In last week’s “Smart SEO for Lawyers” webinar, I emphasized the importance of link building for SEO.  Naturally, someone then asked for practical ways to build links, with an emphasis on “practical.”  I can certainly understand the sentiment, because common advice like “have great content that people want to link to” isn’t very practical at all.  So here are five practical ways that a lawyer could build links to his or her law firm website.

1) Create a blog on your domain

Let’s be honest, the average Joe doesn’t care about law until he’s sued or arrested, which is why link building for lawyers is so hard.  One way around this is to have a blog where your main audience is other lawyers.  However, with enough dedication and writing talent, you could expand your audience to anyone (just be aware that the 5,325th article on “what to do in a car accident” isn’t going to get anyone excited).  The more you participate in the blogosphere the higher the odds of your blog posts attracting links.

That said, a blog is no magic pill.  It’s just a platform, and unless you write stuff people actually want to read, a blog won’t help you.  Whether blogging is practical really depends on how much writing talent and free time you have.  If blogging isn’t a good fit, then move on to the other options below.

2) Do guest blog posts in other people’s blogs

Want to benefit from blogging without fully committing to blogging? You can.  Offer to write guest posts for other people’s blogs (where you’ll get links back to your website embedded in the guest blog posts).  You could do guest blog posts for legal blogs or even non legal blogs.  For example, if you’re a wills, trusts & estates lawyer, there are hundreds of gay and lesbian blogs that would be interested in having an expert lawyer write free guest posts talking about GLBT legal issues.

Here’s how it works, and you don’t even have to waste time writing before you secure a guest blog post:

• Think up a catchy title for a blog post like “7 Laws GLBT Families Need to Know About.”
• Grab a list of GLBT blogs.  Alltop.com is great for this, as it compiles lists of blogs by topic.
• Have an assistant email a form letter to every single blog on the list asking if they’re interested in your guest post. In the letter, give a very short summary of your experience and offer them exclusive rights to the content.
• If you get any takers, then write the blog post and send it to them.  At the bottom of your blog post include a short “About the Author” section with links back to your website.
• Rinse and repeat.

3) Sponsor local nonprofits

Buying links is a big “no no” in Google’s book, but luckily there are ways to buy links without “buying links.”  As far as I know, no one has ever gotten in trouble for sponsoring a nonprofit and getting a link as a thank you.  So do a little research into worthy non profits in your community, and then contact them about sponsorship.  In addition to any SEO benefit you get, you’ll also build good will in the community and help worthy causes.  This is a nice example of traditional marketing blending with SEO.  You might also get a tax break for whatever you donate.

4) Submit to quality directories

There are thousands of junk web directories that are best avoided, but there are still some good ones that are worth submitting to.  Some of these good directories charge a fee, while others are completely free.  Here is a nice list of quality directories.  And, of course, you should look into niche directories that won’t appear on generic directory lists.  For example, Avvo (for claimed lawyers) and Justia will give links to lawyers in their directories.  If you’re a part of any association or school that maintains directories, be sure to submit your site to them as well.

5) Check out the competition

Find competitors who outrank you in Google and enter them into backlinkwatch.com to see where they’re getting their links.  Often times if they can get a link from a particular website, so can you.  The downside to this is that it puts you one step behind the competition, whereas with the other options you can lead, often in a way that’s hard for competitors to copy.

We’re thrilled to have Larry Port, the Founding Partner and Chief Software Architect for Rocket Matter, join us next Thursday as a guest for a free legal marketing webinar.

Rocket Matter is the leading web-based legal practice management and time and billing software for small to mid-sized law firms.

Larry will be covering a topic not yet discussed here at Avvo, but one that is very much moving into the legal industry: Cloud Computing. The ABA Journal wrote a lengthy piece about the technology in its April issue and lawyer Nicole Black is writing the book Cloud Computing for Lawyers to be published by the ABA in early 2011.

But many lawyers are probably still asking,  just what is this cloud that everyone is talking about? From the perspective of the law firm, computing in the cloud eliminates typical IT expenses, management, and headaches. Cloud options are often cost-effective since they forego high up-front costs in favor of predictable monthly fees. Yet many lawyers are concerned about security risks.

In next week’s webinar, Larry will cover it all, including how to carefully select a cloud computing solution and understand the risks.

