Now that 90 percent of the United States uses the internet either at home or at public terminals, search engine optimization has gone from a neat tool to an absolute necessity for remaining competitive.  You know from experience if you've used one that a link popularity check tool is one of the most valuable tools in your web marketing arsenal.  But what if you're not already using a link popularity checker tool?  Do you need one now?  In this guide, we'll explore the basics of using a link popularity check tool and help you come to an informed decision about whether to use one as part of your search engine optimization strategy.

What is a Link Popularity Checker Tool?

Also known sometimes as a backlinks checker, a link popularity check tool is used to identify which websites are linking to your site and some characteristics of those links.  Depending on which link popularity checker tool you use, you may be able to find out information about your inbound links, like “what is my anchor text for each link?” or “which links come from the same IP address?”

Using a link popularity checker tool has become very important because Google now bases most of your search engine rankings not on keyword density, but on your inbound links.  By using a link popularity check tool, you ensure that you know where you stand with Google.  Because Google also bases your link rankings on whether your links come from high quality websites, you may also want to monitor the quality of the sites your links are coming from—something that many of the biggest popularity checker tools do.

Which Link Popularity Checker Tool Should We Use?

There's no one right link popularity check tool that works equally well for all applications.  In some cases, you may find that you actually want to use two or more different tools in order to get a better variety of information about each link.  A good place to start finding a link popularity check tool is Google.  Doing a search for “link popularity checker tool” will give you myriad websites, each of which has its own check.

It is very unusual for a link popularity checker tool to require downloading onto your machine.  Usually, a link popularity check tool works completely online and will be hosted by the website of some other company.  How do these companies make money by giving away a free link popularity checker tool?  Easy—they are hoping that you'll be so impressed with their link popularity check tool that you purchase some of their less easily automated, more costly services.

Can a Link Popularity Checker Tool Improve SEO?

On its own, a link popularity check tool can just help you identify the sources of your inbound links.  However, if you're interested in using these results to improve your search engine optimization, there are several things you can do.  

First of all, you can make your search engine optimization efforts a bit more like the ones your most successful competitors are using.  That's because information about inbound links is totally public, so you can use the same link popularity check tool to look at your competitor's website that you can use to look at your own.  When you use the tool, let's say you find that many of your competition's highest value links come from having accurate and detailed information on various directory websites like Google+ Local.  If this is the case, then you need to make sure you're also on those directory sites so that you are a little more evenly matched.

You can also use a link popularity check tool to learn which linking areas you're not really doing much in yet.  Maybe when you run your check, you find out that there are only three or four links to your website coming in from social networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn.  If you see this pattern, you can use your knowledge to start building new links on social networking sites—the lowest hanging fruit for your particular linking needs.

Alternatives to Using a Link Popularity Checker Tool

If you don't have many inbound links, using an inbound link popularity check tool won't necessarily help you very much.  The data that these websites can give you is more accurate and more meaningful if you have a fairly large number of links.

For people just getting started out, a link popularity check tool can be substituted with a tool for identifying your competitors and finding niches for your content.  If you find niches for your law firm using a niche market finder, you'll be better equipped to create pages that will get the attention of linkers.  However, you should make sure to return to checking your link popularity once you've done several weeks of niche marketing and inbound link building.

Analytics and Your Link Popularity Checker Tool

Tracking your link popularity results through a long period of time is a great way to see how changes to your website's focus and design have affected your inbound links.  The process of using data you've gathered to figure out the next step your website should take is called analytics.  By using an analytics program like Google Analytics, you are using proven mathematical methods to understand what's going on when people visit your website and where they're most likely to come from.

You can do analysis of your link popularity check tool results relatively easily.  Do you ever see a sharp spike in your inbound links, or a decline?  Check what changed in your website or inbound link building strategy at that time.

You can also use analytics on your competition.  By monitoring when they see spikes in their inbound links, you can see what strategies they're using and whether they're automating link submission.  Keep in mind that your link popularity check tool can only see links that have been indexed by search engines—if you or your competition is having a tough time getting your links indexed, you may not be seeing the full inbound linking picture.

Today, backlink building has become riskier than ever before for marketing pros.  If you want to get backlinks, it can be tough to do without tripping Google's new detection algorithm for over optimized sites, called Google Penguin.  Penguin is designed to keep websites that are using spammy backlinking techniques off the front pages of search results.  Keep reading this article to find out what is a backlink quality score, and how to get backlinks on the post-Penguin web.

