[josephmosby]

I've got a friend who made the transition.

Ultimately, he went to law school because he didn't feel there was career growth as just a patent agent... you've got to be a full-on attorney if you want growth in that marketplace.

I'm recalling a little bit of his rationale, but it seems that if you're curious about the law, it's a decent way to get exposure without the total commitment of law school, and you get paid while you're learning. But don't think of it as a "career transition" unless you're going totally into the law, it's more like an experiment to see if that's a direction you'd want to take. You'd still have to go to law school and pass the bar if you want to make a career out of it.

(advice is U.S.-based)

[busterarm]

I would agree that the real money is always in being a lawyer.

Also if you have web development & SEO skills, legal marketing is stupidly lucrative and you need to be a lawyer to actually take advantage of co-counsel fees. You could advertise personal injury on the side and outsource your case qualifying to a few big firms and just collect money by selling leads.

(I worked at a law firm doing exactly this for 3 years)

[alexpotato]

Any sources you recommend for learning more about legal marketing?

I remember reading about Cellino and Barnes and their use of TV ads and found that fascinating so would be interesting to learn more about the current state of affairs.

[busterarm]

I don't really know that there's much written about it. Lawyers tend to keep business models close to their chest and it was very much a learn by doing kind of thing.

When I took the job there was certainly a period of "mind blown" while I learned more and more about the industry but I had the perfect position to learn the industry.

For online advertising, all of the core skills about keyword bidding and targeting apply. Terrestrial marketing is vastly more effective in the legal space though and while more expensive (TV), billboard and radio/podcast pricing has come down significantly.

Really it's all about coming up with your own effective price model and making sure you can measure the effectiveness of your campaigns. Most law firms are vastly overspending compared to what they actually need to but they're spending in places that bring in so much money that they can literally throw money away at this. If you're data driven you can make a fortune here and there's tons of existing firms (and a small but growing group of marketing consultancies) to partner with if needed.

Having technical skills and a JD will make people want to work/partner with you.