Like other businesses, law firms focus much of their online advertising efforts on inbound website traffic and bringing in new visitors or leads. Many of these people arrive at your site because they have a genuine interest or need for your service.

But what happens if they visit your site and like what they see, but then they leave — either because they get distracted, need to use their device for another purpose, or begin to research competing law firms?

For a long time, these lost leads represented one of the biggest challenges to law firms fighting to grow their business online. But in recent years, new practices and technologies have made it possible to “re-recruit” these people, recapturing the leads that got away.

In particular, retargeting and remarketing are effective means of reminding people that they found your firm (and encouraging them to return).

But the practice of retargeting for personal injury attorneys comes with special challenges — so much so that some lawyers assume it isn’t possible or worthwhile.

Below, we explain how personal injury retargeting is not only permissible but also effective and extremely valuable for personal injury law firms looking to compete in a crowded web space.

What Is Personal Injury Retargeting?

Retargeting means displaying banners (or other advertising messages) on third-party websites to users who have already shown interest in your product or service.

It’s accomplished through the use of cookies — not the kind that go over so well on Sesame Street, but the very small text files that websites store on user’s computers through internet browsers like Firefox, Safari, and Chrome. These cookies allow websites and browsers to recognize the user and their preferences as they move around the web.

With retargeting, when visitors leave your site and visit another, the ad blocks on that third-party website will look for cookies to decide which ads they should display. Personal injury retargeting allows your firm to appear in those spaces, but only for users who’ve already shown an interest in you.

Because you’re narrowly targeting a relevant demographic already familiar with your brand, retargeting is an especially cost-effective means of online advertising for attorneys.

Using third-party sites and services to advertise your firm directly to the people most likely to hire you? What’s better than that? You can understand, then, retargeting’s appeal to lawyer.

But is it even allowed? Let’s explore.

The Difference Between Retargeting and Remarketing

Before diving in any further, we want to quickly clarify the distinction between retargeting and remarketing. The two terms are often used interchangeably. Technically, though, “remarketing” refers specifically to the use of email to recapture lost customers.

If you’ve ever added an item to your Amazon shopping cart but then closed the window without making a purchase, you probably got an email later that week reminding you your cart isn’t empty. That’s remarketing in a nutshell.

Some companies and even attorney advertising agencies use these terms more loosely, so it’s helpful to make sure you’re always on the same page. In this article, we focus primarily on retargeting.

The Problem with Personal Injury Retargeting and Google

Many companies use Google’s services to carry out their retargeting efforts. But generally speaking, that’s a no-go for attorneys in the PI market. Why?

Google is concerned about exploiting “the difficulties or struggles of users” in “categories related to personal hardships.” Their definition of hardships includes a wide array of injuries and other health conditions, meaning most PI and/or mass tort firms are ineligible.

(Because criminal charges also qualify as “personal hardships,” criminal defense firms can’t retarget through Google either.)

Given that Google is a leading retargeting and remarketing provider, attorneys sometimes assume it’s the only such provider, or at least the only one worth bothering with. That’s a misconception.

Personal Injury Retargeting Is Possible: Effective Avenues Outside Google

While Google’s Display Network is large, there are many other Demand-Side Platforms (DSPs) outside the Google Network that allow advertisers to purchase display inventory as well.

In other words, while Google may not allow PI lawyers to retarget (or even to serve ads of any kind, depending on their area of practice), there are other vendors who will.

At the end of the day, the user doesn’t know which service you used to retarget your ads. In fact, they’re generally unaware that you’re retargeting at all. So whether you go through Google isn’t important (nor is it even an option for PI practices). Rather, what matters is:

• Cost-effectiveness
• Your ability to reach users who showed interest in your firm but didn’t take action the first time
• Compliance with ethics rules and DSP terms of use
• Return on investment (i.e. your ability to grow your firm)
• Outpacing your competitors without blowing your budget

All of these things can be accomplished through digital marketing services whose rules are not as PI-adverse as Google’s.

