The legal advertising business has never been known for its sense of whimsy. This is, after all, an industry built on the dignified repetition of phrases like "injured in an accident?" and the solemn promise that one will not pay unless one wins.
ADSQUIRE, a Philadelphia agency that has spent the last five years trying to make lawyer advertising somewhat more interesting, would like to change that — or at least to be noticed trying.
The company, which was founded in 2021 and specializes in digital advertising for law firms, is marking its fifth anniversary with a list of accomplishments that reads less like an agency credential deck and more like the itinerary of a particularly ambitious publicist. The highlights include a Times Square billboard that displayed more than 1,000 law firms simultaneously (the agency claims this as a world record, though one suspects the competition for such a title was not fierce), a brand launch into outer space, and what the company describes as the first attorney advertisement ever served on ChatGPT.
"We didn't build ADSQUIRE to be another legal marketing agency," said Anthony Higman, the company's founder and chief executive. "We wanted to build the company we wished existed when we were on the other side of the table."
Mr. Higman added that the company's proof of concept now includes "Times Square, outer space and some very large pieces of real estate." (One assumes the real estate in question is of the billboard variety rather than the kind that requires a mortgage.)
The agency has also earned Google Premier Partner status for two consecutive years, a designation that places it among the top tier of participants in Google's partner program — a distinction that, while less photogenic than a rocket launch, is presumably more relevant to the company's actual business of generating leads for attorneys.
ADSQUIRE says its next five years will continue to balance performance with what it calls unconventional marketing. The legal advertising industry, long accustomed to a certain sameness, may yet be in for more surprises — assuming, of course, that there is anywhere left to go after space.
Original story published in Adweek: "ADSQUIRE Turns Five: Five Years of Making Legal Advertising Anything But Ordinary"