Doug Stern is a freelance writer and strategist. Doug spends most of his time as a law firm marketing content editor and ghostwriter. In addition to legal services, his clients have included leading engineers and architects, medical practices and other professional service providers. Doug also works with manufacturers and real estate developers.

"I never discuss the work I do for my clients unless they've said it's OK to do that."

Law firm marketing and business development

• Hopkins & Carley, a highly-regarded, 60-lawyer firm in the Silicon Valley hired Doug in the fall of 2010.  "I wrote or edited all of the content for the firm's new site.  This involved interviewing all 30-plus shareholders and of counsel."  The new site launched Jan. 31, 2011.  Doug later worked with the firm's IP chair on collaterals for its trademark practice.
  

• Doug edited Web content for a law firm subsidary chartered in New Hampshire.  Hemenway Trust Company creates and manages sophisticated trusts for well-to-do families, individuals and their businesses.

• "I wrote Web site content for a prominent family law practice in northern New Jersey, Simeone Law Group.  It launched in the fall of 2010 and was developed by JeanSullivanDesign."

• Doug was recently hired by a Kentucky-based litigation boutique to write the content for its new Web site.

• "I sourced and edited content for Foster Swift's new Web site. The Michigan law firm launched it in mid-July 2010."

• Hemenway & Barnes hired Doug to source and edit content for the Boston-based law firm's new Web site. It launched April 2010. "I've also handled a variety of other copywriting assignments for the firm."

• Doug completed a couple law firm copywriting projects in 2010 for Merchants' Counsel LLC. That's a boutique, New England-based law firm focusing on the multichannel merchandising and upmarket brand market. "I wrote or edited content for the firm's new Web site along with a legal issues survival guide, BRIEFS." Design Monsters, of New Haven, Conn., was involved in both projects.

• The Boston-based law firm of Goulston & Storrs first hired Doug Stern in 2008 as a writer-editor. "Since then, I've primarily written case studies and client alerts."

• "Back in 2009, I wrote an internal newsletter article for a Boston-based, NLJ 50 firm. It was part of the roll-out for its new file management system."

• Doug Stern has written and edited Web content and other marketing and business development materials for an NLJ 100 firm. "These include sourcing practice descriptions for sports law, supply chain management and sustainability groups."

• "I edited and wrote Search-Engine-Optimized Web content for a Boston law firm, Sherin and Lodgen, in the summer of 2008. The site was relaunched in mid-October and won an award from the Legal Marketing Association chapter in New England."

• Doug Stern edited an article for a Boston firm that got placed in IP Law360 in July 2008.

• "I was the editor of Results Mail from late 2005 until it stopped publishing in June 2009. It was the weekly, practical-as-can-be business development e-letter for lawyers and law firm marketers from Mike O'Horo and Pat Sweeney. As Mark Twain (not a client) once said, 'There are no great writers, only great re-writers.'"

“Impact?  Consider the number of longtime subscribers who have volunteered that ResultsMail is a lot better these days…coinciding with your editing our submissions.”

Mike O’Horo
The Coach

• "I was ghostwriter for an article in April 2008 for a West Coast law firm marketing IT guru on how to be a smarter buyer and user of ERM/CRM software."

• "The law firm of Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge LLP, Boston, first engaged me in 2006. Since then, I've helped its marketing department with a variety of projects, including writing and editing the 500-attorney firm's descriptions of its work in securities litigation and life sciences."

• "I worked with law firm consultant Coke Morgan Stewart, Esq., in 2006, before she joined Kaye Scholer's IP group in Washington, DC. Coke says, 'Doug took a hard look at my website and thought of dozens of ways to freshen it up and make key information easier to find.'"

• New Orlean's McGlinchey Stafford PLLC used Doug Stern to write the law firm's intro to the 2006 real estate supplement to the Greater Baton Rouge Business Report.

