It’s a good day today at Avvo. Why? Well, to start off, we have an amazing team – energetic, smart and committed to innovation. I feel honored just to have a desk among them. Next, we have the best product in the business – a product that has taken us from concept to market leader in just three years. And, finally, today DAG Ventures, Benchmark Capital and Ignition Partners invested $10 million in our business. How neat. You can find the press release here.

We are humbled to have this kind of support from the investment community. However, it also turns up the heat. I remember when Expedia went public, an Amazon friend (who had gone public a couple of years before) said, “Why are you smiling? Now the real work starts.” And, I can’t help but feel that way today. We raised this money in order to continue and expand our success to date. However, to pursue the grand initiatives dancing in our heads while continuing to innovate in our existing products, we are looking at a new round of significant sweat equity.

Thank you to DAG’s John Caddedeu for making this round of financing move as quickly as it did. We don’t have a big team, so for any of us to be focusing on fundraising rather than running our business has its price. John’s reasonable and efficient process allowed us to keep every hand on the wheel.

Go Avvo.

Mark

I’ve written quite a bit before on the topic of online reputation ecosystems, and the value they bring to both businesses and consumers. However, Professor Eric Goldman – who heads the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University Law School – is one of the leading authorities on the subject. Unlike many academics, Eric brings a lot of real-world experience to the discussion, and it’s always worth listening to his thoughts on this topic.

Eric has posed a very interesting deck of slides detailing the regulation of “reputation systems”, and concluding that mediated systems of reputation (e.g., Avvo’s client reviews) are inherently superior to unmediated systems (e.g., word-of-mouth or unmoderated online forums) in offering both breadth and quality of reputational information. In Eric’s formulation, the characteristics of a successful mediated system include: Translucent algorithms + robust anti-gaming enforcement + no pay-to-play, attributed sources and a right of right of reply.

Despite the fact that Avvo doesn’t offer fully-attributed sources (we feel it is important to offer those rating lawyers the option to comment anonymously), I’m glad to see that our gold-standard process for mediating client reviews meets the Goldman test.

This week Google’s Matt Cutts revealed that if you switch domains using a 301 redirect, it could hurt your SEO.   Learn why this is a common issue for attorneys and how you can avoid it.

Changing domains and 301 redirects

Business owners change domain names for a variety of reasons, including trademark disputes, branding issues or plain aesthetics.  For attorneys, a common reason is that a partner leaves, and the domain name has the ex partner’s name in it.

Changing domain names can raise a variety of issues, but one is the SEO impact.  Namely, will Google treat the new domain as it did the old one?  The standard answer has always been that if you do a 301 redirect, then Google will treat the new and old domains the same.  In other words, because 301 redirects pass PageRank (the “juice” that Google uses in large part to rank websites), by using a 301 redirect you preempt any problems.

However, this week Matt Cutts from Google revealed in an interview that using 301 redirects across domains does leak some PageRank.  How much? We don’t know, but it does leak some.  This means that there is a SEO price to be paid for switching domains, even if it’s a small price.

Pick a generic domain and stick with it

Because switching domains means that your website will lose some standing in Google’s eyes, this means it’s probably best to avoid it.  For attorneys, a great way of preventing the need to switch domains is to register a generic domain in the first place.

So instead of JonesSmithMichaels.com, use SeattleBusinessLawyers.com.  If you don’t want to commit to a particular practice area, then go with SeattleLawyers.com or some derivative of it.   This way even if partners go and come, you’ll never need to change your domain name.  As a bonus, a generic domain name can help your website rank for the keywords in it.

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In the spirit of March Madness, we decided to kick off our own competition among law schools with ‘Avvo’s Lawyer Madness‘.  In this tournament pool,  bracketology strategies, seeds, strength of schedule and player-match ups are thrown out the window. Instead, it’s YOUR VOTE that will keep your law school alive.

But if the love of your school isn’t enough, lawyers with degrees from the winning law school will receive Avvo Pro for 3-months free!

We’ve set up the brackets and timetable to mirror the men’s NCAA basketball tournament. To move your school to the next round simply place your vote, as many times as you’d like, and tell others to do the same! Each round, check back to see who advanced, and then place your votes again.

IMPORTANT: We removed the match-ups in which neither college has a law school, and any college matched up against one without a law school (in italics), will automatically advance. But be sure to cast your votes anyway, because they will count toward the next round.  Hooray!

Finally, if your law school is not here – let us know! Enough votes could get them into the competition. Nominate your school!

