Video helps erase the intimidation factor that surrounds the process of contacting and hiring an attorney. Video allows prospects to see and hear from you. It makes a connection with your potential clients 24×7 from the comfort and safety of their own home – with no obligations, commitment, or passed judgment. It is an opportunity for prospects to meet you before they ever walk in your office or pick up the phone. It’s warm, personal and more “human” than written words and static images, and done right it can have the same powerful impact as a face to face meeting.

Considering the fact that Google has rapidly expanded their search results beyond just words and text, it becomes obvious why the use of online video as a meaningful marketing tool for attorneys has exploded over just the past few years. Instead of uploading your video to the standard video sites like YouTube, other sites dedicated to the legal profession, like LegalTube.com have emerged as effective marketing resources. In addition, legal directories like Avvo.com and Justia.com have made room to accommodate videos in their attorney profiles.

There is little doubt that video has a place in your law firm’s marketing plan, but what you produce and how you produce it is important. You do not necessarily need to invest $3k – $5k with a production video company to produce good quality and effective video. Additionally, you should not shoot impromptu video from your desktop camera, just so you can have a video. Undoubtedly, this option causes more damage than good.

Here are some tips for creating good quality, effective video:

A conversational, welcoming style. The style of a video plays a key role in its success. Prospects want to see your personality. Research shows that the vast majority – about 75% -prefer a relaxed interview style to a more formal, rehearsed script. The most effective videos speak to prospects as if they were sitting across your desk, in a way that’s both personal and highly professional.

Content that engages prospects. Flashy images aren’t enough if your content falls short. Take some notes after your next half-dozen interviews with prospective clients … are there FAQs and other key talking points that come up nearly every time? Approach your video marketing as a chance to address those important topics.

A unique point of view. Video should highlight points of differentiation that set your firm apart – such as unique professional experiences you bring to the table. Do you have three distinct practice areas? Create a video highlighting each.

Contact details and a call to action. A video that looks great and says the right things accomplishes nothing if it doesn’t drive viewers to take the next step. Your firm’s phone number, office locations and URL should be mentioned and displayed prominently on-screen in any video presentation.

Providing a strong call to action and prominent contact details matters because video is an easy-to-share technology that can be distributed across the Internet to target audiences. A high-quality video that introduces your firm, then makes it easy for viewers to follow up, can extend your message beyond your Web site.

Bardorf Legal Marketing is a Massachusetts Internet marketing and advertising firm working with lawyers and law firms on enhancing their online effectiveness in the areas of SEO, paid search, social media, affiliate marketing, blog and website development, and targeted local search marketing campaigns.

When it comes to online marketing, what many attorneys fail to realize is the actual value of their online presence.

All too often, “beach front property” in the form of a top website ranking on any search engine, is simply given away to a competitor because of what may be good, yet ill-conceived intentions. A typical scenario is when someone at the firm takes the initiative to update or re-write some content on the firm’s website. Without realizing it, their modifications have dropped the website from the search engines rankings, leaving the vacancy for Google to fill with a competitors website instead.

An even worse case scenario that happens quite a bit, is when a firm decides a sleek new website is in order and proceeds to simply replace the old site without consideration of how established that site has become with the search engines, losing every ranking they’ve ever achieved. Ouch!

To put things in perspective and to illustrate the value of a top search engine ranking, let’s take the following example. Imagine your firm’s website ranks among the first five results on Google for a very common search phrase like, “Boston divorce lawyers”. According to Google’s keyword search volume, this particular phrase is searched over 1,500 times per month. That averages more than 18,000 searches per year.

Statistically, the top 5 results will get more clicks than any other result on the page. So let’s conservatively assume 20% of the people searching this phrase click one of the top five results. This one search term drives 3,600 visitors to your website every year. This is not a ranking you want to lose!

So what’s the value of a good ranking?
1. New Clients: If you are a Boston area divorce lawyer, and you have 3,600 people visit your website who have searched specifically for “Boston divorce lawyers” then, arguably you’re attracting highly qualified potential clients. Even if only 1% of the 3,600 visitors decide to contact you, that’s 36 new inquiries for just that one search term. The question is, how many of those inquiries can you convert to clients?

2. Visibility: There is tremendous value in name recognition and branding. Dominating the search engine pages for specific geographic and practice area searches enhance your exposure and confirms credibility to prospective clients searching the web. If you fail to maintain your rankings or if you do something to ‘give it away’, Google will easily replace you with one of its 24,199,000 other possible results – most likely it will be your competition – and you can start over.

