I bet you want to get your law firm website on page 1 of Google for great keywords. I know I did and still do for more keywords my prospective clients use to look for a lawyer. Do you know how much SEO is enough and how much is too much? Are you or your SEO consultant merely guessing about exactly what you must do to rank on page 1 of Google for specific keywords? There are two over-arching approaches to SEO:

1. The shotgun approach
2. The sniper approach

The Shotgun Approach to SEO

The shotgun approach is doing everything and the kitchen sink hoping you rank well for intended keywords. You don’t aim; instead you fire hoping to hit your mark. You write content, optimize your web page for the keyword, and then randomly build backlinks hoping beyond hope you end up on page 1.

There are two problems with the shotgun SEO approach:

• You miss your target altogether by aimlessly going for keywords that unless you spend tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars and years of time you will not end up on page 1. In other words, you’re wasting your time.
• You overkill your target. You invest time and resources into ranking a keyword beyond that which is necessary and therefore miss other opportunities.

The Sniper Approach to SEO

The sniper approach involves planning, taking careful aim, and hitting your mark deliberately. The sniper approach involves upfront planning, but once you know what must be done, you deliberately plan and execute a precision-based SEO campaign to rank for select keywords. Once you achieve the ranking desired, you slow or stop that campaign and go after other keyword opportunities.

The benefits of sniper SEO are:

• You seek to rank for keywords you have a chance to rank for rather than guessing and hoping.
• You do just enough smart SEO to rank and then stop. You don’t waste resources.

Because sniper SEO is deliberate, it’s smart SEO in that you can plan your campaign and achieve results with minimum investment and resources. Obviously I’m of the view sniper SEO is the better approach. I’m not saying shotgun SEO doesn’t work, it’s just not as efficient and in some cases not as effective.

How do you do Sniper SEO?

You must select your keywords and decide how high you wish to rank for those keywords. For the remainder of this article, I’ll assume you wish to rank somewhere on page 1 of Google. Selecting keywords is a balancing act. You want to rank high for the most searched-for keywords your prospective clients use. Yet, you don’t want to waste time and money on keywords for which you will not achieve a page 1 ranking. How do you research keywords? I use software that produces the following chart for the keyword “Denver Personal Injury Lawyer”

(click to enlarge)

The main two numbers are:

• Number of monthly searches (for an exact search) which is 590.
• Number of web pages that contain the phrase “Denver personal injury lawyer” which is 672,000

“Denver personal injury lawyer” is a fairly competitive keyword given 672,000 web pages contain the phrase. However, it also receives a decent number of searches and the lawyers who rank on page 1 will gain a decent amount of monthly website traffic for just this keyword. But number of searches and competing web pages is just the start.

Next, you must determine how hard it will be to bump an existing site off of page 1. You see, there could be millions of web pages competing for a keyword, yet the top 10 sites on page 1 of Google aren’t that well SEO’d.

Likewise, there could be a keyword with only 10,000 competing web pages, but the top 10 sites on page 1 are very well SEO’d and therefore strongly entrenched.

Analyzing the SEO Strength of the Top 10 Websites for “Denver Personal Injury Lawyer”

I’ll use my software again for a competitive analysis, which produces the following:

(click to Enlarge)

It turns out ranking on page 1 is moderately difficult. It’s not impossible, but does require effort.

What do the colors mean?

The more green means less competitive and pink means more competitive. The brown is moderately competitive. The most competitive factors for ranking in the top 10 is backlinks. The websites listed have many backlinks. Arguably, backlinks (quality and quantity) are a very strong factor to ranking well.

Therefore, yes, there is a lot of green in the chart, but a lot of pink for a very important ranking factor.

The above screenshot lists the top 8 ranking websites for “Denver personal injury lawyer”. The entries with the small icon and no number to the left are Google Places rankings.

I’m concerned with the entries indicated by a number 1 through 8.

What do all these numbers mean? The following is a legend.

The items in the chart are many factors that contribute to ranking well in the search engines for a particular keyword. The hardest part of ranking in the top 10 for “Denver personal injury lawyer” will be amassing enough backlinks.

It’s possible and fairly easy to get backlinks so I deem going after this keyword is doable with time and effort.

A brief note about backlinks. The lowest ranking website in our chart has 1,582 links to the entire site. That does not mean getting 1,583 backlinks will punt that site from it’s spot.

Not all backlinks are created equal. Generally links from higher PR sites are better.

With my software I did backlink analysis and the results showed that this site has the following backlink distribution:

• PR 5: 4
• PR 4: 14
• PR 3: 13
• PR 2: 13
• PR 1: 22
• Remainder PR 0 or PR -.

What this backlinks distribution tells me is that if a Denver law firm website managed to get 10, 20, 30 or more backlinks from PR 5 or higher websites, then there’s a really good chance it could outrank the existing site in spot #8. It’s not a guarantee, but it’s likely.

