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Focus on Your Intake and Conversion!

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For lawyers, the great thing about legal marketing is you can hire an expert to handle it for you. A team of professionals can give your firm’s branding and advertising the strategy, time, and attention it needs to generate results.

But there’s one thing your marketing team can’t quite do for you: turn those calls into cases.

In fact, legal marketing is mostly about attracting potential clients to your firm. We call it lead generation, and – with how competitive the legal marketing landscape is – that’s usually the hardest part.

So, why do so many of these leads get lost in the shuffle?

Sadly, the answer boils down to procedure. Law firms are so focused on the law part of their practice; they tend to neglect the central gear that keeps the whole business in motion: client intake and conversion.

Last month, we identified lacking intake procedures as one of the four most common mistakes in legal marketing. Today, we will take a closer look at how and why this happens… and what you can do to solve the problem in your firm.

You Need Well-Trained, Highly-Dedicated Intake Staff

So much of the breakdown in the intake process comes down to basic training issues.

Unless your practice is very new or very small, your lawyers probably don’t answer the phone themselves. Most mid-to-large-size law firms have a support staff responsible for screening calls, fielding online inquiries that come in through the website, and getting prospective clients set up for a consultation.

It’s easy to think of that as “administrative work” — the kind of task you’d find in any professional assistant’s job description. You might assume, then, that no training is required for anyone who has worked as a paralegal or legal assistant of any kind before.

But intake and conversion are sales and marketing disciplines, not administrative tasks.

Your firm needs to make expert intake a core part of training for every member of the law firm staff who might be involved in answering calls, arranging consultations, or following up on prospects.

We recommend recording all intake calls and listening back to analyze the conversation. How could you improve? At what point during those calls do you seem to “make the sale” or lose the lead?

Never Fail to Follow Up

If a prospective client calls you but doesn’t convert in that first call (or gets put on hold indefinitely), there’s a good chance they’ll never call again.

Are your intake professionals following up on leads? How often do they call back? Are they creating a dialogue?

Consider this statistic: only 10% of sales people make more than three contacts, but 80% of sales are made between the fifth and twelfth contacts.

Intake? There’s an App for That.

When it comes to intake and conversion, technology is your friend.

Software exists that will track each incoming lead, how they found the firm, how many times you’ve made contact (when and through which method), and how much time has passed since first/most recent contact.

With the right analytics tools in place, you can also monitor the cost per lead. After all, lead generation isn’t free, so you want to keep an eye on those costs and make sure you’re doing all you can to capitalize on each prospect.

Speaking of technology, we strongly urge law firms to install a text-to-contact feature on their websites (especially the mobile versions of sites). Research shows that Millennials, as well as the Hispanic population, prefer to communicate by text — especially in the early stages, when they aren’t yet sold on hiring you.

A Little More Conversion Goes a Long, Long Way

We aren’t even necessarily talking about huge gains in your conversion rate here. But even small gains in the rate can mean substantial gains in profit.

For example, if your average net fee is $10,000, converting just ten new cases a year translates to an additional $100,000 for the firm. Furthermore, 100 cases = $1 million! And that’s all without spending one extra dime on your marketing efforts, but making simple and efficient improvements to your existing intake process.

In fact, a few years ago, we put together a hypothetical scenario in which a law firm increased its conversions by just 2%, and then we did the math. Check out the astounding difference a tiny uptick can make.

Stop Letting Hard-Earned Leads Go to Waste! Talk to Our Experts Today.

At Network Affiliates, we specialize in evolving law firms’ marketing efforts so that they actually land bigger and better cases. Contact our legal marketing experts and simply ask how you can improve lead generation, intake, and client conversion. We have a lot of ideas, and we’re happy to chat. Just call 877.709.0633 or contact us online.

How Giving Back Benefits The Community and Your Business

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Plugging into your community and giving back can yield real, demonstrable business growth — the kind that puts you ahead of your competitors. And it’s something you can do without huge monetary investments.

In fact, it is the honest conviction with which you take part and give back — not how many dollars you donate — that makes the difference here.

Today, we look at how a humanized brand cuts through the law firm mold and speaks directly to the potential client trying to choose between your firm and another.

Lawyers Have an Image Problem. Community Involvement Can Fix That.

