Legal Search Marketing Blog

Saving Money at Pay Per Click is Good, Getting top 10 Organic Rankings is Better

A few backs I blogged about the importance of making sure that your Google Adwords campaign is properly optimized. 

Many times lawyers will create an Adwords campaign and not really pay attention to it or use the Pay Per Clicks search engines optimization suggestions, which can result in you paying a lot more money then you should.  We will easily save this client at least $3,000 a month, if not more as a result of reviewing and adjusting his campaigns.

TOP 10 ORGANIC RESULTS ARE VALUABLE
More important though is having top 10 organic results at Google for the same keywords your bidding on via Pay Per Click.  The best thing about the organic listings are they are free!   So if your paying $20 per click on average and you get 100 visitors for the month via the organic listings, that would value your organic listing at $2,000 each month and thats just for one keyphrase.

SAVE MONEY AT PPC & GET TOP 10 ORGANIC RANKINGS
The same Massachusetts Drunk Driving Lawyer that we helped save money on the Pay per click ads, we have now also gotten him top 10 rankings at Google organics for many of the same terms he is bidding on.  Some of the terms are 
- Massachusetts OUI (#6)
- OUI Lawyers Mass (#4)
- Massachusetts DUI (#6)
- Massachusetts DWI (#8)
- Massachusetts Drunk Driving Lawyers (#8)

I already see an increase in traffic from the organic listings. So as a result of our Internet Marketing work, the client has not only saved over $3000 a month but now has many top 10 organic listings and is now getting more traffic and visitors then ever before, which will result in more clients.

If we can be of assistance to your legal practice, with either pay per click marketing or organic optimization, please contact us.

Bigger Lawfirms Don't Do SEO

Most lawyers that contact me for doing organic search engine optimization or pay per click marketing are smaller law firms and solo attorneys.

CAN YOUR FIRMS ATTORNEYS BE FOUND WHEN THEY ARE GOOGLED?

I usually notice that bigger law firms websites aren't optimized and sometimes you can't even find key partners when "googling" them, let alone finding the firms site for keywords related to their practice areas.

I would think that bigger law firms with big marketing budgets would do more with search engine optimization and pay per click marketing.  This is good news though for the smaller firms of the world, they can compete and beat the bigger guys in online advertising.

MOST LAWFIRM MARKETING DIRECTORS DONT GET SEO

I do have a number of bigger law firms that do recognize the value of search engine optimization and thats usually because of a sharp law marketing director.  Yet I find most law firm marketing directors don't seem to understand how important it is to have some optimization done on the firms site, at the very least make sure your firm and its partners can be found at Google.

I do see more and more lawyers recognizing that online marketing is the wave of the future and replacing the yellow pages and traditional ways to advertise.

The latest large law firm client that we are working for is a Canadian law firm with multiple locations including Toronto, New York & London.

If you law firm needs assistance with search engine optimization or pay per click marketing, contact us today.

Checking the # of Links to your Legal Site

Getting links to your legal website from other sites is one of the more important things in getting high rankings at the search engines, especially Google.   To check the # of links that you presently have pointing to your site, goto Google and type in link:http://www.yoursite.com/ changing the domain to your law firms domain name.

Google doesnt report the full # of links though using this tool, yet they have rececently started reporting much more detailed link analysis in the Google sitemaps program. Yahoo though will report a more accurate # using the link search link:http://www.yoursite.com/.

The more links you have the better, but getting links from highly ranked and linked sites that are legal related will produce the best results. Getting links from any .EDU website can be especially valuable. 

If your law firm needs assitance with link building, contact us today.

How To Get 8 Out Of 10 TOP 10 Rankings at MSN

Getting top 10 search engine rankings is the goal of most search engine optimization projects.  It makes sense that if your in the top 10 for a keyword related to your firms practice, that you will get some traffic from people looking for the type of law you practice. How about if you were able to get ALL TOP 10 rankings for certain keywords!!!

Ive got one client who has a number of different sites including many mini sites that are focused on specific practice areas such as corporate law, tax law, litigation, estate planning and others and most all of them are listed pretty well in the organic search listings.

At MSN for the keyphrase Chicago Tax Law the firm has the first 7 spots and then also the 10th place for a dominating 8 out of 10 top 10 rankings!   Its harder to achieve that at Google BUT they do have 3 out of the top 10. 5 out 10 at Yahoo.

Having multiple sites can be a very good idea and a way to focus on different sets of keywords. Yet its important though to not just repeat the same content on multiple sites, you must have unique content in order to have success. The more unique content, the better, content is and always will be King!

