A Well-Run Law Blog is the Cornerstone of a Law Firm’s Effective Internet Marketing
“My law practice already has a good-looking website, why would I want an attorney BLOG too?
It really doesn’t matter if your law practice focuses on criminal, family law, estate planning, business contract, or tax problems, when you really think about it, your legal practice is ultimately very personal. Even if you were to do a lot of Business-to-Business legal transactional work, you first had a personal phone-to-phone or face-to-face conversation with a real live person. Moreover, many legal matters are somewhat —or downright— embarrassing: criminal (obvious), a divorce (you might judge them), taxes (they screwed up), litigation (they could have seen a lawyer before the business deal went south), etc., etc. Growing a law practice is all about personally connecting with people, creating a degree of trust, and your client’s positive expectation that you (the person) can solve their issue.
Websites are more powerful when new and fresh content is regularly added by its attached BLOG
We design and build some pretty awesome looking legal and business websites. But no matter how awesome our ninja skills, a website is still a “brochure” in that it is passive and static. Pictures of you, your partners, associates and staff are helpful to make a more-human connection. Videos even more so. What is even more powerful, however, is an attorney’s written word on more topical issues in a less formal BLOG venue. An attorney BLOG is dynamic, personal and can even be interactive in that it encourages readers to leave comments, share your article with a friend who might be interested, or even make contact by emailing or calling the attorney. These actions are generated because the attorneys’ writing has hit a critical nerve that resonates with the reader.
Not only will a lawyer’s more casual writings get readers’ attention, a BLOG will grow rankings!
Attorney blogging works very well to increase search engine optimization ranking by increasing website traffic, being rewarded for having constant new and fresh content, and for those high-caliber “white hat” backlinks you will develop every-time you post a blog and then re-publish it to various social media accounts. When your blog is connected with social media, blog services talk directly to prospective clients on new and diverse Internet channels that your website, by itself, could never leverage. Your law blog is the cornerstone of Internet Legal Marketing and the centerpiece of your social media marketing campaign. Blogging is the tried and true method for Law Practices to make measurable progress in their all important Internet marketing.
Blue Diamond Almonds Ad: “A can a week is all we ask.” Google rewards the same consistency
Whether you set aside an hour a week, or assign the task to an associate or hireling, your law site blog is one of the most effective ways for you to grow and maintain an incredibly potent web presence and —at the same time— put your unique legal skills in front of your target clients. If you want to finally realize the power of web marketing, you owe it to your career and practice to give blogging a shot. Remember, however, you need to be committed to both regular and persistent postings. Google web bots crawl our clients’ websites every 7 to 10 days on average. To be consistently rewarded by these critical search engines, it is important that Google (and others) index the fresh, new content by having it posted on a weekly schedule. By doing so, the stiffest of competitors can be toppled: you can ride an incredible wave to prosperity. Unfortunately, there are few law firms that have the time and experience to take full advantage of this powerful venue, and choose to have professionals take over this one specialized marketing channel. If you don’t have the time or cannot commit to regular follow-through, lawSITES.PRO offers law firms a cost-effective blogging service if you choose. Call us.
Attorney Blogs are sometimes referred to as B-LAW-Gs by seasoned web authors
“Seasoned” is the key word in our warning and admonition. Blogging is for those who have the gift of patience. If you grew up eating your vegetables first; if you put off some fun times while buckling down in law school; and IF you understand the incredible value of the end-game, you’ll eventually be rewarded by seeing measurable returns in about one year. From then on, you will begin to bury your competitors if you will remain consistent and persistent. Because posting weekly or bi-monthly articles doesn’t offer immediate financial returns, most law firms simply will not invest time and money. Too bad. Such a short-sighted business decision is foolish, considering the numerous law practices we personally know who are riding a wave of prosperity they never conceived: but for their buckling down and doing some rudimentary marketing tasks.
how close they were to success when they gave up.”
–Thomas A. Edison
Committing to a simple Law Blog – can literally be the difference from sweating getting new clients each year for the next 20 years, or positioning your firm to either raise hourly rates or add new associates to cover ever-increasing clients. When law practices make that small commitment to work a blog and the connecting social media accounts the resulting revenue-generating benefits are immense.
Search your niche on Google. Examine which competitors are doing really well. Social Media will play a role
The week we were composing this page we were doing research for a new criminal law client. Here is one of several law firms we couldn’t help but stumble across BECAUSE they are doing blogging and adding posts to social media sites linking back to their blog. Alcock’s connected LEGAL BLOG is the cornerstone of their campaign which is leveraged by their Facebook and YouTube Channel. We glanced at their Google+ account and it appears to be a little rough around the edges and still under construction. When they start working that, their ranking and web exposure will soar! By the way, our new client is located on the east coast, yet this Phoenix law firm has already leveraged the web for their benefit, growth, and brand: Alcock & Associates P.C.
Attorney B-LAW-Gs are easy, fun and ultimately priceless
The founders of most law firms do not recognize the power and potential of establishing an Attorney Blog marketing strategy. Attorney BLAWGs are easy, fun, and can positively impact your reputation in your local network of colleagues, bar members, law professors, and clients. When you are happy with a particular article and publish it to your BLOG, that same post can be sent automatically to your other social media profiles including Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. For now you will need to invest about 5 additional minutes to re-publish on your Google+ profile, but that will likely be available to be automated toward 2014. Upshot? – For about an hour of your time per week you can be a regular publisher of an effective legal BLOG that will be found by untold potential clients in various searches that will help your law practice website be found by more and more people, building traffic, increasing rankings, and growing your clientele if you will focus your articles for a specific niche or two that you are really good at and is a consistent money-maker for you because you are so comfortable in that niche.