The Benefits of Personal Injury Retargeting

Retargeting is a great approach for gaining more digital conversions. Not only does it keep you “top of mind” but it also helps to redirect the user back to your website for conversion.

Ultimately, retargeting can be successful in leading users to fill out a contact form or call your firm directly. These are prospective clients who might otherwise contact a competitor because they left your website and then found theirs.

Retargeting is relatively inexpensive, as it is based on the number of website visitors your firm gets each month. The more website sessions you have, the higher the number of people who will be served the retargeted ads.

Let Network Affiliates help you retarget your leads and increase web conversions. Remember: on average, only 3% of users convert their first time on a website! There’s no reason you can’t capture more of the remaining 97% by bringing the back for a second.

(Featured image courtesy of Growthgrind.com)

It’s all fine and dandy to have a PPC ad or other online advertising tactic that’s driving people to your law firm’s landing page. But what if that page isn’t converting at the same rate you are driving people there?

Let’s review the reason a landing page exists anyway: to convert visitors coming from marketing campaigns as quickly as possible. Remember, this is not your law firm’s website, this is an entirely different beast. Continue reading “3 Reasons Your Landing Pages Aren’t Converting”

An in-depth Q & A session with Network Affiliates’ in-house PPC Expert, Buzz Banda

Remember Yellow Pages? Bet you do. It used to be the bible for a lawyers’ print advertising campaign. It was all rather simple back then. Reserve your ad, maybe even maximize a cover or feature spot; hone your listing; and wait for the phone to ring. People were used to looking for services in the phone book—and that’s where your law firm was found. Nice and neat.

Fast forward a decade-plus, and what used to be a go-to resource for attorney advertising is nearly obsolete. So where are people going to find lawyers when they’re in serious and immediate need of representation or want to research their legal options for the future? The answer will come as no surprise: online—where more and more people are going to get answers, get informed and get business done.

What this means is lawyers are required to leverage online marketing strategies or risk losing out on a massive amount of leads. However, digital marketing has become a sophisticated science during the decade that the Yellow Pages died. And that means you will undoubtedly need some help navigating the digital landscape. A PPC advertising expert can teach your law firm how best to make an impact with pay-per-click advertising (PPC), or paid search, which leverages user “clicks” on keywords to garner leads online.

While dedicated PPC campaigns have proven to work very well for attorneys, there are some landmines that you should be aware of if you want to stay alive—and competitive—when marketing online against other law firms. To address these challenges—and solutions—we put Network Affiliates’ resident PPC expert, Buzz Banda through a Q&A session. Check out his helpful insight below.

Q: What are the benefits of PPC for lawyers?

A: While digital marketing is a competitive play for lawyers, the benefits far outweigh the marketing method’s shortcomings. The flexibility and speed of paid search are unmatched in traditional advertising. One major benefit of PPC for law firms is sheer speed to market. In many cases, lawyers can have a campaign up and running within a couple of days. It’s also possible to see the first-page ranking for a majority of your keywords within days after launching a campaign.

There’s also great flexibility in that you can pause an existing PPC campaign while starting a new campaign with the click of a mouse. This is a huge benefit over long-term strategies like simple SEO or trying to rank for keywords. It may take months to obtain first-page ranking on a search engine results page with this tactic alone. Incorporating a paid-search strategy also allows you to track which keywords are being used by your potential clients, which is very helpful for refining your future SEO strategy.

Q: Why are PPC keywords for lawyers so expensive?

A: Keywords and keyword phrases for law firms are some of the most expensive keywords to purchase because a large number of attorneys are competing for a small number of highly valued search terms, such as “car accident attorney.” Because of the high cost of keywords, it’s very important to be able to determine which keywords and phrases produce conversions versus the ones that do not.