OK, now vote!!

Round 1: March 18-19

Midwest: St. Louis

University of Kansas College of Law vs Lehigh: VOTE

William S Boyd School of Law UNLV vs Northern Iowa: VOTE

Michigan State University College of Law vs New Mexico State: VOTE

University of Maryland School of Law vs University of Houston Law Center: VOTE

University of Tennessee College of Law vs San Diego State: VOTE

Georgetown Law vs Ohio: VOTE

Ohio State University Moritz College of Law vs UC Santa Barbara: VOTE

West: Salt Lake City

Syracuse University College of Law vs Vermont University: VOTE

Gonzaga University School of Law vs Florida State University College of Law: VOTE

Vanderbilt University Law School vs Murray State: VOTE

Xavier vs University of Minnesota Law School: VOTE

University of Pittsburgh School of Law vs Oakland University: VOTE

Brigham Young University J. Reuben Clark Law School vs University of Florida Levin College of Law: VOTE

Kansas State vs North Texas School of Law: VOTE

East: Syracuse

University of Kentucky College of Law vs East Tennessee State: VOTE

University of Texas School of Law vs Wake Forest University School of Law: VOTE

Temple University Beasley School of Law vs Cornell Law School: VOTE

University of Wisconsin Law School vs Wofford: VOTE

Marquette University Law School vs University of Washington School of Law: VOTE

University of New Mexico School of Law vs University of Montana School of Law: VOTE

Clemson vs University of Missouri Columbia School of Law: VOTE

West Virginia University College of Law vs Morgan State: VOTE

South: Houston

Duke University School of Law vs University of Arkansas Pine Bluff: VOTE

UC Berkeley Boalt Hall School of Law vs University of Louisville Louis D Brandeis School of Law: VOTE

Notre Dame Law School vs Old Dominion: VOTE

Baylor University School of Law vs Sam Houston: VOTE

University of Richmond T.C. Williams School of Law vs St. Mary’s (Ca.): VOTE

Villanova University School of Law vs Robert Morris: VOTE

Standing out from the crowd

With 1.2 million lawyers in America, standing out can be a challenge, but not for the 22 lawyers featured here.  Shunning stiff suits and bookshelf backdrops, these lawyers are turning heads.  But are some of them going too far? You be the judge.

1) Jailhouse business cards for a criminal defense lawyer.

2) Separable business cards, stationary and envelopes for a divorce lawyer.

3) More perforated divorce lawyer cards.

4) With all the lawyers out there calling themselves the hammer, the switchblade or the chainsaw, it’s about time someone called himself “generic.”

5) A law firm description on a nutrition label.

6) A divorce lawyer leaves branded condoms at a motel, assuming many guests will soon be getting a divorce.

7) This divorce lawyer ad separates on elevator doors.

8) Can you wear a guerrilla suit to court?

9) Creating demand for divorce lawyers.

10) Divorce lawyer chop sticks.

11) Criminal defense, Jamaican style, ‘mon.

12) The queen of malpractice.

13) “The Thugs Lawyer”

14) DUI T-shirts for St. Patty’s day.

15) Light bulb head ad.

16) Don’t call if your injury has to do with video games.

17) Don’t call if your injury is a paper cut.

18) Cartoons rapping about a lawyer.

19) Hire this lawyer, not “some piece of crap three piece suit downtown.”

20) The “California Switch Blade” cuts up the competition.

21) LA’s dopest criminal defense lawyer doesn’t look like a lawyer (also check out her Myspace page).

22) Forget a shelf full of books.  This lawyer has a snuff film running in the background.

I love to see lawyers get business through Avvo Answers. Here’s a great article from the Wisconsin Law Journal speaking to the power of Avvo Answers. This excerpt really says it all:

“[Lawyer Karyn T.] Missimer says that Avvo Answers has increased the number of visits to her Web site.

‘I’m my own Web master, for now, and I use Google Analytics to keep track of the hits on my Web site,’ she says. ‘I’ve found that, when I go through periods of time without answering many questions, the hits on my Web site go down.’

In addition, she estimates she gets about one new client per month that she can directly trace to an answer to a question posted on Avvo.

Eric T. Raskopf, of Eric T. Raskopf Attorney at Law in Oconomowoc, also answers an occasional Avvo question, though not nearly as frequently as Missimer. While he cannot say that a new client has told him, ‘I hired you because you answered a question on Avvo,’ a sizeable number have said, ‘I found you on Avvo.’”

