Changes with Google Local Search

Ranking high on page one of Google''s search results page is key to drawing new visitors to your website. During the last month, Google has implemented some major changes to the way it displays search results for local searches.

What is a local search?

A local search is one that contains a geographical keyword. (i.e. Seattle Divorce Attorneys) Local searches are very important to Family Law attorneys, since virtually all Family Law is local. Listed below is a description of the recent changes to the Google search engine results page:

• Local Map is now moved to the right sidebar.
• Before the top 7 to 10 listings were from Google Places/ Local (the results formerly next to the map) and the organic results appeared afterwards. Google used and different algorithms for both Google Places/local results and for the organic results
• Now, both the map results and organic results are a blend of data. This is a big change. Before it was possible to have poor organic results and still rank well because your Google Places listing did well.

What does this all mean?

It is not yet clear how these changes will affect Family Law Internet marketing. However, based on what I have seen thus far, I will offer my opinion. The attorneys negatively affected by this change are likely to be those that previously had a high ranking for their Google Places listing, but ranked poorly (or just average) in the organic results. Conversely, attorneys that previously had poor Google Places rankings with good organic rankings may be positively affected. Everyone else is likely to be impacted in some way because it will change user behavior.

What should you do?

Below is a partial list of suggestions for enhancing the visibility of your Collaborative Family Law website.

• Claim your Google places listing: Once you have completed the listing fill in all the information you can including: pictures, videos, reviews and all available fields.
• Update your page titles -These are the words that appear at the top of your web browser when you are on a page of your website. They are also the words the title of the Google search result for your website that show up as a blue link.
• Make each page title unique
• Add a few internal links on your site - Add links within your website. Use keywords in the link description.
• Add your address and phone to every page of the website
• Claim your profile on legal directories, Chamber of Commerce, Merchant Circle, Yahoo Local, etc. - There are a huge number of yellow pages-like directories that allow you to update your business information for free. These sites get a lot of traffic and tend to rank well. At the least you should go to each one, claim your profile and make sure they are linking to your site. In addition, consider directories that are relevant to legal and are local. ALWAYS COMPLETE THE PROFILE FORM 100%.
• Increase the number of inbound links to your site - The change during the last month have made this more important than ever.

Conclusion

It is clear that traditional organic factors (especially title tags and inbound links) are going to become more important. If your firm has not done much in the way of organic optimization in the past, this may be a good time to consider organic optimization. Or better yet give us a call. Visibility Partners has been helping Collaborative Family Law attorneys with organic search engine optimization for the last five years.

Landing Pages are Good

Writing content for your site is always helpful. Here are some thoughts.

Creating 400 plus word articles on any topic related to Collaborative Divorce or Divorce is helpful to your SEO efforts.

In addition to articles, adding landing pages is helpul. I am sending two suggestions for Landing pages. They are listed below. .



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Child Custody Attorneys serving key community

We are a group of divorce attorneys trained in the process of Collaborative Divorce. The collaborative approach to divorce is often a good choice when children are involved.................


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Child Support Attorneys serving your county

We are a group of Divorce Attorneys dedicated to helping families through the divorce process. Divorce can be hard on the kids......................

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When writing landing pages think about your geographic keywords and your practice area keywords

Reviews in Google maps

Your Google maps listing can help you draw traffic to your website or generate phone calls directly to your office. To make your listing more visible (rank higher) it is important that you complete the entire profile. This includes adding pictures/videos and having reviews from happy clients. I recommend that you have 4 reviews for your listing.

The best way to get a review is to ask someone to write a review for you. Ideally the review should come from a happy client. (or colleague outside your firm/group)

A review is usually a couple sentences long up to a paragraph in size and is easy to write. The tricky part comes in actually finding the spot where to write the review. For most people you will need to give them some guidance on where to go.

Guiding the reviewer

The reviewer should do the following:

- Go to http://maps.google.com/ and click on the sign in link in the upper right corner

- Enter a username and password.

- If they don't have a account with Google they will need to create one.

- Then they should do a search in Google maps with the exact listing name:

- Then they should click on the more info link (it is in a tiny font next to the listing name)

- Then click on the write a review link (located in the middle of the page on the right

- Write the review

If you have a client that is knowledgeable in Google this will be a peace of cake. However, for many people, they will need your help.

Where is the traffic going?