We hope you can join us!

Date: Thursday, July 15, 2010, 1:00PM ET / 10:00AM PT
Sign up: Cloud Computing for Legal Professionals with Larry Port

Matt Cutts of Google recently came out with a video explaining the wrong and right ways to “sculpt” PageRank.  At the end of the video he confirms that keeping important web pages close to your homepage is a good way to help your rankings.  Read on to learn about the details.

A quick refresher on PageRank

Google operates as a big democracy, where links count as votes.  But all votes are not counted equally, and some votes aren’t counted at all.  Google has an algorithm called PageRank (named after Larry Page) for calculating how many votes a web page has and how important those votes are.  A link from a high PageRank page counts more than a link from a low PageRank page.

One way to think of how PageRank operates is as “juice” flowing through a network of pipes. Every time a website links to your website, it’s sending “link juice” into your website, which then flows throughout your website.  The higher the PageRank of the page containing the link, the more juice the link will pass.

Links are the “pipes” through which the link juice passes.  Web pages that have accumulated large pools of PageRank may rank better in Google.

Sculpting PageRank

Once it became known that PageRank flows around your website, and pages that accumulate the most “juice” may have a ranking advantage, it wasn’t long before people started trying to manipulate the flow of PageRank so that it would flow to pages they most wanted to rank well for.

A common tactic for doing this was to use the “no follow” attribute on internal links to unimportant pages.  Adding the “no follow” attribute to a link tells Google not to pass “juice” to a link (it closes off the pipe, so to speak).  People figured that if they no followed unimportant pages they’d never want to rank well for, like a privacy policy page or a contact page, then more juice would be left over to go to important pages. This was called “link sculpting.”

Why link sculpting with “no follow” stopped working

At some point Google changed the way “no follow” worked such that it no longer made sense to do it on internal links for link sculpting.

Here’s how no follow used to work:

You have a page with 10 internal links (links that go to other pages on  your website) and 100 points of link juice to spread around.  In that case each of the 10 links would get 10 points worth of link juice.  If you “no followed” 5 links, then the remaining links would get 20 points worth of link juice each. The link juice is simply concentrated into fewer links, making them better off.

Here’s how no follow works now:

You have a page with 10 internal links and 100 points of link juice to spread around.  If you “no followed” 5 links, then the remaining links would still get 10  points worth of link juice each, and the 50 points of link juice going to the 5 “no followed” links would simply evaporate.  You haven’t gained anything by using “no follow” to control the flow of PageRank.

This change was a bit of a scandal in the SEO industry because it turned out a lot of firms had been recommending that clients sculpt PageRank with “no follow” after Google revealed it had stopped working, proving that the practice was boondoggle.

Okay so what can you do now?

Most websites tend to attract most of their links to the homepage.  It’s just the way it is.  What this means is that most websites have a big pools of link juice bottlenecked at their homepages.

When you consider that the more times links juice passes through links, the more it “thins,” you realize that by putting an important page 3 links away from your homepage, the juice that finally arrives at that page is less than if you had put the important page 1 link away from the homepage.

So, for example, if you’ve got 10 practice areas listed on your website, but DUI is really important to your business, link directly to it from your homepage.  The optimal way to do it, at least from a PageRank perspective, would be homepage > DUI, rather than homepage > practice areas > criminal defense > DUI.

That said, you can’t be myopic about sculpting PageRank, since it only tries to redirect the juice you already have.  In practical terms, what you probably need to rank better is to attract more link juice, not to play with the juice you already have.  But we do have confirmation straight from Google that putting pages close the homepage can give them a PageRank boost.

After my wedding, someone said to me, “no one remembers the food at a wedding, I hope they don’t remember yours.” The food was horrible, the service appalling, and the caterer showed up so late that my wedding party had to set up the tables for the reception.

Being a Web 2.0 kind of guy, I left a review on Yelp to inform others about my experience.

