Common Mistakes Law Firms Make That Tank

Their Web Traffic

Primerus Spring Conference 2014

Tom Foster Founder | CEO

Danielle Ruderman Chief Marketing Officer

• Attorney marketing since 1998 • About 400 websites live right now • Over 500,000 visitors each month • We have manually performed hundreds of

website analyses in the last year • Backlink data on over 75,000 law firm

websites • Over 1,000 pieces of content produced

each month • 400-500 paid hours of SEO each month

Why is it so hard to get on Page 1…

Google PhDs

• Google makes over 500 changes each year

• Algorithm changes target specific SEO tricks – and there are more to come

• Search results are customized for users

• Local search factors always evolving

Google Panda Updates Google Penguin Updates

Targets Low-Quality Content Targets Unnatural Links

Google Kills Organic Keywords

Google Hummingbird Update

• Google algorithms are different for mobile

Is your website ready? (It better be!)

• 10 – 50% of visitors to FWM sites are using mobile devices

• Mobile traffic spikes on the weekends • Google said “mobile is growing faster than

anyone anticipated”

What does this all mean…?

STOP OBSESSING OVER KEYWORDS!

Focus on your firm’s BRAND

Deliver a GREAT User Experience

“I want to be on page 1 for Dallas personal injury lawyer!”

“You need to give me a page 1 guarantee”

“I only pay for results”

Typical demands we hear from lawyers:

Consequences of Page 1 Obsession for coveted vanity

keywords

Massive Traffic Drops – No Recovery

Overall 40% drop in traffic

What Causes Massive Traffic Drops?

STEP 1 STEP 2 STEP 3

Write Content Using Your List of Vanity

Keywords as Anchor Text

Post the Content All Across the Web

Get Links Back to Your Website from Keyword-

stuffed Content

Cheap article marketing gets you backlinks from these types of websites:

Cross Linking Your Sites…

Linking your sites together, or a network of your peers sites = unnatural backlink profile

SEO Link Wheels, Link Farms, Link Networks…

Over Optimized Content…

Excessive internal linking to one page…

How much do you REALLY know

about your Web Marketing Provider?

Referring to a lawyer as an EXPERT in

online content is a no-no.

Do they know about lawyer ethics?

“Visit website to hire personal injury lawyer who will put all effort to get the claims you deserved”

And… firm name spelled Incorrectly!

Grammar & Spelling Issues

Fake addresses using firm’s real phone number Trick used by lazy SEOs to rank in other cities – also great for ruining your local SEO!

Article Marketing on low-value article directory websites Listing your business in irrelevant directories It’s a great deal if you want to ruin your backlink profile!

“Spinning” or “Reusing” Content

You might be at risk if you… • Engage in article marketing • Pay for cheap link building or SEO • Outsource your marketing and

don’t have regular meetings to review progress – meetings, not reports.

Protect Your BRAND

Do Not Fall For:

SHORT TERM THINKING

IMMEDIATE GRATIFICATION

PAGE 1 PROMISES

Questions?