SEO Best Practices for Lawyers

This webinar will be held on Thursday, December 15th at 10:00 am PT and will be hosted by Nick Perone, Online Marketing Manager at Avvo. This webinar will last approximately 60 minutes and will include plenty of time for Q&A.

In response to repeated emails and calls about Search Engine Optimization, we’ll offer insight on best practices and address many frequently asked questions. This webinar is an introduction to SEO for the solo practitioner and small law firm delivered in (mostly) non-technical jargon.

Lawyers who attend this webinar will learn about:

• SEO fundamentals
• SEO challenges and opportunities unique to the small law firm
• Highlight common mistakes
• Reveal “black hat” practices that could get your site penalized
• Cover free and easy to use tools vital to SEO success
• End with 10 things you can do in under 10 minutes to improve your site’s SEO performance

Sign up for the webinar here.

Oh, this is a tough one.

On Saturday, we received an email from a fellow lawyer telling us that Brian Dinday had been killed while diving off the California coast. According to news reports, he was diving for abalone with his 30-year-old son when he was swept out to sea by heavy surf.

The entire team at Avvo would like to offer our condolences to the Dinday family. As a son and father, I can only imagine the weight of their loss. At Avvo, we also become attached to active participants such as Brian. I have gotten used to seeing his bushy mustache and big smile all over our site. He will be sorely missed.

Times like these remind us to hug the loved ones around us. Donations in Brian’s name may be made to the St. Vincent de Paul Society, 820 B St., San Rafael, CA 94901 or ARC/Morris, P.O. Box 123, Morris Plains, NJ 07950.

Mark

• ATL tests the waters of U.S News Fourth Tier Law Schools
• Legal Blog Watch looks at whether law firms can mark up (flat fee) legal research costs
• Florida Estate Planning Lawyer Blog explains that those having Power of Attorney must act in the best interests of the grantor
• Seattle Trademark Lawyers has been busy telling INTA attendees how to enjoy their time in Seattle – this time providing a guide to Seattle Hotel Lobby Bars
• Spam Notes looks at the surprising implication of Facebook v Power Ventures Inc. that Facebook users violate Facebook’s rights when accessing Facebook through Power.com
• Ms. Jd looks at why women apply to law school
• Alaska Public Defender argues that Alaska’s definition of domestic violence is overly broad

image by Magic Root via Flickr CCL

• Above the Law continues its coverage of the 2010 U.S. News Law School Rankings and ventures outside the top 50 (oh my!) – compare to Avvo’s Law School Rankings
• Freakonomics looks at the economic consequences of forgiving law school debt (Robert Applebaum‘s cause)
• Nutmeg Lawyer enjoys being profiled by the Connecticut Law Tribune
• Carolyn Elefant discusses how being an early adopter to social media has helped her career
• Ron Coleman looks at the somewhat “scary” implications of Facebook shutting down Christiano Ronaldo’s fan page
• Ernie the Attorney advises on how to secure your iphone
• Digital Media Law eulogizes Barbara Ringer, author of the 1976 Copyright Act

• E&J Gallo flexes its muscle against The Spanish Table, a small specialty grocery store chain – alleging trademark infringement by the grocery for selling Gallo Pasta
• Wilson Sonsini releases term sheet generator tool
• Swedish judge in Pirate Bay case – Nordstrom’s impartiality in question
• Helmsley Estate record to date: $136M to charities $1M to dogs
• Lawyerist points to a troubling case where a New Jersey court found plaintiff employee had waived her attorney-client privilege by using an employer issued laptop to communicate with counsel – even though the employee was using a password-protected personal Yahoo account
• I can’t improve on this Consumerist headling: “Landlord Asks Mother To Pay ‘Early Termination Fee’ After Son Fails To Honor Lease By Dying”

• Congratulations to Ann Althouse on her engagement to Lawrence Meade, one of her blog readers
• Brian Cuban wants you to know that liability for Sexting is Serious
• ent lawyer suspects the Countess(from Real Housewives of New York)’s motivation in filing for divorce – just as she embarks on a book tour
• Legal Blog Watch again highlights Carl Malamud and his efforts to make court filings freely available to the public
• Earnie The Attorney takes a skeptical look at Martindale-Hubbel’s $59 price for rating attorneys
• Digital Media Law assesses SAG’s bargaining position vis-a-vis the studios
• Florida Asset Protection reports that second mortgage lenders are becoming more aggressive

Massachusetts is the latest to file suit against the Fairfield Greenwich Group (FGG), one of the principal “feeder” funds for the now-infamous ponzi scheme of Bernie Madoff (pictured). Mass regulators are alleging a “profound disparity” between FGG’s alleged and actual due diligence on Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC, the broker-dealer that implemented the mystical “split strike conversion” strategy (which everyone now realizes is similar to the more common “liquor store holdup” strategy).