Nobody loves a lawyer until they need one. You’ve heard that before.

The stigma isn’t your fault. You inherited it from generations long ago. Nevertheless, people expect you to counter it. In other words, to overcome inherent skepticism and distrust among your prospective clients, you need to proactively demonstrate that you and your firm aren’t like “all the rest.”

Getting involved in your community is one of the best ways you can do that. But here’s the thing: your community engagement must be authentic.

The goal is for people to see that your community activity comes from the heart. The best way for them to see that? Do things that actually come from your heart!

Talk with the partners and leaders in your firm and ask yourselves: what does our local community really need, what matters to us, what’s an area we would really feel passionate about being a part of?

This Matters a Lot to Millennials

Millennials show a strong preference for companies and service providers that model Community Social Responsibility (CSR). CSR refers to all the ways your business participates in initiatives that benefit society.

They aren’t just paying lip service to the idea, either. Studies show that Millennials put their money where their mouths are, supporting businesses that seem to have a conscience and a heart.

As we illustrated last month, Millennials are becoming the single most powerful part of the population. Their preferences matter a lot, and they prefer businesses that truly seem to care.

Additional Benefits of CSR

Making your law firm a responsible and active steward of its community has other benefits too, including:

  • Setting you apart from other firms (the legal services market has been one of the slowest to adopt CSR, so you have an opportunity to stand out!)
  • Top-of-mind awareness for your lawyers
  • Many employees (especially Millennials and those with many employment options) prefer to work for firms that take care of their community
  • Tax write-offs
  • Each time you get involved with another organization, they’re likely to link to your website on theirs (this is great for SEO)
  • Picking up mentions in local news (or even national headlines)
  • A greater sense of purpose and satisfaction for the attorneys working in the firm
  • Lawyers often struggle with what to tweet about, but community activity is great fodder for social media!
  • When you work with outside organizations, those people are more likely to refer others to your firm

How Your Law Firm Can Implement Corporate Social Responsibility

There are many ways to integrate your law firm within your community and model authenticity. A few ideas might include:

  • Volunteering with local organizations
  • Weighing in on issues of local importance in editorials
  • Providing pro bono services for people in need
  • Emphasizing work-life balance in your employment policies
  • Making charitable donations (but don’t think that writing a few checks every year will impress anyone on its own!)
  • Blogging about your activities and writing from the heart about why they matter to you
  • Simply being present at community functions

Often, the best ideas for community involvement will spring organically from the people and problems in your city, county, or state. Take the time to schedule a meeting with your staff and brainstorm creative ways to get involved.

In all these things, remember that authenticity is key.

Let Network Affiliates Help You Humanize Your Law Firm’s Brand

A lot of this is human nature. People naturally respond to honesty, compassion, and commitment. The more your firm looks and behaves like a caring person rather than a profit-driven organization, the more the public will be naturally drawn to your brand.

Network Affiliates is a team of legal marketing experts with more than 35 years of expertise in law firm branding. Let us help you humanize your brand in a way that pays off. To learn more, call 877.709.0633 or simply contact us online.

Knowing What Not To Do Can Boost Your ROI

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Doing something is better than doing nothing. But doing the right thing is even better.

In our 35+ years as a legal advertising agency, we’ve seen many law firms miss opportunities that could bring in more leads, better cases and a lot of money.

Among those who do manage to make an effort, if the wrong strategy is fueling the execution, results can be underwhelming.

Today, we look at four common legal marketing mistakes. Take a good look – are any of them happening at your firm? Continue reading “Knowing What Not To Do Can Boost Your ROI”

Yesterday’s Kids Are Today’s New Clients

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In life, things are always changing; always moving forward. The young grow old, employees become bosses, attorneys become judges, and so on.

In the latter half of this decade, we’ve seen the legal market become increasingly dependent on a demographic that no one ever bothered to take very seriously: millennials.

If your law firm isn’t taking millennials seriously, it’s time for that to change. They’re older, wiser and wealthier than you may think. They’re living life on their own and, just like anyone else, they’re vulnerable to accidents, injuries, and violations of their rights.

According to some estimates, there are more than 80 million millennials in this country, and every single one of them (at least within your market) is a potential client.