Yesterday, I received an email through Yelp:

Hi Conrad, I accidentally stumbled onto your review that you wrote about your experience with XXXX XXXXX, my company, last summer and I wanted to find out if anything was ever done to satisfy your complaints and disappoinments. I don’t recall talking with you directly after the event and if I did I truly apologize for not remembering.  If you would be so kind as to call me when you have a minute. I would love to resolve this and somehow earn your respect again.  What name was the order placed under and what was the date?
Thank you very much,
John”

I’m a true believer you can build raving fans by proactively responding to negative feedback.  Granted it’s a little harder for a wedding caterer – I can’t really make up for the fact that they were understaffed, took over 30 minutes just to serve the main course and forgot the chocolate in the chocolate strawberry dessert.  So I appreciated John’s approach, but he’s falling a little short.

Best Practices when Dealing with Negative Client Reviews

1. Proactively Monitor Your Online Profiles – don’t “accidentally stumble” onto feedback about your company.  Use Google Alerts to proactively monitor your online reputation.  Avvo makes this really easy with email notifications when something is added to a lawyer’s profile.
2. Reach Out – responding to unhappy clients is a hallmark of good business.  While you can’t please everyone all of the time, you shouldn’t dismiss all disgruntled former clients as nutjobs.  Most online review forums that protect the identity of the reviewer (like Avvo), also offer facilitate confidential conversations – for example, John sent the email through Yelp and he never saw my email address.  Avvo has a similar process where our Customer Care team will reach out directly to the reviewer.
3. Offer to Make It Right – John offers to work with me to resolve this issue.  This is the foundation of great customer service.
4. Make it Easy to Contact You.  You’ll notice in John’s email that while he asks me to call, he fails to provide a phone number or email address. Because the review came through Yelp, I can’t even find his email address.
5. Follow up Quickly – My wedding was in 2003.  I left the review on Yelp more than a year ago.  At this point, the likelihood that I’m going to invest time with John is close to zero.   The likelihood that during the past 7 years I’ve warned numerous engaged couples about my experience with the caterer is exactly 100%.
6. Manage Your Overall Review Profile – one negative review isn’t the end of the world.  People reading reviews know that you can’t please all of the people all of the time.  However, if the balance of your reviews are negative, you may want to look very critically at your business.  John’s business has two negative and one positive review.  With innumerable options available, would they make your wedding caterer shortlist?

Many people are uncomfortable providing negative feedback in person.  Online reviews may be the only indication that you have a grumpy ex-client.  How (and when) you respond can make all the difference.

Facebook’s COO, Sheryl Sandberg, recently proclaimed that email is probably going to die. Her rationale is that if you want to know what adults will do tomorrow with technology, you look at what teenagers are doing today, and teenagers think email is kind of, well, “lame.”  They prefer social networking and text messaging.

A little too ambitious?

Okay, social media is changing the world, but will it really kill email? In my opinion, no, at least not in the foreseeable future. There are all sorts of reasons why email will live on, but here are my two favorites:

Teenagers don’t conduct business

In the future will people use Facebook to send proposals to clients? To send internal office memos to coworkers? To send an invoice? Could you even imagine using text messages for any of this? Teenagers don’t have any of these needs yet, but they will, which is largely why they don’t use email now, and Facebook  seems ill suited for a lot of these purposes.

Besides, even if social media technology renders email antiquated, that doesn’t mean it’s going away, any more than the internet and computers have killed paper.

Teenagers don’t care about privacy

If Facebook kills email, how are you going to sign up for websites (and for that matter, how are you going to sign up for Facebook)? Using your Facebook user/pass instead? Some websites already offer this option, but are you really going to login to your bank, credit card, health insurance or other sensitive websites using your Facebook credentials? Among other problems, this would create a serious privacy hazard — Whoops! Facebook accidentally published every website you logged into and every person you contacted last month, and they sold the info to advertisers!

But do teenagers care about privacy? Absolutely not. Teenagers are famous for publicly posting pictures of themselves with a bottle of Popov vodka in one hand and a stained-glass bong in another, having no concept of how that could impact their careers and reputations down the line.

Adults, on the other hand, care a lot about privacy, which has been Facebook’s biggest problem of late.  I just don’t see adults trusting Facebook enough to make it the hub of everything they do on the web, no matter how sensitive, especially given its problems with privacy in the past.  If for no other reason, email will stick around as a sort of ID card for the web.

The predictive value of teenagers

Is this really crystal ball insight into future adult behavior?

