Word that the Law Society is considering an advertising campaign to enhance the image of solicitors has brought an amused reaction from some quarters.'Some products have "advertising dead loss" plastered all over them,' sniggered the London Evening Standard last week.

'The Sinclair C5, the Ronco Record Selector, Neil Kinnock.

And joining that illustrious list we now have solicitors.'The comment followed the decision of the President's public relations working party to put forward the advertising agency J Walter Thompson (JWT) to the next stage of bids to run such a campaign.

The agency will make a presentation to the Society's strategy committee on 19 June 1996.

Any decision would have to be confirmed by the Council.The two other agencies that made presentati ons, Aspen Communications -- which ran an award-winning campaign for chartered accountants -- and Rileys Advertising, which was used by the Law Society of Scotland for its campaigns, were not asked back.The main objectives of any advertising campaign would be to make the public feel more favourably about solicitors and solicitors better about themselves.

It would also show solicitors that the Society was doing something to represent their interests.

Any advertising would not promote specific services.JWT's proposed £3 million campaign would run over three years through the print media and seek to 'take the high ground' to improve solicitors' reputation.

The agency recommended positioning solicitors 'as performing an essential role in ensuring a well-ordered and commercially successful society'.The proposals included a series of full-page advertisements in the broadsheet national newspapers, and the Daily Mail, as well as leading magazines and the legal press.

Law Society President Martin Mears has previously said that funding would come from existing reserves and that there would be no extra cost to solicitors (see [1996] Gazette, 8 May, 1).JWT is one of the country's top advertising agencies, with a reported annual billing of £370 million and a long list of blue chip clients, including Barclays Bank, Boots, Esso, Kelloggs, Lever Bros and Nestl--.

Its managing director, Stephen Carter, said he was delighted to have come closer to a 'dream brief'.And the reaction to the proposed campaign was a convincing argument itself, he believed.

'The mere fact that everyone finds this so amusing makes the point that it needs to be done,' he said.Mr Mears said he was impressed by JWT's 'professionalism, insight into our particular problems and intelligence'.

Research showed that clients held their own solicitors in higher regard than the profession generally and Mr Mears said he wanted to work on this.

He stressed that it was important to realise that there would not be immediate results from a campaign and that it would not bring clients through the door.Society Deputy Vice-President Tony Girling -- a working party member and chairman of Chancery Lane's public relations advisory board -- said that spending money on an advertising campaign may be justified if it improves perceptions of the profession.

'It is difficult to influence others when your own reputation is in tatters,' he pointed out.

'If you can move public perceptions by just 5%, it's significant.'But Mr Girling was concerned to see any advertising campaign as part of an overall communications strategy, linking in with initiatives like Accident Line and make a will week.

He added that, if it was agreed that advertising would form part of that strategy, JWT's proposals appealed more than the others that were presented.

A press campaign was more flexible, he explained.

'If you don't feel it's working, you can pull it.

That's harder to do with television,' he said.It was the failure to see tangible results that finished the Scottish 'It's never too early to call a solicitor' campaign.

According to research, the television-based campaign -- with ten-second adverts showing a man in various awkward situations reaching for the telephone --- proved popular with the public and materially improved perceptions of the profession.However, it was less popular with the profession itself, and the larger commercial firms, seeing no direct benefits and faced with a levy to continue, voted to end it in 1994.John Elliot, who chaired the Law Society of Scotland's marketing committee , said it was not axiomatic that a campaign popular with the public would not be popular with the profession, but he described it as a distinct possibility.

'Solicitors have difficulty putting themselves in their clients' shoes,' he argued.In 1994, the Institute of Chartered Accountants ran four billboard posters, followed up by a public relations push, in a successful effort to establish chartered accountants as a brand and improve the public's perception of the profession.

Susan Reynolds, marketing manager at the institute, said she had received a large number of complaints from the profession about the first poster used -- 'It's easier to sleep with a chartered accountant' -- but that it had made the most lasting impression.

The overall reaction from the profession was mixed.Liked by the public and hated by the profession was the problem the last time the Society ran a generic advertising campaign.

The award-winning 'Mr Whatisname' series was aimed at getting the public to think of going to a solicitor when a problem arose.

Peter Verdin, who was on the Law Society's public relations committee in 1977, said solicitors made the mistake of thinking the campaign was aimed at them, not the public.But that campaign should act as a warning today.

The profession does not always just stand back and moan when it does not like something.

The 1977 campaign had to end when a solicitor changed his name by deed poll to Mr Whatisname.