Maryland Lawyer Blog
The Maryland Daily Record has an article on a battle between Silverman|Slutkin|Thompson|White and SuperMedia, formerly Idearc, which was formerly Verizon, which was formerly [fill in-joke here]. (I had a great joke but decided it was a little over-the-top.)
Most certainly, lawsuits are a common mating ritual between lawyers and yellow page advertisers. Anyway, the battle is over the back page of the Yellow Book. Silverman Slutkin sued SuperMedia, claiming they welshed on the deal to give them the back cover that Steven L. Snyder had.
SuperMedia’s argument was apparently the ‘ole tried and true: “So what if I breached my contract; the fine print says that you don’t get any real damages in the event we breach.” Which I’m sure is what the contract says. How much this article costs SuperMedia in terms of goodwill is anyone’s guess. Of course, SuperMedia will probably just change its name again tomorrow. So it is probably all good.
When we founded Miller & Zois, I assumed that the yellow pages/phonebook was the path for personal injury lawyers to build a law practice. We began advertising for auto accident and medical malpractice cases, spending money we really did not have at the time. It was just foolish. Today, our yellow page/phonebook marketing is about 3% of what it once was, just covering the back of a little local book. I just don’t think it works consistently in attracting the serious injury cases you need to fuel a personal injury practice.
Silverman Slutkin are good lawyers who know how to market their law practice. They don’t need any advice from me as to how to spend their money. But I still think they won by losing in this case.