SEO Doesn’t Guarantee Blog Visitor Loyalty

Good post from Andy Beal about how most traffic to your blog will come from the search engines, BUT that its not enough, you must provide quality content relevant to what people are seeking for your blog to really flourish.

***  Mixed blessings for SEM come from a Boston University study entitled Traffic Characteristics and Communication Patterns in the Blogosphere.

First, the good news: the majority of blog traffic comes from search engines. Search engines accounted for 43% of referral traffic in the blogosphere. Hurray for search engine marketers! Their diagram of referral traffic (below) does not include the 28% of blogosphere traffic without any referral data (probably bookmark or type-in traffic).

Now for the bad news: “Despite the intimacy between traffic and search, however, optimizing a blog for search engine algorithms does not win the blogs retention or popularity,” as MarketingVOX put it. Yep, all the rankings in the world don’t make your blog well read, popular or sticky. You have to do that.

SOURCE:  Marketing Pilgrim

Legal Mini Websites

We have helped a number of law firms create additional websites that focus on different practice  areas and a different set of keywords.   The minisite will focus on a specific practice area and expand on the information that is on the main site.   This can help you get additional listings at the search engines and drive additional focused traffic to your firm.

The latest firm we have assisted is the Seattle, Washington law firm of Robert Kornfeld.  We had previously created a Washington Personal Injury mini site and now have expanded to create mini sites for Seattle Construction Law, Seattle Medical Malpractice Law, Washington Brain & Spinal Injury & Seattle Truck Accident Law.  Each of these sites has unique content, a unique keyword rich domain name, optimized code focused on a specific set of keywords and interlinked with other websites.

Having High Google Pagerank & Many Links Is NOT Enough

HOW IMPORTANT IS A GOOGLE PAGERANK SCORE?

Google PageRank is a score that Google gives every web site and its from 0-10. Many people think that this is a good way to see how well a web site will do at the search engines. The fact is though the Google pagerank score can be very misleading. Just having a high PR score and a lot of links.

The problem here though is if you don't have other optimization techniques done, like updating each pages title tag or having your keywords within the content of your pages, then your probably not going to be found for keywords related to your practice, no matter how many links you have or how high your pagerank is.

SOLO LAWYERS VS. BIG LAW FIRMS

I see examples of solo attorneys out performing big law firms and saw one today. I reviewed a big law firms site that has multiple locations and over 100 attorneys and they have a very old site that has a domain name from 1994, which is a good thing.  It has a Google pagerank score of 6, which is very good and it has 244 links counted from Google, which is a high #.

These three things combined, an older domain name, a high pagerank score and a lot of links should mean that this site is well ranked but the fact is that its not ranked at all for any keywords related to its practice and in fact many of the partners aren't even coming up if you Google them by name.

I have many different law firm sites, including solo attorney sites that maybe have a PageRank of 3 or 4, have about 20-30 links, yet are ranked in the top 10 for many different keywords and get a lot of web site traffic as a result. This shows you that its a combination of things that have to happen and that certain things must be done in order to get results at Google.

LAW FIRMS ARE MISSING A GREAT OPPORTUNITY

Most law firms have not paid any attention to search engine optimization and are just starting to realize how important it is. If you have a site that has been around for awhile, has plenty of links from other sites, is in the right search directories BUT isn't optimized for the keywords pertinent to your firms practice, then your probably missing out on a lot of focused traffic.

New Meta Search Engine Shows You Results From The Big Four Search Engines

Good post from Search Engine Watch about a new search engine that allows you to do one search and see the results from Google, Yahoo, Msn and Ask Jeeves. Very cool tool.

A new meta search engine allows you to compare results from the four top web search engines, and tweak their relative importance in the mix by adding to or subtracting from the relative importance of each.

Myriad Search is a brand-new and relatively untested meta search engine designed primarily to help search engine optimizers with competitive intelligence research on keywords. Want to know which competitor is ranking well on specific keywords? Myriad Search will show you, presenting search results with their relative rankings from Ask Jeeves, Google, MSN Search and Yahoo.

Value in Giving Your Legal Web Site A Facelift

BENEFITS OF UPDATING YOUR LEGAL WEB SITE:

Many law firms don't bother ever updating the firms web site and I see a lot of legal sites that are pretty stale and out of date.  The search engines favor web sites that add or update content on a regular basis and it also helps to give your a site a fresh look from time to time for your viewers.

IS YOUR SITE SEARCH ENGINE FRIENDLY?

Another reason to consider updating your legal site is because many web sites that were created 3-4 years ago were not built with the search engines in mind. I see a lot of sites that have all graphic home pages, very little content, no site map page and other things that can effect getting the best possible search engine rankings for your law firms web site.