I often remind clients that the Internet is a marketplace and needs to be treated as such. If you plan to actively participate in this market to advance your business, then you really should understand the value of what you have and what you’re trying to obtain. Failing to realize the value of ranking on the first page of Google for “Massachusetts divorce lawyer” or, on the flip side, expecting that your new site will rank for “Boston real estate attorney” because that’s what you do, is simply navigating the marketplace blindly. And with any mismanaged investment it will eventually catch up with you.

Bardorf Legal Marketing is a Massachusetts Internet marketing and advertising firm working with lawyers and law firms on enhancing their online effectiveness in the areas of SEO, paid search, social media, affiliate marketing, blog and website development, and targeted local search marketing campaigns.

Claims like “Guaranteed 1st page Google ranking” and “We’ll put you on the top of Google“, and “Your firm will have an exclusive listing” will certainly lead one to believe that dominating the web in any particular practice and geographic area is only a credit card charge away. The reality of many of these offers is often only realized when the only noticeable increase are those appearing on your monthly credit card statement.

Determining which offers are worthwhile and which offers are scams may be nearly impossible to decipher unless you dig in and do your homework. Unfortunately for attorneys, there simply isn’t enough time in the day to practice law AND effectively manage a marketing strategy that produces results.

Thus, I am sharing my Golden Rule of Internet Marketing. Keeping this rule in mind will undoubtedly save you time, money and a boat-load of frustration:

The Internet is a market place and should be treated as such. As with the real estate market and the stock market, there are no “guarantees”.

When it comes to filtering those relentless email offers, here are a few more tips to help identify the worthy from the worthless:

• Be aware of claims that boast “top listing on Google 100% of the time” and the like. All of these services involve limiting variables and search criteria to a highly controlled and limited function.  You may often appear at the top for a phrase like “Boston Bankruptcy Attorney” but the service does not include the hundreds, if not thousands of other highly qualified search variations and combinations.

• Most everything is measurable on the Internet. Before you purchase a listing in a directory get appropriate data from the provider. They should be able to provide you with the previous six months search volume, and click-through rates of searches specific to your practice and geographic area. If they can’t, move on.

• Know what services are unique versus those services that are offered through the search engines free of charge. The classic example is the claim “We’ll get you top listings in your geographic area” for $199. per month. The service is actually the search engine’s respective Local Business Directory or Maps Directory.

• There are no short-cuts for obtaining long lasting and meaningful results on the Internet. Establishing a formidable presence on the web requires a solid foundation and a variety of marketing channels. It is highly unlikely that one subscription or lead generation program is going to be your reliable, long-term resource for new business.

In the end, good old common sense goes a long way. If it sounds to good to be true, then it probably is.

Bardorf Legal Marketing is a Massachusetts Internet marketing and advertising firm working with lawyers and law firms on enhancing their online effectiveness in the areas of SEO, paid search, social media, affiliate marketing, blog and website development, and targeted local search marketing campaigns.

Google changed its criteria for serving ads several years ago as it became abundantly clear to Google that they could make more money. So the smart folks at Google asked themselves, “what will it take to make more people click on more ads?” Thus, the Adwords ‘Quality Score’ was implemented and Google did make a lot more money.

Here’s the scoop: the Google system calculates a ‘Quality Score’ for each of your keywords. It looks at a variety of factors to measure how relevant your keyword is to your ad text, to the landing page text and to a user’s search query. A keyword’s Quality Score updates frequently and is closely related to its performance. In general, a high Quality Score means that your keyword will trigger ads in a higher position and at a lower cost-per-click (CPC).

The Quality Score is all about “relevancy” and is designed to give searchers better quality results, and also give advertisers better quality visitors. So in order to obtain consistent top ad positions you will need to pay attention to your Quality Score.

Now, as a side note, there are companies who “guarantee you top ad placement” in Google Adwords. The catch here is that they focus on just a handful of keywords and phrases. So its easier to optimize for the phrase “Boston Bankruptcy Lawyer” if that’s all your going for. Otherwise you may want to consider more affordable and perhaps better qualified, geographically targeted, “long-tail” keyphrases, like “Quincy Chapter 13 bankruptcy lawyer”.