Did you know the youngest millennial in the United States, even when using the widest definition of that term, is currently age 20 as of 2017? And the oldest is approaching 40!

In other words, these are the new adults. The future success of almost any business depends on recognizing that fact.

What do we mean by “taking millennials seriously”? You need to be strategically and aggressively marketing your law firm to them.

Why? Like any generation, millennials think and act differently than the generations before them. As decision makers for their own burgeoning households, they are influenced by factors different than those of their parents or grandparents.

Moreover, millennials have a heightened awareness of themselves as a demographic. Having been the subject of countless headlines, studies, jokes, and op/eds (for instance, a recent opinion piece in a national paper unfairly decried millennials’ love for avocado toast as a character flaw and sparked a social media firestorm), they are the most branded generation in history.

Speaking their language and responding to their unique concerns is the key to making sure they ultimately hire your law firm instead of your competitors’. And make no mistake… millennials have plenty of great cases to bring your way. They have insurance policies, they’re in auto accidents, they’re starting businesses, they fall victim to medical malpractice. Many are even parents!

Earlier this month, in Part 1 of this article, we explained why millennials make good hires for law firms and how you can recruit the best young people to yours. Today, in Part 2, we look at millennials as clients and explain why they matter so much… and how you can market your law firm to this generation.

The Unique Challenges of Marketing to Millennials

In a sense, everything you know about advertising changes when millennials become your target. That’s true whether you’re looking at television commercials, inbound marketing on your website, or traditional outbound print ads.

Among those challenges are these fascinating traits of the Millennial:

  • They are deeply skeptical of traditional advertising messages or anything that seems like it’s trying to sell them something. They grew up in the world of big media. They know all the tricks.
  • They are even more deeply skeptical of self-serving professionals. Decades of terrible law firm TV commercials did the industry zero favors among millennials.
  • They drive less. millennials tend to live in urban areas and utilize pedestrian options, ridesharing (e.g. Uber), or public transit more than private cars. They also tend to make more “green living” decisions than previous generations.
  • Many of them work from home or in non-traditional career settings.
  • They are more diverse than previous generations. Advertising in Spanish, for example, is more important than ever.
  • They care about community responsibility, and they expect businesses to do their part.
  • They know the internet better than you do and will do their research via web, review and social sites before contacting you.

Millennials Love Media

The picture we just painted is a generation weary of traditional media. To some extent, that’s true. But make no mistake: millennials love media.

In fact, according to Nielsen’s Q1 2016 Total Audience Report, “U.S. adults spent 10 hours, 39 minutes a day consuming media in the first quarter of 2016. That’s up a full hour from the first quarter of 2015, and it’s thanks to a substantial increase in smartphone and tablet usage.”

10 HOURS AND 39 MINUTES PER DAY! That is a staggering statistic and it’s crucial to understand what that means.

Millennials are more reachable than any other segment of the population, but they must be reached differently than their predecessors.

How to Market Your Law Firm to Millennials

We could write a whole book on this topic. In fact, we’ve already published a white paper on marketing law firms to millennials and another that looks specifically at marketing to Hispanic millennials.

In general, good pointers include:

  • Create digital content. Infographics, for instance, are “millennial-friendly” because they’re easy to understand, quick to read and turn up in Google Image searches.
  • Craft your attorney TV campaigns so that they play well on YouTube too.
  • Embrace the internet whole-heartedly. You must have a digital strategy, and it must complement your broadcast strategy.
  • Understand that, for millennials, everything ends on the internet. That means (A) they’ll probably find you through a Google search… but only if your SEO and PPC are on point, and (B) even if they find you through a TV ad, they’ll probably visit your website first… and then decide whether to hire you.
  • Consider advertising in unconventional places, like blogs popular with millennials in your community. Advertising on popular podcasts can be a good idea too.
  • Quality content is king. Focus on useable, easily digestible information that is valuable to your target audience.
  • Be active and “super present” on social media. To millennials, your social media activity is your pulse. Can they tell you’re alive?
  • Give back to your community in visible and authentic ways.
  • Avoid “salesy” messaging.

Ask Our Experts About Marketing Your Legal Services to Millennials

Network Affiliates is a team of legal marketing experts with more than 35 years of expertise in the field. We work hard to keep our clients ahead of the competition and the curve, and so we focus only on marketing efforts that can directly boost a law firm’s bottom line.