LEGAL WEB SITE FACE LIFT

My legal marketing and design company Lawyers Court recently updated the legal web site of Law Firm Consultant Robert Henderson of RJH Consulting. This site had not been updated in over 4 years and needed a fresh new look, as well as an updated navigation structure, a site map page and additional content.

CONTENT IS KING

We created a simple new design with an updated logo and a few new legal images but the key updates were the additional content provided by including 10 legal consulting related articles. This gave the site an additional 10 pages, all of which have been optimized for the search engines.

OTHER KEY ADDITIONS TO THE UPDATED LEGAL WEB SITE

A few other things that we did, that all law firm web sites should have is #1- Your firms contact info including email should be on every page, #2- The site should have a dual navigation structure, meaning links at the top of every page and then text links at the bottom of every page, #3-Adding additional content to the home page and then #4 is having a site map page to make sure that the search engines can find all the pages within the site.

So now this legal web site is what I would call "Search Engine Friendly" and its come a long way for a very reasonable price.

Contact us if you would like a legal web site face lift for your law firm or legal web site.

Wordtracker Keyword Results Not Always Accurate

I use Wordtracker all the time to do keyword research and its probably the best keyword tool out there, yet Ive always said that its not a perfect science and sometimes I'm skeptical of the results.

The first thing to know is that the way they report all the results is somewhat confusing, they give you two different columns, one a "Count" and then the 2nd is a "Predict" number. (See Below) 

Keyword

Count

Predict

chicago wrongful death lawyers

83

71

Usually these #'s are pretty close but here are the definitions of what "Count" and "Predict" mean exactly from the Wordtracker site.

Count - This shows the number of times a particular keyword has appeared in our database. E.g. Our database currently holds 373 million words. A count of 147 tells us that this particular word has appeared 147 times out of 373 million (this is over a two month period).   

Predicted - This is the maximum total predicted traffic for all of the major search engines/pay per bids and directories. It is based on the current 24 hour period.

SO, the count # is the number of times the keyword has appeared in the database over the last 2 months. The Predict # is just a prediction of how many times max that keyword would be searched in a 24 hour period at ALL the search engines.

This database of keywords is from meta-crawlers and not from any of the big search engines actual search database. According to Wordtracker, "We get our data from metacrawlers, rather than the search engines themselves. After all, the metacrawlers contain the results from the search engines."

This might be true but I still would probably rather have the #'s direct from Google as to the number of searches done and the keywords used.   

I do know that I tend to question the results from Wordtracker from time to time.  I mean as a quick example I was doing  some keyword research on the term "Chicago Lawyers" and wordtracker brought back some very interesting results (see below), they said that the key phrase "Chicago wrongful death lawyers" has a count of 83 and a predict # of 71, which is much higher then the more general term "Chicago Lawyers" which has a count of 26 and predict # of 22.

WORDTRACKER RESULTS FOR "CHICAGO LAWYERS"

Keyword

Count

Predict

chicago wrongful death lawyers	83	71
chicago injury lawyers	82	70
chicago accident lawyers	80	68
chicago car accident lawyers	70	60
chicago personal injury lawyers	67	57
chicago medical malpractice lawyers	62	53
chicago slip and fall lawyers	60	51
chicago malpractice lawyers	57	49
chicago auto accident lawyers	56	48
chicago motorcycle accident lawyers	48	41
chicago dog bite lawyers	35	30
chicago product liability lawyers	34	29
chicago nursing home abuse lawyers	29	25
chicago lawyers	26	22

Notice it also lists many other keyphrases with higher numbers such as "chicago accident lawyers" and "chicago injury lawyers". I thought to myself though, no way is that possible because it just seems like that specific search would never get as many searches as a more general term like "Chicago Lawyers".

So I went to Google Adwords and used the keyword tool and the predictions were much different and more realistic I thought (SEE TABLE BELOW).