This is part of being a sniper SEO. All this data tells me exactly what must be done in order to rank in the top 10.

Rather than blindly going after “Denver personal injury lawyer” now you could methodically go for a top ranking. Note that just because you take the sniper approach does not mean you can rank without effort. You still need to optimize your website properly, publish content, and build quality backlinks to your site.

Moreover, simply doing the above analysis, you can decide quickly whether it’s even worth trying to rank for a particular keyword. In fact, you might decide to simply rank for a slew of low-competition keywords rather than going for a few or one highly competitive keywords.

Understand you do not need to limit targeting only one or two keywords on your website. Each web page is an opportunity to rank for a different keyword. Go for the most searched, yet attainable keyword on your home page, and then go after many other keywords on other pages and blog posts on your site.

Also, in my experience it’s best to go after 5 to 10 keywords at a time rather than 50 or 100 at a time. You can focus your campaign more effectively on 5 to 10 keywords rather than 50 or 100 keywords. Once you rank for your first 10 chosen keywords, go for another 10. In time, you’ll be ranking well for many keywords and enjoying a great deal of website traffic.

What software does the above keyword analyses?

It’s Market Samurai. I find it probably the most useful SEO tool in my arsenal. However, if you prefer to go the free route, you can using an amalgamation of free online tools. It takes longer going the free route … but it is free. Those tools are as follows:

• Google Keyword Tool to determine search volume.
• Keyword Spy (a Firefox browser addon) to check domain age, number of backlinks and type of backlinks.
• Yahoo! Site Explorer for checking the number and type of backlinks.
• Search in Google with “” surrounding your keyword to see the number of competing websites.
• Go to each of the top 10 websites and right click your mouse and select “view page source.” Look for the <title>, <description> and <h> tags to determine if the web page has the keyword in these meta elements.
• Go to DMOZ.org and Yahoo! Directory to see if the other studios are listed with these directories (arguably the two best directories from which to receive backlinks).

There’s no need to guess what needs to be done to rank well in Google. Stop guessing and get scientific with your SEO. The scientific approach means you’ll only do the bare minimum to rank well and you’ll be able to know when ranking on page 1 is not going to happen (like trying to rank on page 1 for “yoga” – you’d need a lot of time and resources to make that happen).

3 caveats when doing SEO:

• There are no guarantees with SEO. You could do everything the numbers indicate and still not achieve a top ranking. It’s likely you succeed, but not guaranteed.
• Using this scientific approach does not mean you’ll be able to achieve top rankings for every keyword. In fact, when you analyze the competition in this manner, you’ll discover the keywords for which you have very little chance of achieving a page 1 Google listing. This helps you avoid wasting time on a hopeless endeavor. That said, no keyword is bullet proof. With enough time, money, persistence, and dedication, you can rank well for any keyword. However, you must assess whether it’s worth it and more to the point, whether you have the time and resources.
• The number of backlinks listed by Yahoo! Site Explorer and Market Samurai are approximated. There is no software I’m aware of that is 100% accurate in revealing the number and type of backlinks to a particular website.
• There are many ways to get backlinks. Some are white hat, some grey hat, and some black hat. I won’t get into these methods here, but in the long run you’re best-served taking the white hat approach.

Related posts:

1. How To Take Your Law Firm Article Marketing & SEO 1 Step Further?
2. Lawyer Marketing Action Plan For Tons of Website Traffic

I’ve been doing article marketing for my firm for some time.  It’s not a major focus of my marketing campaign, but it certainly complements it nicely.  I first wrote about the advantages of article marketing on Ezine Articles here.  In this article I’ll discuss how you can take your law firm article marketing one step further.

Sure, when you publish articles on EZA, if you target relatively low competitive keywords you can rank your EZA article well in the search engines.  You’ll even likely get some traffic to your law firm website.  These are great benefits.

But, you can ramp up your article marketing by taking it one step further and that is syndication.

Syndication is when other websites (or print materials) take your articles from an article directory and publish it “as-is” on their website.

When you publish on EZA and other article directories you’re giving permission for your article to be syndicated.  This is a good thing and something to aim for.

“As-is” means the links to your law firm website you place in the article resource box at the bottom of your article will also be published on the websites that syndicate your articles.  Voila, you’ve built backlinks to your website with no additional effort.

What about duplicate content?

It’s a myth when concerning the same content on different websites.  Yes, it’s true … it is a myth.  Your originally published article whether on your firm website or elsewhere will not get punished in the search engines.  The entire duplicate content issue pertains to the same content on different URLs on your website.  Not the same content on different websites.

Think about it.  Syndication is something that’s been happening for years in the print world.  The major publications continue syndication online including Google with Google News.