Increasingly, we find that marketing to millennials is a major key to getting new clients and bigger, better cases. This is a topic for which we’ve invested a lot of time and research toward developing an expertise — and our clients’ results are speaking for themselves.

To learn more about how your firm can target its advertising and messaging to Generation Y, give us a call at 888-461-1016 or simply contact us online.

Change Your Thoughts About Hiring Millennials – Part 1

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Millennials have been the butt of jokes for at least ten years now. A funny thing happened in that same period though. The millennials grew up!

That presents a problem for people in the business world, including attorneys. Those “lazy young millennials” we’ve all been joking about? They’re your new customers. Your new clients. Your new colleagues. Your new hiring pool.

And they aren’t going anywhere. On the contrary, they outnumber their elder generations, and they’ve gone from punchline to major economic force in the blink of an eye.

So perhaps the time has to come to reconsider our perceptions of millennials and our willingness to take them seriously.

Today, we present the first in a two-part series that considers the role millennials play in the legal market — both as new hires (in this, Part 1) and as high-value clients (later this month, in part 2).

As it turns out, they might be the single best opportunity your competitors aren’t exploring or targeting.

Who Are the Millennials in 2017-2018?

Conjure up an image of a millennial in your mind. Who do you see? A college student posing for a selfie while driving 90 miles per hour to the nearest Starbucks for an all-day latte binge?

That’s the stereotype, but the real millennials — the ones who can help make you money— look more like this:

  • Ages 20 to 36 (born between 1981 and 1997 (give or take) depending on the definition you use)
  • Homeowners
  • Parents with possibly more children on the way
  • Recipients of advance degrees
  • Project leaders, managers, etc.
  • Community activists
  • Travelers
  • Caretakers for their aging parents
  • The primary decision makers for their households

In other words, just like every generation of young people before them, millennials have matured into full-fledged adults. Many of them are smart, vibrant, hip to the latest trends, and have a lot to offer as members of your firm.

“But why should I invest in a Millennial if they’re inexperienced, or if they’re going to leave us in two years?”

We hear you, but look, there’s nothing unique to millennials about that concern.

You’ll find unmotivated or unqualified people in every generation, and with any new hire, there’s always the risk that they’ll move on to a new opportunity in a short period of time regardless of age.

So don’t miss out on a promising field of applicants — not to mention the largest field of applicants! Instead, trust your hiring instincts and choose the best person for the job, even if they belong to the millennial generation.

How Do You Hire a “Good” Millennial?

We’re going to let you in on a little secret… hiring a good millennial really isn’t any different than hiring any other good employee. You’re still looking for the same skill set, the same personality, and the same strengths of character. And you can absolutely find all those things among millennials.

Of course, you might want to figure out what you mean by “good.” We recommend making a list of the attributes you’d like to find in your next hire. For example:

  • Hard worker
  • Spends time in the office vs. working remotely
  • A great researcher
  • Writing experience
  • Previous law firm experience
  • An established book of business (less common among millennials, but not unheard of)
  • Detail-oriented focus
  • A “Yes man / woman” vs. someone who challenges your firm to do things differently and contributes to its success!

Next, we suggest ranking your list of attributes in order of what matters to you the most. Voila, you have a hiring rubric. And it really doesn’t have to look much different for millennials than for anyone else.

The Benefits of Hiring Millennials for Your Law Firm

Whether you’re looking for a new paralegal, support staff member, or an associate attorney, there are several compelling reasons for considering a millennial’s application.

For starters, as we’ll touch on in Part 2, millennials are going to comprise a larger and larger portion of your client base in the years ahead. Having millennials on staff can help your firm seem diverse, approachable, and “with the times.”

Millennials bring different perspectives and new ideas to the table too. They grew up in the internet era. They are digital natives. They’re tech savvy. The lessons of law school are still fresh on their minds.

The right millennial hire could ultimately become the person who suggests the next game-changing idea for your firm. Never resist innovation or new schools of thought!

Talk to Our Experts for Tips on Becoming a Millennial-Friendly Law Firm

The bottom line is that millennials are here, and they’re old enough and populous enough now that your business can’t afford to ignore them.

