Avvo is excited to announce that we have made some changes to the Avvo Leaderboard and Contributor levels for doctors and lawyers answering questions and contributing content across the site.

What this means:  If you already participate on Avvo, your level went up and there are now even more ways to earn points and demonstrate your expertise to potential patients and clients, and your peers.

So why did we change?

We heard from professionals like you that quality and visibility matter, and that Avvo can help raise the bar by rewarding quality work.  We agree.

We added a Leaderboard to our health community and enhanced it in legal. (For those of you not familiar, the Leaderboard shows the ranking of all professionals participating on the site, and by specialty or practice area.  The Leaderboard also reflects the current week as well as all-time activity.) The Contributor levels have also expanded to incorporate more of the actions on Avvo that reflect quality and expertise.

There are now three main ways to earn points on Avvo:

1) Contribute to the Avvo community.

You still get points for answering questions in our Q&A forum and writing helpful guides to assist other Avvo users.  Now you also get points for highlighting other professionals’ quality contributions.

2) Get recognized for quality contributions.

You now receive points when consumers or other professionals mark your answers and guides as ‘good’. (This means you can earn points while you sleep!) You are also awarded additional points when guides are selected as an Avvo Staff Pick or you participate as an Avvo guest blogger or speaker.

3) Showcase  your expertise to the community outside of Avvo.

You also receive points for sharing your Avvo content with a broader community on social networks, such as Facebook or Twitter.

We’ve also added a few pages.

• You can view your Points History by clicking your total points on your dashboard.
  
• Your Contributor level is now visible at the top of your profile with a link to all of your contributions.
  

 As always, please let us know what you think. Thank you for all you do on Avvo!

Have you heard the news?  Avvo has launched a new blog, Lawyernomics, focused on legal marketing and practice management.  My welcoming blog post really explains it all, so please check out Lawyernomics and let us know what you think.

What does this mean for the Avvo Blog?  Well, increasingly, we have struggled with the identity of the Avvo Blog because it has been one part law marketing/management, one part health marketing/management, one part corporate mouthpiece and and one part public policy.  That’s a lot of parts, and we had many lawyers tell us they wanted more of the law marketing/management part.

To oblige, we built Lawyernomics and all of the lawyer parts will go over there.  The medical parts will get their own home soon enough as well.  The Avvo Blog will then focus on the Avvo corporate and public policy discussions that don’t fit squarely into legal or medical.  Sound like a plan?

One thing:  When you visit Lawyernomics, please check out our “Search Engine Marketing & Social Media Cheat Sheet for Lawyers.”  It’s free, and the purpose of the guide is to provide lawyers and legal marketers with a complete overview of online marketing best practices and tactics.  Highlights include how to:

• Leverage SEO to attract new clients
• Profitability use paid advertising
• Tap into the power of social media

Our Cheat Sheet is the only time I will encourage you to cheat — it won’t even affect your Avvo Rating. Seriously though, it’s a great guide from a team that knows a thing or two about SEO and Social Media . . . and you can’t beat the price.

Regards,
Mark

Registration is now open for Avvocating 2012! The 3rd annual online legal marketing conference is being held on Thursday, May 3 and Friday, May 4, 2012 at the Bell Harbor Conference Center in Seattle, Washington.

Rich Barton, the Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of Zillow and Founder of Expedia, will give the keynote presentation, followed by an impressive lineup of technology and legal industry leaders:

• Mark Britton: Founder, CEO and President, Avvo

• Carolyn Elefant: Lawyer, Blogger at MyShingle.com and Author of Solo by Choice: How to Be the Lawyer You Always Wanted to Be and Co-Author of Social Media for Lawyers: The Next Frontier.

• Michael Blumenthal: Small Business Consultant, Google Maps and Local Search Industry Expert and Blogger at Blumenthals.com/blog

• Tyson Snow: Founding partner at Mumford West & Snow LLC in Salt Lake City, Utah. His practice areas include employment law and intellectual property litigation.Tyson is also the founder of Social Media, Esq.,a blog about social media for attorneys.

• Rich Sierra: Florida business attorney and founder of The Law Firm of Richard Sierra & Associates.

• Vanessa Fox: Author of Marketing in the Age of Google, Creator of Google Webmaster Tools and Founder of Nine by Blue.

• Ari Kaplan: Lawyer, Author of Reinventing Professional Services: Building Your Business in the Digital Marketplace and Founder of Ari Kaplan Advisors.