The bottom line is this, advertising on Google can be highly effective and very worthwhile as long as you manage it properly. Otherwise you’re just making Google richer, without realizing very much of your own ROI.

You can learn more about Adwords Quality Score at…where else? Google Adwords

Bardorf Legal Marketing is a Massachusetts Internet marketing and advertising firm working with lawyers and law firms on enhancing their online effectiveness in the areas of SEO, paid search, social media, affiliate marketing, blog and website development, and targeted local search marketing campaigns.

1. What’s with that email address?

Even something as small and as simple as an e-mail address can have a large impact on your business when it comes to determining whether or not you are going to earn a new client’s business over the competition.

When the internet was first taking off a few years ago, nearly everyone was signing up to utilize free web based email services such as AOL.com, Verizon.com, Gmail.com, Yahoo.com, etc. These free, or generic, web-based email services were very convenient and were primarily created for individuals that wanted email accounts. Even if the account was created for small business purposes, it was acceptable then, but this has changed significantly in recent years.

Now that we have moved so far forward in the realm of digital business, something looks fishy if you are still using one of these free email service providers as your primary business e-mail address. In fact, you may actually be giving people the wrong idea about your law firm by telling them that you are not serious about what you do. Because it has become so important for attorneys to have websites, you should already have an email to correspond with your website name, meaning that there is absolutely no need for using a free web based service for your email needs.

Solution: The cost to coordinate your website address and your email address is no more than $20 – $50 per year. The positive business perception created with perspective clients make it worth every penny and then some.

2. You should really update your website…..Really.

In today’s Internet world, even clients who are referred to you by a colleague or previous client will eventually visit your website. What they find, may be their first impression of you and it may very well be the deciding factor as to whether they call you or the other attorney.

Your website is undoubtedly the most cost effective way to market your services. A website informs people of your services, experience, and credentials. It gives perspective clients a “sense” of who you are and what you can do for them. A website is accessible to nearly everyone. It is certainly available to everyone who is searching specifically for You. Your website is working 24/7 and since you own it and manage it, it conveys a message and an impression of who you are.

A website that has been neglected, and is out of date from both a content and design perspective will have a negative impact on how perspective clients view you. A website with bright colors, big fonts, and appears as though it was completed with the help from your 14 year old nephew, will not help you earn clients.

Solution: You may not frequent your website everyday, but keep in mind, perspective clients do. It makes sense to invest in the one resource that will effectively represent you and your services. It doesn’t have to cost big bucks; it just has to be done right.

3. LinkedIn is a reputable, professional networking resource.

If you were to choose one online networking resource, it should be LinkedIn. It does not cost anything to become a subscriber. Establishing an account is quick and easy. From a marketing perspective there is significant value in completing the narrative of your profile, and adding links back to your website.

The value of having a LinkedIn profile is not only establishing a professional network, as you can connect and keep up to date with colleagues, but it will also convey to “Internet generation” clients that you’re engaged.  Additionally, your LinkedIn profile will also show up in the search engine results which give you another online marketing resource in addition to your website.

Solution: Sign up and get started with LinkedIn by visiting: www.LinkedIn.com

Bardorf Legal Marketing is a Massachusetts Internet marketing and advertising firm working with lawyers and law firms on enhancing their online effectiveness in the areas of SEO, paid search, social media, affiliate marketing, blog and website development, and targeted local search marketing campaigns.

I’ll assume your asking about getting great rankings in the organic search listings as opposed to the Sponsored Listings or the local business listings which comes at the top of the search engine page when someone search with a geographic reference, like “Boston, MA divorce lawyer“.

This is referred to as SEO – Search Engine Optimization. Although there are many components to a well optimized web site, it basically comes down to this (according to Google):

• In your site design, use text rather than images and Flash for important content

• Have relevant and descriptive content on the specific topics you focus on.

• Make your site work with JavaScript, Java and CSS disabled

• Organize your site such that you have pages that focus on a particular topic

• Avoid HTML frames and iframes

• Use normal URLs, avoiding links that look like form queries (http://www.example.com/engine?id)

• Market your site by having other relevant sites link to yours

• Don’t try to cheat the system (by stuffing your pages of keywords, or attempting to target specific content at search engines, or using link farms)

Bardorf Legal Marketing is a Massachusetts Internet marketing and advertising firm working with lawyers and law firms on enhancing their online effectiveness in the areas of SEO, paid search, social media, affiliate marketing, blog and website development, and targeted local search marketing campaigns.