Sure, a syndicated article may not rank as well as the originally published web page of the same content.  But it will likely get indexed (which means the backlinks count to your website) and you need not fear about your website being punished by the search engines.

It’s true that Google’s recent Panda algorithm update is ranking websites with only syndicated content lower, but it does not mean those sites are not indexed.  Moreover, syndication is still happening since Panda.  Since the Google announcement of Panda, my syndication numbers from EZA increased from 146 to 171 (see below).  This tells me websites are still syndicating content.

Capitalizing on Syndication

Once you notice that your articles are being syndicated, it’s time to ramp up your syndication efforts.

How can you tell if your articles are being syndicated?

Take a look at your EZA stats screen on your EZA home page.  It looks like the following (taken from my EZA account on March 20, 2011):

The syndication number is indicated by the “Ezine Publisher” figure which is 171 for me.

171 instances of syndication means I effortlessly built 342 backlinks to my websites.  It also means more readers and traffic to my websites.

Syndication = traffic & backlinks which are two cornerstone objectives in online marketing.

Likely more websites syndicated my articles without clicking the “Publish” button on the EZA page where my article is published and instead they simply copied and pasted the article.  But I can’t prove that with any certainty unless I do a search for each of my articles in Google (which I explain below).

A note about my other stats.  The 8.6% click rate is the rate of readers who clicked to my websites.  8.6% is NOT good, in fact it borders on terrible.

The reason I have a low click rate is my first 80 or so articles do not have very good resource boxes (I should go back and edit them but I haven’t had the opportunity).  When I started with article marketing, I made some mistakes.  My click rate has more than doubled with my latest 80 or 90 articles once I learned how to improve click rate in EZA (see my 1 simple tip to improve article click rate section below).

Next, find out who is syndicating your articles

In the Google search field, type the title of your published EZA article surrounded by “”.  If your article is syndicated and it’s indexed you’ll get a list of web pages where your article is published.

Go to each website and if you can contact the webmaster, do so offering that you’re willing to offer them your articles before you publish them on EZA (and elsewhere).

Not every webmaster will take you up on it, but some will and that’s an easy way to ensure you build more backlinks to your website.  Continue delivering quality content and you’ll have another easy source of completely white hat backlinks.

1 simple tip to improve your article click rate

I started getting much better click rates when I integrated the resource box as part of my article.

A very simple way to do this is by starting your resource box with the word “Next”.

For example, if you wrote an article about breathalysers (as a DUI attorney), you could write the following resource box.

Next, discover 5 types of breathalysers used by the police.  Not all breathalysers are the same and not all breathalysers require the same type of maintenance by law enforcement.  Learn about the different breathalysers used by the police so you know something about the breathalyser you blew into when charged with a DUI.

I don’t know if there’s 5 types of breathalysers.  I’m not a DUI lawyer.  I use it as an example.

The bolded portions are th links to your law firm website – be sure to link to the relevant articles.

I’ve stopped the “Atticus is a DUI lawyer practicing law in Fargo North Dakota with the law firm of Atticus & Co. since 1990″ type of resource box.  That’s what your EZA profile is for.

The “bio” style resource boxes receive lower click rates almost every time.  Instead, integrate your resource box into your article and then write a great profile bio in the event readers want to learn more about you.

Related posts:

1. Linkvana Review: Search Engine Optimization Search SEO Software
2. Why Microsites are Perfect Law Firm Marketing Tools
3. Become a Big Time Article Publisher on the Internet With this Article Writing Tool

Do you want more traffic to your law firm website?  If so you need multiple micro-targeted websites as central feature to your lawyer marketing.

My firm’s sites went from 0 monthly website visitors to 3,450 (and climbing) within 1 year.  This article and much of this website is about lawyer marketing with a focus on lawyer internet marketing.

Lawyer Marketing Mass Traffic Action Plan

A.  Build your own websites:

I can’t overstate how valuable it is being able to build your own websites and blogs.  The time you invest in it will pay dividends immediately and for years.  Here is, in a nutshell, what I do:

B.  My Internet Lawyer Marketing Approach is Simple:

1. Get great website hosting:  Bluehost.  Great customer service, cheap, and you can build unlimited websites.  Bluehost shows you how to install WordPress.
2. Use the WordPress platform (install very easily inside your Bluehost account) and get great looking WordPress themes:  StudioPress and/or iThemes (I use both).  These WordPress premium themse are low cost, look great, built-in SEO, very well coded, outstanding support, and they both have a large variety of themes available.
3. Learn on-site search engine optimization (how to write and research keywords for your websites):  SEOBook.
4. Build tons of high-quality links to my site using Linkvana (read my Linkvana review here) and reading 101 Ways to Build Link Popularity.
5. Once I build and get traffic to one site, I do it again, and again, and again.