• Josh King: General Counsel and Vice President Business Development, Avvo

• Duane Forrester:Senior Product Manager for Microsoft Bing Webmaster Outreach Program,Author and Columnist at Searchengineland.com.

• Mark Kelly: President, Chair 10 Marketing a Seattle-based Internet marketing consulting firm.

• Matt Homann: Innovational Speaker, Creative Facilitator, Lawyer and Founder of LexThinkand the author of the legal blog “the [non]billable hour”.

To register for Avvocating 2012, please visit online: www.avvocating.com. For information about sponsorship, please contact Megan Olendorf at megan@avvo.com.

Thank you to everyone who has been part of our 2011 webinar series. We still have a couple sessions remaining, but looking ahead to the new year, we’ve just launched our free legal marketing webinar schedule for the first several months of 2012.

We’ll cover a range of topics including blogging, reputation management, online ethics, social media, website analytics, public relations and search engine optimization. Everything you need to know about how to market the good work you’re doing for clients, to drive more business to your firm. We’ll also have guests from time to time, including Mark Merenda, Founder of SmartMarketing, David Ackert, President of The Ackert Advisory and Stephen Fairly, CEO of The Rainmaker Institute.

Hope you can take time to join us each week, on Thursdays at 1PM ET/10AM PT.

Thanks as always for supporting Avvo and have a Happy Thanksgiving!

This Thursday at 1PM ET/10AM PT we’re excited to have another guest join us for our weekly legal marketing webinar series.

Jason Epstein – a partner with the Premier Law Group in Seattle – will discuss his experience managing the marketing efforts for his firm (in addition to handling his personal injury case load). Specifically, Jason will share the strategy he has developed to reach his target market, including guerrilla marketing tactics, free (and low cost) online tools, search engine optimization and public relations outreach. Bringing it all together, Jason has experienced marketing success as seen by more bringing more clients in the door. You will hear what has worked well for him, and what he has learned through trial and error along the way.

Lawyers who attend this webinar will learn:

• SEO basics and how to increase online search results for your firm.
• Free and low cost solutions to enhance, measure and support marketing efforts.
• Time management advice – how to decide where to focus efforts and how much time to allocate.

Hope you can join us on Thursday!

I had the pleasure of speaking at the University of Michigan law school yesterday.  I spoke to a group of students interested in alternative approaches to the law, in particular the evolution from lawyer technician to lawyer businessperson or total businessperson.

My message was simple:  In order to be a great lawyer, in almost every area of the law, you need to also be a great business person – or at a minimum a student of business principles.  Whether you want to start your own firm, be an influential partner or manager in a larger firm, be a general counsel or even represent business clients in litigation, the more you are a student of business principles, the more successful you will be.

Why?  Because by understanding your and your client’s businesses, you can make better decisions related to risk and return.  Too often lawyers – trained from day one to be ISSUE spotters – dismiss all sorts of opportunities because their fear of the issues – the risks – prevents them from ever thinking through the return.   

And, sadly, law schools and bar administrators are very shortsighted in failing to promote any education on this front.  Very few schools have any sort of curriculum relating to running a business, even though most of their students will be running their own businesses in the near future.  Bar administrators repeatedly refuse to give CLE credit for anything that even smells like marketing, which is pretty sad.  They should be encouraging lawyers to invest more time in becoming better businesspeople.

I noticed while writing this post that Megan has posted our October Avvo webinars and, in so doing, gave a shout-out to the American Academy of Estate Planning Attorneys (AAEPA).  The principals behind AAEPA , Robert Armstrong and Sandy Fisch, are two of the more business-savvy lawyers I know.  I met them a couple of years ago after Sandy attended an Avvo social media event in San Diego.  Thereafter, they have had me speak to the AAEPA regarding Avvo and social media and it has given me a firsthand view of the high quality services the AAEPA offers its members.  As Megan mentioned, they are the “Total Solution” for estate planning attorneys helping them build their business and enhance the technical legal skills.  Having dinner with a number of AAEPA members, they told me repeatedly that AAEPA had changed their practice.

So, if you are interested in learning more about the AAEPA, again, attend their webinar.  There is also the Academy Summit coming up in October In San Diego.  If interested in the summit or membership, contact info@aaepa.com or call 800-846-1555 for a free estate planning practice packet of information and tools.  You can also read their books, “The E-Myth Attorney” and “Dominate Your Market! The Attorney’s Complete Guide to Online Marketing and Social Media.”  Great guides for the business-minded lawyer.

Be a lawyer.  Be a businessperson.

