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How Law Firm’s Can Avoid Google’s Latest Penalty

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Update: Google’s Mobile First Penalty may now roll out sometime in 2018.

Translation

Hi there, I’m Mike Hart and I’m here tokeep you up to date on all things digital marketing.

If you’ve paid attention to digital marketing news, you’ve seen headlines about Google’s updates and new penalties.

In January, Google rolled out a new penalty targeting sites using intrusive pop-ups on their mobile pages. Unlike other changes,  this one didn’t come with a cute name like panda or hummingbird. This one is called the mobile interstitial penalty.

We talked about it on our blog months ago and we put a link in the description below so you can read the post if you want or you can keep watching this video Dealer’s choice, really.

The penalty targets sites with invasive pop-ups. That can mean a pop up that covers the page’s  content, an ad a user has to close before seeing the page or using a layout where an ad pushes content below the fold. Basically, Google doesn’t want anything getting between users and content. 

This penalty hasn’t affected many sites yet, but Google can put more emphasis on it in the future and like other penalties, if this one hits your site your rankings could suffer or your site could be removed from Google search results.

In a post on Google’s webmaster forum John Mueller, a webmaster trends analyst at Google, said this penalty only affects mobile search results. But Google plans on launching their mobile first index sometime this year, which means your site’s mobile version will play a much larger role deciding where your site shows in search results.

This is all well and good but attorneys don’t normally have ads on their web pages, so what does any of this have to do with the law firms web site?

When Google announced this penalty on their blog they listed what would and would not be penalized. A pop-up chat feature wasn’t listed as an exemption from this penalty and if you’re an attorney, you probably have a chat feature on your site to and if you’re an attorney, you probably have a chat feature on your site to capture more leads.

Clearly, you don’t want to remove chats since it could be capturing leads that don’t want to call your firm or fill out a contact form. But at the same time, you don’t want to get hit by this penalty. So what do you do?

Well, the solution is quite simple. Go to your law firms website on a mobile device. If your chat pop-up blocks the content, then you’ll want to change it.

Since chat is a third party product, let your webmaster, ad agency,  or vendor know that you don’t want it to pop up anymore and ask what the alternative options are. That way you can still have chat on your mobile-friendly pages for conversions and avoid the penalty.

And that’s it. That’s all you have to do to avoid Google’s mobile interstitial penalty. Let us know if you have any questions, comments, concerns, or sarcastic remarks and thanks for watching.

Posted in SEO

The Difference Between Google’s Manual, Algorithmic Penalties

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Additional Resources

Here are some additional resources you can visit to learn more about Google’s penalties. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to us.

Google’s Webmaster Guidelines

What not to do, straight from the horse’s mouth. You can find out what Google does and doesn’t like. Mostly, though, it’s telling you what you shouldn’t do.

One important thing they list that we didn’t mention is monitoring your site for hacked content. Like a manual penalty, Google will let you know if they find hacked content on your site.

We’ve discovered a hacked site weeks before Google sent us a notification. If your site is small, use a free website crawling tool like Screaming Frog to find any suspicious pages.

Moz’s Google Algorithm Change History

Moz is one of the leading resources in digital marketing. They’ve been keeping track of Google’s algorithm changes since 2000. This is one of the first places we go when we see any concerning dips in Google Analytics.

A lot of updates are “unnamed” because Google stopped confirming major changes to their algorithm in 2016. Still, this is a good starting place.

The (Almost) Complete Guide To Google Penalties (Manual & Algorithmic)

If you’re unfamiliar with any of Google’s penalties, visit this post. It lists and explains both manual and algorithmic changes. It’s an older post, but does a good job of explaining Panda, Penguin and other penalties. Newer penalties, like Google’s Interstitial Penalty released in January aren’t included.

Video Transcript

You’re looking at the analytics for your website and to your horror, you see that organic traffic from google has severely dropped or stopped completely.

In a panic, you check if your site’s still up, if the analytics tracking code is still installed, or if you’ve accidentally blocked search engines from indexing your site.

Everything checks out but you don’t know what the problem is.