C.  Let me elaborate:

First, you’re probably what are your various websites to be about?  Each website targets different clientele.  For example, if you’re a criminal defense lawyer, do a spousal assault website, a DUI website, an insider trading website, and so forth.

If your law firm practices in several areas, create websites (and blogs) for each practice area.  Then build websites to sub-practice areas.  These specific practice area and sub-practice area websites are called microsites.

Second, you must learn how to choose keywords and where to place keywords in your websites.  You can’t learn about keyword research and use better tools than at SEOBook.

Third, write loads of great content and don’t stop.  Don’t have time?  Hire quality writers at Custom Content and/or Need an Article.

Fourth, don’t forget optimize your local Google Maps listing.  Read David Mihm – he about covers it all for local Google Maps.

Fifth: a little about link building – which is integral to internet lawyer marketing.

• Top Google listings come from link building.  Go for quantity and quality.  Quality links are from websites with high page rank.  Google page rank if you don’t know what this is.
• Take charge of building all the links you want to all the websites you want (plan on building many sites) with Linkvana.  One flat rate each month lets you build all the links to your site you want.
• Read 101 Ways to Build Link Popularity.  This article covers it all as far as I’m concerned.
• If you want to submit your sites to online directries and RSS aggregators (recommended), then automate it with Directorybot and RSSbot.

Sixth: Lawyer marketing is not complete without analyzing your competition.  At Yahoo Site Explorer, enter your competitions’ URLs (the competitors who are ranking in Google higher than you) and see where they get links.  Get links from the same or better websites.  For example, if your competitor has eight PR 6 links, you should get at least 9 PR 6 links.

You can get high PR links from blog comments, forum participation, paying for high PR directory listings, and writing articles for publishing on sites with high PR.

Seventh: Give you prospective clients the chance to talk to you (or your office) live right on all your websites with live chat.  You’ll get more clients in your office doors if you communicate with them while they are on your site.  I haven’t used live chat yet for my firm because I have a staffing shortage.  However, I intend to try live chat on all my sites shortly because I have no doubt if I can answer website visitors’ questions immediately and book an appointment immediately, I’ll get even more clients.

Eighth: Collect, build, and communicate with all your clients and prospective clients with email management: aWeber or iContact are inexpensive robust options that offer forms you can easily place in all your WordPress websites.

That’s all there is to it.  Follow these steps and you can create all the targeted traffic you need to get tons of clients.  Don’t stop building websites, adding content, and building links.

If you don’t have the time or inclination to do all this, but still want massive traffic, check out LoveClients SEO for a full service SEO service.

Related posts:

1. How To Take Your Law Firm Article Marketing & SEO 1 Step Further?
2. Website or Blog? What Should a Lawyer or Law Firm Use
3. How to get a Great Lawyer Website or Law Firm Websites

Get search engine optimization search SEO software that works for you

Read this Linkvana review to find out what is Linkvana and answer the-always pertinent question: does Linkvana work?

Linkvana Review:

For more information about Linkvana, visit Linkvana Information.com.

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Great client service = client retention and word-of-mouth referrals.

I doubt many lawyers pay much attention to client service, or have any policies in place about client service.  This is a big mistake.  Happy clients are will keep coming back and tell other people about you and your firm.

The following are some basic client service techniques that are sure to help client retention at your firm.

