Choosing The Best Social Media Platform For Your Brand

Here’s a question that’ll give you a deer-in-the-headlights look: what social media platform should you focus on?

You’ve heard a little bit about Twitter, you use Facebook to keep up with your friends and family, and you watch YouTube everyday, but how can you use any of these platforms to advertise your legal services?

That’s not the only question you have about social media. I’m sure you’ve asked yourself one or more of the following:

  • Can I be on more than one platform?
  • How do I get more people to follow me on this platforms?
  • What if I don’t do it right?
  • How do I find time to post on social media when I’m already busy as it is?

If you’ve asked any of the above questions, this post is tailor-made for you. We’ll tackle all of them (and more). By the end of this post, you’ll be confident in which social media platform to choose and how to work it like a boss. Are you ready? Let’s do this!

[Tweet “Find out where your ideal client lives (online) and set up shop there.”]
Would you like an example of law-related brands that get it right on social media? Subscribe to receive this extra resource.

Here’s some totally non-creepy advice: find out where your ideal client lives (online) and set up shop there.

If you’re focused on corporate, tax, or labor law, your clients are probably on the social platform LinkedIn. LinkedIn is for professionals who are looking to hire for their companies. That’s why it would make sense to be there if your law firm services businesses and not individuals.

On the other hand, if you’re focused on individuals and not businesses, you’ll find more success on platforms like Facebook. Family law, personal injury, and bankruptcy lawyers can do well with a representation on Facebook.

We’ll go into more detail a little further down below.

Can I be on more than one platform?

Absolutely. You can be on one or five. That said, you don’t want to spread yourself too thin. It takes time and effort to make posts for each platform. If your target client doesn’t exist on a specific platform, there’s no need to be there, no matter how popular that site is.

For example, if your client is all corporate all the time, there’s no need to be on a personal-leaning platform like Instagram.

How do I grow my list of fans and followers?

You’ll grow your list of people who follow you by posting valuable information and doing so consistently.

Don’t post sporadically. If you post multiple times per day every day for two weeks and then go dark for two months, you’ll lose a lot of subscribers when you decide to post again. Why? Because they’ll forget who you are and wonder why you’re posting in their feed—or they’ll just unsubscribe after your lengthy absence because they figure you’ve left for good.

Also, engagement matters. You can’t just post a bunch of self-promotion about you and your law firm. You should take the time to interact with your followers. Answer their questions, even if they’re not directed directly at you.

What if I don’t do it right?

Unless you infuse politics, religion, and too many cat pictures in your social updates, you’re going to be fine. Scratch that last part—there’s never enough cat pictures on the Internet.

bullet-cats

Image Courtesy of Know Your Meme

The most important thing to remember in your social strategy is to provide value to your fans and followers.

What does this mean for a law firm? Discuss current topics, especially those related to your area of practice. Are you an immigration attorney? Highlight human interest stories in the media that may inform or entertain your followers. Are you a labor attorney? Your audience may enjoy a series of visual infographics that illustrate (and make plain) current labor laws.

Remember: Don’t aggressively tout your services. Give as much information as you can. They’ll crave more.

How do I find time to post when I’m already busy as it is?

For just about every social media platform, there’s a scheduling service that can help you automate your posts. We’ll highlight them below.

Twitter

You have 140 characters or less to say something epic. The average Twitter user is between the ages of 18-49 with a college degree. Slightly more men are on Twitter.

Types of lawyers who should consider this medium:
Bankruptcy, Business (Corporate), Civil Rights, Criminal, Entertainment, Environmental, Family, Health, Immigration, Intellectual Property, Labor, Personal Injury, Real Estate, Tax

Why you should consider this medium:
Twitter is great for connecting with other lawyers, sharing inspiration with your followers, and providing quick bursts of useful information.

When to post: 1pm – 3pm Monday through Thursday and Sunday

post-planner

Image Courtesy of Post Planner

When not to post: 8pm – 9am everyday and Fridays after 3pm

How often: three times a day to as much as you’d like

Best practices:
+Use Buffer or Hootsuite to automatically post, even when you’re away from your computer.
+Ask questions and post polls to encourage interaction.
+Use a lot of #hashtags (around five is the sweet spot).
+Follow new people every day to grow your potential followers. Use Twitter’s “who to follow” recommendations to find more people who’ll love your content.
+Favorite retweets to show your gratitude.

Facebook

Approximately one out of every seven people on earth have a Facebook profile. That’s reason enough to create a business profile here.

Types of lawyers who should consider this medium:
Bankruptcy, Civil Rights, Criminal, Entertainment, Environmental, Family, Health, Immigration, Intellectual Property, Labor, Personal Injury, Real Estate, Tax

Why you should consider this medium:
Use Facebook to grow your community, promote events, and help explain complicated subject matter. There are a lot of people on Facebook, so it’s a good place to start no matter what type of law you practice.

When to post: 1pm – 4pm Mondays through Thursday

When not to post: 8pm – 8am or on Saturdays

optimizely

Image Courtesy of Optimizely

How often: No more than five times per day

Best practices:
+Ask questions.
+Include photos with every post to grab people’s attention.
+Upload a cover photo that shows off who you are.
+Keep your posts to 40 characters or less.

sumall

Image Courtesy of Sumall

Instagram

This visual medium appeals to the young crowd (under 30). It’s used mostly by women in urban areas.

Types of lawyers who should consider this medium:
Criminal, Entertainment, Family, Immigration, Intellectual Property, Personal Injury

Why you should consider this medium:
Instagram is all about visual stimulation. Use this platform to share daily inspirational quotes, post behind-the-scenes images, and share a day in your life. You can also post graphics that illustrate a complicated law or idea.

When to post: Daily

When not to post: n/a

How often: Two times per day

Best practices:
+Hashtags are your friend. Use them to get discovered in organic search.
+Follow hashtag trends and engage in the conversation.
+Encourage user-generated content by asking your followers to post under specific themes with your personalized hashtag.
+Use captions for clarity.
+Follow those who follow you and like your posts.
+Use high quality images.
+Use services like Schedugram, Onlypult, and Latergram to schedule out your Instagram posts.

YouTube

The largest demographic on YouTube is between the ages of 25 to 44. It’s highly targeted to millennials, though.

Types of lawyers who should consider this medium:
Bankruptcy, Business (Corporate), Civil Rights, Criminal, Entertainment, Environmental, Family, Health, Immigration, Intellectual Property, Labor, Personal Injury, Real Estate, Tax

Why you should consider this medium:
YouTube is the second-largest search engine in the world. It also serves as a wonderful discovery engine. Your client can reach you simply by typing in keywords like “bankruptcy law for Florida.” As long as you’ve added this term to your video, you’ll pop up in the search results.

When to post: Monday-Wednesday: 2pm-4pm EST

Thursday-Friday: Noon-3pm EST

Saturday-Sunday:  9am-11am EST

trackmaven

Image Courtesy of TrackMaven

When not to post:

Over the holidays (July 4th, Thanksgiving, Christmas, end of December and beginning of January)

hypebot

Image Courtesy of Hypebot

How often: It’s more about consistency than how many per week

Best practices:
+Keep your videos under three minutes long.
+Unless your law firm is moonlighting as a sitcom, don’t include a long intro with a theme song. It’s a waste of your three minutes.
+Post on a regular schedule, whether that’s once per week or specific days each week.
+Respond to comments.
+Film your video in landscape mode, not portrait.

