nov 1

AMONG the most derided commercials on television are those by law firms that represent victims of accidents, which often feature tough-talking lawyers promising vengeance, video of car accidents and assorted mayhem, and modest production values.

Now a new campaign by Jacoby Meyers, a law firm with offices in New York and throughout the United States, is taking the unconventional approach of eschewing lawyers and employing humor.

“Remember that guy?” begins one text-only commercial. “Who came in second in the last New York Marathon? Neither do we. Winning is everything.”

Another commercial opens with the song, “Hail to the Chief,” and shows portraits of the historical figures Horatio Seymour, Charles C. Pinckney, Hugh L. White and Lewis Cass. “Presidential elections are like lawsuits,” says a voiceover, “You’re nobody unless you win.” (The ad does not spell out the victors: Ulysses S. Grant, Thomas Jefferson, Martin Van Buren and Zachary Taylor, respectively.)

“They say,” begins yet another ad. “It doesn’t matter if you win or lose. As long as you tried your best. They probably weren’t rear-ended by a truck. Jacoby Meyers. Winning serious injury lawsuits since 1972.”

The campaign, by Korey Kay Partners in Manhattan, started with several commercials on network and cable stations in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut in September, with several more scheduled to be introduced on Nov. 1.

Allen Kay, chief executive of Korey Kay, said legal commercials typically were “told from the perspective of the law firm and not the consumer, and they generally talk down to consumers in commercials loaded with commands: ‘If you’ve been injured, come to me,’ and ‘Come in for a free consultation’ and do this and do that.”

What potential clients are interested in, naturally, is success, Mr. Kay said, so in his agency’s proposal to the law firm, “we told them we believe your strategy is one word and that’s ‘win,’ and your tone is that you’re human beings.”

Using humor, even in relation to the tragic circumstances of accident victims, helps humanize the firm, he said.

“Some of the most serious things are said in jest,” Mr. Kay said.

Andrew Finkelstein, the managing partner of Jacoby Meyers, said the firm settled 97 percent of its cases before or during a trial, and that of the 3 percent decided with a verdict at trial, it wins about three out of four cases.

On that basis, Allan Ripp, a New York publicist who represents many law firms, said he thought the new Jacoby Meyers ads “have a very clever concept, but it’s more sizzle than steak.”

Even when settlements are hefty, the firm has not in the technical sense won those cases, especially considering that defendants often stipulate in settlements that they admit no wrongdoing, Mr. Ripp said.

In an e-mail, Mr. Ripp questioned “comparing Jacoby Meyers’s winning record to a demonstrably, statistically provable event of what constitutes a win-loss contest, such as a presidential election or a marathon.”

In response, Mr. Finkelstein said that his firm’s reputation for winning trials was what prompted insurance companies to offer sizeable settlements, and that accepting such offers rather than going to trial “ultimately is our clients’ decision, not our decision.”

So, he continued, “when clients walk away and accept a settlement and they are happy with it, they feel that they’ve won — it’s a win in their eyes.”

Stephen Gillers, a professor at the New York University School of Law who specializes in legal ethics, said the ads were “fine.” Since 3 percent of cases decided by a verdict at trial constitutes a large number in such a big firm, Professor Gillers said, and because they have won most of those cases, it legitimized the campaign tagline, “Winning serious injury lawsuits since 1972.”

But he did caution against equating a settlement with a win.

“When a case is settled, we say that both sides have won because the case was compromised,” Professor Gillers said.

Jacoby Meyers spent $3.7 million on advertising in 2010, according to the Kantar Media unit of WPP, whose data indicates that advertising for the legal services category has grown in recent years. Law firms spent $789.9 million on advertising in 2010, up from $691.6 million in 2008, an increase of 14.2 percent.

One agency doing a brisker-than-anticipated business with lawyers is the Levinson Tractenberg Group in Manhattan. In 2010, the agency introduced a campaign for the New York law firm of Trolman, Glaser Lichtman that also used humor.

“It’s like I had this huge, really sharp machete chopping down on me every time I tried to move,” says an actress in one of the commercials. “It was the worst paper cut I ever had — they made that paper way too sharp.”

