Need a Timeline for Your Law Firm Website?

Law Firms often have proud histories – and rightfully so! If your firm has a past to boast about, why not share it with your site visitors? At PaperStreet, we often create timelines for firms that have over 100 years of business history, but we can do the same for younger firms with brag-worthy deets.

If you are interested in creating a timeline for your firm, you’ve come to the right place. Below is an outline of our timeline creation process, examples of previous timelines we’ve created for clients, style options and other need-to-know details that will help you understand what the feature entails and how to best share your firm’s unique story with the world.

Process of Creating a Timeline

Ok, so you want to create a timeline; great! Now, where do you begin? It all starts with raw data: the actual history you would like to share and how exactly you want to share it. Ask yourself the following questions:

1. What information do I want to share? This is the bread and butter of your timeline. To make things easy, we recommend gathering your information into an excel chart and parsing it out according to the following:
   1. Date of event, successful verdict, milestone etc.
   2. Excerpt (brief description) of the event/milestone in question
   3. Full text (if needed) to expand upon the subject
   4. Photo (if needed) to commemorate the historical occurrence
2. What style do I prefer? Figure out the style you would like for your timeline (horizontal or vertical). In our experience, a vertical timeline is more common and easier to scroll through.
3. Do I need animation? Do you want your timeline to feature animation (banners, slides and other imagery) or be static (a standard list)? Keep in mind, static is budget friendly while animations can be more time consuming to create. However, either is possible. If you can dream it, we can do it!
4. Should I choose custom vs. script? Decide on a custom or existing script. The advantage of a custom script is that you get exactly what you want. The advantage of using an existing script is lower cost. Take your pick.
5. What’s next? The answer: design, code, install and test. This is where the fun happens. Once you tell us the specs for your timeline, we’ll make it a reality. Sit back, relax and enjoy the finished product!

Examples of Our Work

Every law firm’s story is unique in its own right. Naturally, we make a point to create individualized timelines for each firm, taking several areas into account such as the firm’s “personality”, main points the firm would like to convey and other topics of interest. Below are a few examples of timelines we’ve created for our clients (please keep in mind, some of these are more basic and lack animation, but we can animate just about anything):

Morris Nichols

http://www.mnat.com/about/story/

Oles

http://www.oles.com/about/our-history/

CCM Invests

http://www.ccminvests.com/about-us/

How to Choose

Ah, decisions, decisions! If we go the custom route, the sky’s the limit in terms of your firm’s timeline design. We can set up a meeting to discuss your ideas and brainstorm with our design and development team. If we go the script route, then I’ve found some additional resources with some animations you can use as a springboard for your own creative concepts. Below are some options that are available on CodeCanyon.net for a reasonable price.

• http://preview.codecanyon.net/item/first-responsive-timeline/full_screen_preview/19352502
• http://preview.codecanyon.net/item/timeline-gorilla-responsive-vertical-jquery-timeline/full_screen_preview/19957081
• http://preview.codecanyon.net/item/flik-timeline-wordpress-responsive-timeline-plugin/full_screen_preview/17409873
• …there are many more, too!

There you have it – the secret ingredients to creating your firm’s very own (and kudos inspiring) timeline. Those are just a few of the timelines we’ve either created at PaperStreet or that I simply like and admire. As always, we welcome your creative concepts and will work with you to design a timeline that captures your law firm’s most impressive and noteworthy moments. Cheers!

Further Learning

Are you interested in learning more about legal marketing? Head on over to our SEO Guidelines & Best Practices page. Our guide will teach you the do’s and don’ts for law firm SEO along with what we include in our SEO plans.