Are You Paying to Market Your Law Firm or Their Marketing Firm?

I get it, there's comfort in face to face relationships. You just finished your educational session at a major legal conference and proceed to walk into the exhibit hall, where you greet an array of Lawyer Internet Marketing vendors pitching you on the latest and greatest products and services.

Most lawyers, who have been buying products and services in the same way for years, will select one of the 3-4 Internet marketing vendors within these halls to handle their online marketing. Why? For the same reason you are willing to pay double at the supermarket, for a product with the exact same ingredients, but different labels. It is the power of branding.

By experiencing their brand in person, you gain a sense of added comfort. If they are at this event, they must really be experts in their trade. They are tangible and real, there is comfort in the fact that you have shaken hands with them and thus they have created the perception of added trust, credibility and work product quality.

I believe in branding, but I also believe that brand power is dying. We see this today in supermarkets, through the increased dominance of store brand products and there is no reason to think that this trend away from big brands will diminish.

The reason for this is that the Internet is educating consumers at an extraordinary rate. People are sharing information like never before and there is an increased surge in demand for true value over hyperbole.

I always go back to referencing Honda. They do not have the best marketing in the industry, but they have the best product. They succeeded in communicating this value to their clients and the rest is history... that is until Hyundai came along and started giving them a real run for their money on value...

Back to the big attorney tradeshows. There is a price to pay for shaking hands with those marketers. That price is exhibit fees, travel costs, sales and marketing staff overhead, sponsorship fees and additional high operational expenses - all of which have to be passed on to YOU.

You will not get to shake my hand at conferences because the way law firms are buying is changing and we are on the cutting edge of this trend. All of our promotion today is done via the Internet and direct e-mail. We leverage a stellar offshore delivery team that is extremely talented and can deliver results that are equal to or better than anyone else you will find in the business today. Simply put, there is no more efficient model than ours available today.

You may not have the that same warm and cushy feeling until we handle an Internet marketing project for your firm. We fully expect to see a backlash from every marketing company out there that is comfortably used to charging you 2 to 3 times more than you should be paying and everyone else that is profiting from this.

Mom and Pop stores all over the country kicked and threw mud when Wal-Mart came in and changed the face of retail in America. You know who didn't hate it? The customer, who received superior value. Similarly, established online marketing companies ("the overchargers" and their supporters and partners will likely throw mud at us. Like Wal-Mart, our #1 focus is delivering maximum value to our clients and at the end of the day, results come down to basic finance that we can measure and no detractor can deny.

YOU SPEND LESS WITH US FOR MORE LEADS - PERIOD.

Our vision is to change the online legal marketing landscape in the same way that Wal-Mart changed retail. We promise that once you see how your fees compare to your results, you will never want to work with another Internet marketing vendor. Visit LitigatorEdge today.

Top 10 List Why Lawyers Should Market Online

10) High return on investment
9) Minimal Risk
8) It is fun seeing your relevant keyword phrases in the top 5 organic search results of Google
7) It is more fun seeing your Web site in the top 5 organic search of Google for over 50 relevant keyword phrases and watching the leads coming in
6) Watching your peers' jaws drop when you tell the story of how you once spent only a few dollars on pay per click and found a client for a major toxic tort case
5) Internet clients are more likely to swamp you with e-mails than calls
4) Your great-grandchildren will one day enjoy reading your Articles and Blogs
3) Google's spiders will enjoy reading your articles and blogs and will reward you with higher search engine results
2) Show your competitors that you are young and hip

...and the number one reason lawyers should market online

1) Watching your top competitor's grin disappear when LitigatorEdge helps you leapfrog his/her search engine rankings for a favorite keyword phrase

If Search is King, then Content is its Queen

Any law firm that targets a consumer client base and wants to be a major online player over the next 10 years should read this post very carefully:

By now, you probably don't need anyone explaining the value of being at the top of search engine results pages for keywords relevant to your area of practice. If you're only focused on traditional media and rely on referrals, know that there are firms in your geographical area generating tens of millions of dollars in verdicts and settlements using the Internet and they are not spending millions to drive this business through their Web sites.

Now, unless you do something about it, these firms will likely continue to generate this traffic and the more they learn about Internet marketing and the more consumers use the Internet to find law firms, the larger the competitive gap will get between the top online marketers and everyone else and the harder it will be to catch up.

Why is the gap getting larger?