Pinterest

Approximately 69% of Pinterest users are women. Sorry James Brown: on Pinterest, it’s a woman’s world.

Types of lawyers who should consider this medium:
Bankruptcy, Family

Why you should consider this medium:

If most of your clients are women or families, you should definitely consider creating a profile on Pinterest. It may even be a good idea to pay for promoted pins (this is a paid ad on Pinterest).

When to post: 2pm – 4pm and 8pm – 1am

When not to post: 5pm – 7pm

How often: Five posts per day

Best practices:
+Add a thorough description on your pins (this is what they call a post on Pinterest) to make it easy for people to find you.
+Vertical images are better than horizontal.
+Use Tailwind, Viraltag, and Viralwoot to schedule your pins on Pinterest.

tailwind

Image Courtesy of Tailwind

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is the social platform for professionals, most between the ages of 30-64. It’s strictly business here.

Types of lawyers who should consider this medium:
Business (Corporate), Entertainment, Intellectual Property, International, Labor, Real Estate, Tax

Why you should consider this medium:
LinkedIn is the best place to reach businesses who may need your service.

When to post: 7am to 9am and 5pm to 6pm Tuesday through Thursday

When not to post: 10pm to 6am and the weekends

coschedule

Image Courtesy of Coschedule

How often: One post per day Monday through Friday

Best practices:
+Give endorsements and get endorsements.
+Write posts on your legal discipline to increase your expert status. +Focus on writing how-to and list-based articles.
+Add photos and videos to spice up your posts.
+Join legal groups.
+Don’t include #hashtags (it’s not useful).

Overall Tips

+Interact with your audience whenever possible. Respond to comments.
+Use the 80/20 rule. Post helpful content 80% of the time, and market yourself 20% of the time.
+Only focus on the social platforms that provide you with the most engagement.
+Create a consistent visual brand on your social media platforms. Check out this post for more details on how to build a visual identity.

Final Thoughts

Choosing the perfect social media platform isn’t so hard now that you’ve got this guide to help you out. Remember that there’s not a one-size-fits-all solution for your legal practice, and you may have to experiment with different platforms to see which one gives you the best results. If you need extra guidance, we’re here to help you every step of the way.

Would you like an example of law-related brands that get it right on social media? Subscribe to receive this extra resource.

How To Build A Visual Identity For Your Law Firm

It may be unfair and hopelessly shallow, but clients will judge you based on how you look. You know to dress the part in the courtroom, but what about your website and social media presence? Does it look like you: polished, professional, and worthy of a client’s trust?

Be honest. Be brutal. Your clients will be.

A strong brand identity relies on the fine balance of cohesion, presentation, and personality.

There’s a sea of law firms out there that look either out of touch or overly generic. In fact, I’m pretty sure some of these law firms just copy and paste their entire visual identity from other brands. Yikes.

That may be okay (it’s not okay) for fly by night, side-eye worthy amateurs, but not you. You’re the best, and you’ve got to look the best, or no one else will know it, except for me and your mother.

By the end of this post, you’ll learn exactly how to create a visual identity that looks smart, savvy, and purposeful. This visual identity will make your brand more memorable and more trustworthy. Ready to get started? Let’s go!

Psst… Would you like to get 12 tools for creating a stunning visual brand? Subscribe to receive this free resource.

What message would you like to convey?

Here is the best place to start. Would you live to cultivate a friendly persona or an intellectual one? They aren’t mutually exclusive, however you’re looking for the dominant tone in your visual identity.

Perhaps it’s best to think of your ideal client. Are you in family law? Are you an entertainment attorney? Do you work primarily in real estate? Your target clientele shifts depending on what type of law you specialize in. Keeping that client in mind, you can create a brand identity that reaches and relates to them.

[Tweet “You can create a brand identity that reaches and relates to them.”]

How can a law firm that specializes in entertainment be satisfied with a dated and bland visual identity? Or, how can a firm that focuses on family law create a visual identity that’s aloof and unsympathetic?

Actually, it’s easy and a lot of brands do it unintentionally. However, it’s also easy to create a visual identity that deliberately gives off the vibe you wish to present. Let’s take a look at the components that create your visual identity.

The Components of Your Visual Identity:

Color

Color has a profound impact on us. One color can make us feel calm, another can make us feel creative. Studies show that the color called drunk tank pink can actually reduce violent and hostile behavior. There’s little doubt that color influences our psychology.

This is why you need to think about what colors to use in your visual branding. Each color affects us differently. Depending on the message you’d like to convey, use a corresponding color to subtly but effectively echo it.

Here’s a breakdown of each color and how the brain interprets it:

Green – Fresh, Organic, Natural, Eco-friendly, Gentle

Blue – Trustworthy, Secure, Peaceful, Calm, Loyal

Purple – Creative, Unique, Vibrant, Luxurious, Royal

Yellow – Friendly, Excited, Positive, Joyful, Energetic

Orange – Playful, Warm, Cheerful, Social, Confident

Red – Passionate, Bold, Strong, Dynamic, Brave

Pink – Feminine, Sweet, Compassionate, Affectionate, Caring

Brown – Reliable, Approachable, Stable, Dependable, Practical

Gray – Modern, Neutral, Conservative, Futuristic, Advanced

Black – Sophisticated, Traditional, Classic, Powerful, Elegant

White – Pure, Good, Clean, Honest, Open

You’ll probably want a combination of two or three colors to create a unique and intentional visual identity. For example, the color combinations of blue and gray say modern yet trustworthy, while brown and pink say dependable and compassionate.

Do you need help deciding which colors should represent you? Browse the most loved color palettes of all time over at ColourLovers. Pick up inspiration by the user-submitted color palettes and use it to jump-start your brand identity.

Graphics

Graphics are a huge part of visual branding. Along with color, graphics are an immediate way to communicate your brand’s unique identity. This includes images, photos, icons, infographics, and other visual elements.

As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. If you want to immediately impress your firm’s identity, personality, and tone, you need to intersperse graphical elements into your online content.

On your general website, your blog, and your social media accounts, use graphics to craft a uniquely identifiable visual brand.

When you post an image on your blog or social media accounts, make sure that it:

  • includes your brand logo. In case your image goes viral, you want to leave your calling card.
  • continues the same look and feel as the rest of your brand. Consistency is important for developing a strong visual identity.
  • supports the text if on your blog. Your image should make sense and emphasize the blog post.
  • is high quality. There’s nothing worse than a tiny image that your visitors have to squint to see.

Where to Find Images

Speaking of high quality, there’s no reason to settle for cheesy images when there’s plenty of free and amazing stock libraries on the web. Check out this list of my favorite stock images (and subscribe for even more resources).

Be sure to check the license and usage requirements. Most of these sites require no attribution, but terms can change at any moment.

Logo

Your logo is the best way to instantly impress who you are as a brand. Think of your logo as a first introduction. It can immediately convey the tone and personality of your brand before your client has an opportunity to look at your services, testimonials, or blog posts.