If the stop or drop in traffic was sudden, then congratulations, you may have a penalty to deal with.

There are different penalties that can have negative effects on your site. And all of them are either an algorithmic or manual penalty.

Google uses a mathematical equation called an algorithm to rank websites. This algorithm checks your web pages against more than 200 on and off-page factors. How your pages compare with the competition determines your place in search results.

An algorithmic penalty is when google changes or updates their algorithm. And that change could cause a sudden drop in rankings and website traffic.

If you think an algorithm update caused your site’s drop in performance, check the seo or digital marketing blogs for any info on a new update.

If there was one, look into what the update changed and when it was launched. If the launch date is around the time your traffic and rankings dropped, then that update may be your problem.

It’s also a good idea to track recent changes to your website as the change may have triggered a pre-existing algorithmic penalty.

Since there are multiple algorithmic penalties to deal with, you’ll have to spend time researching the problem and finding the solution.

If you can’t find news about an update or you haven’t made any changes to your site, then you may have been hit by a manual penalty.

Your site get’s a manual penalty when it violates google’s webmaster guidelines. These guidelines cover what is and isn’t acceptable behavior regarding your website.

Basically, google doesn’t want you to use specific strategies to game their algorithm to improve your site’s position in search results.

Unlike an algorithmic penalty, google sends a message to your site’s search console account telling you your site was penalized.

You may need additional tools and more time to fix a manual penalty but that depends on what your site is penalized for.

Keep in mind that the negative effects from a penalty, both manual and algorithmic, can affect your site well after the penalty is removed.

That’s why you, someone on your staff, or your marketing agency should be keep up-to-date on rumored google algorithm updates or periodically audit your site’s on and off-page seo strategy.

And that’s it. Those are the differences between google’s two types of penalties. We’ve put links below if you want more info.
And if you have any questions, comments, concerns or sarcastic remarks, leave a comment or reach out to us on facebook, twitter or our website.

And as always, thanks for watching.

Posted in SEO

Why Law Firms Should Focus On Quality Content

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Video Transcript

Hey there Network family, I am Emily Frickey and here is our digital topic for the week!

Content.

Specifically quality of content vs. quantity of content. The age-old saying still rings true today “quality over quantity.”

Content is still an imperative part of digital marketing strategies. Creating unique, content helps with SEO rankings, user experience and even website conversions.

Because of this, many marketers decided that creating as much content as possible, around a single topic, was the best strategy for ranking number one for key phrases.

However, gone are the days of keyword stuffing, news jacking, and creating dozens of blog posts a week to increase rankings.

Instead, the focus should be on giving users the information they are truly looking for. User experience is always rewarded in the eyes of Google.

Focus on creating great content! Take more time to produce a well-researched piece, than five super quick, short pieces.

While long form content tends to have higher rates of engagement and higher rankings, word count isn’t really a measure for “great content.”

Great content is not bound to a specific word count. Rather, what information do readers want for a specific topic? Is the formatting easy to read regardless of the device they happen to be on? How long do they stay on the page? Do they convert after they are done reading?

Think of your website like a neighborhood. Each piece of content is a specific house in that neighborhood. Well, when you have a dilapidated house in a neighborhood it brings down the overall value of the houses around them and the neighborhood as a whole.

Content is the same. The more pieces of under-performing content on a site, the more that hurts the overall authority and value of your site.

However, if you create great, high performing pieces, you will raise the overall value of the site. In turn, making your site rank higher in search engines.

Again. Everything you do should be with the intent of giving Users the information they are looking for, the way they want to consume it.

Take your great long-format pieces and truncate them into infographics or shorter email blasts. That way, you are disseminating the same content in different mediums for users to decide how they consume.

Whatever you create, make sure it has purpose and is useful to the end user. Always choose quality over quantity. It has the most lasting, and most effective results.

As always, thanks for watching! And if you have any questions about this or marketing in general… Reach out to us here at Network Affiliates!

Posted in SEO

How Net Neutrality Deregulation Could Hurt Law Firms

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Additional Info On Net Neutrality

What is Net Neutrality?