OK, here's the scoop. Google loves content and also loves links to your site from relevant Web sites with content. What is one of the best ways that is completely within your control, to generate quality links back to your site? Writing and submitting online articles that are relevant to your area of expertise and having them linking back to your Web site.

That's right... Quality Content -> Quality Back Links -> High Rankings

While Google can change the rules whenever it pleases, this is the general law of the land in SEO and while it may be tweaked here and there, no one expects it to deviate radically.

So, it will be very difficult to dislodge firms with significant content and links from their positions of search engine dominance. The good news is that the online content world for law firms is still in its relative infancy and only a few firms have really grasped its long term value.

If you want your firm to climb to the top for your favorite keywords and stay there, contact me today and I will explain how we can help. Just make sure that you don't come to see me after they have stopped publishing the Yellow Pages, OK?

Offshoring: Necessity, not Choice

No one enjoys offshoring. It involves inconvenient change, can be challenging to manage and has a number of inherent risks. Nevertheless, the competitive advantages gained in the form of cost-savings and increased productivity cannot be ignored.

Let's imagine two identical competing plaintiff's law firms, each with $2.5 Million in annual revenues, $2.0 Million in expenses, including a marketing budget of $225,000.

Now, envision this: one firm saves $200,000 a year in operating expenses by offshoring redundant legal support functions, as well as some document production and research. They reallocate the entire amount to marketing. This firm now has a $425,000 annual marketing budget.

Normally, the firm would dedicate 20% of the marketing budget to online marketing ($85,000 of the new budget of $425,000). The firm has also offshored part of its online marketing efforts, so instead of spending $85,000, they are now spending $40,000 for the same results. The firm chooses to reinvest the $45,000 in savings and more than double its online marketing investment. The end result is the marketing budget equivalent of $470,000, versus the original $225,000 budget.

Offshoring is here. Your competition is hoping you find it too inconvenient to act.

Things to know about SEO

Search Engine Optimization (SEO), as defined by Wikipedia, is "the process of improving the volume or quality of traffic to a Web site from search engines via "natural" ("organic" or "algorithmic") search results. Typically, the earlier a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine. SEO may target different kinds of search, including image search, local search, and industry-specific vertical search engines."

Few quick facts to keep in mind as you explore a search engine optimization campaign:

- No matter what anyone tells you, the return on investment (ROI) of SEO is untouchable IF you select the right company, with the right expertise, at the right price

- Firms that guarantee results are typically not firms you want to go with. Many distort information by guaranteeing first page Google listings for keywords that look appealing but do not generate considerable traffic. Go with firms offering both competitive pricing and expertise. I personally prefer working with tech background delivery resources - they often take great pride in keeping up with Google algorithms and are highly metrics driven.

- Meaningful results on search engines take 6-12 months.

- Once you have selected the right company, picking the appropriate keywords for your specific practice is 90% of the battle - spend a lot of time on this.

- Remember that Google represents an overwhelming majority of the entire search market today, with Yahoo being a distant second. You have to optimize your site for Google - it's virtually the only game in town today and only getting stronger.

- Listen to your SEO company when they give you Web site advice (coding language, layout, keywords, specific content - every SEO campaign has significant Web site specific and non Web site specific elements)

- Once the on site modifications are complete, and assuming your firm knows what they are doing, your results will be driven by the amount of effort put in by your firm. Know what you are getting in terms of hours. The best firms can accomplish almost anything with enough resources (maybe short of knocking Google off first place for the term "Google" on the Google search engine...)

- Monitor your ROI as soon as leads start flowing

To learn more about how you can increase your financial return on your SEO please visit www.litigatoredge.com

Announcing LitigatorEdge Business Launch

The Internet is the great equalizer. Large plaintiff's law firms with huge networks and equally large budgets will find it increasingly more challenging to dominate lead generation. Blogs, social networking and strategic pay per click and search engine optimization campaigns are helping progressive firms capture a growing share of Internet lead traffic. Armies of smaller and more nimble firms will inevitably steal leads away, by being more strategic about their approach to online marketing.

LitigatorEdge was founded to help its clients stay ahead of the curve through cost-effective, high caliber online marketing capabilities. We are currently only accepting up to 5 law firm clients per metro area, due to competing keyword interests, but may accept additional firms that are only looking to target a niche case type or geographical location.

For more information please visit www.litigatoredge.com