Effective leadership in the marketing and technology industry is essential for creating a productive environment and achieving strategic goals. It involves clear communication to align team members, mobilizing people around common objectives, and developing key leadership skills, such as emotional intelligence and conflict resolution. Additionally, leaders should cultivate a service-oriented attitude to build trust within the team and engage in strategic planning to optimize resources and adapt to market changes.
Darin Swayne is the President and CEO of Advantage Attorney Marketing and Cloud Solutions. He is a prominent leader in the marketing and technology industry, bringing over 20 years of experience in digital marketing, IT, business development, consulting, agency management, and law firm operations. Darin has collaborated with over 400 law firms across the country, helping them develop complete strategies for technology, marketing, and business growth. He assists clients in identifying and merging similar technologies, showing them how to make the most of their existing systems to lower costs and streamline their business processes.
The Journey in Legal Marketing
Darin Swayne earned his Master of Business Administration from Washington State University. With his deep expertise, he helps clients improve their digital marketing and online presence using strategies like SEO (Search Engine Optimization), SEM (Search Engine Marketing), social media engagement, and boosting conversion rates. As a result, his clients enjoy cost savings, greater efficiency, and a noticeable increase in website traffic and conversions.
In 2007, Darin Swayne started Advantage Attorney Marketing and Cloud Solutions to provide an affordable marketing option for small law firms. He was freelancing for a law firm that didn’t have a website, and with his team, he created one and applied basic marketing strategies. Soon, the firm became one of the leading bankruptcy filers in Southern California. As its success grew, other law firms began reaching out to ask how they achieved such results and if they could receive help as well. This is how Advantage Attorney Marketing and Cloud Solutions came to be.
The All-in-One Digital Agency for Law Firms
Although Advantage Attorney began as a marketing agency, many people mistakenly believe that it only focuses on marketing. In reality, the firm has evolved into a comprehensive digital marketing, advertising, and technology company. It offers a wide range of services, including website development, digital and traditional marketing, advertising, TV and radio production, podcasts, and newsletters, as well as Android and Apple app development. They also provide live chat, chatbots, artificial intelligence development, and social media management, among many other services. No other agency in this field offers as much.
In 2025, the firm plans to introduce several new services, such as recruiting, pre-employment testing, benefits management, and other HR-related services—all designed specifically for law firms.
Strategy for Sustainable Growth
When it comes to the firm’s growth and achievements, Darin takes great pride in its churn rate. While many large agencies spend a lot of money on marketing to gain new customers to replace those they lose each month, Advantage Attorney Marketing and Cloud Solutions focuses on its clients. The firm invests in its clients by innovating and improving its services to enhance their experience.
Since its founding, the firm has maintained a minimum growth rate of 50% yearly. In three of the last five years, it has achieved growth of over 120%. Advantage Attorney Marketing and Cloud Solutions has worked with over 400 attorneys across its various services and boasts a 92% client retention rate. Darin believes that many agencies make the mistake of not prioritizing client retention, which can be a costly error. Retaining clients is much less expensive than constantly trying to acquire new ones.
Balancing Risk and Stability in Legal Marketing
“Risk is part of life. When a leader becomes risk-averse, the growth of a business stops.” Darin Swayne says.
There is an old saying that goes, “When growth stops, decay begins.” This means that the real danger for a business is being too cautious. In the marketing and technology industry, risk and innovation go hand in hand. When discussing technology and digital marketing, stability and profitability rely on innovation, which inherently involves risk. Not innovating is a surefire way to fail.
Investing in innovation is essential, but it must be done responsibly. This means considering the long-term return on investment (ROI) while ensuring that these investments do not threaten the firm’s short-term financial health. Therefore, innovation needs to be funded wisely. Instead of taking on excessive debt, Advantage Attorney Marketing and Cloud Solutions focuses on cutting costs now to support innovation, as long as these cost-saving measures do not negatively impact the client experience.