I’m not going to dismiss wholesale the notion that teenagers predict adult technology trends, but certainly there must be exceptions.  It seems that at least with business technology, old habits persist, perhaps even irrationally, and a ton of email’s utility is wrapped up in business.

So if I’m going to accept the “email will die” thesis at all, it’s limited to the possibility that social media will kill social email use, which is already starting to happen.  But I doubt email is going anywhere for business, at least in the near future.

So, do you think email is going to die?

Big news last week that Obama fired his general in Afghanistan, General  Stanley A. McChrystal.  I read the Rolling Stone article and couldn’t help but thinking that McChrystal was a megalomaniacal moron.  From a managerial point of view, McChrystal’s comments gave Obama no choice but to dismiss him.  Anything less would have been an abomination to Obama’s elected position as Commander-in-Chief (by that way, is that title even in English?) and duty to be a competent manager.

In any organization, it is critical that people argue and debate.  I remember joining Microsoft and watching people engage in mental (and sometimes hostile) combat regarding product and other strategic directions.  They always left the conference room as friends, but the culture at Microsoft, which spawned Expedia, which sort of spawned Avvo, mandated such a crucible to ensure the best ideas rose to the top.  Even at Avvo today, I feel fortunate to have a team that cares so much about our product and vision that I practically have to pull them off of each other in strategy meetings.  All of this conflict is borne of passion, and I don’t believe any company can succeed without it.

That being said, when a decision is made within Avvo and any other successful organization, that’s it.  Possibly the decision is revisited if it is not achieving its objectives, but it is not revisited immediately after it is made (otherwise the decision has not been made at all).  Moreover, anyone who disagrees with the decision needs to get on the bus and support the direction rather than dwell on the differences.  Failure to get on the bus is arguably a firable offense, but then taking that to the media in such a crass way is akin to loading your own gun.  Why?  Obama could not have said it any better, “I encourage debate will not tolerate dissent.”  Maybe he should have said “public dissent” but you get it:  He’s talking about the bus. 

Adding insult to injury, this is not the first time Obama told McChrystal to get on the bus.  The picture above was their first public spat over disparaging comments McChrystal made regarding Vice President Biden.  Even though Obama called him to the carpet then, McChrystal was still full enough of himself to ignore his boss’s admonition and do it again a year later.  Sheesh.

It was bad enough that McChrystal chose to attack Biden again and just about everyone in Afghanistan not in fatigues. But taking this matter deeper into the organizational toilet was how he did it.  The article opens with him engaging in an expletive-laden whining session about having to have dinner with a French official.  He could not have sounded more jingoistic and moronic.  He is flipping the bird at his subordinates for getting him “screwed into” this Franco-mess and reminding them that they could not kick his ass (his words).  Think of your own business, if this was one of your employees publicly discussing his disdain for a business partner in your local paper or similar media outlet, you would go crazy — no matter how troubled the relationship with that partner may be.  If the relationship needs help, then work on it with a positive attitude.  If it can be saved, then save it.  If it cannot, then get out of it.  But don’t stoop to the level of badmouthing your partners, co-workers or superiors in public.  It is such bad form that I cannot come up with a pithy analogy that does it justice.  My “moron” characterization is the best I can do.

I’ve written and spoken about organizational communication a lot over the years:  It is the lifeblood of any successful organization.  Successful organizations need to constantly work to keep the good, bad and ugly in plain view and on the table for discussion.  But McChrystal’s actions were none of that.  They were a violation of organizational respect, good manners and all of the lessons we learned (or not) in kindergarten . . . beginning with “works and plays well with others.”

Mark

As some consumers have found out the hard way, one of the problems with describing one’s experiences with businesses online is the potential to get slapped with a defamation suit for your trouble. It doesn’t really matter whether the suit has a chance of prevailing; the cost of defense makes censoring oneself seem like the best option.

Obviously, this is no good for the kind of reputational ecosystem that can provide other consumers with valuable information about the quality of a service providers’ offerings. That’s why I’m so encouraged by the potential of the Citizen Participation Act (H.R. 4364), a bill currently working its way through Congress that would put in place a nationwide anti-SLAPP law. Under the Act, those sued for exercising their First Amendment rights would have access to a special motion to dismiss. Valid defamation cases could still proceed, but those driven by thin-skinned bullying tactics could be thrown out at the earliest opportunity, complete with attorneys fees paid to the defendant.