If you’re short on time, the Wikipedia entry touches both the basic and advanced thoughts on the topic. You can read the whole thing or cherry pick the sections for a quicker experience.

 

How Did This Argument Begin?

Another Wikipedia entry, but this is the court case that started this debate. Long story short, Verizon sued the FCC, claiming the FCC didn’t have the justification to regulate ISPs and telecoms under the FCC Open Internet Order 2010. Verizon won the case but opened their industry up to reclassification and additional regulations.

 

The Current FCC’s Position on Deregulation

Reason.com interviewed current FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. In the 30 minute video, Pai explains why he believes the FCC should roll back the Title II regulations.

 

The Argument Against Deregulation

This piece argues against some major talking points used against Title II regulation. The piece also links out to examples of ISPs using secret data caps, throttling traffic, and giving their own services a boost over the competition. They were literally caught doing the things they said they wouldn’t do.

It’s long, but also has abbreviated answers if you’re pressed for time.

 

Major Brands Against Deregulation

Amazon and other tech companies planned a protest in an attempt to save the regulations. Other tech companies involved included Reddit, Kickstarter, Etsy, and Vimeo. Google, Facebook, and Netflix are also supporting the current regulations.

 

The Fight Gets Dirty

The FCC is allowing public comments on their plan on deregulating ISPs. But someone isn’t playing fair.  A bot was found submitting the same anti-net neutrality message using real people’s information.

In retaliation, someone created a service that allows users to find if their name and information has been used by the bot. Then Comcast sent them a C&D.

 

How To Comment On The FCC’s Proposal

This article from Techcrunch.com gives you a step-by-step instructions on how to comment on the FCC’s proposal. There’s also a pre-written message you can use if you’re having difficulty writing your own comment.

 

Tell The FCC What You Think

This is the FCC’s public commenting system. If you want to let the agency know what you think, click the link. To leave a comment, click “+New Filling” or “+Express.”  I’d recommend the Express option since it’s a shorter form. For your comment to be accepted, you have to fill out all fields and all the information you submit will be open to the public.

Video Transcript

We know you’re busy running a business and depending on your responsibilities outside of the office, you might be highly selective about how you spend your free time. Assuming, of course, you actually have free time.

I’m not here to tell you how to spend your down time, but there is one topic we think you should keep an eye on and that’s net neutrality.

Net neutrality has been in the news as of late and here’s why you should be paying attention to it.

Net neutrality is the idea that internet service providers should treat data and traffic on their network the same. Meaning you should be able to visit any site without interference from your internet provider.

It’s a simple idea with a complicated past and uncertain future. But it’s an important topic to be aware of since it affects everyone who uses the internet.

In 2015, the FCC classified internet providers as common carriers under title two of the telecommunications act. This lets the FCC enforce net neutrality making sure companies like Comcast, Verizon and AT&T aren’t blocking sites or throttling traffic on their networks.

But this may not last much longer. On May 18th, the FCC voted to proceed with scaling back their title two classification.

While the final vote is months away, if it’s passed, it could dramatically change how you use the internet in your professional and personal life.

Internet providers could throttle traffic to the sites or services that are direct competitors. Take Netflix and Hulu for example. Both services stream on-demand tv shows and original content.

Now Comcast owns approximately 30 percent of Hulu. Without the current rules, Comcast could throttle the data transfer speed between your computer and Netflix’s servers, making Netflix’s videos virtually unwatchable but you wouldn’t have any problems connecting to Hulu. By throttling traffic to Netflix’s servers, Comcast hopes you would ditch Netflix and sign up for a Hulu account, increasing Comcast’s bottom line.

Throttling isn’t the only thing ISPs could do. They could also block your access to any site on the web. Consider this – without these rules, ISPs could create bundled internet packages that mimic cable packages. They could create a multitude of bundled sites and depending on your subscription level, your access to sites and services could be limited to a pre approved list. a basic internet package might include email and some news sites, a social package could just be a few social networks in addition to email and news, and an entertainment package would add YouTube, Hulu, or Amazon Prime (video). And just like your cable subscription, these bundles would be offered at different rates.