Because your logo represents your brand, don’t go ordinary and buy a template that every other law firm uses. To really stand out, commission an original logo from a reputable logo designer. Find designers, and their portfolios, on Dribbble or Logopond.

Fonts

Check out Creative Fabrica for awesome free fonts!

Last, but not least, is your font choice. Your font says a lot about your brand identity. It can say that you’re fun and hip or serious and staid.
Font libraries like Fontspace and 1001 Fonts let you search for fonts based on the type of mood you’d like to convey. Simply type in “classic” or “modern” to find the perfect font for your brand.

Put it to Work

Now that you’ve been introduced to the four components to your visual identity, it’s time to put it to work on your blog and social media platforms. Here’s how:

Your blog

Be sure to include an image on each and every blog post you write. Not only will it provide visual interest to your post, it will subtly reiterate your brand identity.

Facebook

One in seven people on earth use Facebook. No doubt some of your clients use this popular platform. Take advantage of the cover photo as a prime opportunity to reinforce your brand message.

LinkedIn

With 300 million monthly users, LinkedIn is a powerful marketing tool. Use a professional image here to represent your brand.

Twitter

On Twitter, use the header photo as another opportunity to brand just like on Facebook.

Pinterest

Not on Pinterest? Pins last longer than Facebook posts, and can greatly expand your marketing reach. On Pinterest, use similar cover images to create a consistent visual branding.

Psst… Would you like to get 12 tools for creating a stunning visual brand? Subscribe to receive this free resource.

Final Thoughts

To create a visual identity that mirrors your brand message, remember to ask yourself what your clients need and expect from you. Once you understand what that is, use these tips to build your visual identity.

Don’t forget to download our extra set of recommended tools to help you create a winning visual brand identity for your law firm.

Slow Drip Is Better Than A Big Splash: Consistency Is King

Lately we have received several questions revolving around the difficulty of maintaining a consistent marketing presence without having to spend all day doing marketing instead of client work.

Most attorneys have heard the advice that they need a consistently updated marketing presence, but you’re already busy with your client cases and maintaining the business. Taking time away from the work that pays the bills to “work on marketing” is a tough ask without even considering that most of the time, it’s not always clear what needs to be updated or how often.

Here at AmazeLaw, we’re trying to take the generic guru-ish marketing advice that experts spout like gospel, and deconstruct it to teach attorneys what it really means and how they can use that advice to grow their firm.

The point of this post is to show you what consistency really means and how mastering it can benefit your business. Not only will we tell you what consistency online can do for you but we will also help you to keep up online while you keep up with your busy schedule.

What does it mean to be consistent?

What it means to be consistent varies depending on the activity, but the general goal, is that any time a prospective client stumbles upon your firm, either through your website, a facebook page, a tweet, etc, it needs to look like you’re on top of your marketing.

There are some technical reasons why this is beneficial, but let’s focus on the feels.

As a prospective client of your firm, I want to know that I’m going to be working with someone that I can relate to. Someone that’s on top of the latest trends in the area of my problem. And having marketing that’s up to date checks both of those boxes for me. And as a tip, another signal it sends, is that you’re not an overwhelmed solo. It shows a position of friendly strength. That you can afford to spend time teaching people about your craft because you’re good at what you do and you’re confident in it.

Consistency online helps to build professionalism, clarity, and trust from your viewers while also boosting your google standings. When your viewers are on your pages and you have only updated some of the content or haven’t updated in a really long time it looks as if you don’t care about the details.  As a solo the details can make or break a referral so keeping up online sends a message to your current and potential clients.  Your viewers will respond well to your commitment to be consistent online and take it as a sign that you are willing to commit to their issues and build a bond of trust.

So now you know you have to be consistent but you need to know how consistent do you need to be with each avenue that you have online. Does that mean every day? Every week? Every month? Well, it depends on the activity, so let’s break it down.

Social Media

Putting content on your social media posts can be simple and easy. An original thought everyday. Do you have more than one? Post it! Do you want to promote something more than once? Schedule it! Social media is a way to draw the attention of everyday viewers into things that you are mutually interested in. The idea behind social media is to constantly be grabbing the attention of  people online. Social should be part of your everyday morning routine. Get up, stop at Dunkin Donuts, get to the office, POST.

But it’s easy to say “Do social media every day!” That’s where most gurus stop. We put together a detailed 20-minute daily marketing plan, so check it out and commit to it for just one week.  

Blogging

Ah blogging, ranking second just behind social media for the buzzwordiest marketing advice that never gets into the details.

We’ll cover a simple plan to get you started in a few seconds, but let’s talk about what consistency means when it comes to blogging.

First off, the idea isn’t necessarily to drive a ton of traffic to your site today (though it’s possible and can be a nice side benefit), the idea is to build up your blog like a long-term savings account. And the easiest way to do that, is to make small weekly deposits. Over time your bank account (your website) will grow enough to the point that it has a large number of pages. And just like compounding interest, as a site grows and ages, it’s ability to attract more traffic increases as well.

We recommend weekly blog posts, mostly because it makes it easier to keep up with. Two weeks in between posts and you’ll get out of the groove, and blogging will remain that “activity I’ll get to later when I have lots of free time.” Twice a week can work even better, but we’re also trying to be realistic. It’s hard to set aside that much time every week.

Pick your slow day of the week if you have one. Friday is my favorite. Make a recurring weekly appointment on Friday morning (avoid the afternoon because we all know what happens to tasks relegated for Friday afternoon) to draft a blog post.

I would allocate an hour.  And all you do is spend one hour answering one common question you get from clients in the simplest terms possible. It might feel like you’re giving away your secret sauce. You’re not. The clients that take your info and try to run with it on their own, were never going to be clients anyways. The clients that look at it and say, “Whoah, she knows what she’s talking about and I really don’t have the time or the expertise to handle this on my own” are the clients you’ll love.

Alright, back to it, spend one hour answering one of your common client questions. The headline can be verbatim what clients usually ask, i.e. “How often should I update my will and what should I be looking out for?”

If you’re happy with the post after that hour, go ahead and post it you’re done. If you think it’s a bit rough, put it away and schedule 20 minutes of time on Monday to edit it.  You’ll find that having a weekend for the thoughts to settle in your head can really add to the clarity of your answers.

There’s no rocket science to blogging, and we could go into all sorts of advanced advice, but that plan will make it easy to get started, and could provide you many months of great blog posts.

Email Marketing

There aren’t many firms out there that are using email marketing to their advantage. And in an industry where you’re typically not needed until you’re really really needed, having a medium that puts you in front of prospective clients on an ongoing basis can be key to making sure that you’re top of mind when they do have the need.

We’ll be posting an epic email marketing tutorial soon that will go over all of the how’s and why’s of email marketing, but for the sake of completeness, we recommend that you’re emailing your list anywhere from once to twice a month.  More than that, and it’ll be tough to keep your newsletters stocked with great content, and any less and your list will go stale. Meaning your readers will start ignoring your emails, or perhaps even forget why they’re getting the email in the first place.

