Marketing Yourself To a Law School

Start your analysis of the competition you face by getting the summary data schools provide about their entering classes. In addition, you can always ask the school itself for additional information. Many collect and collate more than is provided in the information packages for potential applicants. Most of the schools provide the data. With these data in hand, it is a simple matter to determine how you stack up relative to the prior year's successful candidates in terms of your academic credentials, LSAT score, amount of experience, and background.

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A Shortcut to the Strengths and Weaknesses Analysis

Each person will be more than just a member of a category; a person who happens to be a paralegal will not—one hopes—be the same as all other paralegals. By the same token, knowing what category you fall into can help you determine how you are likely to be viewed by admissions officers. Admissions officers, like everyone, make various simplifying assumptions about the world. Not all astrophysicists and brain surgeons will be extremely smart, intellectually driven, and so on, but most of us assume this is the case unless given evidence to the contrary.

Understanding how your "type" is perceived—absent any other evidence—and about how others in your category will also be perceived is valuable. (Knowing how your most direct competitors—those who most resemble you—will be viewed is an important part of developing your marketing strategy.)

If you are a member of one of the most traditional categories of applicants to JD programs—for example, a recent graduate of an undergraduate university with no work experience—recognize that just having the strengths noted here will be insufficient reason to admit you. You may need to be demonstrably stronger than others in the same category (and perhaps even free of the category's typical weaknesses).

Once you have analyzed your situation and recognize where you stand, you should be aware of what an admissions officer is likely to see as your strengths and weaknesses. Your job is now to capitalize on this understanding. First, you will want to support any of the strengths you do indeed have. Do whatever you can to minimize your weaknesses, or, better yet, show that you do not suffer from them. Once again, it is a matter of addressing them through each of the vehicles at your disposal. In other words, you should maximize your reward/risk ratio. Schools want students who will make major contributions to their  programs—who will provide a reward for accepting them—without involving substantial risks of academic and other types of failure. The higher the reward/risk ratio, the better is your chance of appealing to a school.

The tasks facing people with different profiles will, of course, be different. A paralegal at a major law firm faces a very different task from that of a commercial photographer or a recent college graduate in trying to maximize the reward/risk ratio. The paralegal, (or law clerk) who has already spent three years working at a top corporate firm, is likely to be regarded as being quite bright and determined, with strong research and analysis skills, and a good understanding of law, without being much of a risk to the program. After several years' work as a paralegal, she knows enough about law and the tedium involved in legal practice that there is essentially no danger that she will fail out of the program, or lose interest in law, or be ‘unplaceable’ in a good job upon graduation. She therefore looks like an easy admit because she brings good experience and qualities to the program without any risk. The problem for her, however, is that she is but one among numerous paralegals, all of whom bring similar qualities. To improve her chances of admission, she must show that she is quite different from those other paralegals in terms of her range of work, the depth of her understanding of a specific area of law (or two or three), her success to date, and how she intends to employ her law degree in the future.

The commercial photographer is in a nearly opposite situation. In his case, the problem is not what he brings to the program. He is likely to be the only photographer applying, so he has considerable uniqueness value to start with. His problems involve the risk side of the ratio. An admissions director is likely to worry that he will be unable to handle the program's grueling academic demands and that he will fail out of the program early on. Similarly, she may worry that he will lose interest in law and simply go back to photography midway through the program. She will probably also worry that his lack of work in a traditional field may make the employers who recruit at the school reluctant to hire him. To improve his chances of admission, he needs to address each concern. He may, for example, want to take several courses that show he has the ability to do analytical, research-intensive work prior to applying. By doing this he also shows that he is sincerely interested in law, is not applying on a whim, and is likely to complete the program. Last, he will want to show where he is headed with his JD and how he intends to get there. This will involve explaining what skills and experiences he already has, plus showing how he will acquire other relevant skills and experiences during the law school program.

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The recent college graduate is, of course, a common brand of applicant. She is likely to have excellent grades and scores, and have demonstrated prowess in courses that are at least tangentially related to the study of law. She is likely to be bright and hard working—like the paralegal—and also have strong analytical skills. Although she, too, looks like an easy admit, the recent college graduate is not exempt from the risk factor associated with the commercial photographer.

Combating a Privileged Image

Do:

• Participate in/lead substantial community service activities.
• Show that you have taken advantage of all opportunities.
• Demonstrate that you have crossed social and other divides or experienced the plight of (and sympathize with) others less fortunate.

Do not:

• Discuss expensive trips you have taken or glamorous events you have attended.
   
• Describe your parent as managing director of Wall Street's fanciest investment bank—"banker" will do.
   
• Sound arrogant, spoiled, or unappreciative of your opportunities. World-weary cynicism does not play well with admissions directors.
   
• Act as if you hit a triple when you were actually born on third base (as one critic had it of former President Bush). In other words, do not make a big deal out of having gone to a fancy prep school or having managed to make money performing mundane services for your parents' wealthy pals.

An admissions director may wonder about the recent college graduate's motives for obtaining a law degree, and if they are well-founded. Although it is not likely that she will fail out, the bright-eyed 22-year-old may discover that legal study—and, ultimately, a job as a lawyer—is not at all what she had expected. To clinch her chances of admission, then, the recent college graduate needs to show that she is aware of what law school entails and that she understands the almost-inevitable consequence of attending: practicing law.

Fashioning Your Message: Positioning

Positioning is a marketing concept that is meant to deal with this problem of too many applicants trying to capture the attention of admissions directors who are overwhelmed by the onslaught. To cut through all of this communications haze, you must have a very sharp and clear image that is readily noticed and understood and valued.

Applying the Concept to Yourself

How does this apply to you? You must distinguish yourself from others in the applicant pool who may apply to the same schools you do. Law school applicants are not all the same; your job is to show your uniqueness. You increase your value by appearing unique. After all, if you are the same as 2,500 other applicants, what school will really care if it gets you rather than one of the other 2,499? You also make yourself more memorable by making yourself unique. Remaining anonymous will not help you.

General Positioning Versus Specific Positioning

To what extent should your positioning be different for each target school? Since no two schools are exactly the same, you might want to position yourself differently for each school. On the other hand, doing markedly different applications for each school is a lot of extra work. Not only do you need to write your essays differently, but you also need to have your recommenders write each recommendation differently.

The Marketing Vehicles

You have three primary vehicles for getting your message across to business schools: the essay(s), recommendations, and possible interviews. You will need to be consistent within and across these three vehicles to gain the maximum positive impact.

The penalty for failing to capitalize on your strengths and to prepare a powerful application is, all too often, rejection. Schools have plenty of qualified applicants who took the time to figure out the process and complete a good application. Failure to do these things suggests that you are not able to do so, or at least do not care to. In either case, you are unlikely to be viewed as having top law school potential, at least at the moment.

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