And those bundled internet packages may kill your law firm’s website. If the cable companies or ISPs created these internet bundles, they could charge companies a fee for inclusion, meaning if you don’t pay up, then you won’t get any traffic to your site from their network. On top of your marketing budget, you might have to pay Comcast, AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, t-mobile, Cox Communications, Time Warner, Centurylink or Charter just so people can get to your site.

Of course, this is all hypothetical. At different times, the ISPs have said they wouldn’t do this. But companies like Comcast, Charter, Time Warner and AT&T are annually on lists of the worst companies in America. And while they haven’t created the internet bundles yet, there are news stories online where ISPs have been caught throttling traffic to specific sites. So my question to you is do you trust them enough to take them at their word?

At the end of the day, without net neutrality rules in place, cable companies and ISPs could pick the winners and losers on the internet. A complete 180 from the level playing field it is today.

To be honest, we do have a biased opinion on net neutrality. We are for the current set of regulations because to us, without them there would be nothing to stop Comcast from creating their own marketing department and throttle traffic to our site, damaging our ability to reach new customers, and in worst case scenario, putting us out of business.

But we want you to make your own decision on net neutrality. We’ve compiled a list of articles and videos explaining net neutrality in more detail. We recommend that you read or watch them so you can be more informed on this topic.

And if you’ve already made up your mind about net neutrality, then you should let the FCC know. Currently, they are taking public comments on their site about the proposed deregulation. we’ve put the direct link below so you can share your thoughts with the FCC.

Ive purposefully skipped a lot of information about net neutrality in this video. Including everything about it would make this video longer than it already is. But if you have questions about net neutrality and how its repeal might affect your business, feel free to reach out.

Thanks for watching.

What Law Firms Need To Know About AMP

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Transcript:

Hey there! I’m Emily Frickey and I’m here to keep you up to date on all things digital marketing. We get that you’re busy running a business and practicing law but there are a few topics that we think you should be aware of.

Today we are talking about accelerated mobile pages or AMP. AMP is a project from Google and Twitter that lets publishers make very fast mobile pages by using basic website code.

More than 80 percent of online searches start on a mobile device so your site needs to be fast so users get the content they want as fast as possible. If your site is too slow, that user may go back to the search results and hire one of your competitors.

When you’re searching on a mobile device, you may see a little lightning bolt next to some articles on the results page. That’s Google’s symbol for an AMP enabled page. AMP is especially prevalent with news sources. In fact, more than 70 percent of Google News results are amp listings.
AMP example of Tesla News Stories
Before you install AMP on your website, you have to think about the pros and cons. Like the name implies, AMP lets you serve content to mobile users super fast and can improve your site’s impressions, click-through rate and user experience that, in turn, can improve your site’s SEO.

For AMP to work you have to remove elements like contact forms and rotating images meaning there will be fewer data captures and a very simple design. Enabling AMP on your blog is not an automatic way to get to the first page. Other ranking factors still affect where your site shows up in search.

Your site needs click to calls, contact forms and live chat features to capture leads and monitor your site’s performance. Here’s how you can benefit from AMP without sacrificing conversion tracking. Your site should have responsive design so it looks good on any mobile device. Then you or your digital agency can install AMP on your blog pages. The amp blog post gets the user to your site. Then they click through to a responsive page and either call your office or fill out a form.

This combination is a good mobile-first approach to add to your SEO strategy. If you have any questions, comments or sarcastic remarks feel free to reach out to us.

Posted in SEO

What Is HTTPS And Why Is It Important

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Transcript

Hey there! I’m Emily Frickey and I’m here to keep you up to date on all things digital marketing. We know you’re busy running a business and practicing law so we’ll make this as short as possible.

Today’s topic is HTTP or Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure. So what does that mean? Essentially this means a website is secure meaning all communications between your browser and the website are encrypted.