Don’t have an email list yet? Don’t worry, we’ll get to that soon. Better yet, sign up for our marketing bootcamp and you’ll get a weekly email that explains the whole process.

Consistency Is The Golden Ticket

It really is. Over time a consistent marketing approach will be out the best marketing campaigns or PPC ads, or TV commercials. So look at your schedule and see where you can add those small marketing nuggets to your daily, weekly, and monthly routine so that you never have to think about what to do next.

And if you need help, sign up for our Marketing Bootcamp,  and we’ll walk you through the basics and turn marketing your firm into a habit.

20 Minute Marketing Plan For The Busy Attorney

We get it. You’re busy! On the long long list of things you have to do in a day, marketing is probably one of your least favorite and often gets lobbed to the end of the todo list.

But successful marketing depends on consistency, and we all know what happens to the tasks at the back of the to-do list.  So let’s set up a plan that will allow you to be consistent without causing the dread of staring at a blank screen wondering what to do.

We’ll start today with social media.  Yes. The amorphous, ubiquitous, and perpetually misunderstood side of marketing.

It can be a pain to sit down and come up with a single Facebook post let alone creating an entire social media strategy.

Well, what if it only took 20 minutes while you were sipping your morning coffee? Well that’s more manageable right? Today we’re going to outline a process and tools that will help you to do just that.

We’ll cover three components of a social media strategy that will allow you to create a bustling social presence without needing to spend all of your time dinking around in the productivity sucking waste-pool that is Facebook.

Without further ado, our first focal point – curation.

ABC – A – Always, B – Be, C – Curating. Always be curating!

What is curating you ask? Curating is collecting and filtering content from across the web that will interest your ideal clients and allow those ideal clients to interact and share with you, and more importantly, their peers, that are also ideal clients.

Everyone is drinking from a firehose these days, and with so much awful content being spewed into the ether by “marketers” it’s harder than ever to filter out the good stuff.  Your goal in this exercise is to be that filter for your ideal clients.

This does two things.  First, it distinguishes you as a thought-leader in your space, and second, it makes you the source for all things true and helpful.

Another way to think of your role in all of this is as a magic flower. No, I’m not on some other magical substance writing that. Your goal is to be like the magic flower in Super Mario Brothers.

For the uninitiated (read: those over 40 or under 25), the magic flower turns regular old Italian plumber Mario into Super Mario. Super Mario is bigger, faster, and stronger than his wrench-wielding alter-ego, and he’s also invincible.

Through your carefully curated information, you can make your ideal clients into super heroes.  They’ll be more on point with what’s going on in their industry. Able to impress their bosses, their clients, and maybe even their spouses with how in tune they are with the world of [insert ideal client’s industry here]. They might get promoted. They might close that deal. They might get their spouse to stop rolling their eyes (unlikely).

But you see where we’re going with this. By giving your ideal clients those super powers, who do you think they’re going to turn to when they have a problem even their super powers can’t handle?  That’s right.  You.

So how do we do this?

First we need a way to keep track of the content we find worthy of sharing. The goal is to find something that you have available at any time, because you never know when you’ll come across something you want to share.  The best tool is the one you have with you.

For capturing content as it flies past you, we recommend an app called Pocket.  Pocket allows you to instantly save the contents of a website while you’re looking at it.  They have a great mobile app so you can just quickly “share to Pocket” and the article gets saved for later review. They even have a browser plugin so when you’re come across a good article at your desk or on your laptop, you can quickly save them there.  You can find Pocket at http://getpocket.com.

But if Pocket isn’t your thing, Evernote’s web clipper can do a great job as well (though if you use Evernote for other aspects of life/business, it’s a little hard to control the clutter of constantly saving articles). And if you don’t want to learn a new tool, a simple note taking app on your phone or (gasp!) an actual notebook, work just as well.  Point being, find a tool that works for you.

So, when you are listening to the news in the morning, scrolling through Facebook or Twitter on your lunch break, etc. always be on the lookout for those magic flower articles.

What do you do once you find one? If you’re using pocket, just save it to Pocket. If not, take down the URL of the story, and then write down the first “take” you had on it. Your thoughts on where it was great or missed the mark slightly, or how it might fit into the bigger picture for your ideal clients.

Then move on, you’re all set.

Now you might be thinking, “Wait, I’m always doing this? I thought you said 20 minutes!” Well, you’re right. You need to be on guard 24/7. But the real benefit is that this takes just a few seconds as you come across great content, and it allows you to do GREAT things in just 20 minutes if you already have a starting point when you sit down each morning.

This next part is where we get into the meat and potatoes. The 20 minute social media habit.

Habits are super powerful when it comes to compounding the returns on your time investment. That’s our goal, to layer up little marketing habits that set you up for that month down the road where you’re suddenly turning away clients because you’re too busy, or thinking about hiring that associate to handle the workload.

So let’s commit to it, right now.  Let’s commit to 5 week days in a row of curating and scheduling social media each morning.  Then we’ll revisit.  Figure out what isn’t working, make tweaks and commit to another five days. Rinse. Repeat.

Here’s the 20 minute morning routine.

First 5 Minutes – (Gasp!) Original Posts

Original posts are always the hardest. But we don’t want to derail the process because we have writer’s block.  Give yourself 5 minutes to come up with an original post or two or three. But stop after 5 minutes, and don’t beat yourself up if you can’t think of anything. That’s why we have that hopper full of curated content, so you don’t always have to be on your A-game.  The juices will start to flow over time, so don’t get hung up here.

Next 10 Minutes – Queue up Curated Content

Next, dig into your treasure trove of curated content, and pick out three or four posts that you can share.  Use a tool like Hootsuite or Buffer to create posts on Twitter or Facebook or LinkedIn. Link to the articles, write in your “take” as the post content, and then get ready to schedule those posts.

Last 5 Minutes – Scheduling for Long Term Success

The powerful part of this plan isn’t necessarily that you’re generating social media posts every day, it’s actually that you’re going to be generating social media posts for weeks or months in the future. To the point that there will be a morning in the future where you’ll sit down and realize you already have two or three posts ready to go for the day.

So here’s how we schedule them.

First, you need to decide how “evergreen” the content is.  Once you figure out which bucket this falls into, follow the scheduling guidelines below.

Breaking News

This content is usually only good for one, maybe two days. Think – a comment on a big supreme court ruling, an announcement of a new staff member, or a comment about a the latest corporation to screw up, etc.  For these posts, we suggest scheduling the post to go out on each of your various channels today. Post once on Facebook and LinkedIn, and consider posting two or three times on Twitter.

Timely

This content is something that is useful now, and likely for the next few weeks or months.  For example, an article about this year’s trends in industry X, how a certain technology is affecting Y, etc.  For these posts, I’d schedule one post for today on each of your channels, then create posts for each channel that are 4, 14, 30, and 60 days out. Note, those numbers aren’t set in stone, but rather ball park values. The idea being to keep the posting going but at larger and larger intervals until you think the article won’t be relevant any more.

