Notes on law firms.
Professional rules, fees, secrecy and AI, and what a client needs to see before trusting you with a matter.
Law firms ·
No testimonials, no logos. And still, trust.
Websites in other sectors rely on testimonials, client logos and success stories. A law firm rarely can. Professional secrecy, the ban on naming clients without consent and the ban on promising results prevent it in Switzerland and Spain. What builds trust instead, and what to do about Google reviews.
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The same sentence does not work on both sides of the border.
A law firm with clients in Switzerland and Spain cannot use the same sentence about fees on both sides of the border. In Switzerland, the law forbids agreeing a share of the outcome instead of fees. In Spain, contingency fees have been possible since 2008. Costs work differently too. What each rule says and how a website explains it.
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The assistant that says it is not a lawyer.
Someone asks at eleven at night whether they should accept an inheritance. An AI assistant on a law firm’s website can help them reach the right person, but it cannot answer that. What Article 50 of the EU AI Act requires from August 2026, what the Swiss data protection regulator says, how professional secrecy is protected when a provider is involved, and how the Orvalle assistant behaves.
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A law that reads like a design brief.
Since 4 December 2024, Spain’s Right of Defence Act gives every client the right to be told simply how fees are set, what an adverse costs order could mean and who their lawyer is, with their bar association and number. The Act never mentions websites, yet it reads almost like a design brief. What it requires, what the General Statute of the Spanish Legal Profession adds and how it translates to the screen.
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A letter, a free consultation and a sanction.
In March 2021, a lawyer in Fribourg wrote to tenants who did not know him to offer a free first consultation. Almost four years later, the Federal Supreme Court upheld the disciplinary sanction. The facts, the court’s reasoning, what changes and what does not for a law firm’s website in Switzerland, and what the Spanish rules say about the same thing.
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Names first. Facts later.
Before hearing a case, a law firm has to know it does not already act for the other side. Many law firm websites do it the other way round: they ask for the facts in a text box and check the names later. What the rules say in Switzerland and Spain, why the usual form is a risk, and how to design a first contact that starts with names.
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