Google made HTTPS part of their ranking algorithm because they are moving toward a more secure web for users. The goal is to give users the information they want as quick as possible. Ensuring that users can browse the web safely has become a top priority for Google.

So it’s time to take notice and take action. While google says they have no intention of increasing the boost HTTPS sites get in rankings, they are ranking secure sites over those still using HTTP. According to a study done by Doctor Peter Myers at Moz, over 50 percent of first page search results are secured sites.

Your site needs to be secure and the sooner the better. We know digital can be technical and overwhelming, but is extremely important to make the switch. All you have to do is contact your web provider or webmaster and ask them to make the change. And as always if you have any questions please reach out to us here at Network Affiliates.

How To Get More Reviews For Your Law Firm

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Transcript

Hey there! I’m Emily Frickey and I’m here to keep you up to date on all things digital marketing.

Today’s topic is about the importance of online reviews. I’ll be giving you three tips to help your firm get more reviews and three tips on review strategies you need to avoid.

Ready? Let’s get started.

Online reviews are important for not only your online reputation but as a ranking factor as well. Over the last few years, reviews have grown to be one of the top ranking factors in SEO right behind links, a claimed Google My Listing and on-page optimization.

Even outside of the SEO arena, reviews are a powerful tool to convert potential clients. According to Bright Local’s annual local consumer report, more than 84 percent of people trust online reviews as much as a personal recommendation. And 90 percent of people formed an opinion of a business after reading less than 10 reviews.

If a potential client searched for your firm’s online reviews right now what would they think about your business? Think of it as word-of-mouth marketing.

How To Get Reviews

Here are a few tips to get you meaningful reviews for your firm.

You will never get a good review if you don’t ask. So when you have a happy client ask them to leave a nice review for your firm. Train your intake staff to follow up and ask for a review. Consider following up with an email through your CRM platform.

Most clients will pick their favorite place to leave a review, but if you can ask them to leave one on Google, Avvo or Facebook. Google rewards good reviews and it can help your SEO strategy. AVVO is an industry-specific review site that also ranks well in search engines. And Facebook has the largest active user base out of any other social platform and is often a top traffic referral source to your law firm’s website.

After getting a review make sure someone is going to respond to them. This is a powerful way to show potential clients that you care and how great your customer service is.

How Not To Get Reviews

Here are a few tips on what to avoid.

Avoid using a review station at your office.  Sites see the reviews coming from the same computer and could decide that the reviews are fake.

Paying a third-party to post reviews as customers or setting up customer profiles to aggregate reviews. Getting too many reviews all at once. This could trip filters that review sites have set in place, which could cause the reviews to be deleted.

Law firms can’t afford to ignore online reviews. They are part of your SEO strategy and they’re are how potential clients are deciding who to hire.

If your law firm needs help with online review strategies, or any other marketing needs, please reach out to Network Affiliates. We are committed to providing quality legal messaging that speaks to the integrity of your attorneys, the greed of the insurance companies, and the hope of victims everywhere.

How to Target Demographics and Get New Eyes on Your Advertisements

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Ask any marketer for their best piece of advice, and they’ll probably say, “Know your audience.”

It’s an old pearl of wisdom relayed and repeated nearly to the point of cliché, but banal as it might seem, it’s still sage advice.

Mark Zuckerberg has a few billion dollars to attest to the value of audience information. Advertisers pay Facebook big bucks to better understand the lifestyles, backgrounds, and behaviors of their prospective customers. They do that because the information is both beneficial and hard to come by.

Sure enough, if you’re managing a law firm, you might wonder how to get your hands on that kind of information within your own market.

Most law firms market themselves at the local or state level, so it’s easy for attorneys to picture their advertising audience as “everyone in my state” or “all my neighbors” — and then pitch a one-size-fits-all message to the masses, hoping it’ll stick.

If it were that easy, though, your incoming leads would look just like the community as a whole. That probably isn’t the case. Responses to broad messaging are almost never perfect cross-sections of a broad audience.

So how can you figure out who is currently seeing your ads, who is actually responding to them, and (perhaps most importantly) who you aren’t currently connecting with?

