Is Google + a Minus For Attorneys?

There is an old saying in marketing that you should "fish were the fish are" so when Google announced their competitive offering to Facebook, many people took immediate notice. This was then, this is now:

- Google + has 90 million registered users VERSUS 845 million for Facebook
- PC users on average are spending 3 minutes a month on Google + VERSUS 6-7 hours for Facebook.

These numbers were courtesy of a recent report in ComScore and further reported on in the Wall Street Journal. 

As I previously posted in July of last year about Google +, I had my doubts about the effectiveness and sustainability of Google + for a number of reasons: chiefly amongst them was the value proposition and intuitive ease of use provided by Google with this new system. I recently heard a lecture where the speaker referred to Google + as the best social media system that nobody uses. The WSJ went further to describe Google + as a "virtual ghost town" compared to places like Facebook - surprise!

Of all the analytical measurements people use on the web, time-on-site is one of the most critical in measuring user value: Facebook has it is spades and Google + clearly does not. It is becoming clear at this point that not only do people create Facebook accounts, but they also use them. Google + might have had a large initial signup - but how many have returned? Social media is largely about connections and reach and what is the point in hanging out in a ghost town? I suppose you could have a good gunfight but who would know?

For attorney marketing, my advise in July still stands: fish were the fish are. If nobody is hanging out on Google +; what type of ediscovery could you possibly gather, how many of your referral partners will follow you, and how will you generate more visibility and new cases from it?

More on Google + for Attorneys : http://www.seolawyermarketing.com/2011/07/will-google-1-help-attorneys.html

4 Steps To Create An Effective Online Review Strategy For Attorneys

Yesterday online review company Yelp Inc. exploded onto the scene with a strong IPO with first day trading up 61% from their strike price – not bad! Yelp’s IPO follows recent IPO’s of GroupOn and Angie’s List, with Angie’s List still fairing the better on the two on the street. Yelp currently averages around 66 million unique visitors a month and users have created more than 25 million consumer reviews to date.

 

Why Are Online Reviews Important to Attorneys?

There is a 90% chance that somebody has already written a review about you online. To date there are at least 20 major online review sites where anybody can write anything about you and your practice and unsolicited reviews are very often negative! How long will these reviews remain online? Well, according to recent IPO’s like Yelp, it looks like forever at this point!

As we have previously reported - according to studies by AC Nielson; 70% of people now indicate that they trust online consumer opinions. This is second only to opinions received from friends (90%). The question of whether or not you need an attorney website and/or an online reviews strategy is no longer optional when reviews about you and your practice are now being written online – like it or not.

Impacts of Online Reviews on Your Referrals

As yourself a question about how you behave today before you buy a product or service. I know when I buy a book, product or get a referral to a service provider; I almost always look online at what people have said (online reviews) about each before I contact them. Your clients and referrals now behave in the same manner. In the world of the internet, your referrals now have something they had never had in the past- a fast an effective means to help validate, measure and compare the quality of a referral.

In today’s world, attorney referrals are commonly given out in numbers – thanks largely to a process fostered by your insurance companies in their malpractice avoidance procedures. Because of this, a referral to you may also include a referral to 1-2 other attorneys that the potential client must now consider and compare. In the past, they would simply call you and the others and make decisions from the phone call. Today, referral clients look online and make judgments about you BEFORE THEY CALL YOU based on such items as how your website, blog, news and online reviews are in comparison to the other attorneys referred to them. Still think online review management is not important? What do you think happens when they see at least one negative review online about your practice? Your chances of converting that referral business just went down and that negative review is costing you money!

4 Steps To Building a Successful Online Review Strategy

1. Start by creating a proactive review strategy for your practice. In this case, create a preformed email that includes a link directly to the reviews section of your Google Places Page. Send out these emails to all of your clients who had a successful outcome with you IMMEDIATELY AFTER that outcome – this is the best time to ask them to create a positive review for you online. Follow-up with them as needed in order to get a steady flow of reviews in Google. 
2. Ever wondered why some Google Places listings have those 5 gold review stars listed and others do not? That is because the listings with the stars have more reviews – typically 7 or more to display prominently in the search results. Set a goal to have at least 7 positive reviews to help improve your conversions and performance from your Google Places Listings
3. Check your reviews on a regular basis. There are at least 20 places to check: Google Places, Yelp, Ask, CityVoter, CitySearch, iBegin, Bing, Dogpile, NoMoreClipboard, Yahoo, Blogs, Demandforce, SuperPages, Mojopages, Manta, Local, Yellowpages, Lycos, Avvo, and FindLaw.com.
4. If you have negative reviews written about you, try to track back who the client is and request that they remove the review. If you are unsuccessful, write a response to the review (in your Google Places admin screen) or simply be proactive and push the negative review down the list with more recent positive reviews. Remember, the more positive reviews you have listed at the top, the least likely the negative review will impact you.