Evergreen

These are the holy grail.  They’re the articles that keep on giving, and they’re rarer than one might think. These articles are the ones that will be as useful today as they will be in five years.  For example, with attorneys, these might be articles that relate to handling common situations that ideal clients might not know about. They might be articles about how to think about a particular issue.  And sometimes they come in the form of an article so good that you couldn’t imagine someone covering the topic more completely (like, for example, a 1500 word lesson on how to do your social media in just 20 minutes 🙂

For these posts, schedule out as many as you can forever. For example, post one today, and then repeat monthly or bi monthly for the next year. Basically, for as long as you can go before your 20 minutes runs out.

Conclusion

And that’s it.  If you follow this plan for even a month, you’ll find that your social media hopper is filled out for weeks and months into the future. Your facebook page will no longer be a dormant ghost-town where we promoted that one blog post we wrote 2 years ago. Your twitter account will start to accumulate followers. You’ll start to hear the phrase “oh I saw you posted about that a few weeks ago” at random networking events from people you’ve never met before. You’ll get a referral and when you ask who it’s from, it’ll be from a person you’ve never met, and when you Google them, you’ll see that they’ve been following you for a few months on Twitter.

In short, you’ll start to see why social media can be a real benefit to your firm, and you’ll laugh at the big firms that don’t get why.
Finally, reach out to use here at AmazeLaw. Tell us how this is working for you.  Suggest tweaks. Let us know when you get that superfan client that you realize has been stalking you just a little too creepily on Facebook.

Don’t Let the Bastards Get You Down! Dealing With Online Criticism

Let’s face it, as you grow your firm, eventually you’re going to run into the problem of an unhappy client (or more likely, an unhappy non-client.) It happens, and as much as we’d all prefer that they bring their grievances to us personally so that we can work things out like adults, sometimes it doesn’t work that way.

They decide to lash out and leave a nasty review. It could be on some desolate part of the web designed for angry people to air their grievances for other angry people. Or it could be on a Google page or local business directory.

The point is, it’s out there, and you won’t always have the ability to control the message. It’s the price we pay for exposure. Sure we could opt out of Google’s local search and eliminate the risk of a bad review, but we’d also eliminate the risk of getting clients online.

So what’s a business owner to do?

Well, first, take a breath. It’s not the end of the world. In fact,` it might even be seen as an opportunity to show your commitment to making sure your clients are happy.

So what are the options?

Obviously, in the moment, the reaction is to get defensive, or more accurately, offensive. The initial thought is to burn it to the ground, to go all scorched earth on the whole review site. Tell the little arrogant SOB what’s what. How you bent over backward for them, or how difficult they were to deal with and how ungrateful they are for your service. In short, you want to bring them to justice!

Well you know better than anyone else that justice isn’t always easy, and often times both sides lose. Overreacting now is almost guaranteed to make the situation worse for everyone involved.

So now that we’ve gotten the least desirable outcome out of the way, let’s discuss the option in order of preference.

Kill them with kindness and work it out offline

The first step should always be to reach out in private to try and resolve the problem in a cool and collected manner.

But first, you do want to respond to the review, so start by posting a message that shows empathy and a sincere desire to work through the problem. If it feels dirty to turn the other cheek at this point, just remember, this is more for the benefit of others that come along to see the review than the actual reviewer. You’re still going to reach out in person.

For example:

    • I’m sorry to hear about that, let’s talk offline so we can fix this…
    • Feel free to contact me personally with any other feedback to make your next experience better…
    • I’m sorry that you feel that way. We do our best and if it wasn’t good enough, we want to have a chance to make it better.
    • I apologize for your experience please let me know if there is anything I can do for you. If I cannot help you I will put you in contact with someone better equipped to handle the situation.

If you’re able to resolve things in person, kindly ask them if they’d update their review. Whether that’s removing it or even mentioning how you went out of the way to make things right.

Ignore it

If there’s no hope in trying to make things better, I would still leave the contrite message showing your  willingness to work through it, even if you know it’s pointless. Beyond that, you do have the ability to just ignore it. I know, it’s not the best feeling to let something like that just sit out there. But sometimes it really just doesn’t matter.

For example, I’m sure you’ve seen sites out there whose sole job is to shame lawyers for supposedly bad practices. I don’t know why these sites proliferate with attorneys, but they’re out there. They’re clearly vendetta machines.  The thing is, it’s unlikely that they get much traffic, so the risk your potential clients will come across it is low. And what’s more, many of those sites are so out there that a sane, level-headed individual can clearly tell that it’s a bunch of crackpots that are mad because their case went beyond their retainer and their attorney wouldn’t work for free. In other words, they have no credibility with the types of clients you actually want to work with.

So again, it doesn’t feel good, but those sites are best to let fester at the ends of the internet.

But if the review is on a reputable site like say Google, Yelp, Avvo, or a local chamber of commerce or BBB site, ignoring it probably isn’t the best option.

Contact the site owner

It’s rare that this will work as the incentives of the site owner are not aligned with you, but it can be worth a shot. If it’s a smaller site and the comment is clearly offensive or out of line, you may be able to contact the site owner and simply ask them to take down the post.  Put your letterhead on it and maybe make a veiled threat of “considering legal action” (you’re not going to, it’s not worth it) just to let them know that it might just be easier to take down that single post.  Keep it polite and respectful. Again, the odds aren’t good, but as a website owner myself, I’m happy to side with a polite professional over a nutjob.

Legal action

This is included only for completeness. In all but the most egregious of cases where there’s proof of fraud and/or a substantial effect on your business this isn’t this even worth considering. I’ll leave it to the lawyers in the house to discuss legal recourse, but again, this is a last ditch, I’m losing multiple clients because of this review, kind of an option.

Drown out the bad

Regardless of how this particular review turns out, you should still be actively soliciting reviews from happy clients as part of your outtake or project handoff process.  If you’re effective at getting a decent number of reviews from happy clients then the good will invariably drown out the bad, and further minimize the impact of the review.

Ethical Considerations

Not only do lawyers have the difficult job of trying to please each client that comes through the door but now you also need to be concerned with what these clients are saying online and what the repercussions will be if you choose to respond. Across the country responding to those pesky reviews has become a hot topic. States such as New York and Illinois have released statements that have determined that releasing any confidential information, even in defending yourself, your practice, or employees, will result in disciplinary action. Lawyers, look out. It is time to be careful. Unhappy clients will say anything under the moon, true or untrue but the response you choose to use could affect your more than losing some clients from some crackpots ridiculous review. Responding online could cost you so follow some of the strategies we have suggested and steer clear of trouble!

5 Costly Attorney Website Mistakes

I recently had the opportunity to talk with Chris Small of The Art of Lawyering Podcast about legal websites, and thought I’d share a few points from the podcast.  If you’d like to check out the podcast (and the deal we’re offering its listeners), you can find it at theartoflawyering.com/021.

Let me start with a few words about why I started AmazeLaw, and why I understand what lawyers are dealing with when it comes to online marketing.  When my wife left her big law job to start her own practice, we were bombarded by all sorts of scummy sales-guys cold-calling her about all of these digital marketing solutions that were overpriced at best and downright harmful at worst.  She doesn’t have a marketing background, so everything was so new and foreign to her, and I know she found the whole learning process very stressful.  Luckily, I have a background in building marketing tools from my time building the Content Management System for Hubspot.  I knew I could help her.  Then I realized that I could help a lot of people who were just like her.