In this article, we explain how to create a target audience profile, how to break that profile down into individual personas, and how to ultimately use those profiles and personas to get more business for your law firm.

Using Google Analytics: It’s Only the First Step in Target Audience Analysis

Google Analytics is one of the best free web analysis tools on the internet, and it’s a great way to get a preliminary perception of exactly who your audience members are.

The Google Analytics software will help you identify the keyword searches that bring people into your website, track your traffic rates, and determine which content items perform most strongly (among other things).

You can even get some preliminary demographic information that will help you see your audience as actual people — real injury victims or grieving family members — instead of as raw data.

That’s what we call a target audience profile. It’s more specific than “every TV viewer in Colorado,” for instance, and specificity is a good thing. But you can press even deeper than that with a “next-level” audience analysis strategy we call persona identification.

How to Identify the Different Personas Who Make Up Your Target Audience

While target audiences may share certain common traits, they are not homogeneous. Your audience is comprised of many different people — individuals and families of different ages, genders, backgrounds, socioeconomic status, and religious faiths.

They live in different parts of town and all throughout the state. Some of them are super tech-savvy; others are not. They might prefer mobile devices or desktops… Chrome or Safari… Mac or PC. And they come to you with different needs (car crash victim, wrongful death relative, nursing home resident, medical patient, mass-tort consumer, etc.)

All of these things matter.

By using this information, much of which is already at your fingertips, you can create fine-tuned client personas — detailed descriptions of the types of people who ultimately convert into cases.

In building a persona, what you’re really looking for is: who responds to what, and how?

For example, in addition to the basic target demographics, a persona must answer these types of questions:

  1. Do these kinds of people ultimately become clients?
  2. If so, what’s the last thing they saw or did before “pulling the trigger?”
  3. What kinds of cases do these people usually have?
  4. Do they generally have a good understanding of their legal rights, or are they looking for answers?
  5. On an emotional level, what are they really looking for?
  6. Do they come to you from television or the web?
  7. What kinds of technology do they use, and how do they use it?
  8. Did they consider (or interact with) other brands or firms before yours?
  9. What causes them to hesitate before signing with your firm? (Money, time, confidentiality, communication concerns, distance etc.?)
  10. Are these kinds of people ultimately good for your business? Do you want more or fewer cases like theirs?

Through this process, what you’re ultimately doing is layering your audience. It isn’t an exercise for its own sake. The whole point is to grow your practice. Bigger and better cases — that’s what it’s all about.

How Target Audiences and Personas Help Your Bottom Line

Attorneys are exceptionally bright people, but they cannot predict the future. None of us can. It is possible to predict behavior, though. And that power is really at the heart of our profiles-and-personas practice.

By studying your audience, your firm will come to understand who responds to its current marketing efforts, how they respond, why they respond, and whether you want those same personas to respond again in the future.

The answers to those questions then inform your next steps in TV and digital advertising.

Talk to Network Affiliates About Your Law Firm’s Target Audience Profile

Legal marketing is truly a strategy, and strategies benefit from research and insight.

But gaining insight doesn’t have to be a dizzying or time-consuming ordeal. The expert legal marketers at Network Affiliates are ready to help you size up your target audiences and put that data to work right away.

Give us a call today. Dial 877.709.0633 or simply use oureasy online contact form. We’re here to help you grow.

There Is More to Lead Tracking for Law Firms Than Meets the Eye

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There are many ways to market a law firm, and the best approach combines more than one. Whatever channels you use, it is imperative that you track the leads coming in through each.

Lead tracking is the science of determining how your potential clients find you — and how many people each advertising method is sending your way.

Furthermore, attribution is then assigning credit to marketing touchpoints that a customer was exposed to prior to their purchase or conversion.

Need help understanding other marketing definitions? Download our digital marketing glossary here.

By comparing leads from television to, say, leads from your website, you can begin to get a sense of what’s working and what’s not. But caution! Things aren’t always what they seem.