In light of Massachusetts allegations of “profound disparity,” I wanted to share some of the FGG pitch documents (links below) that a friend forwarded to me a couple of months back. This is from a FGG pitch in October 2008 for their Fairfield Sentry, Ltd. fund (yes, “sentry” like “guard”) and it is full of some now-fascinating quotes, such as:

• “[FGG seeks] a more transparent understanding of risk from all managers . . . for FGG portfolio analysis and risk monitoring.”

• “Value Added by FGG: Independent verification of prices and account values”

• “Value Added by FGG: Systematic investment compliance monitoring of Operating Guidelines”

• “Value Added by FGG: Examination of option greeks to make sure the hedge is working as expected”

• “The services of [Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC] and its personnel are essential to the continued operation of the Fund, and its profitability, if any.” (emphasis provided)

Admittedly, I am not close to the case; but it feels like shooting fish in the Massachusetts barrel. Here are the pitch documents so you can form your own opinons. We shall see.

FGG Sentry Fund Pitch Powerpoint
FGG Strategy Description

Sleep with one financial eye open.

Mark

In a rare case of a big law firm taking an aggressive stand against allegations of discrimination, Covington & Burling responded to Yolanda Young’s EEOC complaint (one of the allegations was that Covington maintained a staff attorney pool as a ghetto for minority attorneys) by noting specifically why she did not meet the standards of a Covington Associate:

Her average grade was only slightly better than a “C,” well below the threshold level for a Covington associate.  She did not pass the bar until 1998, three years after her law school graduation.  When she applied to Covington for a staff attorney position, her work experience as a lawyer consisted of a series of short-term jobs with temporary staffing agencies reviewing documents as a contract attorney.  She has never worked at any firm as an associate and never engaged in the regular practice of law – i.e., she has not represented clients with respect to their legal matters.

Ms. Young responded, “Covington can say what they like now, but they hired me”.  She discusses her thoughts further on her blog, On Being A Black Lawyer.

• Above the Law’s March Madness continues (they have compiled a bracket of biglaw firms least likely to lay off lawyers)
• Grits for Breakfast notes that Obama’s Mexico policy is so far “depressingly familiar”
• Taxgirl answers what to do if you received an overpayment and are about to file your taxes
• LeHave you ever wanted to be featured on reality TV?  Invent Blog has the scoop on a show that is looking for a family of inventors
• Legal Blog Watch posts that “flipping the bird” to a policeman is protected speech in Pittsburgh
• Greatest American Lawyer reviews LegalZoom and other self-help websites
• Chuck Newton advises attorneys to develop a vessel-closing niche practice
• Sam Glover reports on Lawyerist that Adobe is open to hearing from small firm lawyers

Today’s “Most Read” article on ABA News is “Law Dean Says Schools ‘Exploiting’ Students Who Don’t Succeed”.  Richard Matasar, Dean of New York Law School, had this to say at a recent Association of American Law Schools Conference:

We should be ashamed of ourselves.  We own our students’ outcomes. We took them. We took their money. We live on their money to pay to come to San Diego. And if they don’t have a good outcome in life, we’re exploiting them. It’s our responsibility to own the outcomes of our institutions. If they’re not doing well … it’s gotta be fixed. Or we should shut the damn place down. And that’s a moral responsibility that we bear in the academy. It’s a leadership responsibility that each of us has. And damn the U.S. News if it affects our rankings. The kids are not gonna show up. Do you know that LSAT registrations are flat to down this year. That students’ applications to law school are flat to down in a substantial number of law schools. That’s never happened in a downturn in the economy before. They’re catching on. Maybe this thing they are doing is not so valuable. Maybe the chance at being in the top 10% is not a good enough lottery shot in order to effectively spend $120,000 and see it blow up at the end of three years of law school. [Via TaxProf]

Matasar was commenting on a recent article in Forbes that detailed the plight of Joel Kellum and Jennifer Coultas, two students who met at Case Western School of Law and incurred $194k worth of loans by the time they graduated in 1995.  They married but divorced last year – due in part to the strain of the huge debt load.  According to Kellum, “Two people with this much debt just shouldn’t be together”.

Last week, Above the Law broke the story of the mock New York Craigslist job posting advertising a $30k attorney job at a private 20 attorney firm in Manhattan – that ended up receiving over 100 resumes, the vast majority of which were in earnest.  All of this points to an information mismatch – if non top 30 law schools were forced to disclose to applicants that only top students could be expected to get six figure jobs and that the rest may struggle in finding a legal job, would law school students choose to enroll, knowing that the average law school debt is $100k?