While California has long had a such a law – and Washington just got one – most state anti-SLAPP laws are non-existent or anemic in coverage. A robust nationwide standard is long overdue. If you’re interested in supporting the bill, visit the Public Participation Project website or write your representative.

This is not a humble post. It is not full of business acumen, legal insight or bleeding edge technology advances. This is a cheerleading post about Avvo’s growth in appeal to both consumers and lawyers.  I write not out of arrogance, but to answer the question we get asked by lawyers every day, “why should I spend time on Avvo instead of all of the other websites out there?”

When it comes to legal directories bigger is better – be it having the most lawyers, the most information or the most consumers using that information to chose a lawyer. Two Novembers ago, I wrote a post called “Avvo – World’s Largest Legal Directory” using some data to compare Avvo to the establishment. It’s time to update those stats:

Avvo – more lawyers, more ratings, more reviews and more people finding lawyers than anywhere else in the world.  Lawyers, there are literally hundreds of websites in which you can invest your time and dollars. Prioritize Avvo, the one that delivers the biggest impact to your business.  (Oh and we’re free.)

Data Sources

• Lawyers – Avvo (internal numbers), Lawyers.com search, Superlawyers – 5% of roughly 800,000 practicing lawyers.
• Rated Lawyers – Avvo (internal numbers), Lawyers.com search, Superlawyers – 5% of roughly 800,000 practicing lawyers.
• Lawyers w/Client Ratings – Avvo (internal numbers), Lawyers.com search
• Traffic Growth – Compete comparison of annual growth rate for Visits (Findlaw directory data on lawyers.findlaw.com requires a free log in to Compete to see subdomain data).

Over the years, I have had various people contact me – many of them lawyers – looking to make a jump to the “business-side” – i.e., leave their current profession and become a business person.  I try to take as many of these meetings as possible mostly to be helpful to other professionals in transition, but also because I like the “forward payment” of these meetings.  We have all been in transition at one time or another, and the more we share ideas, introductions, etc., the better off we will all be as a community of professionals over the years.

Notwithstanding my desire to be a good community participant, these meetings with lawyers often fall flat.  After a bit of small talk, the meetings usually go something like this:

Mark:  “So how can I help?”

Transitioning Lawyer:  “Well, I wanted to get together because . . . well . . . I like business and I think I could be good at it.  I’m also pretty tired of being a lawyer.  I have a couple business ideas, and since you made the jump to the business-side maybe you could give me some advice on how I could do it.”

Mark:  “What kind of business do you like?  Did you major in business? “

Transitioning Lawyer:  “Any kind of business.  Maybe high tech?  I majored in philosophy and got my JD and have been doing litigation for the last four years, but I have done some contract negotiation in the past.  I always felt that I had an affinity for business when negotiating contracts.”

I’m always a little puzzled where to take the conversation from here.  The Transitioning Lawyer likes business, but doesn’t really have a passion for a particular area of business.  It’s like saying you want a dog – ok, but is there a type of dog that makes you so excited that you want to take it home and snuggle it forever?  How do you know you want a dog?  What kind of dog is best for you?  Big?  Small?  Furry? Hypoallergenic?  Active?  Quiet?  Good with kids?  Simply wanting a dog is not enough.  You must passionately want a particular kind of dog; otherwise the long-term commitment is going to be hard.  Jumping to the “business-side” is no different.

Moreover, the Transitioning Lawyer above has little exposure to business, and yet he knows it is for him.  Don’t get me wrong, the world of business does not require a Mensa-certified IQ.  Many with below-average IQs and little formal business training have succeeded.  But just because you are sick of practicing law, doesn’t mean that the “business-side” is for you.  Many lawyers want to make the jump because they feel overworked and underpaid – “I’m tired of dealing with clients” is a common complaint.  But here’s the secret:  Being in the business world is not all giggles.  The wide-ranging business world is rough and tumble and finding success therein always requires, just like legal, brute-force, roll-up-your-sleeves execution.  Don’t fool yourself, the grass may look greener in the business yard but it’s because someone consistently pulls all-nighters to keep it watered. 