• Live telephone reception.  I’ve been tempted to get automated answering, but I have to say I sure appreciate a live-person when I call somewhere.  I know you and your clients do as well.
• Meet your clients when and where it suits them as much as possible.  I’m not saying give up every weekend (there are limits), but it’s not much of an imposition to meet clients outside your office and on occasion outside your office hours.
• Pleasant and prompt greeting at the door.  Ask your clients about their experience.  Your reception will be nice to you, but are they nice to clients?  This also requires that you have a receptionist or someone working at the door.
• Fast e-mail and voicemail response time (i.e. within 24 – 48 hours).  I set out in my initial client letter that we try to do this.  I don’t always succeed in responding within 48 hours.  When I don’t, I apologize.
• Don’t make clients wait if at all possible.  If they’re early and you’re available, see them early.  Otherwise, meet them at the appointed time.  If you’re running late, try to contact them.  It’s easy with cell phones these days.
• Have a decent magazine selection in your reception area.  I’ve heard about lawyers only setting out their marketing materials.  That’s too self-promoting for my taste.
• Coffee, tea, water, soft drink service.
• Freebies: pens, mugs, folders, thumb drives, etc. (with your firm logo and contact information of course).
• Client feedback (short surveys, anonymous client feedback on your Web site using uservoice.com, e-mail your clients, give them a form to fill out, talk to them, etc.).  Feedback is a great way for you to improve your client service firm-wide.
• If you hire staff, don’t permit bad talk about your clients. You don’t want a negative client service environment because clients sense it.
• Delight your clients – over-deliver your service every time.  Yes, sometimes cases go sideways.  That’s the way it is in law.  However, diminish the bad experience for your clients with exceptional client service in every way you can control.  A decent analogy is restaurant service.  Sometimes the kitchen screws up.  I don’t mind if my server apologizes and makes up for it with a token offer such as dessert or comps the bill.  I also like an explanation.  When this happens, the bad situation is mitigated.  I’m likely willing to return.
• When you don’t over-deliver, apologize and offer a gift, fee reduction, or some way to make up for it.
• Don’t take your clients for granted.
• Give personal service as much as you can – get to know your clients a little and at the very least call them by name.  Show that you’re actually interested in them.  That said, if you sense your client isn’t interested in divulging, then don’t.  I enjoy getting to know more about my clients; most seem to appreciate that I show an interest.
• If you spend some time chit-chatting in an effort to get to know your clients, don’t bill them for it.  This loss of time is leakage which is inevitable.  Increase your hourly fee to make up for it.  Clients prefer to spend an extra $20 per hour than see a bill and know you charged them for time talking about the recent birth of their child.  That said, you don’t want to burn up 30 minutes chit-chatting.  A few minutes is good, but you have to make a living.
• Get client feedback in some way – so you can improve your services.
• Strive to say yes as much as possible – be flexible.
• Treat your employees well – your clients will notice. There’s nothing so distasteful from a client’s perspective as unpleasant employers.  Remember, most of your clients are employees too.

There is no substitute for classy, convenient, and outstanding client service.  There is no better way to maintain and build revenues than repeat clients and word-of-mouth referrals.

Related posts:

1. Client Referral Fees that may be Permitted
2. Add Law Firm Value by Helping Clients: Ask these 2 Important Questions
3. Sending Clients Season’s Greetings

Most jurisdictions as far as I know prohibit lawyers from paying referral fees (let me know if I’m wrong about this.  I know my jurisdiction does).

As business owners, we love it when clients send us business by word-of-mouth.  Why?  Because word-of-mouth marketing costs us nothing.  More importantly, word-of-mouth referrals come to us pre-sold.  In fact, in my experience, clients who see me who were referred, came to see me to discuss their case and get started; not to determine whether they’ll hire me.

Alternative referral incentive program:

Tell referral sources that you’ll donate $X amount to a charity of the referrer’s choosing.  It can be a set amount or a percentage of the ultimate legal fee.  Institute this for every client they refer to you.

Caution:  check with your governing authority whether this would be permitted.

What if the charity donation referral isn’t permitted?  Then ask if a donation to any legal aid fund would be okay.  If so, just tell referral sources that $X or percentage-of-fees amount will be donated to a legal aid fund for each referral.

If the charity referral donation is also too aggressive for your governing body, be sure to always send a thank you card or letter to your referrals.

Related posts:

1. Client Service Tips to Keep your Clients Happy

Track which marketing activities work and which ones don’t?

The internet offers many, many, many excellent ways to market your law firm.  And this is in addition to the traditional law firm marketing options such as brochures, radio, TV, giving talks, networking, etc.

The internet is a wonderful vehicle for lawyer marketing because the internet is an information-delivery mechanism; lawyers  are in the information business.  The two work great together.

This website (thePAPERLESSlawyer) shares a large variety of marketing strategies and activities.  You should realize that not all marketing activities will be best for your firm.  In other words, not all marketing activities you try will result in an acceptable return on investment (ROI).

There is no marketing formula for lawyers.  I suggest you get informed about marketing.  Then try various marketing activities and TRACK the results.  It’s imperative you track the results.

Tracking results means you need to track how much time and money you invest and then the return.  Tracking the money spent is easy.

Tracking time, until now, was a bit more difficult.  Now, with with RescueTime, you can effortless and automatically track how much time you spend on marketing.  RescueTime is an online service that automatically tracks what you do on your computer.

How to track your marketing results?

Every person who answers the phone in my firm has a spreadsheet on which they track the types of calls that come in the firm (by practice area).  When I interview anyone, I ask how they learned of our firm.

That’s it.  Short answer to how to track law firm marketing results:  ask all people who contact your firm.  Track the numbers – those who contact you, those who make an appointment, and those who hire you.  You can take it further and correlate the fees earned to the marketing method that brought the client into your firm.

I caution that you don’t go extreme.  We practice restraint.  When a person first calls our firm, we don’t ask how they hear about us.  I figure it’s not the time or place.  Yes, it would be very nice to know, but I’m sure not going to alienate a prospective client for figures and statistics.

Don’t give up on marketing your firm if something you did was a disaster.  I’ve wasted money on disastrous marketing activities.  However, I’ve also hit marketing home runs.