What is a Backlink?

First, let's start with the basics.  What is a backlink?  It's when another website links to yours, which is then noticed by search engines.  There are many different ways to get backlinks, but first, you'll need to understand some of the basic terminology.

Anchor text is the text of the actual link itself.  This text can sometimes just be a single word, but more often it's made of relevant keywords that will attract someone to click on a link.  Often, when businesses have just started learning what is a backlink, they'll try to create numerous backlinks with the exact same anchor text.

Some ways to get backlinks are considered positive SEO—that is, they tend to add to the web experience rather than detracting from it.  However, other types of backlinks are considered negative SEO.  What is a backlink that would be considered negative?  Usually, one that appears to be paid for or otherwise is not relevant to the page it's on.  If you get backlinks that have nonsense text around them, it's very likely that this will be considered a negative SEO backlink.

What is Google Penguin?

In order to stop people from trying to get backlinks regardless of whether the links were of good quality, Google released an update in April 2012.  This update did several things to check the web for sites that showed signs of over optimization.

Over optimization, the way Google explains it, just means websites that are too optimized for their level of overall traffic and their online brand reputation.  These websites were appearing too early in queries and had often become over optimized through less than ethical methods.

While Google Penguin only affected about three percent of total search queries, it changed how marketing professionals get backlinks.  Penguin now judges websites according to a quality score (which you can check with backlink audit tools), and high quality websites do better for backlinks.

What Do “Over Optimized” Sites Look Like?

Some websites have seen what happens when an overly enthusiastic marketer goes wild with buying backlinks.  You may get backlinks, but the links won't really generate much traffic, because they're not usually very good links.

What is a backlink strategy that Google will usually recognize as over optimization?  Things like buying large quantities of links when your website is brand new will always set off red flags.  Google knows that people don't just go from asking “what is a backlink” to generating hundreds of organic backlinks in just a few days.  If your site is picking up links too fast, expect to see Penguin squash it.

If your anchor text all appears identical on a huge variety of websites, this is also a Penguin red flag.  In the same way, if you get backlinks by posting a large number of comments on unmoderated blogs that accept any comment made, you'll be identified as a spammer and see your search engine rankings drop accordingly.

Usually, any time you get backlinks from a low quality website, you should be a little bit worried about the prospect of over optimization.  A few of these links won't hurt you, but unless you balance them out with some high quality links, you could be looking at Penguin trouble.

What is a Backlink From a High Quality Site?

Ideally, you'll want to get backlinks from the highest quality sites you can.  But what is a backlink from a high quality website going to do for you that one on a mid-ranked blog can't?  Simple: it'll raise your search engine results by much, much more.  That's why it's a great idea to focus at least some of your attention on this method to get backlinks.  Because attorneys are legal professionals with highly prestigious businesses, it can be much easier for lawyers to get press coverage from high quality websites than other types of businesses using SEO.

What is a Backlink Tier?

If you're so backlinked that even your backlinks have backlinks, congratulations—you're using one of the best new techniques to get backlinks.  This is called “tiering,” and can make Google consider your website even more high quality than it already is.  By backlinking to backlinks that connect to your website, you give those backlinks more credibility and help your own in the process.

For the truly serious web marketing professional, three tiers (linking to backlinks of a backlink) is not out of the question.  If you're new to backlinking and are just beginning to ask “what is a backlink,” this technique may not be for you, but otherwise it's one you should consider.

What is a Backlink Strategy for 2012 and 2013?

The best strategy to get backlinks in 2012 is to focus yourself completely on high quality.  Low quality links won't bring in new clients, and they're becoming increasingly bad bets when it comes to search engine optimization.  Make sure that your website's quality level is kept high and that you are regularly auditing your backlinks for any issues with links from bad sources or irrelevant, out of context links created by spambots.

2013 looks like it will be the era of no shortcuts for most people who want to get backlinks.  Instead of creating explosive growth by spending a lot of marketing dollars right away, slow and steady will win the race.  Slow, high quality growth is growth that you can depend on for the future, and that will only serve to enhance your reputation.  Don't make the mistake of using old strategies—use new resources that take Penguin into account before you decide how to build links in 2012.