Marketing your law practice by focusing on one or more “legal niches” with your legal BLOG
We hear the same story over and over. It wasn’t planned that way but we stumbled into this really specialized legal niche: “It just happened…” A niche developed. If that’s your experience, embrace it. Shout about it. Rise above the noise and cash in. It may have started with a client that had an “odd case” that was very unique and you eventually prevailed. The niche was so unique that you’ve never know any other lawyer who’d ever really thought about it as a niche or specialty area. Perfect. Go develop that niche. Write about it. Soon, clients will be calling you from out of the blue —several calls a week— for what was once an odd case. A simple Marketing site with a connected blog can paint you as the GO TO person for a stream of clients and a consistent source of revenue.
Some profitable legal Niches that some of our clients have leveraged:
- Toxic Black Mold – We were contacted by an attorney who defends tenants and homeowners against insurance companies for routine 6-figure settlements for toxic mold exposure. 99% success rate. The insurance company settlement checks never bounce.
- Prison Law – We were contacted by a “prison law” lawyer who developed a huge following for representation at disciplinary hearings, representation of prisoners at parole board hearings, appeals against conviction and sentence, and “lifer” reviews.
- Forfeited Bail Refunds – Buff Fund** Niche – We built several websites for an attorney whose had one odd niche specialty which was drafting motions for petitioning the court to return forfeited bail of defendants who would flee to another jurisdiction, state, or country and the bail bonding company can demonstrate that they know exactly where the fugitive is, yet the DA or state refuses to issue a warrant for the fugitive’s arrest outside the jurisdiction, state or country. The bondsman and the Surety are the attorney’s clients. The judge will often order the forfeited bail to be refunded to the surety. When the bail is refunded, the bondsman’s BUFF account (aka: retirement account) is reimbursed for the hit it sustained. These BUFF accounts can grow to millions of dollars.
**Buff Fund – A Bail Bondsman retires by the use of his or her BUFF fund and possibly some cash from the sale of their assets such as: lease, location, furniture & fixtures, location, reputation and “goodwill” that might offer value to a buyer. Throughout the years of writing bail bonds, they will have put a decent amount of money in to what’s called a buff fund. Every bond that is written, has a portion of the fee or premium go into the bondsman’s buff fund. When the bondsman retires, they may pull payments or a lump sum from this buff account. Thus when a high dollar client goes on the run, if they have an attorney prove to the local court that they know exactly where the client is, but the DA or State will not process the paperwork to extradite, the bondsman can effect a refund of the bail to the surety underwriter and the surety company will, in turn, fund the bondsman’s critically important buff account. Who knew? Right… A true niche!
The Lawyer who will write articles on that niche important to him or her will grow their bottom line!
There are many motivations why Lawyers will choose to publish a BLAWG: to build their legal reputation, to demonstrate professional abilities, and to grow their law practice. Growth is accomplished by attracting readers to their articles which, in turn, drives traffic to their website, which results in new clients and cases that are perfectly matched to their skill set. New clients are searching to hire a lawyer that they perceive is a trusted and reliable authority in the very niche of their immediate legal matter. By writing regular articles on an attorney blog, attorneys can establish themselves as the authority for a specialty or proven money-making niche that attracts their perfectly targeted client. BLOG postings are easily found and read by prospective clients who are furiously searching to find them. The only question is… Are you there to be found?
Does publishing a legal BLOG require technical expertise?
No – Not at all… If we add a BLOG to your existing website, or if we are selected to design a new website for your firm, the connected BLOG that comes with any website we build has BLOG software that is simple to master, straight-forward and user-friendly. If you can use the typical Microsoft Office products such as Word, PowerPoint, or Outlook, you will have no problem writing a BLOG posting. Maybe 5 or 10 minutes of coaching on the phone, and following your very first article, you’ll be right a home.
We will have your new Attorney Law BLAWG ”UP and LIVE” within 48 hours. Give us a call.
The crew here at lawSITES.PRO will provide a customized and “branded” blog design that can be matched and connected to your: website, Facebook, Google+, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and other social media heavyweights that you choose. Posting your articles will be no more difficult than crafting a well-written email or client letter. Finally, if you would prefer to outsource your blog writing and publishing, lawSITES.PRO will take on the task on your behalf. We will write niche-focused, engaging content that will get you involved in what is really a business necessity for any law practice that does not want to lie dormant in a dynamic and expectant culture.
or do something worth writing about!”
—Benjamin Franklin
Get Professional Help with your new or existing BLOG. We can set it up or create content and publish for you.
Don’t leave your website design, critical SEO, social media marketing or Legal BLOG in the hands of an amateur. If your law practice wants to leverage your website traffic and increase client conversions by consistent posting well-written articles and then re-publishing those articles to one or more powerful social media sites, you will soon learn how you too can leverage the web to grow your law practice. Posting unique and timely articles consistent with your niche market will drive web traffic to your website and increase your site’s search engine rankings so you can get the clients and cases you deserve.