The majority of the work force is not going to adapt to you. So you should start thinking of ways to adapt to them. That might mean a modest evolution for your law firm, a change in the way you think about this once-maligned generation, and maybe even new employment incentives to ensure you recruit the best of the best from their age group. After all, plenty of other organizations (including law firms) are already embracing them.

Later this month, we’ll look at why millennials are an imperative but oft-overlooked client demographic for attorneys (especially in the personal injury market). This is something we talk to our clients about all the time.

Network Affiliates is a leading legal marketing agency with more than 35 years of expertise in our field. Part of our job is to identify trends and help our clients respond to them creatively and proactively.

Undoubtedly, the emerging millennial market is one of the most pressing trends in the legal sector right now, and there’s so much you can do — from your hiring to your messaging to your client intake procedures — to make sure you capitalize on this ripe opportunity.

To learn more potential tactics and tips for becoming a millennial-friendly law firm, give us a call at 877.709.0633 or simply fill out our easy online contact form today.

How to Handle the Big Threat to Local Law Firms

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It’s the fear of every mom-and-pop shop, small business, and boutique law firm: a major player with national name recognition enters your area and begins offering exactly the same thing your business does, investing more money and resources in advertising than you could ever dream of.

Sound familiar?

In fact, earlier this year, we identified national power players entering your market as one of the biggest challenges in the legal advertising space in 2017 and beyond.

Multistate practice is a hot trend in the Big Law world, and these firms are able to pour much more into advertising than their local competitors.

The internet has become something of a national power player itself, too. From LegalZoom to new services like Dentons’ Nextlaw Global Referral Network, it’s becoming more challenging to stake your claim as “the local lawyer.”

So what do you do if a national power player enters your market and you can’t match their marketing budget? For some of you, that’s a terrifying hypothetical. For others, it’s already reality. But either way, it’s important to realize that not all hope is lost.

In fact, there’s a lot you can to do to effectively market yourself regardless of how big the competition’s budgets are, and it all comes down to messaging and strategy. Below, we present the first prongs in a strategic playbook.

Big Bucks vs. Brain Power: How to Play It Smart When Your Competitor Has Cash to Burn

When you can’t outspend, outsmart!

Big national law firms aren’t inherently better, smarter, or more marketing-minded than yours. In fact, in today’s age, when affordable media production is more accessible than ever, you have the power to craft creative messages that will outshine theirs.

Remember: the average personal injury client doesn’t know the first thing about the world of law schools and law firms.

They don’t know which law firms are big or small, new or old, good or bad, or whose J.D. is the most impressive. Nor do they really care. That isn’t their language.

Their language looks more like this: “I’m hurt. I’ve been wronged. My financial situation is a mess. This isn’t right. I can’t afford a lawyer. What am I supposed to do?”

The specifics of their language will depend on which practice area they fall within, but the point is this: the only effective legal advertisements are the ones that directly speak to the client’s needs and concerns. You need to speak to those issues in a way that stands out.

That’s where creative, outside-the-box ads come in.

You don’t need an enormous budget to make a law firm commercial campaign that stands out from the crowd. You need creative vision and a distinctive message.

The most effective, appealing campaign is the one people will respond to, regardless of whether the firm behind it is a small-town boutique firm or a national player.

 

Knowledge (Read: Data) Is Power

There’s no substitute for an in-depth understanding of your market. Fortunately, that’s information you can actually get your hands on.

By referring to a market analysis or media audit for your area, you can identify key areas of opportunity in your market.

Are there dayparts with ideal audiences that your competitors haven’t tapped yet, for example? A practice area no one’s targeting? A rival’s campaign that doesn’t seem to be working?

The more intel you have, the better equipped you are to make strategic, data-driven decisions that can deliver results.

Incidentally, we’re going to take a closer look at market analyses and media audits later this month, so be sure to check back for a deeper dive into how these resources can make a difference for your firm.

Let Us Help You Make Better, Smarter Law Firm Television Commercial Campaigns

If a national firm has dipped its imposing toe in your local market, now is the time to prepare your plan of attack. Don’t sit idle.

With creative advertising that gets to the core of what clients really need, you can run highly effective ads on a targeted budget and remain competitive.

