Despite what some might think, the internet is the most important marketing tool you have. By typing a few words, a potential client can find hundreds of lawyers and law firms that you must now compete with. Having a website is a great way for your business to connect with new customers. Unfortunately while building a website has brought instant success for some businesses, it has the potential to be an absolute disaster for others.

Poor website design is often the primary reason for a website’s failure. This is because it fails to engage the user. We show you how to identify poor web design and how to apply best practice web design principles. Also if your firm lacks an online presence, you're putting an extra step between you and increased revenue. Law Promo can help you eliminate that step by working with you to create a website that's both informative and innovative. Or we can help you make your existing website generate new clientele.

We will use the knowledge and expertise we have developed to work with you on what type of website is right for your firm. Our web design experts have cutting edge skills in design and technology, including ways to increase optimization on search engines. Expect the finished product to be an original, creative design that will make you stand apart from your competition.

Credibility and professionalism is important to you and we will be sure your site reflects that by keeping it organized and up-to-date. We also offer a content management system so that you can keep information on your site current, no matter what time it is.

We can also help with other attorney marketing strategies, including branding and brochure creation. We have partnerships with a number of legal news sites and have connections with major public relation representatives to broaden your media presence.

All of this will help Law Promo and your firm accomplish the goal with both want: expansion and increase in revenue.

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"Legal services employment in Boston, which never fully recovered from the previous recession, is now shedding jobs at a rate not seen since the recession of the early nineties," and one result is that some local law firms are unloading no-longer-needed office space, Jones Lang LaSalle said in a new report.

A real estate money management and services firm with a big presence in Greater Boston, Jones Lang LaSalle said, "The downturn has caused Boston law firms to shed surplus office space and renew their focus on utilizing remaining space more efficiently."

Declines in mergers and acquisitions and in legal financial business have led to a drop in law firm revenue, and law firms are now looking at "their real estate for possible opportunities to decrease overall operating costs," the report said.

The press release included a statement from Tom Doughty, the international director of Jones Lang LaSalle law firm group.

"There is a 'Perfect Storm' of circumstances that law firms need to understand and take into consideration as they contemplate their real estate plans for the future," Doughty said. "Space options abound � from new buildings to existing built-out space - while competition for premium space is decreasing and rental rates are declining. As a result, law firms that are able to take advantage of the current market will have an opportunity to solidify long-term occupancy at significantly decreased costs."

An anti-abortion activist says he's the one who killed a Kansas abortion provider — and did it because it was necessary to save lives. But one of his attorneys says there's no such thing as a "necessity defense" in state law, and that is not the strategy the defense team plans to present at his trial.

Scott Roeder told The Associated Press in a telephone call from jail on Monday that he plans to argue at his trial that he was justified in shooting Dr. George Tiller to protect unborn children.

"We have explored that possibility," public defender Steve Osburn said a day after his client's confession. "That does not seem to be the approach that is viable, nor is it the approach we intend to use."

Roeder, 51, of Kansas City, Mo., is charged with one count of first-degree murder in Tiller's death and two counts of aggravated assault for allegedly threatening two ushers who tried to stop him during the May 31 melee in the foyer of the doctor's Wichita church. Roeder has pleaded not guilty and is scheduled to go to trial in January.

Reed Smith, one of Pittsburgh's largest law firms, said Tuesday it will reduce its hourly billing rates 20 percent in January, as well as cut salaries of newly hired lawyers.

The moves are a response to client concerns about "driving down the cost of legal services," said global managing partner Gregory Jordan.

First-year associate salaries in Reed Smith's 15 U.S. offices will shrink to a range between $130,000 in New York, Chicago and other major markets to $110,000 in Pittsburgh.

A survey of the nation’s top 250 law firms shows they collectively shed 5,259 lawyers in the past year, a drop of 4 percent.

The drop is the largest since the National Law Journal started collecting the information in 1978. The survey has recorded only two other declines—a drop of less than 1 percent in 1993, and a 1 percent drop in 1992, according to a National Law Journal story on the results.

The number of associates at the large firms dropped by 8.7 percent, while the number of partners increased by slightly less than 1 percent, the story says. The number of lawyers in the “other” category, including of counsel and staff lawyers, dropped by 8.9 percent.

The numbers indicate a law firm strategy of saving partners, according to law firm consultant Ward Bower of Altman Weil. “The cuts made were done primarily to preserve workloads for partners," he told the National Law Journal. "It suggests that work done by partners is work that associates could do.”

The law firm with the largest percentage reduction in lawyers was Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson. It lost 168 lawyers, a decline of 26.4 percent, according to the article. The firm that lost the most lawyers in raw numbers was Latham & Watkins. It shrunk by 444 lawyers, a decline of 19.1 percent.

The largest law firm, according to the survey, is Baker & McKenzie, with 3,949 lawyers.

The law firm of Burlingame attorney Joe Cotchett filed suit today against JPMorgan Chase, in connection with a busted, $150 million Bay Area Ponzi scheme.

As stated in a press release sent out by the firm, Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy, the scheme, was operated out of Napa, by William A. Wise, Jacqueline Hoegel and her daughter, Kristi, operating through an entity known as Millennium Bank.

Last March, the SEC filed action against the bank and the principals, and froze their assets, including a Napa home purchased by the Hoegels with the money from duped investors.

According to the lawsuit, the Napa branch office of Washington Mutual, since taken over by JPMorgan Chase, "not only assisted in depositing millions from innocent investors and helping wire millions to offshore banking havens, it also "provided to Millennium a remote banking platform that it could use to transfer and launder money faster and with less oversight, all in violation of the law."

A separate, revised class action suit filed by the firm on behalf of Madoff victims, names JPMorgan, along with the Bank of New York Mellon, as "custodians of key Madoff bank accounts, sold Madoff structured notes, administered Madoff feeder funds, and helped ship Madoff money between New York and London."