A Baker's Dozen Tips & Tricks for Law Firm Marketing
Content marketing is a proven strategy for developing business leads across all industries. However, not enough lawyers are taking advantage of this strategy to increase practice visibility and generate a steady stream of new cases.
Content marketing presents you with a unique opportunity – a way to overcome the confusing “legalese” and speak to your audience in a manner they can understand and relate to. How do you do that? We spoke with dozens of legal marketing experts from firms such as Platta Law and came up with the below baker's dozen tips and tricks to supercharge your content marketing efforts.
1. Optimize for Google's Featured Snippets Inclusion
“Optimizing your law firm’s blog posts and pages for Google’s Featured Snippets is an effective way to increase post visibility in Google search results. Why wouldn’t you want to be the go-to answer for someone’s query on Google? Snippets are at the very core of user intent, which lawyers should be seeking to directly address and answer.
Simply write your blog post, go back, synthesize the information into 2-3 core bullet points, and place it at the top of your post. Doing so is a great way for law firms to increase click-through rate (CTR) and traffic.”
By Owen Cook of BlockchainSEO
2. Be Sure To Leverage LinkedIn
“The number one place you want to dominate ASAP in 2019 is LinkedIn – the user base is exactly what you’re looking for, and LinkedIn’s organic reach is still very attractive relative to other platforms, and you should take advantage of that.
Start by taking a video of yourself addressing the most common client questions and misconceptions in your niche.
Strip the audio from the video so you can post it as a podcast (giving you an additional channel with no extra effort), and distribute the podcast and video to all of your social channels.
The video is your ‘macro' content, and your best customer engagement and results will be from chopping that video up into pieces for ‘micro' content, which is what you will post to your social media channels at least every day, but ideally 3+ times per day.
In addition, document what you do every day in pictures and video, and chop these up into more micro content. People who would consider hiring you want to see “behind the scenes” and get to know who you really are. Be your authentic self, and as Gary Vaynerchuk says, ‘document, don’t create.'”
By Devin Beverage of Dev Bev Co.
3. Outlandish Client Questions Make Great Marketing Content
“Our hack is that we add the dumbest questions we get asked to our FAQs. When a client does or says something mindboggling, it goes in the FAQ. These are the questions people Google but often hesitate to ask in person. Also, all the common questions have been addressed on competing sites. Not so many answer the question ‘how will it affect my divorce if I stalk my wife' or ‘does installing spyware on my spouse's phone look bad in court.' One of our old blog posts that did very well and got us some clients dealt with what constitutes harassment of a public servant, such as intentionally urinating or defecating in a police car.
‘Put that in the FAQ‘ is how lawyers in our firm acknowledge spectacularly terrible behavior by our clients, but it has been a solid organic marketing hack.”
By Joe Hoelscher of Hoelscher Gebbia Cepeda PLLC
4. Geo-Targeted Content Provides For Quicker Search Engine Traction
When it comes to content marketing, there are some best practices that law firms can take advantage of to get more leads for their practice.
Content marketing has the dual goal of attracting search engine traffic from Google and Bing while also being the primary content that drives social media.
In order to attract the ideal client using content, it's important to understand what they're searching for online. Since most law firms operate within a specific region, it's important to write content that can rank locally rather than nationally.
This one tactic is where many law firms fail in their content marketing. Instead of setting a local or statewide focus, they write to rank for national terms that their domain isn't strong enough to rank on the first page for.
It's better to adopt a content strategy that begins with the terms that clients are searching for in your general area first, and then expand to state and national terms after your site's authority has been established.”
By David Gafford of Fusion Creative
5. Keyword Research In Reverse
“Reverse engineer your keywords. Go to major review sites like Google, Yelp, and Facebook business pages and research the language that both happy and upset customers use to review other firms practices. Use their language to help you communicate your offerings in a way that your customers understand and relate to. It's fool-proof, the research is cost-free and it's a strategy your firm can implement immediately.”
By Lori Ramas of Relezant
6. KYC: Know Your Client
“The best hack is rooted in the 2 rules of business: know yourself, know your customer. Too often content marketers try to target people, when they need to target a person. There’s a quote from a man considered the grandfather of advertising, Claude Hopkins, who said ‘we cannot go after thousands of [customers] until we learn how to win one.' It’s this principle that needs to be applied to content marketing. Understand one person. Know exactly what they’re looking for and create an article that provides value in their life.”