The tricky thing about lead tracking and attribution for law firms is that your clients don’t always travel a straight path to your front door. Personal injury clients, for instance, are likely to hop around from one source to the next before landing in a case file on your desk. We call that path The Client Journey, and it’s typically a circuitous one.

But with all that hopping around, how are you supposed to measure your success in advertising? Where are your calls and cases really coming from?

Extreme Vetting: The Attorney-Prospective Client Relationship

We encourage all of our clients to assign a unique track line to every advertising asset. When an injured person views your TV ad, for instance, they should see a different phone number than the one they find on your website.

That way, whenever a particular phone line rings, you know exactly how the person got that number — in theory.

There’s just one problem with that theory, though: the modern customer journey is not linear. Everything leads to the internet.

Customers tend to vet service providers extensively before making first contact — especially when it comes to legal service providers (and personal injury lawyers in particular).

Your prospective clients simply have so many options available to them that it wouldn’t make sense to contact you without doing their due diligence first. After all, they can access tremendous amounts of information about local attorneys in a mere moment on Google, and they’re well aware of that power.

Accordingly, even if a client first learns about you from a highway billboard or a local broadcast commercial, they’ll likely visit your website as a next step. Then, when they finally contact you, they’ll either use the online form or the phone number on your website.

We often hear from law firms who are dismayed that their TV track lines are showing relatively few contacts. But the truth is that many of your online track lines actually belong to television or other advertising assets, because that’s where they first discovered you.

The Big Picture Is Made Up of More Than One Kind of Screen

Since many of your leads are coming to you as a result of multiple advertising assets, it’s critical that they all complement each other, working together as a cohesive whole — a complete user experience.

Everything needs to be stable, ready, and working well for the ease of the users (who in this case are usually accident victims or the family members of accident victims).

For example, if a car accident victim – or one of their relatives – sees your commercial on TV while in the hospital room and then visits your website on their mobile phone while still in the hospital bed; your site must be mobile-responsive, fast-loading, and informative.

They’re coming to you for help, so your website should be ready to educate, inform, and lead them to the next step on their journey: making contact.

Law Firm Synergy and The Client Journey

Think of your prospective clients as digitally empowered people. Thirty years ago, they would have picked up a landline phone with a long, curly cord and dialed a 1-800 number they found in one of two places: the phone book or on the commercial they caught (in real time).

Today, there’s no counting all the ways they might have found you, nor all the information they might have gathered about you along the way.

Take a look at this video which aptly demonstrates just how unpredictable and nonlinear the modern Client Journey can be.

https://digourideas.wistia.com/medias/ngl9u2n94x?embedType=async&videoFoam=true&videoWidth=640

In a world where accidents can happen at any moment, and the victims might look literally anywhere for an attorney to help them, your law firm’s challenge is to be anywhere and everywhere.

So just as a multimedia company like Disney or Universal might look to promote itself across film and television and theme parks and the internet all at once, you should adopt a similarly synergetic view of your legal marketing initiatives.

Be sure that wherever a client’s journey starts, you’re part of the path.

Talk to Network Affiliates About Lead Tracking and Call Tracking for Law Firms

Raw data is less important than how you read that data and what you decide to do with it. Don’t make faulty assumptions about your legal marketing assets because you’re misconstruing your call tracking or lead tracking metrics.

Reach out to our team at Network Affiliates and learn how your law firm can take full advantage of the modern Client Journey.

Call us at 877.709.0633 or simply use our easy online contact form today.

Why Intake Needs to be a Priority in Your Firm

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What’s the goal of a legal advertising campaign?

“To reach a lot of people,” you might answer… or maybe “to get more business!” But those goals aren’t the same, and it’s all too easy to confuse the two — especially where television and online marketing are concerned.

Advertising is playing an increasingly important role in the legal services market, with surveys showing that law firms across the country are buying larger shares of media (and spending more on marketing in general) than ever before – more than $1 Billion in 2016 alone.

In fact, in terms of dollars spent on television advertising each year, the legal services sector has grown faster than any other industry.

“Dollars spent” doesn’t always translate to “dollars returned,” though. Too many law firms are expending large amounts of money on attorney TV ads that don’t deliver sufficient ROI.