Mark

We have some great legal marketing webinars planned for this month, including two Avvo guests, and another from The American Academy of Estate Planning Attorneys. Sign up below, or see the full schedule here.

October 6: Using Personality Assessments in the Attorney-Client Relationship with Kevin Houchin

This webinar will be held on Thursday, October 6th at 10:00 am PT.

Many lawyers have “Attorney & Counselor at Law” on their business cards, but how much time do we spend improving our “Counselor” function? One of the key to being an effective “Counselor at Law” is effective communication between attorney and client, and the attorney’s ability to facilitate effective, accurate communication between the client and other parties to a negotiation or dispute. Because these communications are so important, how can legal professionals facilitate the process of accurate communication? One answer is to implement personality type assessments into our legal and mediation practices.

During this webinar Kevin Houchin, attorney, entrepreneur and leadership coach, will share the motivation, process, and benefits of implementing personality assessments in your law or mediation practice. While the session will focus on the Enneagram personality type assessment, the concepts discussed can be implemented using other personality typing models such as Myers-Briggs, DISC, Strength-Finders, or others depending on the preference of the attorney or mediator using the process.

Lawyers who attend this webinar will learn about:

• The mechanics and ethics of implementing personality typing tools into the client intake process and mediation preparation process.
• How implementing these relationship-building tools will benefit you as an attorney or mediator in both your professional and personal development process.

Sign up here!

October 20: Guerrilla Online Marketing: What You Can Do Right Now For Free* (*or, Not Too Much Money) with Jason Epstein

This webinar will be held on Thursday, October 20th at 10:00 am PT.

Hear from Jason Epstein – a partner with the Premier Law Group in Seattle – discuss his experience not only handling personal injury cases, but also managing the marketing efforts for his firm. Specifically, Jason will share the strategy he has developed to reach his target market, including guerrilla marketing tactics, free (and low cost) online tools, search engine optimization and public relations outreach. Bringing it all together, Jason has experienced marketing success as seen by more bringing more clients in the door. You will hear what has worked well for him, and what he has learned through trial and error along the way.

Lawyers who attend this webinar will learn:

• SEO basics and how to increase online search results for your firm.
• Free and low cost solutions to enhance, measure and support marketing efforts.
• Time management advice – how to decide where to focus efforts and how much time to allocate.

Sign up here!

We also want to pass along another webinar from our friends at the American Academy of Estate Planning Attorneys. Tomorrow Tuesday, October 4th and Wednesday, October 5th they will be covering the topic “Online Market Domination for Your Law Firm: Mastering the 5 Key Internet Tools to Save Your Law Firm From Extinction in the New Digital World.”

Go here to sign up for the webinar or call 800-975-6448.

The American Academy of Estate Planning Attorneys has been around  since 1993 as the “Total Solution” for estate planning attorneys helping them build their business and enhance the technical legal skills. The Academy Fall Summit is also coming up later this month – October 13-17 – in San Diego.  If interested in attending, or learning more about membership contact info@aaepa.com or call 800-846-1555. They will also send you a free estate planning practice packet of information and tools.

Today, we released some pretty exciting data on the growth in participation in Avvo’s expert-only Q&A forum:

• 50,000 questions and answers are submitted to Avvo every month
• Avvo’s Q&A forum has a 90%+ response rate
• Every 90 seconds a user receives advice from an Avvo-rated and verified doctor or lawyer on the site

We’ve also put together an INFOGRAPHIC to show you how fast the Avvo Q&A forum is actually growing.

There are two important underlying trends that are in large part fueling this growth:

a) The continued momentum in the ePatient and eClient movements. More and more consumers are taking charge of their health and legal affairs, in part because of economic necessity, and in part because the Internet has made a wealth of medical and legal information available to the masses.  Consumers are become more educated and, as a result, are participating more in deciding the treatments and solutions.  They are also becoming more discerning about the providers they turn to for help.   Eight in ten Internet users have looked online for health information, according to a May 2011 study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, and ePatients say the Internet has had a significant impact on the way they care for themselves and for others.

b) The increase in importance and popularity of social media platforms, including Q&A, in these movements. More and more, these empowered consumers are realizing that while search engines and other Q&A sites serve up access to a wealth of information, they don’t make it easy to find trusted information or expert advice that addresses the person’s specific need.  As a result, they are turning to resources like Avvo that offer more personal, more reliable, and more efficient ways to get the advice they need and compare providers – all in one place.

These trends also provide significant opportunities for medical and legal providers as well.   For example, professionals that answer questions on Avvo receive 7 times the number of contacts from prospective patients or clients than those that do not participate in Q&A.

