Member Article

Newcastle business to launch UK's first legal comparison site

The UK’s first legal comparison website is set to be launched by a Newcastle-based business.

Legal Comparison Ltd, an independent business within Winn Holding Limited, the parent company of Newcastle’s Winn Solicitors Ltd, will launch The Law Superstore in a bid to simplify the procedure of matching a customer with a suitable legal provider.

The business, which has the financial backing of JZI and Souter Investments as institutional investors, is being spearheaded by Matthew Briggs, former CEO of Minster Law Solicitors and Brilliant Law Solicitors; one of the first non-lawyers to set up a UK legal firm and bring fixed pricing in to the profession. He is joined by chief operating officer Lee Dixon, a solicitor with more than 20 years’ experience and digital entrepreneur Aaron Knox as chief technical officer.

The online platform which will be launched to the consumer in March 2016, will empower customers and SMEs to compare legal service providers quickly and easily across a wide range of criteria and then choose the most appropriate offering and purchase legal services directly via the platform.

For customers, The Law Superstore will enable them to make better-informed choices when searching for legal advice and access more clarity on the range of services on offer by giving them the ability to quickly and easily compare legal providers on criteria including services, location, expertise, accreditations and price.

Other key benefits include management information detailing the exact return on investment for their marketing spend, no up-front fees with payments only made for pre-qualified leads received and the ability to manage volumes and staff utilisation by a flexible approach to accepting work.

The platform also provides a focused channel that enables legal providers to target preferred and specific areas of legal work and a digital shop window that allows them to showcase their offerings and brand.

Matthew Briggs explained: “The Law Superstore offers a hugely positive step forward for legal service providers looking to attract new customers using innovative technology and marketing strategies not often seen in the legal sector.

“The site allows firms to tap into a nationwide pool of people and SMEs who are ready to instruct a legal expert and, having used the search engine on our platform, can be confident they have found the right provider to use according to their specific criteria.

“Whilst word of mouth and personal recommendations will never be fully replaced, more and more people buy services through online platforms which has led to greater competition amongst lawyers for visibility online.

“The Law Superstore aims to sit alongside existing marketing activity to provide cost effective and intelligent marketing that generates well-matched and pre-qualified leads that can be fully measured as part of a modern approach to assessing marketing campaign effectiveness and return on investment.”

He added: “The future drivers of both customer demand and digital disruption will only place further pressure on legal service providers to future-proof their marketing activity. With The Law Superstore that headache is removed allowing Partners to focus on providing excellent advice and client care.”

“Only quality vetted Partners can join and use the comparison platform to showcase their services. In return the Partners will have full control over and 24/7 access to the details they share. This will enable them to generate more potential customer connections, have greater control over their marketing spend and access new potential clients through wider coverage.”