And if that’s not enough to have you answering thousands of Avvo questions per week, take a look at this Avvo Profile. The lawyer, Kimberly Ann Kralowec, has answered only two questions on Avvo (at the time of posting); but already one of her questioners turned into a client. The questioner left a review saying:

“I found Ms. Kralowec on avvo.com when she responded to a question I posted. When I needed to actually get detailed legal advice, I called her because she is in the same city where I live. She agreed to make one phone call to the other side’s lawyer for a small contingency fee, then did way more than that.”

Reading this sort of stuff is so gratifying. May we continue to build products that achieve this level of goodness – wins for both consumers and lawyers.

Mark

1) Alan Brinkmeier of Chicago, Illinois

2) Norman Victorino of Lake Zurich, Illinois

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3) Patrick Alexander Bradford of New York, New York

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4) Pamela Koslyn of Hollywood, California

5) Kenneth B. Kramer of Texas

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6) Gary C Furlong of Seattle, Washington

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7) Blair Frederick Paul of Seattle, Washington

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8. Shah Iqbal Nawaaz Peerally of Newark, California

9) Margery Ellen Golant of Boca Raton, Florida

10) Okorie Okorocha of Los Angeles, California

Last November,  Avvo participated in the Ranking the Raters: A Forum on Methodologies, Benefits and Value discussion hosted by the ABA Law Practice Management Section in Philadelphia. It was a great opportunity for the major players  to present their rating methodologies to a panel of in-house counsel from major U.S. corporations, the conference audience, and now you.

Here’s Avvo’s Mark Britton:

You can also view the presentations from the other participants,  as well as interviews from key influencers in attendance. Thanks again to the ABA LPM section for putting together a great event!

Joel Spolsky has run one of the most popular software blogs for the past 10 years, but this week he announced he’s calling it quits.  Find out what made his blog successful, why he’s quitting, and how lawyers can learn from his experience.

The key to successful blogging

According to Joel (borrowing from author Kathy Sierra), the key to having a successful blog is to make the blog about something bigger than you or your company.  In other words, if you’re using your blog to promote your business, the focus shouldn’t be you or your business.

This is counter intuitive because, after all, the word blog is short for “web log,” which originally was meant to be some kind of online diary.   People also naturally assume that if they want to promote themselves, they should talk about themselves.  But the trouble is that unless you’re a celebrity, no one really cares about you.  Joel illustrates the concept with a couple examples:

“If you’re opening a restaurant, don’t blog about your menu. Blog about great food. You’ll attract foodies who don’t care about your restaurant yet.”

“If you make superior, single-source chocolate, don’t write about that great trip you took to the Dominican Republic to source cocoa beans. That’s all about you. Instead, write the definitive article about making chocolate-covered strawberries.  For the next 10 years, whenever a gourmand or a baker searches Google for a recipe on how to make chocolate-covered strawberries, he or she will find your post.”

Joel followed this rule and it was the spark that launched his company.  He reflects, “Once I had built an audience among programmers, enough of them turned into customers that I was able to get my bootstrapped company off the ground.”

Joel’s rule applied to lawyers

Although Joel runs a software blog, his advice nonetheless applies to lawyers.   If you don’t know where to start with blogging, consider it like writing for a magazine rather than a personal diary.   If you’re a criminal defense lawyer and you write the definitive article on DNA evidence, lawyers and potential clients will be reading it for years to come courtesy of Google and referrals from other blogs.  Isn’t that a better introduction to you and your expertise than screaming “call now!” on TV? As a bonus, all those links can help your non-blog website rank well in Google so that potential clients can find you.

Joel’s advice goes beyond blogs, incidentally.  Twitter, for example, has evolved in a similar way as blogs, in that it was originally meant as some kind of online diary, but now treating it as one will get you ignored (unless you’re a celebrity).  Practically, this means linking to, and commenting on, other interesting sites rather than talking about what you had for lunch.  Joel calls this strategy “free editorial advertising.”  The idea is that you and your firm have to piggyback on something more interesting and important than you and your firm.

Why Joel is quitting blogging

Joel brought up several concerns about blogging, from not having enough time, to potentially offending one of his many employees or clients.  But his main concern seems to be that having a wildly successful blog has become a crutch that’s causing him to ignore other marketing channels.  Plus, his blog audience may be too narrowly focused for his future ambitions.

In other words, Joel feels his company has outgrown the blog that started it all.

That’s not a bad problem to have.