If you need help in setting up and executing your online review strategy, contact us today for more help…

Bankruptcy Legal Demand Growth Takes A Hit In 2011

The Hildebrand Institute recently released their 2012 Client Advisory and there was some interesting growth trends (and lack thereof) that took place from 2010-2011:


As we can see from the chart:
The winners were: IP Litigation, Labor & Employment, Litigation and Real Estate.
The biggest losers: Bankruptcy, Tax, and M&A

What can we learn from this from a legal marketing perspective? It is always hard to tell by trying the steer a tanker by its wake but here is what I am seeing:

- The bankruptcy wave may have peaked sometime last year or the year before
- Litigation still remains strong
- Labor & Employment law is still going strong
- Has real estate started to turn the corner? Some states like Arizona have sold a good deal of their inventory over the past 24 months which could be a sign of things to come...

New Google Places Charges Will Have Little Impact On Law Firms?

New news broke out of Google land that next year Google is planning on charging high volume users of their Google Places listings: http://www.gpsworld.com/lbs/google-charge-high-volume-users-map-use-12285.

As the story currently goes, Google plans to charge an excess impressions fee for companies who have more than 25,000 impressions per day. Most law firms rarely reach 25,00o impressions daily since more attorneys searches are more practice area specific and parochial in nature.

The question however becomes how does Google plan to define a "company" in their system and how are their totals calculated? Are the totals discussed based on ALL Google Places listings in one account? This would seem logical as the only way to connect the dots here. Or is this based on the total volumes for each listing - no matter where they reside? Since they will likely bill from your Google account, questions remain.

Again, most law firms needn't be concerned about this but the firms with multiple locations and are in higher volume search practice areas should take notice. We will keep tabs on this and see what is the best course of action here...

Optimizing Website Title Tags For Improved Google Places Results

When Google first introduced Google Places (formerly Google Local) listings in their search results, the phone books were officially added to the endangered species list. Historically the old phone book companies that would proactively contact attorneys each year make sure their listing were up to date and made the process easy to update and renew. With the advent of Google Places, attorneys must now proactively claim their listings, optimize them, and make sure they are working properly with their attorney websites. To further complicate the issue, Google has now blended the website and places listings into one result for the most common attorney searches online.

Google’s Previous Problem Managing Firm Names

For those who have searched over the past few weeks, you will notice that the displayed results have changed…again. Google has now placed the address and phone to the right and more importantly the way the company name is displayed in the blended results listings. Historically, Google would pull the company name (or attorney or firm name) directly from the Google Places name. Naturally, this created problems for Google since people would, despite Google’s policy to the contrary, change their firm name to better present themselves and increase conversions for specific searches. This worked fine for a while until Google started validating their listings (finally) and suspending accounts that violated their policies.

Google’s Most Recent Display Changes

Ironically Google is now doing through their results page what many attorneys previously had tried to do themselves: provide better conversions and targeted results for their Google Places listings. In the example to the right, you will see the listings for the “Omaha real estate attorney” search. Notice how the top two listings display details about the attorneys (Highlighted: that are not the firm’s name in Google Places) while the others do not. What is displayed in the first two listings are from the Title Tag of the home page from each website. Also notice how the title tag displayed is only relative to the search query. For example in this search, Omahabankruptcy.com is displayed as “Patricia Geringer, Bankruptcy Attorney” but if we change the search to “Omaha bankruptcy attorney” we see that not only is Patricia’s position improved but the title tag of her website is also now displayed.

What You Can Do To Improve Your Google Places Search Results & Conversions

• If you are an attorney, you need to identify your practice areas of concentration. If you only do bankruptcy work, this is easy. But if you have multiple practice areas, you need to understand your concentrations and narrow them down to 2-3 for the home page optimization of your website. A good law firm marketing consultant will be able to assist you with this.

• Once you have identified your 2-3 areas of concentration, go into Google and do searches within your targeted geography and identify those search results for your targeted practice areas that display blended Google organic and places listings as used in the example. If no Google Places are displayed for specific searches (i.e. “Omaha Land Zoning Attorney”), then you know you are too narrow in search.

• Once you have claimed and complete your Google Places Optimization, make sure that you review the SEO elements of your website and in this case – the title tags on the home page of your website. MAKE SURE that the home page title tag contains the keyword search terms that are most important to your practice areas of concentration (as discussed above). Again, a law firm SEO consultant will be able to assist you with all of these steps.

It is CRITICALLY IMPORTANT that attorney websites have the proper on-site optimization and nothing is more important than creating the correct title tags. Just ask yourself how many books you have purchased that had the wrong titles and you will quickly realize the significance of good title tags on a website. If you would like to learn more about how law firm search engine optimization can help your practice online, please contact the SEOConsultantFirm.com today…

Top 5 Tips To Maximize Attorney Referrals Online

We recently worked with a very prominent attorney who for years said that he didn’t need a website and if anybody wanted to see anything about him, they could just Google his name and see all the results. This all changed when we finally received a call from the client saying that he now wanted a website. When we asked him why he changed his mind, he had indicated that the night before he was at a dinner party with a major celebrity who had not retained his services. When asked, the celebrity indicated that he did not choose our client because he did not have a website and he was impressed with the other attorney referrals that did.