So I set out to build AmazeLaw to offer a do-it-yourself marketing solution for attorneys that focused on simple, sustainable marketing tactics that busy solos can manage themselves.

While doing research for the business and in helping our clients build or re-build their sites, I’ve come across a lot of common errors that solos make in their digital marketing, so I thought it would be fun to share some of those mistakes and how to fix them.  So I present…

The 5 Most Common Attorney Website Mistakes…and How to Fix Them

Not updating frequently enough.

If you haven’t made added/updated content on your site in the last month at an absolute minimum, your site will get stale.  Your audience will not understand how busy you are.  They will think you don’t care.  So how do you keep a blog updated?  First, your blog should be on your website.  Don’t buy into the malarkey that it should be separate.  Second, here are few easy ways to come up with content for your blog.  Write down the ten questions you get most often.  Write down 10 common assumptions your clients have that are wrong.  Now, write one or two posts per week explaining those in their language.

Writing for attorneys, not people.  

I think I can say this, because my wife has admitted it to me.  Solos often have this insecurity about competing with the big guys, a subconscious need to show the big law attorneys that they’re serious attorneys.  Resist that urge. You’re not writing for lawyers, you’re writing for clients.

Clients are PEOPLE. They want to work with REAL PEOPLE not stodgy old-school law firms (and the ones that really do, you shouldn’t care about because you’re fighting an uphill battle trying to compete with firms that have many more resources than you do).

Repeat after me.  Clients don’t care about case law.  Clients don’t care about case law. Clients don’t care about case law.  Don’t write about case law.

Sure it’s the stuff you can geek out on, but clients care about a solution to their problem.  They don’t care about the particulars. They pay you to know the case law and to recommend a solution in the context of their business or their situation, not in the context of a courtroom argument.

One key exception: a new case or new legislation somehow changes or contradicts a common assumption your clients have that impacts their day-to-day decisions.  You can mention it, but when editing, err on the side of “they don’t care, just tell me what I need to do differently with this new information.”

Not having a clear “next-step.”

Once you’ve explained something in their language, how do you get them to take action?  Each piece of content should end with a call to action. It doesn’t have to be fancy, just a simple request written in italics at the end of your post is just fine.  As long as it’s clear what the next step is.

After all, they’re interested enough to read your entire post. They’re feel ingratiated because you gave away your expertise. Capitalize on that using reciprocity as a motivation to (1) ask for a consult request; (2) ask them to join an email list; or (3) ask them to comment.

Finally, your homepage needs an email address and a phone number.  Place it in the footer for sure, but consider placing it in prominent places in your copy.  Finally, make sure to hyperlink your phone number for mobile devices and never embed your contact information in an image (because Google will never find it).

Speaking of mobile…

Not having a responsive website, or not having a mobile site configured properly.

This is 2015, you need to have a website that not only “works” on a mobile device, but is optimized for it.  Why? Anywhere from 40%-55% of search traffic is on a mobile device.  Google started cracking down on April 21st, meaning that if your site isn’t mobile optimized, it will be virtually impossible to find it from a mobile device.  If you want to see if your site is mobile-friendly, you can check out at https://amazelaw.wpengine.com/googletest.  If you find out that your website isn’t mobile friendly, it’s time to upgrade to a mobile responsive site.  For more information about Google’s changes, why they’re happening and what you can do, check out our Mobilegeddon overview for attorneys.

Not having up-to-date and consistent local search listings.

Your #1 priority should be getting a google local listing set up and correct for your site.  This will make sure your business shows up with a map and details when they search for your firm directly, which in turn makes your firm eligible to show up in the local listings that appear on the first page of google just below #1 search position.  Go to the AmazeLaw Google Guide for step-by-step instructions for making sure you’re taking advantage of all of Google’s tools.

Your #2 priority is making sure you have a consistent web listing (with no duplicates) for your firm across the various local search aggregators.  Rather than managing this yourself each time something changes in your business, use Moz Local.  You enter your information once and they publish it and sync it across all of the major local search aggregators. A steal at $84/yr.

[thrive_leads id=’702′]

Are you making any of these mistakes?

You’re not alone. These are super common and we can help you avoid each and every one. Want to see how we can take your website from blah to blazing?

Schedule a Demo Today

Lessons In Marketing For Solo And Small Firm Attorneys From A Solo Attorney

Hi, I’m Katie.  I’m an employment attorney.  I like what I do, and I’m good at it.  Oh, you want to hire me?  Great!

If only it was that easy.  I’ve been a solo attorney for a little more than a year and a half.  I’ve learned so much about attorney marketing, especially marketing online.  I know I’ve probably only scratched the surface of everything that I should know, but I’ve made huge strides.  I get calls from other attorneys telling me how much they like my blog.  Clients find me online.  Am I always on the first page of for the search terms I want?  No.  But I’m getting there.

I was lucky that I have a husband who understands all this stuff, but I still had to learn a lot of it myself, and I had to make a ton of mistakes along the way.  If you’re reading this, you might be where I was when I first started.  Let me help you by sharing a few of the lessons I’ve learned.

  • It’s hard and it takes a lot of time.  Sorry.  I know you were looking for lessons that are going to make your life easier, but let’s start with the principle that’s going to carry you through all of your marketing endeavors.  No one teaches you how to do this in law school.  If you started your career at a firm, the firm paid someone else how to do this.  So now not only are you starting a completely new business and lifestyle, but you have to learn another skill.  But that’s okay, because you can do it and there are ways to make it easier, but let’s just all accept that as lawyers, marketing is a skill that does not come easily to most of us.
  • Take time to figure out who you need to reach.  When I first started out on my own, I felt like I needed to get in front of anyone and everyone.  What if I missed out on an opportunity?  I need blogs that reach every audience.  I want to send my email updates out to everyone and their brother (and somehow find a way to be interesting to everyone on that list).  Then I realized that I only have so many hours in the day, and that I need to be efficient, effective, and focused.  Who are your best referral sources?  For me, it’s HR professionals and other attorneys who don’t do employment law, so my marketing efforts need to be specific to those groups.
  • Figure out the best way to reach them.  The people you want to reach may not always keep you top of mind, but your online presence can help with that.  I try to write blog posts and email newsletters that attract HR professionals (day-to-day information that helps them do their job) and other attorneys (legal changes/important cases).  I also only send my email newsletters to people who have expressed interest.  And it works.  I’ve actually gotten emails back from readers thanking me for putting the email together.  How often do you get a mass email and decide that want to thank the author?
  • Find the right tools to help you.  Everytime I write a blog post (shameless plug – it is so easy to do this through AmazeLaw), I make sure to put it out on social media.  I use Hootsuite and autoschedule.  I don’t have to think about the best times to post, and I only have to post once for it to go to Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, and Facebook.  I also use Mailchimp to manage my email lists (more shameless plugging – AmazeLaw integrates with Mailchimp).  Yes, it took a little for me to learn how to use these early on, but now I cannot imagine marketing without them.