There are two key reasons for that. The first and biggest problem is that the messaging in these ads frequently fails to resonate with viewers. We’ve recently written about how to connect with personal injury clients, for example. The right approach can make a world of difference in terms of results.

The other major problem is more internal in nature: when individuals actually do respond to the ad, law firms don’t always take the right steps to convert them into clients.

This latter dilemma is a real challenge for busy people who are pros when it comes to complex legal questions but who might struggle to make their marketing work. Below, we look at practical ways to bridge the disconnect between running attorney TV ads and actually generating new cases.

The Difference Between Leads and Intake

The first step is to understand the distinction between leads and intake.

“Leads” refer to the people who take some action in response to your marketing efforts. They see your ad on television and then call your office, for instance. Or maybe they find your website on Google and then ask a question in the chat box.

Leads are great. They are an early goal of any marketing campaign. The more of them you attract, the better. But they aren’t clients — yet.

“Intake,” meanwhile, refers to the process of converting these inbound leads to clients.

We find that law firms are often very excited about their marketing efforts at first, and with the right strategy in place, they successfully attract new leads. But what’s lacking is the conversion from lead to client.

Too many law firms fail to convert leads to intake. And without skilled and dedicated intake, these leads ultimately don’t do you much good. ROI is measured in terms of successful intake procedures.

How to Track Your Intake

So how do you improve your intake? The first step is to track it.

To the fullest extent possible, your office should keep a clear record of every single lead.

On the telephone end of the spectrum, when the phone rings, ask your support staff to collect names and contact information, as well as the date and time of each call. This way, you can monitor who has (and just as importantly, who hasn’t) converted into a case.

Online, you and your web marketing team can use analytics tools to monitor how many people are taking action through your website and how many of those people return and/or become clients.

Learn more about using lead tracking to monitor your marketing effectiveness.

7 Simple Ways to Improve Your Intake Game

The more you put into lead conversion, the more you get out of it.

There’s a lot you and your office can to do to get serious about capitalizing on each and every person with a worthwhile case who cares enough to visit or contact your firm.

The following tips are practical, actionable ideas that you can begin implementing today to make a difference:

intake improvement tip 1

  • As we mentioned earlier, immediately get contact information for everyone who contacts your office. This should be the first thing you do because people calling on cell phones often lose service unexpectedly. If the call is disconnected, you can call them back.

intake improvement tip 2

  • Commit to never keeping a caller on hold for more than one minute without someone personally re-acknowledging the call. (The less, the better.)

intake improvement tip 3

  • Be sure that you’re identifying your law firm by name at each point of contact — every email form, every phone call, every ad. Your prospective clients almost always talk to more than one firm before making a decision. Make sure they remember who you are.

intake improvement tip 4

  • If the client comes to you by phone, make sure they also know about your website. Likewise, if they come to you online, make sure your phone number can be easily located. Surveys show that many clients use both forms of contact before making a decision.

intake improvement tip 5

  • Listen in on your support staff’s handling of calls. Monitoring your call intake is an important part of client conversion and retention.

intake improvement tip 6

  • Good old-fashioned politeness goes a long way. We have found that law firms often give off a “we’re too busy” vibe, and that’s enough to send people running to your competitor. Remember: clients don’t see their cases as cases; they see them as emotional needs. At every point of contact, send the right emotional message: you care.

intake improvement tip 7

  • Always follow up. So many leads are left unconverted because the firm never takes the time to reinitiate contact. Don’t leave leads cold. If you don’t go after them, your competitors will.

Click here to for the full version of this intake infographic.

Ask Our Experts About How to Generate More Cases for Your Law Firm

Network Affiliates is a team of legal marketing professionals who emphasize creative approaches to legal advertising, always with an eye toward measurable growth.

Attracting leads and converting them to clients can feel like an overwhelming, full-time job all its own. But it doesn’t have to be. That’s what we’re here for.

Reach out and learn more about how we can help. Call 877.709.0633 or simply use our easy online contact form today.