The Opportunity Cost of Managing Your Legal Business

Most attorneys look at legal marketing expenses as what they gain by taking action. This includes building up referral networks of other attorneys and formal clients, advertising on TV, radio, in print publications, directories, etc. This also includes the visibility you can receive (or not receive) through the use of a legal website. In 2009, the ABA Journal found that 65% of people indicated that they now start their search for an attorney online. But what is important to note is that attorney searches also begin at the point of referral. Since most attorneys give out referrals in numbers (which most malpractice insurance coverage companies encourage), people are increasingly looking up and researching their referred attorneys online BEFORE they decide to contact them.

The Power of Controlled Content

Without a website that you can control, you as an attorney are at the mercy of the alternative websites and directories that will ultimately end of controlling your image online for you. If you don’t have a optimized website (or no website at all), try Googling your name and look at the results. These will likely include attorney directories, ratings agencies like AVVO, news, press releases, case summaries, etc. You may even see Google Places listings with customer feedback (positive & negative) about you. Even though you may not be aware of these things, your clients and referral clients are. In most cases, you have little or no control over these sources of information about you – especially if you don’t have a plan to manage them online.

What Your Referrals Want To Know About You

When people receive attorney referrals, they want to know information about you in order to determine if you are the right attorney for them. Traditional sales psychologists indicate that the average person will go through three stages during a sales process: Needs, Proof & Risk. Clearly in the case of the referral client, they seem to have a need which is what led them to you. At the point they receive information about you, they are considering questions dealing largely with Proof & Risk which includes questions dealing with:

• Does this attorney have the experience and expertise to handle my case?
• What results has this attorney received for other clients and does he/she have a solid track record?
• How much will this attorney end up costing me and what value do I get in return?

Because of these questions, it is little wonder why I typically see web pages dealing with results and/or testimonials at the top 5 most trafficked pages on a good attorney website.

Top 5 Tips To Maximize Your Legal Practice Online For Referrals:

1. Make sure your website is fully optimized for attorney searches. Go on Google and type in your name along with lawyer and/or attorney and your location and see what comes up in the search results. If your profile on your website is not ranked #1 for this search, you need to contact a legal SEO consultant to help change this for you. It important to point out that the #1 ranking in Google gets 36.4% of the clicks on the first page so your goal should always be to achieve that position. If you don’t have a website today, get one now – waiting will only make things worse for you.
2. Design your website to appear more professional than your competition. Studies have shown that most people will make a decision on the quality of a website within less than a second. In short, you have a very short window to impress your referral clients online BEFORE they decide to let your competition do the same. If you know who are commonly provided as other attorney referrals along with you, take a look at their websites and see how you stack up. If you are unclear of your competition, simply ask your referral clients on a regular basis and take note of who else is commonly mentioned to them.
3. Utilize social media with an active content strategy. Since most attorneys get business from client referrals, what are you doing to actively keep you in their minds? Marketing experts agree that you need to be in front of people 7-12 times a year for them to actively remember you WHEN THEY NEED YOU. One of the best ways to do this is to create an active content strategy so they will see you on a consistent basis when they are on Facebook, LinkedIn and/or Twitter.
4. Claim and optimize your Google Places Listing. If you have no idea what I just said, then once again you should rely on a legal marketing expert to help you at this point. This is critically important when people do searches for you by name and also include where you are located in the same search. Google will make this connection and in many cases, will propel their Google Places listings at or near the top on the results. Once claimed and optimized, these must then be monitored, controlled, and improved upon by encourage customer testimonials and removing or displacing any negative comments as well.
5. Monitor and edit third party sources involving your name. In addition to your website, you will still have other web pages displayed for searches involving your name. There are three things you can do to best manage these third party sources:

• Try to edit any third party attorney profiles that appear on the first page of Google. Some of these like AVVO will allow you to claim and edit for free while other sources such as Martindale may require a fee to claim and modify these listings and/or to make them more comprehensive and complete.
• Promote positive third party search results to higher positions on the first page of Google. Do any of the search results involve newspaper and/or TV articles about major case wins? How about positive press about an award you may have received or something else that positively reflects on you? Through the use of targeted inbound link building, you can actually help promote and improve these search results by creating targeted citations from other web properties.
• Remove and/or diminish any negative results or articles dealing with you. If somebody has said something negative about you in a blog, in a news article and/or other content sources, you may have little recourse to have it removed if any of that information may be factually correct. If you cannot have them removed, you next best option is to simply diminish their visibility by promoting other positive web sources to appear above them. In short, you can push down bad results by promoting positive results above them. Again, this involves targeted link building strategies which a good legal SEO consultant can help you with.

If you would like to learn more about how you can improve your marketing online to better promote attorney referrals and conversions, please contact the SEO Consultant Firm today to see how we can help you better grow and promote your practice online. www.SEOConsultantFirm.com. Free CLE New York