Becoming a businessperson does not automatically give you the G4 -flying, Cristal-sipping, celebrity-mingling lifestyle you see on TV.  To the contrary, the “business-side” often drops you in a jungle with no path or map and only a butter knife for defense.  So, with that admonition, let me offer a couple pieces of advice for the aspiring businessperson – especially those that are planning to leave their boring legal job for that of the mythically exciting life of corporate America:

• First and foremost, you need to have a passion for a specific area of business.  If you don’t have that innate passion, you probably don’t have a sense for business opportunity in general.  Anyone who starts a business does so because he or she has a passion and corresponding vision.   In the healthiest companies, that passion flows through the ranks.  Why would a founder, CEO or any other manager hire someone who they need to get fired up or otherwise explain the opportunity to?  While somewhat overused, the old adage of “learn it, live it, love it” holds true here.  If you are simply pursuing business for the sake of “being involved in business” you have already failed.  You need to find your passion and pursue it with abandon.  With that passion comes opportunities.
• Second, many lawyers forget that they are already in business.  They own a P&L, even if it is their own production for the year.  I am always surprised by lawyers who don’t understand this business element of what they do.  It is usually the solos that have the greatest grasp on this and understand their organizational ROIs, etc.  Whether solo or not, if you are not excited about running or even being part of a legal business, why would you be happier in a non-legal business?  If it’s all hard work, then what are you looking for?  If you can’t answer that, then you need to stay in the legal business.
• Third, while not an absolute, it does help to have a business background/education in making the jump from legal to business.  Maybe it is an accounting degree, maybe it is having worked on a number of financially sophisticated deals through the years.  However, if you don’t have this experience, all is not lost – think about ways that you can get the experience.  One of the best ways I know of is to join an in-house legal department (which incidentally was my own path to the business-side).  In-house counselors will quickly acquire business experience simply by doing their job.  You succeed in-house by understanding your business well enough to balance business opportunities with legal risk. 
• Fourth, if you are going to start your own business out of the gate, keep in mind that a cost of business is making all sorts of mistakes.  Again, make sure you understand the business you are getting into and have socked away enough savings to allow you to weather at least a year without income.  Because lawyers can start billing on day one, they often forget that revenues from any product can often be many months out.  Moreover, lawyer-run businesses are not typically the first choice for outside investors – especially VCs who have a strong MBA bias.  This is because lawyers are often more risk-averse (obsessed?) than your average MBA and they do not have as much exposure to diverse business cases.  So, if your plan is to leave your law practice and immediately score VC money, you may want to have a back-up plan.  Many VCs will require you to show some business development before they believe in the viability of your business.
• Finally, before doing anything, reach out to everyone you know (and everyone they know) who has already had success in business – especially ex-lawyers.  Offer to buy them coffee or lunch and pick their brain on how they identified the opportunity and executed against it.  Ask if you can pick their brain from time to time.  For the most impressive and engaged, put them on your board or ask them to serve as an advisor.  The network you assemble will be invaluable to you as you decide to make your jump and, if you do, as you grow your business.

In the end, this is all pretty basic stuff.  But when it comes to the lawyer who is just tired of a being a lawyer, it’s worth repeating.  The old adage that “nothing in life is free” holds true in the business world as much as anyplace else.  Yes, there are wild success stories like the YouTube founders selling for a billion dollars eight months after launch, but there are umpteen gazillion more stories of businesses crashing and burning.  To have a shot at business success – which I hope for most is building a sustainable, responsible business, rather than simply looking for the YouTube quick hit – you need to have a passion which leads to vision which leads to a ton of hard work and, hopefully, a little bit of luck. 

That’s the recipe:  passion, vision, hard work and luck.  If you have it for the “business-side” then, by all means, get moving.  If you aren’t sure, then it’s time to get back to happily shepardizing that brief you’re working on.

Be Passionate.

Mark

For those of you that missed the webinar last week with Smart Marketing’s Mark Merenda, here is the video recording of the session. Mark covered a range of legal marketing topics and offered some great advice for small firms and solo practitioners.

We also have a calendar full of upcoming free webinars, including more guests! Larry Port of Rocket Matter will be joining us on July 15 to talk about Cloud Computing and Andrea Cannavina – the LegalTypist -  will be with us on August 12 to offer 30 Tech Solutions in 30 minutes.

Take a look at the schedule here!