I know that I’m not an expert on marketing, but I’m learning and finding a way to make it work for me.  As a solo attorney, I can’t justify spending money on marketing consultants when I know I’m smart enough to figure it out for myself.  I became a solo attorney in part for the flexibility, and I’ve built my firm so that I can make time for marketing because it’s worth the effort.

If you’re looking for more information on marketing, AmazeLaw has a great email marketing bootcamp that you can sign up for at  amazelaw.wpengine.com/#newsletter.  And if you have any questions about your firm’s marketing efforts, you are always free to email me with questions at info@amazelaw.com.  Good luck!

Why Google’s Cracking Down On Non Mobile-Friendly Sites And What Attorneys Need To Do

You may have heard whisperings that Google is going to be cracking down on non-mobile-friendly websites starting April 21st.

That’s absolutely correct.

For a while now they’ve been keeping track of whether sites are optimized for small screens and slow data connections. Up until now they haven’t changed any of the rankings based on that information and instead, just show a little “Mobile-friendly” label on search results when searching from your mobile device.

But now, they’re taking the next step, and using mobile-friendly as a ranking signal when someone searches for your firm on a mobile device. We don’t know how much it will affect rankings just yet (but we’re watching closely and will report as soon as we can measure it), but we know that it will drop rankings for searches from mobile devices, and it’s expected to drop them considerably.

What does that mean for you?

Well, it depends on if your site is mobile-optimized. Here’s a link to check if your site is mobile-friendly. If it is, then you should be all set.

But if it’s not, come on back here and we’ll discuss the options you have for avoiding the Google hammer in a few weeks.

So here’s the link to Google’s mobile-friendly tester.

Go check your site and see if Google thinks it’s mobile-friendly. I’ll wait.

How’d you do? Did your site pass?

It passed!

That’s awesome. Gold star for you! You may want to read ahead though to see if one of the other options here might be a better option for you.

It didn’t pass?

Don’t worry all is not lost. Consider this a bit of a wake-up call. After all, you still have a little time to right the ship, so to speak.

First of all, these changes won’t affect your rankings when someone searches for your firm on their desktop. Which, is still somewhere around 75% of search traffic in the US depending on whose stats you use.

But, that still means you’ll start to lose out on 1/4 of your traffic.

A better way to think about this might be to consider the following scenario. Let’s say a potential client just got into a cab when they received an email from a friend referring your firm to fix their problem. The first thing they’ll do is google you or your firm.

If your site isn’t mobile-friendly, your firm website might not be right there in the first spot in their search results. Instead, they might see your Avvo profile (which you may or may not have done anything with). Or maybe they’ll see a complaint a bitter client left on a review site.

All that effort crafting your brand and your message, and it’s all for naught because your site wasn’t the first one listed.

Obviously, that’s not a great place to be in. So it begs the question…

“How do I make my site mobile-friendly?”

Well, you have two options. You can redesign your site, or you can create a separate mobile site that lives at mobile.myfirm.com.

Each has their benefits and drawbacks, but I’m going to strongly recommend a site redesign over creating a separate mobile version of your website.

The main reason is maintenance. With two different web properties to maintain, you’ll need to have a way of keeping them in sync. And what’s more, you’ll need to be diligent about telling Google which version of a page is ‘canonical’. Meaning, which version is the “one true version?” Fail to stay on top of that and Google will dock you for having duplicate content.

The second reason is just common sense. For the same cost it would take to build a mobile-specific site, you could redesign your site to be mobile-friendly and avoid the mess of maintaining two properties altogether.

No need to worry about whether the mobile site matches your desktop branding. No worrying about duplicate content. And hey, you get a fancy new desktop and mobile website for the same investment.

How large is that investment? Well, it depends on what you’re starting with.

I use wordpress or another CMS.

If you already use a content management system like WordPress, it could be as simple as finding a theme you like. A decent responsive theme can be had for peanuts on sites like themeforest.net. You might get lucky and be able to just swap in the new theme and call it a day and you’re done in ~$50.

More likely, you’ll want to find a developer to customize the theme in a few places to fit your brand. That could cost you ~$50-$100/hr for a few hours of work. A far cry from building a new site from scratch.

I had a custom site coded for me.

But if your site was a custom job, as we typically see with agencies or with one-off website designs, your options get a (little) bit more expensive.

You’ll likely need to go through that process again. Which is a pain, I know. This time through though, keep an eye on an ability to upgrade in the future. If you’re working with a developer or agency, make sure they’re using a commonly-used CMS that will be around for a while. WordPress would be my recommendation (outside of using AmazeLaw of course.)

For an idea of what a site should cost these days, check out our guide to How Much a Law Firm Website Should Cost.

But regardless of your starting point. This update is a good thing for your firm. Sure it requires some investment. But that’s exactly what it is. An investment that you’ll most definitely see returns on.

Again. This is a GOOD thing. Think of it this way.

Imagine you had a 20 year old car. It’s worked well for you in the past. Sure, it’s not shiny, but it’s gotten you where you’ve needed to go.

But, a lot has changed in 20 years. Technology has gotten exponentially better. While you might say “I don’t need my car to talk to me,” it’d be hard to argue against the safety, fuel-efficiency, and reliability improvements that have come along with it.

On the road, states incentivize adoption of new technology through car inspections. On the internet, Google is taking on that role by rewarding sites that stay current with better search placement.

So rather than lamenting the fact that it’s become necessary to upgrade your website, you should also feel excited. You can now take advantage of advances in technology that make marketing your firm much easier.

Does your site need a mobile upgrade?

Our sites are all fully-mobile-optimized. If you want to see what mobile magic AmazeLaw can do for your firm…

Schedule a Demo Today

Find Stunning Free Images For Your Next Law Firm Blog Post

Just about every law firm blog post needs an image. At the very least, it’s a nice visual introduction to your post. But finding high-quality photos that are free and not likely to get you busted for copyright infringement is tough.

After all, when you pull out Google Image search, besides the dubious quality, it’s hard to tell if you have the right to use the image. And it’s likely that you don’t.

Here’s how to find a high-quality, free-to-use image for your blog post.

The long story short is that we use Flickr’s Creative Commons image search to find photos that are licensed to be used for commercial use, providing you attribute the author. Then we show you how to correctly add that attribution to your blog post.

Here’s a quick video to see how to add a great looking image to a WordPress blog post in just a few minutes, and how to add the same image to an AmazeLaw blog post in just a few seconds 🙂

Not too shabby huh? It’s fairly easy and yields great results that aren’t likely to get you sued.

See how easy AmazeLaw makes it?

That’s our whole purpose, to make marketing your firm as dead-simple as possible.

If you want to spend more time being a lawyer, and less time tinkering in HTML…

Schedule a Free Demo Today

 

.attorney vs .lawyer vs .com domains. What Should Small Law Firms Do?

There are a couple of new top level domains that are opening up for registration in the next few weeks, and the announcement has attorneys wondering what, if anything, should they do?

What’s the deal?

Well first, let’s talk about what the change is.  Around 2006, ICANN, the governing body for domain names on the internet started taking bids for new generic top level domains (gTLDs).  Since most lucrative and/or useful domains have been taken up by domain squatters and the occasional legit business, folks welcomed the opportunity to get a branded domain name that was relevant to their business.