Accidents happen when you work on managing your reputation online.  If you've done something that you now know was a mistake, it's probably not the end of the world—options still exist for online reputation repair.  In this guide, we'll take a look at seven different lessons for websites trying to do damage control.  Whether your website has been taken over by hackers, you've had a serious compromise of information security, or you just goofed up and said something that angered people online, this guide can help you understand what your next steps should be and how to mitigate the damage you've already done.

Lesson One: Be Professional, Be Courteous

Lawyers are actually in a worse position than some other professions when it comes to managing their reputation online.  Why?  Because people tend to already have a somewhat negative preconceived view of attorneys, and because any attempt at online reputation repair needs to be done with an understanding of that view.

Don't try to weasel out of mistakes in a way that will make people scoff and make lawyer jokes.  Those aren't the stereotypes you want to live up to when managing your reputation online.  Online reputation repair for law firms involves keeping all of your actions completely above-board and transparent.  If people think you're lying or stretching the truth, you won't succeed in managing your reputation online.  You need to be very courteous, even to your most harsh critics, in order to prevent your problems from multiplying.

Lesson Two: Takedown Notices

Don't be afraid to send a takedown notice to content that you believe is libelous.  Managing your reputation online means knowing what other people are saying about you, and you may find that your competition isn't being ethical when it talks about you.  Do you see reviews that you know are obviously fake when you're managing your reputation online?  Part of online reputation repair for you probably involves sending takedown notices making it clear that these defamatory statements will not be tolerated.

If your takedown notices don't work and webmasters continue to display the defamatory content, you can talk to the service provider that is currently hosting their website.  Generally, these hosting companies are more than happy to remove offending content in order to avoid getting sued.  As a lawyer, you'll have an advantage in this part of online reputation repair: unlike most businesses, it isn't difficult for yours to send cease and desist letters.  

Lesson Three: Social Media Updates

One of the best ways to fight a campaign of negativity is to start sending out positive messaging.  Managing your reputation online will be substantially easier if you already have accounts on major social network websites.  You can monitor your website reputation by seeing what people are saying about you on these websites, and then you can do online reputation repair by contacting dissatisfied people and responding with empathy and concern to their complaints.

Lesson Four: Action and Distraction

Any time that you need online reputation repair, you can try managing your reputation online through strategically designed distractions.  For instance, let's say that you have been hacked recently and your clients' information including addresses and some brief information on their legal problems (sent through your contact form) was compromised.

If this is the case, your first strategy for online reputation repair should be to immediately be honest about the damage and report it as quickly as possible.  This show of good faith on your part goes a long way to managing your reputation online.  Then, you should try to create some positive buzz for your company by releasing press releases and creating inbound links that illustrate your prowess with the law.  Distractions should never be your only method of dealing with managing your reputation online, but can be a great online reputation repair tool when you're out of ideas for directly addressing the problem.

Lesson Five: Showing Your Best Side

Don't try to do online reputation repair that directly contradicts your brand image.  While this may seem like a relatively obvious lesson, it's clear that many people who work on managing their reputation online haven't taken it to heart.  Many firms go into a shut down, bunker mentality when online reputation repair kicks in.  They start talking in vague generalities and using boilerplate language, when that's actually the worst way to go about managing your reputation online.

Instead, you need to make sure that your brand image still shows through so that your online reputation repair actually enhances your reputation overall.  Be yourself, and don't let consultants tell you that the best methods for managing your reputation online involve defensiveness or trite language.

Lesson Six: Enlisting Your Past Clients

Your past clients can be some of your biggest allies in online reputation repair.  If you're having problems with a disgruntled client causing trouble and giving you many negative reviews, consider talking to happy clients and asking them if they would be able to post a positive review for you.

By drowning out the negative results, your clients can make your online reputation repair job much easier.  Most people won't pay much attention to a single negative review if there are dozens of positive reviews on the same site—people are smart enough to know that this is more often a reflection of the complainer than the person being complained about.

Lesson Seven: Tell the Truth

No matter what, you should always tell the truth about what happened when you're managing your reputation online.  It's easier than ever for clever internet denizens to identify any misinformation and distribute it widely.  You'll have a much harder time managing your reputation online if you become known for lying about what happened on your website and why it happened.

Even when the truth is hard—perhaps especially when it's hard—you need to say it.  People don't always expect integrity from attorneys, and they respect heartfelt apologies and immediate owning up to the problems your website has caused.