Conversion tactics need to be engineered with a reverse strategy. Begin with the landing page. Is your landing page built to optimize conversions? Think about mobile-first strategy, online forms, and call to actions. Then develop your keyword strategy to align with the content on the landing page. Last, if you are optimizing for phone calls, make sure you know which keywords are producing the calls.

This reverse technique allows you to focus your bidding strategies on keywords that are performing. Obtaining high-quality scores for PI attorneys, for example, can be challenging, although this needs to be a main area of focus. Falling short in any of these areas may result in a very expensive endeavor with very little to show in terms of new cases.

Q: What does the removal of right-hand ad placement mean for PPC users?

A: After nearly two years of focus-group testing, Google recently eliminated all ads on the right-hand rail of search-result pages. These right-hand ads consistently showed a lower conversion percentage when compared to those at the top of the page. This decision was also supported by consumer feedback: Users noted that content was much easier to read and understand without intrusion by right-hand ads. Along with this change came the addition of a fourth ad at the top of the page.

The visual adjustment also backed Google’s new mobile-first strategy. When doing a search on a mobile device there are now three ads instead of two at the top of the screen, however, Google is considering adding a fourth to further support and improve the position of paid advertisers. With newly limited space for paid ads, many worry this will increase costs. Google thinks not. The number of people doing searches isn’t decreasing, so the question is do you want to be one of the four ads competing for their business?

Q: But how do PPC ad campaigns make the phone ring?

A: About two years ago Google stopped allowing phone numbers in ads, but you can still add a phone number if it’s set up with a call “extension.” This type of ad also requires a strong call to action. Make sure you use a different number for your call extension than you are using for your landing page. A unique number—or track line—will help you trace the lead back to your PPC campaign. Whenever you get a call from your call extension, you know someone called you before they clicked on your ad. This means you were not “charged” because there wasn’t a click. We see a remarkable 50% of the calls to our legal clients coming from the call-extension tactic.

Q: How can I get a PPC campaign customized to my keywords?

A: Using the correct keywords in your campaign is critical. If you haven’t already identified these keywords, using Google’s Keyword Planner tool can offer many suggestions on the appropriate keywords for your customized PPC campaign. One other strategy for developing a good set of keywords is simply surveying people in your law office. Create a scenario for them: Ask colleagues to imagine that someone they know has just been hurt in an auto accident and needs to find a law firm fast. What would the person type into a search box to find that law firm? Using real people to develop real search phrases will give you an additional list of keywords, many of which we find produce great results.

Q: What’s different about PPC ads viewed on a mobile device?

A: For the first time in 2015, the number of searches on a mobile device exceeded desktop searches. After the first 30 days of your PPC campaign and each month going forward, it is important to know where your searches are coming from—mobile or desktop? You can find this information in Google AdWords. If the majority of search is coming from mobile, you need to optimize your mobile bids and make sure you have created mobile-friendly ads. Mobile ads, especially, need to give people a reason to call. Your mobile bid optimization should be keeping your law firm within the top three positions—or at minimum an average of two.

Need more information about pay-per-click advertising? Call Buzz Banda at (303) 597-9625. Network Affiliates is happy to review your current PPC program for free to see where you stand. You can also contact us here or give us a call at 800-461-1016.

One important key performance indicator (KPI) for the success of any law practice is cost per lead, or CPL. Understanding how much lead generation costs your firm each month can quickly help reign in programs that aren’t delivering strong return on investment and hone your law firm marketing to deliver more clients to your door, without exorbitant costs.

Here are six ways to start improving your CPL today:

1. Keep score. You can’t truly measure CPL unless you have an effective way of tracking specific leads, attaching them to expenditures and keeping a scorecard of what strategies are winning. Any online lead-gen application today comes with built-in analytics. Make sure you’re comparing data across marketing efforts—or find an expert who can help you interpret the numbers.