So, they offered companies and investors the chance to own and manage new top level domains.  Some of them are innocuous (.ceo, .bike, .directory, .beer), some are scandalous (.sexy, .xxx), and some are just industry specific (.plumbing, .attorney, .lawyer).

What makes the .attorney and .lawyer gTLDs interesting, is that they are intended to act like the .gov, .edu, and .mil “sponsored” top level domains.  Sponsored TLDs act as a signal of trust since not just anyone can get one of those domains.  You need to meet a managing body’s criteria. In the former, you need to prove you’re an attorney (or attending an accredited law school), and in the latter, you need to be a government, educational institution or branch of military service.

That’s the theory anyways.

Without going into the threat this imposes on existing ethics regulators (a threat that Carolyn Elefant covers in depth in her post “Should Lawyers Mark A Spot With With a Domain Dot – And Will Ethics Regulators Say Yay or Not?“) it’s important to note that even if regulators embrace the new gTLDs, the real question is whether potential clients will.

I’ve always considered sites with the newer TLDs as somewhat suspect.  It’s not a perfect system, but the fact that you need to pay a decent amount of money for a great .com domain is such a good filter that it tends to cloud my judgement when it comes to trusting other domains.

At least, that’s my bias.  But I’m not one to assume that everyone is like me.  I’m a computer nerd by trade, and as such have a fairly biased opinion when it comes to technology in general.

Enter real data…

Instead, I ran an experiment to find out for real, whether the regulated TLDs accomplish the task of inspiring trust in normal, everyday folk.

Here’s how it worked.  Using Google’s awesome Consumer Surveys tool, I asked a simple question of 100 people.  If you were looking to hire an attorney, based only on the domain name, who would you choose?

  • www.john-smith-law.com
  • www.johnsmith.lawyer
  • www.johnsmith.attorney

The idea for those three is based on the following scenario.  Let’s assume you’re trying to find a domain for your solo firm.  And let’s say you have a fairly common name where you can’t get the exact johnsmith.com or johnsmithlaw.com (because if you can, you should do that right now and stop reading.)

You might then consider, do I get my exact match domain with .attorney or .lawyer instead?  Will that get more clients to trust me?

Well, survey says…

Overall, I was surprised by the results. I thought the .com would absolutely trounce the gTLDs and that appears to be absolutely wrong.

.attorney and .com lead the way.
Turns out, while almost noone prefered the .lawyer domain, .attorney actually appears to hold roughly equal to slightly more trust than .com when you take into account the error margins in the survey.

Here’s the preliminary result:

.lawyer vs .attorney vs. .com trust

Younger folks prefer .com, older folks, .attorney
While that’s the general population, it’s interesting that there are fairly heavy splits when it comes to the age of the recipient. Something that might be useful to know for all your elder law folks out there.

age_split

Upper income clients still prefer .com
If your clients tend to be wealthier, or you hope to get more wealthier clients, it’s interesting to note that upper income individuals still prefer the .com.

Upper income folks seem to prefer .com dmoains ober .attorney and .lawyer

Upper income folks seem to prefer .com dmoains ober .attorney and .lawyer

Want to analyze the data for your target clients?
If you want to comb through the data to see what your target clients might prefer, head on over to the Google survey results page and tinker to your heart’s content.

And if you think this data is bunk, or if you want more info for your own purposes, this survey is set for 100 responses and only cost $10. You can set one up yourself and target the results by geographic region and income, and you’ll have the results in a few days.

I see the data, so what should I do?

Well first, don’t panic. It might seem like there’s a great gold rush out there for these domain names, but the population that uses them is tiny (relative to other TLDs) and an even smaller fraction will actually purchase the domains. And since switching and/or deciding on a domain is a BIG deal, don’t make the decision rashly.

Should I switch to a .attorney domain?
Probably not, definitely not right away, and MOST DEFINITELY, not without some professional help.

There are a number of things to consider when considering a domain switch. You’ll need to consider the cost of replacing any marketing collateral you own like business cards, pamphlets etc.

You’ll need to perform an audit of your existing site to make sure any and all pages on your site are redirected to the new domain properly (for any site with more than 5 pages, seek professional help with this).

You’ll need to update all of your DNS records to match the old domain so things like email will still work… in other words, it’s not as simple as just changing your domain.

Should I register my existing domain with the .attorney and .lawyer TLDs?
If you have $35-$100 burning a hole in your pocket and it would make you feel better to have them just in case, go ahead and buy them. But remember, if you buy both at $35, that’s $70 every single year you own them.

But what if I want to prevent someone else from registering them?
Unless you’re a giant brand with money to spare, this is generally a false worry. First of all, as a small law firm, you’re not big enough for most squatters to care about.

Second, unless the squatter commits to building content in your niche, search engines will never find the squatter’s site anyways.

And thirdly, if you’re concerned about someone coming along and registering a domain just to bad mouth you or your firm, well, the only way to prevent that is to buy up every gTLD out there, and that’s going to cost you a whole lot of money just to prevent a hypothetical.

However… one case where I’d consider squatting is if your firm is hyper personalized and your name is reasonably common. For example, if you own “marystevens.com” or “marystevenslaw.com”, consider picking up “marystevens.attorney” and “marystevens.lawyer” as building a little moat around your personal brand is important when you have a common name.

I am just starting out, should I go .com or .attorney?
Based on the data, it looks like we can rule out .lawyer. And if you can get a decent .com with no dashes, go that route for sure.

But, if you found a really nice .attorney domain in a competitive niche, like say “nydefense.attorney” or “thepersonalinjury.attorney” go for it! Given that it appears that the trust is there, it can’t hurt.

But, one thing to consider is whether having the singular “attorney” or “lawyer” as a domain name will be limiting if you want to grow your firm. The domain seems to imply a single individual, and that might become an issue down the road if you suddenly have a couple of associates or additional partners.

I already registered the domains, if I don’t switch, what should I use them for?
First, redirect them to your existing site by using a CNAME or URL record with your DNS provider. I know that’s really techy, so if you need help, just email me.

Second, if you’re not changing your primary domain, do not use your new domains for things like email or other branding materials. Besides confusing your clients, it also confuses google into thinking there really are two sites and that hurts your SEO.

Should I buy up domains for multiple practice areas?
Not unless you’re creating separate sites for each and have the time to maintain them.

Just owning the domains and pointing them all at your existing site won’t really make a difference for your site traffic. Google will only recognize those domains if you actually have content on them and have links coming in using the new domains. And since it’s highly unlikely that any consumer is going to type “newyorkpersonalinjury.attorney” into their browser bar without some sort of marketing material to prompt them, you won’t get any additional direct traffic either.

But what if I’m squatting, hoping to sell the domains to other attorneys?
Well, sorry to be the one to say it, but you’re the reason we can’t have nice things (like reasonable .com domains.)

That’s it! Any more questions?

If you like this kind of no-nonsense marketing advice for solo and small firm attorneys, sign up for our marketing bootcamp where you’ll get one email every week with easy to digest marketing plans that let you get back to being a lawyer.

Join the Small Firm Marketing Bootcamp