The Formula for Client Retention & Success
The key to the firm’s long-term success is what Darin Swayne calls ‘stickiness.’ This means it creates services that make it hard for clients to leave—not because clients feel trapped, but because the firm offers valuable and effective packages that would cost much more if bought separately. It does not lock clients into contracts or hold them back if they decide to leave. Instead, it focuses on being responsive; when a client makes a request, the firm usually fulfills it within a few hours, rather than taking days or weeks.
On the rare occasions when a client does leave, more than 50% of them end up returning after realizing that most agencies fail to deliver on their promises. The firm aims to be its clients’ marketing department for life. Its business model is centered around building lasting relationships with clients. It makes switching to its services easy by keeping the transition costs low and providing a high-quality onboarding experience. This often means it loses money initially on new clients. However, it makes its profits by retaining those clients for many years.
AI and Innovation in the Legal Industry
Advantage Attorney Marketing and Cloud Solutions positions itself as a disruptor in the attorney marketing industry. It stands out by providing more high-quality services at a lower cost than any other agency. Unlike many of its competitors, it combines its services into bundles rather than charging clients for each small addition, which makes its approach unique.
The firm focuses on improving the client experience by offering exceptional service and delivering impressive results. By using the latest technology, it stays ahead of the industry and regularly adds new services to its bundles several times a year.
Some agencies rebrand a live chat service and sell it to their customers, but Advantage Attorney
Marketing and Cloud Solutions has always included chat services as part of its bundles at no extra cost. Recently, AI technology has rapidly advanced, becoming more affordable and flexible in its applications. However, the firm has been using AI for data analytics for years, starting with IBM’s Watson. With its in-house application development team, Advantage Attorney
Marketing and Cloud Solutions have consistently stayed ahead of other agencies in utilizing AI.
The Approach to Employee Development
Darin Swayne values having intelligent and motivated people on his team at Advantage Attorney
Marketing and Cloud Solutions. He says, “Give me a team of eager, smart, motivated people and we will accomplish twice as much as a team of very experienced but apathetic people in half the time.”
Of course, the downside of having a younger team can be that they might make mistakes—sometimes even costly ones—but that is part of the learning process. Many experienced teams become apathetic because they feel stifled by management. They fear making mistakes, hide their errors, blame others, and develop a defensive attitude.
Darin aims to reward and support those who are committed to protecting the firm and putting customers first, even if they make mistakes. As long as they take responsibility for their mistakes and learn from them, they will grow and become more valuable to the firm. He emphasizes, “We don’t fire people for making mistakes.” However, he does terminate employees who are negligent, indifferent, or fail to act in the best interest of clients and the company.
Leadership Through Teaching & Empowerment
Darin’s leadership style combines elements of teaching and a supportive authority figure. He doesn’t aspire to be the smartest person in the room; instead, he aims to surround himself with intelligent, hardworking, and ambitious individuals. He provides them with the training and experiences they need to grow into their best selves. Nothing makes him prouder than seeing a passionate, eager young person evolve into a leader who positively influences the company simply because it’s the right thing to do.
“I love to delegate something just to see what solution my team will come up with,” Darin Swayne says.
He is often amazed by the unique and creative ideas they generate when they are free from external limitations or unnecessary restrictions. If he had been involved in shaping some of those solutions, his 20-plus years of experience might have constrained their creativity, and those fresh ideas might never have emerged. However, he understands that delegation doesn’t mean giving up responsibility. The final accountability still rests with him, and nothing will reach clients without being thoroughly tested and approved.
“I think the most important thing, whether we are talking about a new product, service, or people, is to gather information,” he says.
Darin Swayne believes in collecting as much data as needed to make an informed decision and then making that decision quickly. He warns that being overly cautious can hinder growth. It’s crucial to make decisions without allowing the business to be bogged down by excessive analysis or having too many people involved in the final decision-making process.