2. Monitor consistently. Whether you think you’ve already landed on a new-case generation tool that works consistently well or you’re trying an entirely new strategy, monitoring these initiatives are critical. Check in regularly. What’s leading to the most new contacts? Which programs are converting at a higher rate? When are spikes occurring?

3. Maintain brand consistency. That goes for all channels. If you are savvy about law firm digital marketing, you already know that your brand must touch people in a variety of ways—from the Internet, to social spheres, to interpersonal communications. Again, as you experiment with the most effective lead-generation tools, you might think of your legal brand as your “control.” Keep core brand attributes consistent, while tweaking messages for different audiences and platforms under that brand umbrella, so you can measure the value of response.

4. Change one variable at a time. If you are pursuing multiple lead-generation pathways, try not to change too much at once, or your next step won’t be clear. Instead, pick the low-hanging fruit—for example, the most ineffective new-business developer—and start there. Like any experiment, you need to limit variables to effectively draw conclusions.

5. Market to your database. We already know that the best—and most cost-effective—leads come from referrals by clients who already know your attorneys or have expressed satisfaction during or after a legal case. Don’t overlook the potential of your database to tighten up CPL. Not sure if you’re leveraging your catalog of past clients effectively? Ask your advertising agency to walk you through the newest customer relationship marketing platforms.

6. Evaluate new marketing channels. The beauty of law firm marketing these days is it’s driven more than ever by technology. The innate flexibility of tech allows advertising agencies to constantly test new and existing lead-generation applications to help your law practice settle on what works best. We are no longer tied to a few marketing channels, but instead can explore attractive new opportunities as they come online.

If you think leads may be costing you more than they’re worth, give Network Affiliates’ law firm marketing pros a call to investigate your current lead-generation ROI. Call Network Affiliates now at (888) 461-1016!

Pay-per-click, or PPC advertising, is a savvy way to gain some serious traction online.

This highly targeted form of paid search Internet advertising can pinpoint prospective clients to drive targeted traffic directly to your legal site. Attorneys only pay when someone “clicks through.” PPC works as a complement to TV advertising and even as a stand-alone Internet marketing investment for lawyers with smaller or stretched budgets.

There are three key reasons why PPC for lawyers is worth considering:

It’s fast and flexible.

It’s targeted and tangible.

It’s driven by results and ROI.

Let’s dive into these benefits so you can see how pay-per-click really pays off.

It’s fast and flexible.

By fast, we mean if your PPC ad posts today and you could see pay off immediately through increased traffic to your website. With PPC for lawyers, attorneys can competitively bid so more people see their ad near the top of a search-results page. Statistics consistently prove that the higher up ads appear, the better click-through rate (people who see your ad and actually click on it) they earn. As you dial in this scientific method further with your legal marketing partner, the more your ads will appear. Likewise, because of the speed and impermanence of the Web, law firms can change ad text at any time, testing and adjusting around the keywords that are resonating (encouraging click-through) best for different audiences. This flexibility is nearly unmatched in traditional advertising.

It’s targeted and tangible.

As your law firm continues to articulate its ideal client, paid search campaigns can target with remarkable precision this person through keyword development (the words and phrases people type in a search engine when looking for a specific type of attorney, for example) and exclusive PPC landing pages designed to drive people to your firm’s website. To attract the most qualified client, you can hone PPC strategy further by location, time, language, gender and other analytics tied to consumer behavior on the Internet. What’s even better is lawyers can see tangible results straightaway. Through specialized PPC management tools for lawyers, you can now see how people click on your optimized ads, follow through to your website and, ideally, take the next step to convert to a case.

Bonus: PPC ads can also generate calls for free! By placing a phone number in the ad, people are able to call without actually clicking on it. However, make sure to use a unique number – or track line – so you can trace the lead back to your PPC campaign!

It’s all about results and ROI.

