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Legal Commentary

: Ernie the Attorney

Martindale Hubbell lawyer ratings: now for only $59 (operators are standing by)

By Ernie the Attorney

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When I graduated from law school, the Martindale Hubbell ratings were considered by many attorneys to be some sort of gold standard. The Martindale Hubbell books were in almost every law firm library, and in every federal judge's library. Whenever the judge I clerked for didn't know a lawyer in one of his cases, we'd consult those books to see where he or she graduated from law school. The ratings were interesting, but not very helpful (as I explained once before).

Most attorneys paid to be listed in the Martindale Hubbell. It was a good way to make yourself known to attorneys in other jurisdictions who were looking to hire counsel outside their state.

But then one day someone invented the World Wide Web, and soon websites started sprouting up like weeds. These days almost every attorney has a website; it costs almost nothing to put one up. If I want to know what law school an attorney went to I can look that up on their website. Odds are I'm more interested in what kind of law they practice. But, again, that's going to be on their website.

Martindale Hubbell has a website too. And if you pay the exorbitant fee to be listed in their books you get added to the website for free. Some attorneys are pleased when they get an AV rating from Martindale Hubbell, and so they list that rating on their website. This used to be prohibited under the terms of Martindale's service. The only place it could be displayed was on Martindale's website, but that website was not indexed by Google so you'd have to go there and do a special search. So basically your online Martindale rating had an only slightly better chance of being found than a message in a bottle at sea.

Today I got a letter in the mail from Martindale Hubbell telling me that if I want to display my rating on my website I can now do it. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, "Martindale-Hubbell, in collaboration with American Registry, LLC has created a handsome selection of Peer Review Rating Acknowledgements that allows [me] to showcase [my] Peer Review Rating while providing essential support for tomorrow's legal professionals."

Sounds too good to be true, right? So I can now display my 'Peer Review Rating' on my website?

Yes, but only if I pay them a $59 fee (or $199 if I want to use the specially designed icon). That's because I don't subscribe to their service. If I did then the "Peer Ratings Display Fee" would be included in my (very costly) subscription.

On the one hand, I'm kind of tempted to pay the fee. It'd be for only one year, but I'd get to display my MH rating on my web page. What's $59 in the grand scheme of things? On the other hand, I don't like supporting a dying business model.

I realize that it takes a lot of work for Martindale Hubbell to collect the lawyer ratings. But, over the years I've seen that most lawyers get an AV or a BV rating, so there's not much distinction in getting a top rating. Obviously, no one is going to pay to display a poor rating. And if most lawyer had poor ratings then they'd be disinclined to pay Martindale money. In short, as hard as Martindale works to gather and compile the ratings, the fact remains: the ratings are kind of useless.

Sure, there are a lot of lawyers who rely on them. A lot of lawyers follow the herd, and are reluctant to exercise critical thought or search the internet to find information. So should I pay $59 for the right to tout my Martindale Hubbell rating (which I can't reveal to you unless I pay)?

No, I think not.

If you want to know if I'm a good lawyer, here's what I suggest you do. Research me thoroughly online. Check my website, obviously. But then Google my name and see what I've written, and what others have written about me. Find out what kind of law I practice. Check my LinkedIn page and see what people who have used my services say about me. If you are really serious you can get a PACER account and look up all the cases that I've been involved in and then write down the names and phone numbers of my opposing counsel. Call them and see if they'll tell you bad things about me (some of them might, but most probably won't).

Look, hiring a lawyer is an important decision. If you want to hire a lawyer because he or she got a typically good rating (from a service that charges lawyers to display the rating), then go ahead. If I were in that position, though, I'd want to get a lot more information. Most of the information you'd need is available for free on the Internet.

You have heard of the Internet, haven't you?

Full post as published by Ernie the Attorney on April 08, 2009 (boomark / email).