I’m reminded about an old investment adage that you need to only find and invest big in three investments throughout your life to make a fortune.  The key is cutting off losses on the losers before the farm is lost so capital is preserved for the right pick.  Marketing is the same; not every activity needs to be a success.  Instead a few successful marketing activities will build your firm big time.

Related posts:

1. Lawyer Marketing Online
2. Stop Punching the Clock with Automated Time Tracking Software
3. Add Law Firm Value by Helping Clients: Ask these 2 Important Questions

Short answer: both IF you or your firm will actually write blog posts regularly.  If you won’t commit to writing blog posts, then it’s a website format.  This article goes through the pros and cons of each and how to best integrate both a website and blog.

The lines separating websites and blogs are blurring these days.

Blog features such as news updates and updated articles are being fed to appear on the homepages (another other web pages) of traditional websites.

Traditionally a website is a static set of pages linked together.  The information (content) on each page seldom changes.  A blog, on the other hand, is dynamic.  Properly used, a blog has new articles and information posted to it regularly.  Also, many blogs are interactive between blog publisher and readership primarily through posted comments found under the subject blog post.

These days, websites incorporate blog elements, while blog platforms can be configured to function like websites.  This is great because now it’s very easy to use have both a website and a blog.

For example, our firm’s main website feeds/cycles 3 types of updated information in our left column (it’s a standard 3-column website).  We list the titles for our 5 latest blog posts, articles, and news posts.

Integrating a blog and website like this creates a dynamic and fresh looking website.  It is important that if you choose to cycle information on your law firm’s homepage that new information and content is added consistently.

Why should a law firm decide on a website or blog or both before building or revising your present website?

Because what you choose will likely determine what is the best approach and platform to use.  Your options in configuring your website and blog are as follows:

A.  Website only:

Website only means you intend for a fairly static online presence.  You could incorporate a library page where you add

Pros for only a website:

• Much less ongoing time investment.
• The library concept takes of the pressure to add content consistently, yet does enable adding fresh content and information for your clients.  This gives you the option to build credibility and add search engine optimized content.

Cons for only a website:

• search engines favor larger websites / blogs.  Not adding content can adversely affect search engine ranking / placement. Yes, you may have a library component; however, if you have to have your webmaster add those articles to your website, that’s an ongoing expense.  Blogs are typically much simpler to add content to than websites.  So simple that anyone can easily add content quickly and painlessly.  That said, if you can get library articles added, those articles can be well optimized for improved search engine ranking.
• Website alone doesn’t have the dynamic look because the content is more or less the same.

B.  Blog only:

I don’t know any lawyer who uses only a pure blog, but I’m sure they are out there and do so successfully.

Pros for a blog:

• Low cost.  With open source blogging platforms (more on this later in the series), very easy for you to set up on your own.  You don’t need to know any coding language.  It’s an out-of-the-box solution.
• Great search engine ranking potential: if search engine optimized (more on this later in the series) and content is added consistently, will rank well on the search engines.
• Build readership and viral capability.  Blog posts, if you enable an RSS feed and/or e-mail subscription (like the top right of this blog), your readers can subscribe and forward your posts to other people.  This can result in new clients.  After all, if someone forwards one of your posts to a friend because the friend needed a lawyer, that friend will likely call you and is already pre-sold on hiring you.
• Blogs are excellent at building credibility.  Because you write about your practice area, it’s an opportunity to share information; information prospective clients are looking for.  If you do it well, then you can presell prospective clients.  They’ll recognize you as an expert and appreciate sharing some of what you know.
• Blogging gives you an opportunity show a bit of your personal side.  In my view, clients like this.  I don’t mean to do a tell-all blog; instead, when writing you’ll develop a voice and intertwine personal experiences that give a taste about who you are that your website won’t be able to do.
• Stay current: because you have to update it regularly, presumably about your practice area, it’s an excellent motivator for you to stay current in your practice areas.
• If you’re part of a large firm, you may wish to write a blog about your practice area.  Seriously consider getting your own domain for your blog and doing it separately from the firm so if you leave the firm, you get the blog.

Cons for only a blog:

• Prospective and current clients may not find a pure blog very user friendly.  People have expectations about website layout, especially for businesses.  Blogs don’t present your “what we do” information very well.
• Labor intensive.  A blog with no posts for 3 months looks bad.  If a blog is your sole online presence, be sure to write consistently.  In my view posting twice a month is sufficient.  Consistency is key.

C.  Website with blog content cycled throughout and integrated:

An example of a website with blog integrated and the blog’s content cycled throughout is listing your 5 recent blog post titles somewhere on your website homepage.  Another example is cycling 5 law firm news items on your homepage.  By integrated I mean that your blog is part of your website (i.e. part of your website domain or your website is part of your blog domain).

