A Guide to Understanding Internet Advertising for Lawyers
During the nearly quarter-century that the internet has existed, the ways it has been harnessed for commercial interests has been diverse and impressive. One of the prime modes of online commerce quickly grew to be marketing, because regardless of the reasons one is on the internet, advertising drives the revenue of most content-serving sites, making it a bonanza for those who want to increase the visibility of their businesses. It was only a matter of time before this was extended into more traditional professions like medicine and the law.
Today, online legal marketing is a major resource for attorneys and a cornerstone in any plan to generate more referrals as you build your firm. There are a variety of elements that go into a successful legal marketing plan, though, and it is important that you know how to use each of them to their best effect, as well as how they come together to make an effective marketing strategy.
Your Attorney Website
This is possibly the most obvious area to get working on, but how to make it work might be less obvious. Most people realize that they need a page or a site. What they do not always realize is what makes a page or site rank well in Google—in other words, what makes it visible. There are a few things that help this, but the most important ones are what kind of content you have and how often it is updated. Search engines prefer information that is refreshed regularly, and they also rank sites more highly when certain search keywords are prevalent.
Research the keywords that fit your niche and location, and work out a schedule for refreshing your site that will keep pertinent pages ranking highly. It’s also work considering adding resource pages that can rank for individual keywords for each practice area, and to rotate them into your rewrite order.
Photo/Nodar Kherkheulidze via wikimedia commons
Email and Newsletters
One of the most effective forms of online marketing for any business is to cultivate an email list or newsletter. Some resources even claim that this is the most effective method of online marketing overall, but not all resources agree. What they do all agree on is that this is a powerful form of communication that works in practically any industry by helping to keep clients engaged.
Social Media
If email is your way to stay in touch with older clients and to build referrals from their social networks, social media is your way to reach new people. If you run a blog or host resource pages on your website, it can be a great way to spread that information as well, and search engines use traffic to a site as a factor in rankings, so views from social media help there too!
Blogging
Need something to share on social media? Produce content. Legal bloggers are also available to write commissioned articles that fit your practice niche on your behalf, so this does not have to be a process that keeps you busy. Instead, you can take to the blog as you wish while still producing relevant content for potential clients through a hired blogger. Many legal bloggers are lawyers themselves, making it easy for them to build content that suits your needs.
Pay Per Click Advertising
Last but not least, do not be afraid to buy ad space. Advertising is one of the most effective ways to get your name out there, and internet advertising is a very effective way to make sure the right potential clients find the right resource pages, since you can link to any location page on your site if you wish. The reason it is so effective is simple: you only pay for the actual clicks that get users onto your site, not every ad impression your page makes. That way, you have an easier time controlling costs and seeing a return on your investment.
If you need to get your legal marketing strategy in order today, you need a partner who can help you build and maintain each of these elements of a successful legal marketing plan. That way, you can reach your potential clients easily.
Author: Lolita Di