Traffic Estimates from Google Adwords - 5/11/05

Keywords	Clicks / Day	Average Cost-Per-Click	Cost / Day	Average Position [?]
chicago accident lawyers	1.0	$0.28	$0.26	1.8
chicago attorney	15.0	$1.49	$22.22	1.8
chicago attorneys	9.4	$1.26	$11.78	2.0
chicago brain injury lawyers	< 0.1	$0.05	$0.00	1.0
chicago car accident lawyers	< 0.1	$0.05	$0.00	1.0
chicago dog bite lawyers	< 0.1	$0.05	$0.00	1.0
chicago injury lawyers	0.3	$1.44	$0.46	3.5
chicago lawyer	8.6	$1.50	$12.85	2.6
chicago lawyers	13.0	$1.39	$18.00	2.6
chicago personal injury lawyers	0.2	$1.79	$0.41	3.5
chicago slip and fall lawyers	< 0.1	$0.05	$0.00	1.0
chicago vioxx lawyers	< 0.1	$0.05	$0.00	1.0
chicago wrongful death lawyer	< 0.1	$0.05	$0.00	1.0
chicago wrongful death lawyers	< 0.1	$0.05	$0.00	1.0
Overall	47.5	$1.39	$65.98	2.2

Notice how Chicago lawyers & Chicago attorneys would both get about 12-15 clicks per day, BUT "Chicago wrongful death lawyers" would get LESS then one click a day.   PLUS notice it would only be 5 cents per click for that term, which really says that it gets no action at all and nobody is interested in it.

SO that tells me the numbers from Wordtracker are way off, at least for the keywords Ive listed. I mean they are saying that the term "Chicago Lawyers" only appeared 26 times in 2 months. 

Yet according to Google, if you were listed in the top 3 for that term, you could get 12-15 visitors a day. That might be high but its at least 5-10 per day, because I have clients that are listed for that term and I monitor the traffic.

Wordtracker is still a great tool and it usually is more accurate then this example.  I usually use Wordtracker in combination with the Overture and Google keyword tools for the best possible results.

Example of a Law Firms Search Marketing Success

I'm always amazed at how many lawyers and law firms just don't take advantage of Internet search engine marketing.   I don't know if they just don't understand it or don't think its necessary. 

Some lawyers do get it though and understand how important the Internet can be to attracting new potential clients.  One law firm that does get it, is Horowitz and Weinstein. We have been helping them with Internet Marketing and search engine optimization for the past 4 years and they have had great success and have gotten many new clients from the Internet.

They are well ranked at Google and all the other search engines for a variety of keywords related to their legal practice.   At Google they are #2 for Chicago Lawyers and #3 for Chicago Attorneys, as well as top 10 for other geo specific key phrases, such as Chicago Bankruptcy Lawyers or Chicago Elder Planning.

This is important, as is doing a focused Pay Per Click campaign, getting key links from other sites and being in key search and legal directories.    Having a search engine friendly site that has good content also will help and its a combination of all of these things that will result in focused and qualified traffic coming to your legal web site.

We have helped many attorneys succeed on the Internet and we can help your firm as well. Visit our web site to see how we can help your law firm succeed and get new clients.

Search Engine Listings that Disappear

Do you ever notice that sometimes your web site appears in the organic search engine results and then the following day the site is just gone?

This seems to just happen at Google and usually with sites that haven't been around for that long.   

Sometimes it can be a result of a penalty imposed by Google for breaking any of their search engine guidelines. Sometimes its hard to tell because I have sites that were well ranked, then all of a sudden drop out for a week, then come back but not as strong, until later.

As an example, I have a legal directory at www.lawfirm-directory.com and it was always well ranked at Google for a number of terms including "lawfirm directory", then it dropped out for a few weeks, but came back and slowly worked back to the previous listings. NOW its better positioned and we are #3 for lawfirm directory and #10 for law firm directory at Google. #1 at MSN and Yahoo.

I don't see much ranking fluctuation at MSN or Yahoo and once your site is in at MSN or Yahoo, it usually stays there. Unless of course your talking about the Yahoo directory, which you have to pay $299 annually to be included in. 

So be patient if you see your rankings fluctuate, I know it cant be frustrating but if you have a good solid web site, usually things get back to normal pretty quickly. 

Do Legal Directories Work?

Someone asked me the other day if listing in online legal directories was a good idea. I of course said yes because I run a legal directory but I have many law firm clients that have had great success with legal directories and it really depends on the directory. 

I have clients that list in many different directories and they usually want to know which directories drive the most traffic.  I have reviewed stats and usually I have found that most legal directories do produce traffic, but some more then others.

Usually the bigger directories like Martindale Hubbell and Findlaw didn't really bring as many visitors as other smaller legal directories, like Attorney Find or Attorney Locate.   It does depend though on the type of listing you have, the number of categories your listed in and other factors.

It helps if the legal directory is well ranked at the search engines for terms like "find a lawyer", "legal directory", "law firm directory" and also for more specific geographic keyword terms like "Chicago appellate lawyers" or "Illinois tax attorneys".   

Some directories are ranked well in the organic listings, while others just rely on pay per click advertising for traffic.    Getting traffic from the legal directory listing is a good benefit and an added benefit can be the value of the link pointing to your site.