I could write a full post on this concept alone.  However, I’ll try to give you the gist of it.

Website and Blog integration

If you have a website, you can integrate your blog as part of your website domain or separately.  If your blog is related to your legal practice area or law firm, I strongly recommend your blog be PART of your website.  For the technically minded, this means your blog is a subdirectory of your website rather than a subdomain (or totally different domain).

Examples for http://www.lawyerwebsite.com

• Domain name: lawyerwebsite.com
• Subdirectory setup:  http://www.lawyerwebsite.com/Blog (the hostname: lawyerwebsite.com)
• Subdomain setup:  http://Blog.lawyerwebsite.com  (the hostname here: blog.lawyerwebsite.com)
• Separate domains:  http://www.lawyerwebsite.com  and http://www.lawyerblog.com

A subdirectory is optimal because the search engines consider the blog content in a subdirectory as part of your main website domain.  That means the blog content contributes to the search engine optimization of your entire website.  On the other hand, if your blog is a subdomain or separate domain, your blog content does not count as content in your main lawyer website.

For example, if you have a website that you or your webmaster have optimized for the search engines and then you set up your blog on a subdomain or separate domain, your main website optimization efforts will not spill into your new blog.  However, if your blog is set up in a subdirectory, then all existing search engine optimization efforts will contribute to your blog (and vice versa).*

D.  Exceptions to setting up your law blog as a subdirectory – benefits of a completely separate blog

1. A benefit of setting up your blog on a totally separate domain (i.e www.joejustice.com) is you now have an external site from which you can do some link exchanges that you control.  I’ll be writing extensively about link exchange and building later.  For this article you need only know that an inbound link to your website is good for search engine optimization. Therefore, if you have two sites, you can create links to specific pages on each site.  Essentially, a separate domain gives you some control in creating inbound links.
2. Another possible benefit of setting up your lawyer blog on a totally separate domain is the situation where you’re trying to break into a new practice area.  If you are trying to establish a new practice are, you may not want to confuse prospective clients who visit your main website with your new practice area development.  If this is the case, then separating your blog and website on different domains is the smart move.  An example is this blog – thepaperlesslawyer.  It’s hosted on its own domain; it is not part of my firm’s website.  In fact neither mention the other.
3. If you’re part of a law firm – consider:
   • The firm may not want your blog integrated.  Okay, no problem, you separate it on its own domain.
   • More importantly, suppose you leave the firm in the future.  You will want to take your blog with you.  If it’s part of the firm’s domain, you might      have a bigger battle on your hands keeping what you created.  Keep control of your blog by getting your own domain if you have an uncertain future at a firm.

However, my recommendation for sole practitioners or lawyers securely settled a firm, is to integrate your law firm website with a law firm blog in a subdirectory format (i.e. both are in the same website).  The benefit of more content counting as part of your firm’s website outweighs any benefits of doing link exchanges between your website and blog.

Pros and Cons of having both a website and blog for your law firm

Pros of having both Law firm website and blog

• Potential for great search engine ranking.  I say potential because content alone is not sufficient.  You must optimize that content.
• Build credibility by writing and publishing in your practice area(s)
• Potential viral marketing opportunity with your blog posts using RSS feeds.
• BIG BENEFIT UNIQUE TO AN INTEGRATED WEBSITE AND BLOG: your integrated site can cycle blog content on your website homepage to create a live and fresh-looking website.
• Your main homepage content can remain the same while you cycle updated information in a column or somewhere on the homepage.
• Maintain traditional website navigation look and feel for your clients.
• Simplicity: anyone can add content to a blog.  You won’t need to pay your webmaster to add content (unless you don’t mind and couldn’t be bothered even logging into a blog platform).  The point is you don’t need to know any html or other coding language to add a blog post.  FYI: there’s website software that makes adding content very easy also.  More on this later in this “How to get a Great Law Firm Website” series.

Cons of having both a website and blog

• A blog is time consuming to keep content updated
• You’ll incur additional costs for technical integration (unless you learn to do-it-yourself).  However, once it’s integrated, unless your webmaster chose a terrible or complicated blogging platform, you’ll be able to add content easily yourself.
• You may also incur additional costs to revamp your website to include article title feeds on your homepage
• If you write bad content in your blog, you may actually harm your internet marketing efforts.  You must commit to writing or generating good content.

If you’re a lawyer in a firm and your future at that firm is less than certain, ensure your blog has its own domain owned by you, unless you’re officially writing for the firm’s blog.

In my view, a great lawyer or lawfirm website integrates the traditional elements of a website such as a static homepage, an about pages, services page, contact page, profiles, case results, etc. and blogging capability.  The benefits of integrating both website and blog for your law firm are huge … IF OPTIMIZED AND DONE WELL.