The television commercials, which close with the tagline, “There are some cases even we can’t win,” have been viewed more than 200,000 times on YouTube.

After hearing from lawyers across the country seeking to buy the ads for their own firms, the agency and law firm formed Market Movers, and they share revenue for licensing the commercials as “turnkey advertising campaigns.”

Eleven commercials originally made for the New York firm, some serious, can be customized easily because information identifying the firm is limited to a title card and voiceover at the close of the spots.

Joel Levinson, a partner at the Levinson Tractenberg Group, said law firms in eight other cities — including Denver, Wichita, Kan. and Springfield, Mass. — were now using the commercials.

Mr. Levinson said ads that did not rely on “scare tactics” or “take advantage of victims’ misery” appealed to lawyers — and to consumers.

“You don’t need to take such a negative approach, and we chose to take the high road,” Mr. Levinson said.

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The E.C.B.’s restraint came in contrast to the action of the Bank of England, which announced another round of bond buying to support the slowing British economy. The pound fell against all major currencies after the announcement; the euro rose against the dollar.

As a slump in German factory orders provided the latest sign of a looming recession, the E.C.B. left its benchmark rate unchanged, at 1.5 percent. The Bank of England also left its main rate unchanged, at 0.5 percent.

During his last news conference as E.C.B. president, Jean-Claude Trichet said that members of the central bank’s governing council had discussed a rate cut before concluding “by consensus” that inflation in the euro area — at 3 percent — was still too high. The statement, and a subdued assessment of the euro zone economy, suggested the bank will be open to cutting rates in coming months, as many analysts expect.

Mr. Trichet said the central bank expected “very moderate” growth ahead in “an environment of particularly high uncertainty.”

Janet Henry, chief European economist at HSBC, wrote in a note to clients that the E.C.B. “has clearly left the door open to a cut, possibly as soon as November.” She said that Mr. Trichet may have been reluctant to send any stronger signals on E.C.B. intentions that might constrain his successor, Mario Draghi, now governor of the bank of Italy. Mr. Draghi will take office Nov. 1.

Mr. Draghi brings a similar outlook and background as Mr. Trichet and is not expected to radically alter monetary policy. But he may find it hard to move boldly at the beginning of his term, given that he may feel it necessary to establish his anti-inflation credentials. He has kept an extraordinarily low profile in the final months of Mr. Trichet’s tenure and his intentions are largely a mystery.

The E.C.B. did respond to signs that banks are reluctant to lend to each other because of fears about their exposure to shaky government debt.

Those fears were intensified by the woes of the French-Belgian bank Dexia, which is seeking its second taxpayer-financed bailout in three years and said Thursday that it was close to selling its Luxembourg unit.

The central bank will spend €40 billion, or $53.6 billion, in the coming year buying so-called covered bonds, a form of debt secured by payments received on assets like packages of loans.

Covered bonds are one of the main ways that European banks raise money. The E.C.B. also bought covered bonds in 2009 to alleviate the bank financing squeeze that followed the collapse of the U.S. investment firm Lehman Brothers in 2008.

The E.C.B. measure, however, was dwarfed by the Bank of England’s plans to widen its so-called quantitative easing program to £275 billion from £200 billion.

“Vulnerabilities associated with the indebtedness of some euro area sovereigns and banks have resulted in severe strains in bank funding markets and financial markets more generally,” the Bank of England’s governor, Mervyn A. King, wrote in a letter to the British Treasury explaining the bank’s decision.

The E.C.B. does not have the power to save ailing banks like Dexia or address deeper problems in the banking system, officials insist, caused by banks’ exposure to sovereign debt and reserves that are too thin to absorb potential losses. That task belongs to governments.

Angela Merkel, the chancellor of Germany, suggested Thursday that Europe was moving closer to a coordinated effort to bolster European banks and address the longer-term problems.

While cautioning that more expert advice was needed, she said, “If the conditions are there we shouldn’t hesitate.” Mrs. Merkel appeared at a news conference in Berlin that also included Christine Lagarde, president of the International Monetary Fund, and Robert B. Zoellick, president of the World Bank.

Her comments were similar to what she said Wednesday during a visit to Brussels and in line with remarks made Thursday by José Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=48b47cb9c1bb2f912668917d70f11409

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