By Joe Martin of Martin Creative
7. Cater To Your Niche
“One of my biggest tips for law firms is to study your market. If you're a firm that specializes in elder law, social security, or another area in which the demographic tends to be older, Facebook would be the best platform. If you're a firm that focuses on DUI's, OVI's, and other areas in which you see a younger demographic, a platform like Instagram may extend your reach. Because the general public doesn't tend to voluntarily follow a law firm on social media, it's best to use at least some paid tactics like boosted Facebook posts and sponsored Instagram posts to gain a following while also supplementing with organic posts.”
By Kaylee Anchulis of Tittle & Perlmuter
8. Positive Reviews Lead To Positive Marketing Results
“Organic tactics are the lifeblood of our marketing strategies. As cliché as it may sound the best marketing a firm can have is to be in the top three listings on google. Similar to what Mr. Ryan B. Bormaster wrote in his article for Free Press, it is imperative to focus webpages and SEO settings to target your lead pool effectively. Reviews are even more important for trial attorneys, I’ve managed to attain sixty five-star ratings. I know for a fact that this has helped me get clients as I do ask what brought them to my firm, the number one answer was ‘you’re the highest rated in the area.'”
By John D. Pascoe of Pascoe Law Firm
9. Who's Your Perfect Client?
“Legal practices share many of the ‘funnel-filling' problems that other ‘one-and-done' service providers: Customers and clientele don't feel the need to have ‘their own law firm' on speed dial for ongoing services – they feel they will only need a Lawyer on certain occasions. How do you, therefore, stick out in people's minds for when they are ready to look for a service?
Zero in on what you do best, what has been most profitable for you in the past, and build the persona of a ‘perfect client'. Then market to them, directly. Marketing is an ongoing exercise, so ensure that your content speaks to that Perfect Customer, and show how you can fill their possible future needs better than your competition.
Choose your platforms and messages based on your perfect client, and ensure that you ‘give before you take'.”
By Steve James, Marketing Consultant
10. Be Sure To Leverage Google Search Console
“When you're developing content for marketing purposes, be sure to utilize Google Search Console in your process. Once you've added your website property to this free Google feature, you'll be able to visualize important KPIs (e.g., click-through-rates, average search ranking, impressions, etc.) to understand how consumers are interacting with your website and your content. From there, you can begin to optimize your content for search engines which will make it easier for consumers to find and view your content, which means more leads for your business. For instance, if you were a law firm in the Denver area and utilized Google Search Console, you might find that your website content is missing vital keywords that Denver residents may use to find law firms, like “denver area lawyer” or “best attorneys in Denver.” Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a vital part of any content marketing strategy and by utilizing Google Search Console, you can begin to optimize your content to acquire more leads.”
By Niles Koenigsberg of FiG Advertising + Marketing
11. Don't Forget Earned Content
“In addition to creating high quality ‘owned' content, many law firms forget about ‘earned' content. Investing time and money into proven link building strategies like submitting guest blogs to online legal directories and media publications is a great way to generate more traffic — and ultimately leads — by boosting your organic domain authority in the SERPs. Lots of online sites are looking for authoritative legal experts to weigh in on important topics. Attorneys should try to offer their expertise as often as possible to websites that are open and receptive.”
By Lance Buchanan of Enjuris
12. Online Legal Shopping? Yes.
“The most important ‘content‘ any law firm website should have is transparent pricing, ideally in the form of flat fee packages, accompanied by a submission form through which clients can immediately hire the firm. If a firm's call-to-action is to ‘get a quote‘ or ‘call for a free consultation,' many potential clients will look elsewhere. The legal field is not immune to the universal desire for upfront pricing and a smooth purchase process. Online shopping carts are not just for ecommerce and software anymore.”
By Jeremy Peter Green of JPG Legal
13. Appeal To Emotion
“No matter how successful your law firm might offline, online, you won't get far without the right content marketing approach that appeals to your clients' emotions. Find their most significant needs and wants. I refer to them as ‘pain points.' Use online forums, like Quora or Reddit for fresh ideas. These pain points lead naturally to topics and topic clusters potential clients use when searching online. Speaking directly to the needs of your clients lets you reach them on an emotional level.”
By Bradley Shaw of SEO Expert Brad Inc.