Google continues to be a dominant player on the Web. But there is dominant shift underway. Social media sites like Facebook are growing to the point where they are likely to surpass Google in terms of overall traffic. According to the analysts at Hitwise, Google currently receives 9% of all the Internet traffic. While Facebook receives 7%. Google still has the lead but the gap is rapidly closing. In the United Kingdom, Facebook traffic now exceeds the traffic to Google.

How does this affect Family Law attorneys? The traffic numbers give us an indication of where the action is. There is still a lot of action in the search area, but it is clear that social media is growing at rapid rate. To have marketing success, as a Family Law attorney, it is critical that you become comfortable with Social Media and in particular Social Networking. (Facebook, LinkedIn)

I spend most of my time with LinkedIn because of it's concentration of business users. However, Facebook is the market leader and should be considered in your Social Media strategy. The key is to get comfortable and competent with social networking. Social Networking is not expensive but it requires that you participate in the game. With old school marketing and advertising you just had to Pay to Play. With Social Networking, you have to Play to Play.

Not in our blood?

Avinash Kaushik is the Analytics Evangelist at Google. Listed below is quote of his from a recent speech.

"The Web has been around forever and yet it is not in the blood of the executives who staff the top echelons of companies. Make no mistake, they are smart, they are successful and they want to do better. But the web is such a paradigm shift that if it is not in your blood it is very difficult to imagine its power and how to use it for good. How do you demand innovation & creativity & radical rethink if you can't imagine.

This is not just a problem for executives. It affects most of us who are over 40 years in age. We were born into an analog world and the web is forcing us to change in a way that does not feel natural. However, if we are willing to take the plunge into the digital world, it will creep into our blood as well.

Plan Ahead When Going Solo

Sometimes the partners of multiple attorney law firms decide to split up and go back working as solo attorneys. Making this transition involves important decisions regarding the current website of the firm and the future website platforms needed to support the attorneys who go back on their own. Here are some things to consider:

• The firm's current website may be a valuable asset. Often times the firm's current site gets substantial traffic because of it's size, age and number of inbound links. Unfortunately, it is difficult to split the value of an established website into multiple smaller sites. The original domain name can only be used by one of the new firms. Deciding who gets to keep the original domain name is an important decision.
• Generating traffic for a new website requires, writing substantial content and doing substantial SEO work. It may take a long time to generate the same level of traffic of the firm's current site. More visitors means more phone inquiries.
• Duplicating the content of the current firm's current site on to multiple new sites is not an option. Splitting up the content may be possible, but only to a degree. And splitting the content could result in a net negative traffic flow.
• Websites will need to be created for the attorneys going solo. There may be economies of scale in creating multiple new sites at the same time using the same general structure, but with different color schemes and different content.
• When you make the decision to split up the firm and transition back to solo attorneys, start building the new websites ASAP. Because of Google's Sandbox, it is very difficult to get good search results until six months has gone by. It is important to get the clock started.
• If you have a strong need to generate leads faster for the new websites, you may want to consider setting up a Pay for Click account and buy your visits. With Pay for Click you can turn up the traffic quickly. Of course to do that, you have to donate substantial money to Google. (Clicks can be expensive and Click fraud is real)

The key is planning ahead and getting help from a firm who is experienced in helping Family Law attorneys with SEO and website planning.

Website Report Card

Your website can be an important marketing tool for your practice. But how do you know if your website is set up to create value for your firm ? Perhaps it's time for a website report card. Listed below are five main criteria for evaluating your website.

Visibility

Is your site generating leads for your practice?

Is your site on page 1 of the search results when prospective client search divorce related "keyword phrases?

Is the structure of the site adequate for taking on a search engine optimization effort?

Is there limited or no flash?

Content

How much content is there?

How frequently is the content updated?

Are important keywords prominently throughout the site.

Is the content readable?

Is there sufficient white space?

Is the width of the content is less than 75 characters ? ( less than 60 is ideal)

Is the phone number prominent?
Is there original content on the site? (duplicate content kills your SEO)

Message on the site

When prospective clients visit your office are they inspired to take action and call your office?

Is your content written to address the concerns of your prospective clients?

Navigation

Is the navigation understandable or are people confused the first time they visit your site?

Aesthetics

Is there a professional clean look to the site?

Are there attorney pictures on the site?

Are there appealing client focused pictures, quotes and images on the site?

Are the client benefits to working with you immediately visible to your eye on the home page ?

Conclusion

If you would like to learn more on how you improve your website grade please visit www.visibilitypartners.com or call us at 414-828-5897.