Healthcare marketing

• Doug created messaging and copy for ISOSIGN in the summer of 2010. Here's the brochure he wrote for the infection-control smart sign system developed by Louisville-based SIGN4 for hospitals.

• "I handled two agency jobs for Louisville's Bandy Carroll Hellige in early 2006. Both involved creating ad concepts and writing copy--one for a home-health tech supplier and the other for a workforce education initiative."

• In 2006, Doug worked with a metro Washington-based company, P.L. Doyle, Inc., on marketing communications and strategies relating to the company's alternative and integrative healthcare products.

• Plaschke Design Group used Doug Stern in 2006 to write copy for a direct-mail piece for Muhlenberg (Ky.) Community Hospital announcing the installation of state-of-the-art imaging equipment in the Kentucky facility. "I've been a student of healthcare issues ever since the late 1980s, when I worked as a speechwriter for Harvey I. Sloane, MD, the top elected official in Jefferson Co., Ky., and a public-health physician."

Public awareness and policy communications

• Doug Stern was part of the team hired in May 2008 by Kentucky's suicide prevention group. Business Communication Group produced a new Web site, videos, branding and a variety of other awareness-building tools and events.

• The Corradino Group is the lead consulting engineer and planner for the Detroit River International Crossing. TCG used Doug in late 2007 to edit technical translations and to script an overview video for the project.

• A Washington-based architectural firm hired Doug to plan, edit and develop a Web site documenting the privatized historic housing at a military installation. This was part of the fulfillment of a Memorandum of Agreement with a State Historic Preservation Office.

• "The Kentucky Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty was a pro bono client, April 2006 through March 2008. I grassroots-organized faith communities and civic groups in about 10 key legislative districts statewide to pressure the General Assembly to hear and support abolition-related bills."

• In late 2005, a Louisville ad agency, New!West, hired Doug to re-write the copy for www.kentuckytourism.com. That's the official Web site for the state's tourism agency.

Real estate sales and development

• Doug Stern has created print ad concepts and copy as well as other collateral sales materials for two innovative urban redevelopment projects in Louisville: Park DuValle and Liberty Green.

• Louisville-based Peritus Public Relations has turned to Doug Stern for several projects. He re-wrote the agency's Web site in 2005-2006 and has handled newsletter copy and production of a invitation to a special event for one of the agency's clients, Museum Plaza.

Other assignments

• "In May 2011, I wrote the script for a brief video documenting the history of an international manufacturer for use in celebrating the corporation's 90th anniversary."

• Doug has recently been engaged to write Web site content for a Washington-based consultant to the regulated utilities sector.  "I'm delighted to be working again with Katie Bush Design.  Katie is handling site design and development as part of a larger branding program for this client."
  

• "In the summer of 2010, I was hired by a top branding agency in Hollywood, Calif., mostly to handle edits to its new Web site.  It launched in the fall of that year with my content.  BIRD has used me on other projects, including branding content for one of the agency's key accounts."  Doug pitched in again in early 2011 for another round of Web edits and new content.
  

• "In the summer of 2010, I sourced content for a new Web site for an up-market custom builder-remodeler in Louisville."

• Doug Stern worked in 2008 with an international vendor to the restaurant industry on a customer-service survey. Montreal-based Posera, developer of the Maitre’D software, is a "[l]eading provider of restaurant POS & management solutions."

• A supplier and contractor hired Doug Stern in March 2008 to produce a new brochure, re-launched Web site and other collateral materials. Plastic Composites Inc. is based in Florida and serves the concrete corrosion industry throughout the Southeast and beyond.

• A book producer, Crescent Hill Books, hired Doug Stern in May 2008 to write nine case histories of graphic design branding campaigns from the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom. Market Smart: The Best in Age and Lifestyle Specific Design was published in spring 2009 by HarperCollins.

• Katie Bush Design hired Doug Stern in 2007 to write copy for a relaunched Web site.  Katie's client was a DIY gourmet-to-go business in San Francisco.