Those are exactly the kinds of ads we help to make. Network Affiliates is a team of legal marketing professionals, and we’ve been creating innovative law firm commercial campaigns since day one (literally — ours were among the very first when the U.S. Supreme Court first allowed them!). We know what works and what doesn’t, and we can put that insight to work for you.

To learn more, call 877.709.0633 or simply fill out our easy online contact form today.

The Indisputable Power of Authentic Testimonials

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The Best Endorsements Come from Those You Have Helped – Your Clients!

A common mistake we see across the legal marketing industry is lawyers who often times highlight the wrong things – degrees, years in practice, millions recovered for clients, etc.

Yes, all of those things are impressive, and there’s definitely a place for them on your website. But if they’re at the core of your messaging and television marketing campaigns, you may be missing the mark.

Why? Because prospective clients primarily care about what you can do for them. And while your accolades and awards may speak to that, they tend to say more about you than what you do for others.

Your law firm’s messaging needs to resonate with victims, with those in pain, fear and in need of your help.

Authentic client testimonials can do as much for your messaging as any powerfully written marketing copy. They also have the added benefit of allowing your prospective clients to see themselves and hear from people you’ve actually helped.

After all, they engage with your creative content (TV, web, outdoor, etc.) and then decide if you are the person who can help them. What better way to answer that question than with real stories told by real people in situations similar to theirs?

The Power of Life Stories

Since the dawn of human communication, storytelling has served as mankind’s tool of choice for making sense of the world around them. Many communications theorists believe there might be something hard-wired in humanity that makes us responsive to story. That would certainly explain the power of literature, song, and film in culture. Even many sacred religious texts impart their lessons by way of narrative device.

Client testimonials are stories. And, they absolutely can strike a similar chord.

That’s because a client testimonial, when done in a tasteful and respective manner, belongs to perhaps the most powerful literary genre: the story of a life changed.

Whether your clients are drivers suffering from catastrophic trucking injuries, parents caring for negligently injured children, patients facing the horrors of medical malpractice (a fear every patient can connect with on some level), or young people who made a mistake and are being excessively charged by aggressive prosecutors, you – the lawyer – are ultimately a character in a story that people find compelling.

Accidents, injuries, and bad decisions change lives. Skilled attorneys come in and fight to change them back for the better.

Victims looking for a hero can find one in your client testimonials.

Avoiding “Testi-Phony-ials”: What We Mean by “Authentic”

Notice that our headline refers to authentic testimonials. In other words, testimonials that are not:

  • Heavily scripted
  • Read off a teleprompter
  • Excessively polished
  • Performed by an actor
  • Inclusive of slogans and “marketing speak”
  • Low-budget or gimmicky

We’ve all seen them. There are plenty of law firm commercials on the air each and every day featuring interviews with “clients” who do not come across as authentic because of aforementioned reasons.

The irony is that many of these testimonials cost more money to produce – yet deliver lesser outcomes. Why pay for an actor or a low-budget melodrama when raw, candid comments from actual clients would yield better results?

Real people connect to real people. So your testimonials should come from real people. Period.

Without compromising confidentiality or violating ethics rules, of course, you want to provide enough detail for the reader or viewer to tap into the emotion of this success story.

The client’s story should always focus on their experience, from beginning to end, and how their life was forever changed by this experience.

 

Honor Your Clients

As a lawyer, you do many things for your clients. You protect their rights against violation. You help them get justice. You help them get ahead.

But there’s also an emotional facet to what you do for them. You give a voice to the voiceless.

In the face of injustice from an insurance company, a major employer, or even the government, what else can “the little guy” do but rely on a lawyer for help.

In that sense, attorneys are a kind of empowerment. Authentic testimonials are a great way of educating people about that.

Honor your clients and what your firm represents. Let them tell others what you did for them. No other message can command such power.

Good or Bad? How to Tell the Difference…

How to distinguish an effective law firm testimonial from a dramatization? Watch them side by side! Check out our reel of the good, the bad, and ugly below:

Talk to Our Legal Marketing Experts About How to Get Better Testimonials

Getting great client testimonials might seem like an easy exercise, but it’s something many law firms struggle with. We can help. Network Affiliates is a team of legal marketing professionals who specialize in creative, out-of-the-box branding and messaging that produces actual, measurable results for your law firm’s bottom line.

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

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.

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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