Category: Agency News

Firesign’s website design for client AEON Law has earned a second award win in 2023, this time from the Communicator Awards, an international program in its 29th year recognizing excellence, effectiveness, and innovation across all areas of communication.

The Communicator Awards honored Firesign with an Award of Distinction, presented for projects that exceed industry standards in quality and achievement. Click here to see the full list of winners. The Communicator Awards are sanctioned and reviewed by the Academy of Interactive & Visual Arts, an invitation-only group of professionals from media, communications, advertising, creative and marketing firms such as Amazon, Disney, ESPN, Spotify, the Wall Street Journal/Dow Jones, and Wired.

Earlier this year, Lawyerist, an online publication and community geared to guiding healthier small law firms, chose Firesign among the winners of its annual Best Law Firm Websites award.

Firesign Marketing was selected as a Gold Winner in the 2023 Hermes Creative Awards, an international competition administered by the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals.

The winning entry was a holiday card Firesign created for client Hanley Flight & Zimmerman, an intellectual property law firm in Chicago. Firesign managing partner Katherine Hollar Barnard and graphic designer Sky Morrell teamed up to create the concept “Great Moments in Thanksgiving IP” and the card featured patent drawings of kitchen innovations we take for granted today, like the potato masher. The award shows that legal marketing can be educational and entertaining at the same time.

The 2023 competition was expected to attract around 6,500 entries. Of those, only 16 percent win Platinum, the top award, and 22 percent the Gold Award. The entries are judged individually by AMCP members, which consist of several thousand marketing, communication, advertising, public relations, digital media production, and freelance professionals.

Firesign’s Katie McNeil was awarded a Gold Award for Logo Design in the annual NYX Marcom Awards, an international competition that “honors individuals, agencies, and organizations that demonstrate extraordinary caliber” in marketing, communication, advertising, public relations, and related fields.

The winning design was a logo for Kies IP, an intellectual property law firm named in honor of Mary Dixon Kies, the first woman to be granted a United States patent. Katie’s logo for the law firm paid tribute to Kies’ invention, a process for weaving straw with silk or thread in the hat-making process. The interwoven letters I and P represent intellectual property and two of the key principles the firm wanted to convey to the public: Kies IP is innovative and pioneering.

While legal marketing must be ethical, appropriate and professional — Firesign believes that shouldn’t stop it from being beautiful. This award-winning logo is a perfect example, and it shows how we help law firms and legal services companies define their brands and set themselves apart from their competitors.

The NYX Awards are judged by a diverse panel of experienced and leading industry professionals. More information about the awards is available here.

Lawyerist, an online publication and community geared to guiding healthier small law firms, chose Firesign | Enlightened Legal Marketing among the winners of its annual Best Law Firm Websites award. Firesign won for the website it designed and created for client AEON Law.

The judges said this about Firesign’s work, which echoes what we set out to do for every client we serve: “AEON Law sets itself apart with its vibrance and its overall branding. It has a clear client picture and is specifically speaking to that user.”

Firesign was one of 10 winners chosen from a pool of more than 110 nominated websites. The judges at Lawyerist ran each website through a performance and accessibility grader that rated each site from A to F. Then, they rated the highest-performing sites based on Branding, Marketing, Accessibility, and Technical SEO.

Click here to see the full list of Lawyerist’s Best Law Firm Websites of 2023.

Katherine Hollar Barnard, founder, and managing partner of Firesign | Enlightened Legal Marketing, announced the addition of two business partners today: Firesign Vice President Amy Nouri and Firesign Creative Director Katie McNeil.

Nouri uses the four main elements of modern public relations – paid, earned, shared and owned media – to help Firesign’s clients attract, win and retain business. She leads major accounts and oversees the agency’s content and communications operations.

Fusing her graphic design experience and acumen with her legal training, McNeil develops and creates award-winning website designs and brand identities for Firesign’s legal industry clients. She leads Firesign’s creative team and implements new service offerings.

Launched in February 2017 by Barnard, Firesign is nationally certified as a Women’s Business Enterprise by the Women’s Business Development Center-Midwest, a regional certifying partner of the Women’s Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC) – the nation’s largest third-party certifier of businesses owned and operated by women.

Firesign is also one of the nation’s only marketing agencies solely devoted to the legal industry, helping law firms build their brands and bottom lines. The agency’s work has been recognized internationally by the dotCOMM Awards and the MarCom Awards; in its home market, Firesign has won every category in Missouri Lawyers Weekly’s Reader Rankings for four consecutive years.