The reason for this lies in the traditional “conversion funnel” that is taught in Marketing 101 courses.  Consumers at the top of funnel researching a medical or legal issue are increasingly typing in longer, specific phrases or questions to get to the specific information they want.  Google recognizes this so it places a high value on Q&A content, which mirrors these searches.   As a result, professionals answering questions on Avvo show up in valuable long tail search results that are less competitive than very general keyword terms and convert better.

Avvo Q&A enables professionals to interact with ePatients and eClients researching providers in a significantly more meaningful way than a directory listing or website.  Q&A is a series of conversations.  And like any conversation, even a short one, Q&A provides insight into what it is like to interact with that provider, which is as important as experience or education. For those professionals seeking new business, Avvo Q&A is a competitive edge.  For those who want to ensure that the medical and legal information that is available online is accurate and who do not want to concede health or legal thought leadership to celebrities, quacks and cons, it is a very powerful platform.

We also launched a new version of our homepage today to make it easier for people to ask a question of our tens of thousands of experts or search our database of questions asked on their topic of interest. Try it out and let us know what you think.  We’d love to hear your feedback.

свети георги

My first year of being a lawyer, I did securities litigation defense and really didn’t like it.  Why?  For starters, I wanted to be a transactional lawyer from the beginning; but in the early nineties corporate law departments were still waiting out the junk-bond hangover of the late eighties.  So, I took a job in a securities-related area that was doing well (as there were a whole lotta lawsuits stemming from the high-flying eighties), and considered myself lucky to have a job.  It was a dynamic similar to today’s legal market, although probably (and sadly) less severe.

In that first year, I loved digging into the mechanics of a disputed deal and understanding what went wrong; but the never-ending coup-counting between opposing litigation teams was more than I could stomach.  Even in my mid-twenties, I found myself often saying, “This is so childish,” as I watched one-too-many lawyers engaging in less-than-civil procedure.

As a junior lawyer, I typically watched these tussles from the sidelines; but maybe that gave me the best perspective.  And, although I encountered many talented and respectful lawyers on the other side, I saw just enough of the dark side for me to take the first transactional offer that came my way.

Because I have many friends who really enjoy being litigators, I have often thought, “It was probably just me.”  However, every so often I am reminded that I made the right move (for me).  This often happened when I would get litigation reports as a general counsel or when one of my litigation-loving friends went off to be a sherpa.  

However, one of my more-poignant reminders showed up in my inbox the other day.  It was an order, sent to me by my uncle who is a judge.  It reads in part:

“Greetings and Salutations!

You are invited to a kindergarten party on THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2011, at 10:00 a.m. in Courtroom 2 of the United States Courthouse, 200 W. Eighth Street, Austin, Texas.

The party will feature many exciting and informative lessons, including:

• How to telephone and communicate with a lawyer
• How to enter into reasonable agreements about deposition dates
• How to limit depositions to reasonable subject matter
• Why it is neither cute nor clever to attempt to quash a subpoena for technical failures of service when notice is reasonably given; and
• An advanced seminar on not wasting the time of a busy federal judge and his staff because you are unable to practice law at the level of a first year law student.

Invitation to this exclusive event is not RSVP. Please remember to bring a sack lunch! The United States Marshals have beds available if necessary, so you may wish to bring a toothbrush in case the party runs late.”

Upon opening it, I laughed out loud and thought, “Geez, I wish we had that judge in 1992.”  With a little research, I found that the order’s author, Judge Sparks, has a history of calling out the dark side — often using dripping sarcasm as his light saber. 

All I can say is keep up the good work Judge Sparks.  The litigation world needs more judges like you.

Be civil.

Markиконописikoni

Join us for a free webinar this Thursday, September 8 at 10:00AM PT with Rich Sierra, a Florida business attorney and founder of The Law Firm of Richard Sierra & Associates.

We often cover online marketing and social media strategies and tactics, but thought it would be much more effective to hear a practicing attorney share his actual experience marketing his firm. Rich will share what has worked – and what has not worked – and how he is able to get more business with his lead management system.

Specifically, lawyers who attend this webinar will learn:

• How to keep track of the effectiveness of your website.
• Steps from initial client inquiry to client acquisition.
• Use of a Virtual Assistant to manage prospective customer inquiries.
• Applications to measure how you rank in the search engines compared to your competitors.
• How to integrate all your lead sources into one “sales funnel” to achieve your goals

Hope you can join us!

Sign up here! икони