Its good when you have links from other legal related web sites, especially if they are also well ranked, this can boost your web sites legal link popularity score.

Overall I think that legal directories are a good value because usually if you get just one new client per year, it will more then pay for the listing. Research the directory though and make sure they have some search engine exposure, then test them out for 6-12 months and see what kind of traffic they produce.

Whats in and out in Legal Web Marketing

The Law Marketing Portal has a good article entitled "Marketing Technology: Hit the Jackpot". The article offers some highlights of a recent conference on business development, sponsored by Thomson's Findlaw.

The panel focused on small and medium size law firms, and discussed what's "in" and what's "out" in online legal marketing.  Here are some examples of what's in and out and my comments.

IN: Search engine optimization: "If you have a great website that no one can find, do you exist as a business?" asked MicroLaw's Kodner (The implied answer is "no").

"If a prospect Googles your firm and you don't show up on the first hit page, you're invisible. If a prospect Googles your area of practice and your location and you don't show up on the first hit page, you're not getting hired or ever considered.

*** I have been telling lawyers this for years now, that its very key that your site be found in the search engines and that if you don't come up, then its like you don't exist on the web.     Also that's it key that you be found by your firms name, key partners name and of course by your geographic location and main practice areas. 

Search engine optimization is no longer optional, it's absolutely essential, says Kodner. "The object is to skew hits to your site. Your firm needs a professional search engine optimization consultant if you expect to get top results in your promoted practice areas." 

*** I would agree that search engine optimization in a must these days for law firms. My company has been helping lawyers for a over seven years now optimize and promote their legal web sites.

OUT: Tweaking metatags and other coding tricks. Search engines have gotten wise to all the behind-the-scenes coding tricks and don't pay attention to them any more, reports CLASS' Jackman.

Coding tricks include standard techniques such as beefing up title and metatags in a website's HTML code, and sneakier ploys, such as hiding keywords in invisible text (like black text on a black background), automated software services that spam search engines with information, buying links back to your site on link farms, or creating mirror or gateway sites to your site.

*** I would agree with all of this except that to point out that the Title tag on each page is still very important.

IN: Pay-for-performance search advertising. Overture, Google and other online companies sell key words that people use when conducting online searches. When a person uses a keyword your firm has reserved, a listing for your firm appears at the top of the search results.

"Clients are searching for your services," says Stevens. Pay-for-performance-search helps lawyers attract clients cost-effectively, he asserts. "A lawyer, as the advertiser, will know whether the reserved keyword is working. It is the perfect marketplace for the little guy," he said.

*** Pay per click is very in and I'm surprised not to see more attorneys utilizing it.  Ive been assisting attorneys with pay per click campaigns for many years now and its a great way to drive additional focused and qualified traffic to your web site.

Sometimes you can find some great keyword values that drive a lot of traffic for a very little investment.  Its just a matter of staying on top of it and adjusting your bids.

Blogs keep visitors coming back

Great post today at the Be Spacific blog on a story from the Wall Street Journal about how Weblogs or Blogs keep visitors coming back to your site and how its a fantastic marketing tool for many reasons.

I would concur and think they are a must have for EVERY law firm. Its a great way to establish your legal expertise and if done right, its a great way to get good search engine rankings, which will lead to more traffic coming to your site, which in turn will lead to more clients. 

Top 5 Search Engines for Law Firms

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.

New Form Of Google AdWords Click Fraud

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".

Difference between PPC & Organic listings

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SPONSORED AND ORGANIC SEARCH  LISTINGS

Many lawyers are confused by the difference between the pay per click sponsored listings and the free organic listings at Google, Yahoo and other top search engines.

The free or "organic" search listings at Google are listed on the left side of the page and the sponsored PPC listings are located on the right side of the page under "sponsored links" and sometimes at the very top of the page, right above the organic listings.

Organic listings take time and effort to achieve and are usually a result of a legal web site that has a lot of good content, is listed in the Yahoo and Open directories and has a lot of links pointing to it from other sites.

The pay per click or sponsored listings are a result of web sites that bid a certain amount per click on a keyword. The higher the bid, the higher the ranking. Even though at Google its a little bit of a different bidding process then at Overture. At Overture, its simply a matter of whoever bids higher, gets the higher listing, where at Google, its a combination of different criteria including amount bid.

Obviously you want to be listed in the organic listings because its like the gift that keeps on giving and you don't have to pay every time someone clicks on your site.  Yet it takes time to get the free listings and sometimes you have no choice but to pay extra to visitors to your legal web site. Some lawyers do both, get great organic listings but then also pay for the sponsored links to cover all bases.