own personal bills and other alleged crimes.

That kind of embezzlement is familiar among lawyers. On "The Good Wife," law partner Will Gardner had done that in Baltimore to settle his gambling debts. His penalty was light: temporary suspension from practicing law. 

Some recall that Avenatti had toyed with the idea of running to be U.S. president in the 2020 Election. 

Need affordable help strategically planning and putting together content? That ranges from blog posts and e-books to planning/scripting podcasts and creating traditional speeches. Complimentary consultation on how to generate influence and sell without paying high rates, janegenova374@gmail.com. 

Law Firm, Minneapolis, MN - Marketing Director

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Sandy Hook - Father of Victim Avielle Richman Apparently Commits Suicide

Jeremy Richman's child - Avielle Richman - was fatally gunned down in the Sandy Hook School massacre.

In response Richman launched the Avielle Foundation. The mission was to prevent violence.

But, that outreach and other coping mechanisms may not have been adequate to address effectively Richman's pain. We never know what decision-making doors men and women who take their own lives open and pass through. However, given the scope of the Newtown, Connecticut tragedy, we have to assume that imprinted on Richman profound trauma.

The New York Post reports that Richman died from an apparent suicide this morning. He was age 49. His body was found in front Newtown's Town Hall. 

What should concern anyone who loves those who lost family and friends in massacres is this: The "cluster" suicide phenomenon might have taken hold. Two survivors of the Parkland carnage took their own lives recently. 

This blog passes on deep sympathy to those Jeremy Richman left behind.