Lawyers, not unlike other service professionals, like it when advertising results are directly tied to investment; a measure that’s trickier in traditional advertising. In PPC for attorneys, ad- and traffic-tracking tools like Google Analytics actually measure minute-by-minute what’s working in an online campaign and what’s not. The way to realize true ROI in PPC advertising is to do a quick calculation based on click-through rate and conversion. Good CTR for a PPC ad campaign starts at about 1% and up. A solid conversation rate (website visitors who “convert” by taking action to contact your firm, for example, to request a free consultation) starts closer to 2%. Some quick math using the most conservative rates shows that about 5,000 people need to see your ad to generate a qualified lead.

Ready to learn more about how PPC can work for your law firm? We’re here to answer all your questions about pay-per-click. Just click here or call us today (888) 461-1016.  

Years ago, digital display advertising was about placing ads on websites where we assumed our target audience was spending time online. Generally, this “educated guess” or shotgun like approach would deliver hit or miss results that were difficult to track and hard to prove a positive return on investment.

All of that has changed with the creation of intelligent display advertising technology. This revolution in how online display advertisements are generated, served, and tracked has revived display advertising as a cost efficient form of paid media – especially for law firms looking for a leg up in the highly competitive legal advertising space.

What is ‘intelligent’ display advertising?

Intelligent display advertising is paid media in which a marketing or advertising agency strategically disseminates your advertising message in the digital space. It leverages innovative technology to create the most effective ad—in real-time.

Specialized tools curate dynamic data to combine the right mix of your law firm’s library of core ad components—logo, tagline, visual assets, key calls to action, etc.—to assemble the most relevant ad for where your target audiences land on the Web.

Rather than relying on one static, pre-designed display advertisement for several outlets, intelligent display ads are constructed around algorithms that survey things like past performance of different ads, top-performing traffic sources, website content, language, time of day and geographic location.

All that means is that really “smart” technology can take your online advertising from a nebulous presence on the Web to a more data-driven, precise and flexible campaign.

How does ‘intelligent’ display advertising work?

Today, display advertising is almost entirely data-driven. It’s all about actionable information that makes media buying make sense.

By design, intelligent display advertising tools use live data to create a competitive advantage. So your digital media planner now has access to statistics and analytics on all kinds of information like:

• where other law firms are placing ads—and getting results
• what types of banner advertising (size, design, location) the competition is using
• the length of time these campaigns are running—and on what specific landing pages they’re appearing

Based on this knowledge, your law firm might work with an agency to cleverly “mimic” effective creative elements; conversely, you might want to avoid placements where your ad would appear directly next to the competition. All of this data can be extracted based on specific criteria that your firm and digital media expert deem most worthy.

The second part of intelligent display advertising is tracking your progress:

• looking at where those “smart” ads ultimately end up
• measuring how many people actually saw them
• analyzing what the true conversion rates were

In turn, this data helps your digital media buyer determine the most cost-effective ad buy going forward. Plus, as research and tracking tools continue to evolve, over time it will become easier to prove the return on investment for digital display campaigns.

Ensuring your ads are being served in front of the right person at the right time will go a long ways towards that last point.

Why should my law firm add or shift to intelligent display advertising?

Well, because you still need to be where the modern world—and potential clients—are: online, 24/7. Advertising on the Web, while it may have lost its way for a number of years, is back and more effective than ever. This dynamic medium will let you test new creative and messaging—even course-correct, almost overnight.

Intelligent display advertising must be part of any marketing strategy because no one, and we’d argue especially lawyers, like to gamble when it comes to ad buys. No savvy business would risk money on a best “guesstimate” about where to place online ads over a data-backed, intelligently informed strategy. And no attorney should overlook a technology, now deployable from the agency level, that’s designed to help guarantee better results from a display ad campaign.

Just like our phones have gotten smarter, Internet display advertising is now way more intelligent than we are. That’s a good thing. And, with integrated analytics and evolving algorithms, placing and tracking online ads has gotten more sophisticated over the years.

In many ways, that means the decision to spend money on these highly targeted, real-time ads is simpler than ever.