Many times an event coordinator will ask an attorney to speak at an upcoming event on an area of their specialty or focus. In their own marketing efforts the coordinator will publish the details of the events highlighting the speakers invited.

The value of publishing your website (and getting an active hyper-link to your site) in their online listing is significant. It’s significant not because people attending the event will see your site and click through to visit your website, but because a link from their site to your website serves as “a vote” in Google’s eyes. Even better, if the event is about Massachusetts real estate law, and the listing details topics about Massachusetts real estate law, then links to your website which also discuses Massachusetts real estate law, then you’ve potentially established a highly effective link. The more effective links you create, the more “authority” your site will earn in the eyes of the search engines. More authority equals more visibility.

Got a question? Let me know if you have any questions about building effective links to your website.

Bardorf Legal Marketing is a Massachusetts Internet marketing and advertising firm working with lawyers and law firms on enhancing their online effectiveness in the areas of SEO, paid search, social media, affiliate marketing, blog and website development, and targeted local search marketing campaigns.

Although adding appropriate keywords to any web page is a critical step in properly optimizing a site, it is just one task from various interdependent actions and processes required to effectively optimize any site.

Perhaps the most important factor regarding the “process” of adding appropriate keywords to your website is specifically ‘how its done’.

The most severe ramification for improperly optimizing your site is becoming “blacklisted” by the search engines. That means, your website will never be served in the search engine results. One would really have to be totally negligent or willing to take a tremendous chance for potential short term value to become blacklisted for improper implementation of keywords, but it does happen.

For a more complete answer regarding the optimization of your website, I would invite you to read my article title SEO 101.  Let me know what you think.

Bardorf Legal Marketing is a Massachusetts Internet marketing and advertising firm working with lawyers and law firms on enhancing their online effectiveness in the areas of SEO, paid search, social media, affiliate marketing, blog and website development, and targeted local search marketing campaigns.

Search marketing is a continual process of integrating and optimizing various online components. The fact is, there is only so much real estate on the search engine result page (SERP) and we all know that Google is not going to present your website ten times as the only choice. The search engines look for variety. They select websites, blogs, directory listings, social profiles, videos, press releases, PDF files, and just about anything digital that they can index.

Effective search marketing converts searchers into clients by ensuring your brand appears within the SERPs in the right place, at the right time and with the right message. Your chances of obtaining optimal SERP real estate for highly appropriate and targeted search terms significantly diminishes if you simply rely on your website alone.

Typically, one decides to invests in search marketing, also often referred to as search engine marketing (SEM), to achieve a defined business goal like; to obtain new clients, increase visibility and brand awareness, drive qualified traffic, obtain a competitive advantage or integrate off-line marketing initiatives with an online target audience.

If you have invested in a new website and expect it to immediately perform well without the consideration of a search marketing strategy, then you’re better off shooting for early retirement by doing a quick pick on the Mass Mega Millions lottery tonight.

The bottom line is this, effective search marketing is not a single “item” like a website, nor a one time “event” like launching your new website. Search marketing, when implemented and managed properly is a process that utilizes a variety of digital assets to achieve specific business objectives. The results can dramatically change your business.

Bardorf Legal Marketing is a Massachusetts Internet marketing and advertising firm working with lawyers and law firms on enhancing their online effectiveness in the areas of SEO, paid search, social media, affiliate marketing, blog and website development, and targeted local search marketing campaigns.

Here’s how:

To determine how many of your web pages the search engines have discovered and indexed use the following techniques. If your website has 50 pages and you see that the search engines have only indexed 25, then you know that half of your web pages are not appearing on any search engine result pages (SERPs).

Yahoo! To determine if your site has been indexed by Yahoo! you will use Site Explorer.  This allows you to explore all the web pages indexed by Yahoo! Search.

Google: To determine if your site has been indexed by Google, you can simply type “site:yourdomain.com” in Google’s search box. Be sure to enter your website’s domain, and not ‘yourdomain’

Got a question? Let me know if you have any questions about your search marketing strategy.

Bardorf Legal Marketing is a Massachusetts Internet marketing and advertising firm working with lawyers and law firms on enhancing their online effectiveness in the areas of SEO, paid search, social media, affiliate marketing, blog and website development, and targeted local search marketing campaigns.