* Google won’t list all your subdomains in a search results page for a single search.  If very relevant, more than one subdomain may be listed.  Source: Matt Cutts’ blog post titled “Subdomains and Subdirectories“.  Matt Cutts is a software engineer for Google.

Related posts:

1. How to get a Great Lawyer Website or Law Firm Websites
2. Build Up Your Law Firm by Building Your Own Websites
3. WordPress and Joomla make Great Lawyer Websites

LinkedIn is an online professional networking website.  Once you register, colleagues, classmates, and just about anyone can find your LinkedIn profile.

LinkedIn search engine results are pretty impressive when searching a lawyer’s name and legal practice areas.

LinkedIn is a relationship-building online service that if used well, can result in many connections that can lead to more business for you and your law firm.  LinkedIn is also a great resource for hiring.

Read the following 35 LinkedIn tips, techniques and recommendations for improved social media and marketing results for lawyers and law firms:

Setting up LinkedIn

• Complete your profile as thoroughly as possible.  Include personal information.  The more information you provide the more potential points of connection with other people to build your network.  Of course, be judicious and don’t divulge sensitive and personal information.  Include present and past employment.
• Describe your work experience in as much detail as possible. Don’t simply list employers and experience.  Instead, be expansive by setting out duties, positions, responsibilities, awards, recognition, achievements, facts, figures, etc.  Don’t be modest.
• Connect with as many business associates as you can. Continue doing so to build your network.
• LinkedIn gets good Google results.  Use LinkedIn’s Google and other search engine popularity to your advantage by using keywords in both your profile and your content.  If you’re not sure what are good keywords, see what people search at Google Adwords keywords tool.  Use your legal practice area keywords and geographical areas extensively.
• Keep your profile up-to-date.
• Check your home page on LinkedIn often. It contains industry updates, news, and postings from associates.  The key to using LinkedIn and other social media is staying active.  You’re better to be active on one social media platform than inactive on several.
• Check the “index” option so your profile will be searched by the search engines.
• On company profiles, the top five most popular other profiles are displayed on the home page. Be aware of who your top five most popular profiles are because they will show other people with whom you associate.
• Choose the top five profiles who will link back to you for a reciprocal benefit.
• Update your status with useful content and information as much as possible.
• Customize your buttons. This will make your profile look more professional and give you more control.
• Keep in mind there are a limited number of characters in the profile fields.  You may want to do a few practice runs first before publishing.
• Customize your public profile’s URL so it’s easier to link to other pages and easier for people to remember it.
• People see the top of your summary first, so be certain you set out your vital information there.
• Enable the “show website” feature in your profile.
• Make sure the full view and websites options are also checked so that the information in your profile is public.
• Use the Q&A feature to ask others their opinion of your website, blog, services, etc.

Building a LinkedIn network

• Answer questions. Become respected and acknowledged as an expert in your legal area.
• Comment in the discussion forums as much as you can.  Contributing in forums is an outstanding way to become respected and acknowledged as an expert in your field.  Another great aspect of forum contribution is that your efforts will pay dividends in the long run because your answers will remain for other people to read going forward.
• Write extensively about your current business and legal practice areas.
• Be focused in building your network.  Plan who you want in your network and who you prefer not be included.
• Do not be friends with people just because they ask you. It looks odd for a lawyer to be friends with partying buddies from college. Leave the casual online friendships to Facebook.
• Monitor your network statistics.  If you don’t know the numbers, you don’t know whether your efforts are worthwhile.
• Compliment others when you’re speaking to them so that they reciprocate. It makes both of your profiles look much better.
• Become a recommended service by establishing a good reputation. People flock to people, companies, and services, including law firms that have the “recommended” status.
• Introduce yourself to other members. Don’t always wait for others to approach you first.
• Don’t be shy – ask others to recommend you if they have had experience with you.  Being recommended is terrific for your profile.
• Use the ‘groups’ feature to meet others, post feedback, and get a feel for what other lawyers and law firms are doing.

LinkedIn as a law firm marketing, hiring, and research resource

• Include your LinkedIn profile link in other places like Twitter, Digg, Facebook, your law firm websites and blogs, and other social media platforms you use.
• Use LinkedIn to find employees and associates.
• Include your law firm URL(s) somewhere in your profile.
• Ask other people in the community for advice. People are more than willing to answer questions.
• Use LinkedIn to study your legal competition.
• If you need a service, LinkedIn has its own services area where you can trade with others who are among the trusted network.
• LinkedIn is a targeted marketing platform, so be specific when selecting your industry and expertise.

Want to learn more about using LinkedIn?  Check out these LinkedIn books:

Related posts:

1. Website or Blog? What Should a Lawyer or Law Firm Use
2. How to get a Great Lawyer Website or Law Firm Websites

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