Yahoo! will be celebrating their 10th anniversary on March 2nd. Hard to believe its already been a decade since Yahoo has been delivering search results. The AP has a wonderful timeline of Yahoo! with key dates and milestones in the history of Yahoo.
Netimperative has details of a survey conducted by Agence Virtuelle that claims British search engine users are smarter than Americans.
Nine out of ten (93%) Web users in the UK know the difference between sponsored and organic search engine results compared to just 38% of Americans, according to new research.
The problem? The company that conducted the UK survey, did not conduct the US survey. So I highly doubt that the questions would be the same. I do know that many people here in the US wouldn't know the difference, so that 38% figure seems right, but the 93% figure seems off
Ive come up with what I believe are the top 5 search engines or directories that law firms should be most concerned with being listed in.
Top 5 Search Engines and Directories for Law Firms:
1) Google - The King of the Search Engines is hard to beat and everyone knows the term "googled". Probably a good reason that Google is used more then any other search engine.
So its important when a potential client is looking for information on your law firm and decides to google you, that your law firms web site appears. Its also important being found by key partners names. Usually this isn't a problem but Ive noticed some big firms not coming up even by firm name.
Since Google gets more traffic then any other search engine, its obviously the #1 place your law firm should be listed in.
Just submitting your site isn't enough though, you must have at least one other link from another web site. Its also very advantageous if you have a directory listing at both Yahoo and the Open Directory. In addition your site should have plenty of content that is updated on a regular basis.
2) Yahoo - Yahoo has been making a solid comeback after Google knocked them off as top dog in the Search Engine world. They are very important and get a lot of traffic. Potential clients could very easily search for you at Yahoo instead of Google, SO its very key that your legal web site be found in all of the top search engines.
Yahoo has a search directory that you can list your law firm in for $299 per year. Now usually this is a good idea for the value of a link from Yahoo, but the thing to keep in mind, is that you can get into the Yahoo search listings without buying the directory listing.
3) MSN - MSN Search used to rely on results from the Inktomi index and the Looksmart directory. Those days are gone and MSN just launched a new search engine, so there's a chance your firm is not in the new MSN.com.
I think its a much improved search engine and feel that Microsoft is committed to overtaking Google, so its obviously important to be listed with MSN. They have a built in user base from people that get computers with Microsoft Internet Explorer set with MSN.com as the starting page.
4) AOL - AOL has been changing things around but they are still basically using the Google results and most AOL and Google searches return identical results. Still that will change soon and there will be another search engine to optimize for, because right now as long as your in Google, your in AOL.
Its important to be in AOL because they also have a big built in user base that will ONLY use AOL for search purposes, so its important to be in Google and the Open Directory.
5) OPEN DIRECTORY - The Open Directory on its own isn't very important BUT because Google uses those results for its own directory, its very important be listed at. Its a free listing IF you can get it. It sometimes takes me 6,7 attempts before I get my clients site listed. Usually it just takes the editor who is reviewing your submission time to get to it, because they aren't paid and its all volunteer and many categories don't have editors.
Still once you get a listing, then your usually better listed with Google and your rankings improve. Sometimes you can get multiple listings for your site if you can get listed in different practice areas OR if your firm has different geographic locations. Its pays to be patient here and get a listing because it will pay off in the long run.
Washburn University of Law has a great legal resource site called Washlaw Web. They have every states legislative info, historical documents, court information, rules of the courts and a whole lot more. Its very well organized and they also have a good legal directory that all law firms should be listed in.
1. Google (17.9) 1
2. Yahoo! (14.5) 2
3. AltaVista (13.6) 15
4. Tiscali (7.8) 12
5. My Way (6.0) 6
6. MSN (5.5) 4
7. Wanadoo (5.5) 10
8. Lycos (4.8) 16
9. Ask Jeeves (4.5) 3
10. Dogpile.com (2.7) 18
11. AOL (2.3) 7
Read entire list of top 20. Source: Nielsen//NetRatings
The paid search market will more than double from $2.6 billion in 2004 to $5.5 billion in 2009, and that growth will be driven by the "four horsemen" of vertical search, according to a new study by JupiterResearch.
The study, "Vertical Search: Early Marketers Will Reap Rewards of Low Pricing," predicts that the paid search industry will evolve similarly to media markets like television and magazines: with broad-based engines spawning a host of vertical players devoted to specific categories.
More from ClickZ: The Four Horsemen of Vertical Search
News.com - Fearing a slowdown in online advertising, an analyst downgraded the stocks of search giants Google and Yahoo on Thursday.
Shares of both companies fell roughly 5 percent each in late morning trading, pushing Yahoo to $30.49 a share and Google to $185.25. The broader markets, however, were up during morning trading.
I dont know about the stocks of Google and Yahoo but I do know that search engine marketing is bigger then ever and all reports Ive seen, points to it getting even bigger in the near future. So I guess that means buy Yahoo and Google now.
A study from Oneupweb finds that in general, longer search terms convert better than shorter ones. In particular:
This makes sense and for most lawyers and law firms, usually you want to try and target the key phrases that combine your geographic area with your practice areas.
So it makes sense to bid on terms like "Chicago eminent domain lawyers" or "Illinois condemnation attorneys" instead of just "eminent domain" or "condemnation lawyers", if your a Chicago based condemnation firm.
You might not get as many clicks but odds are you will convert more of these leads into clients because someone searching just for "eminent domain", probably is just looking for free or general information opposed to hiring an attorney.
Andy Beal of the Search Engine lowdown has a good post today about the new MSN search engine and how many in the search engine community consider it a flop and "that MSN Search's "marketing and attempts to connect just suck" and "my gut feeling is that they've blown it".
Andy Comments : Come off it! They only launched it a few weeks ago and they have 5 years of catching-up to do. I know for a fact that they are still working on refining the search engine and have efforts to reach out to the search marketing community. It may take a few months for them to gain traction, but don't write them off in the first inning (remember the Red Sox vs the Yankees?).
I would agree with Andy here and I think so far that the MSN search engine is better then it was. I think it has a long ways to go to beat Google but I wouldnt count Microsoft out here at all.
I think the results of the new search engine are better and I like a lot of the new features it has, not to mention that most all my sites are very well ranked! I like the new feature at MSN where you can ask it a question, like "Who is the president?" or "What is the NRA?" and get the correct answer. Google is still king but MSN and Yahoo are gaining.
Another story from Pay Per Click Universe talks about click fraud and how it only applies to Google Adword accounts because Adwords is the only PPC to use a complex algorithm to determine how high your overall ranking is.
This is where a lot of people get confused about Google adwords. Its not as simple as Overture, where whoever bids the highest, gets the top spot. At Google adwords, its different because your CTR / click through rate determines how high your position is. The article goes into more detail with a good example.
"For example, if you get a 5% CTR (50 clicks out of 1000 impressions), but your maximum bid is only 50 cents, and your competitor bids 80 cents but has 1% CTR, you WILL appear higher than him. With AdWords, though, if your CTR is less than 0.5%, your ad is disabled and disappears until you make some changes to bring your CTR back up."
The story goes on to talk about how certain click fraudsters will artificially inflate the number of impressions for certain keywords and what happens is your CTR will go down and if its under .5%, your ads will be disabled and then when your sites out, someone else moves into your position.
Now I don't know how illegal that is since they are not clicking on ads. I would be more concerned about your competitors who might click on your keywords.
Its key to have someone pay attention to the pay per click traffic and monitor the stats and make sure the same IP address isn't visiting your site multiple times. This is usually only an issue when you are bidding on high valued keywords like "vioxx" or "mesothelioma lawyers".
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