Over 92 percent of internet users in the United States use search engines, according to Pew Internet Research.  That means search engine optimization needs to be an integral part of your internet marketing strategy.  With new algorithm updates from Google called Panda and Penguin, doing an occasional backlink check became more than just a good way to do analysis.  For many websites, it's now absolutely critical to check backlinks if you want to avoid negative consequences.  Keep reading this guide to find out why doing a backlink check is one of the best things you can do to improve your search rankings.

#1: Getting Rid of the “Unnatural Links” Warning

If you've already received an email from Google that warns you about a high percentage of what it calls “unnatural links,” you need to do a backlink check as soon as possible.  Every so often, since rolling out its new Penguin update to decrease the prevalence of “over optimization,” Google will check backlinks for your website.  If too many appear to be from dubious sources—for example, low quality article marketing websites—Google will send you this warning and may penalize your search rankings.

When you perform a backlink check on your website, you may see a wide range of links.  In some cases, if that range is too wide, Google may see these backlinks as being artificially created.  If you check backlinks to your website and find that many of the sites linking to you have very little to do with the topics covered by your site, you may want to ask for the links to be removed.

Often, when law firms get the unnatural links warning, it's because they violated Google's Webmaster Guidelines by paying for backlinks.  In order to avoid this kind of situation, it's very important not only to check backlinks, but also to make sure you're following those guidelines in the future.  Don't purchase huge numbers of backlinks for cut-rate prices—you'll get what you pay for, in the form of low-quality links that Google ignores or worse.

#2: Getting Rid of Bad Backlinks

Even if you have never purchased a backlink in your life, it's still possible that your website has bad backlinks that could look like paid for or irrelevant linking.  Performing a backlink check shows you where those links are and what percentage of your total links they constitute.

While you check backlinks, you may discover that you have a huge number of links to websites you didn't even know were linking you.  Some backlink check tools will help you to assess whether the links you've gotten are high or low quality, and whether you should ask the webmaster who controls those backlinks to remove them.

Keep in mind that there's no reason to be afraid of Penguin if your backlink check reveals just a few bad backlinks out of many good links.  Google's algorithm already takes into account the fact that just about any website could have some bad links.  It's only if you check backlinks and a significant percentage of your links are already poor quality that you need to worry.

#3: Understanding Your Reach

Sometimes, law firms don't even understand exactly where their reach extends to.  With a backlink check, you can see who's linking your website and how far your reach really goes.  You may find when you check backlinks that you are being linked by many websites with a particular focus, or that something you wrote generated a huge number of backlinks in a short time—even on high prestige websites.

Once you've looked at your reach, it's much easier to figure out where you need to advertise and what kind of advertisements might work best.  This is a great way to use your backlink check to inform other parts of your marketing and advertising strategy.

#4: Creating New Backlink Opportunities

If you notice during your backlink check that you've had a great deal of success getting backlinks from  a particular type of website or blog, that's great news.  It means that after you check backlinks, you may want to try talking to the owners of other websites or blogs that have similar content.  This can help you to generate new, high quality, contextual backlinks.

For example, let's say that you notice several different articles on your website (for a law firm of divorce attorneys usually representing wives) being re-linked on many different domestic violence information websites mentioning restraining orders, temporary restraining orders, and how to leave an abusive situation.  This lets you know that you may want to specifically seek out other sites like this, for guest posts or new backlinks.

#5: Checking Your Anchor Text

One of the other things that you may want to look for when you check backlinks is how similar the anchor text is for your various links.  When Google sees a huge number of links that all have identical anchor text, this is considered to usually be a sign that someone is engaging in link buying or other shady link building practices.

Some backlink check tools allow you to spot when too many links have the same anchor text, while with others you'll have to check this manually.  If you see a lot of identical text when you check backlinks, ask webmasters to change the link text on some of these websites.

How To Get Bad Links Removed

If your backlink check gives you a pile of bad links to have removed, you're going to have to contact a lot of different webmasters.  Often, webmasters will take down a link that is negatively impacting your search engine performance without another word.  However, some will outright refuse, won't acknowledge your message, or will demand payment.

If any of these things happen after you check backlinks, don't panic.  Instead, document your correspondence including dates and times of emails and send it to Google.  Google can actually review your documentation and may allow your website's rank to increase again even with a large number of bad links if this happens.

Backlinks are one of the best ways to differentiate yourself from your competition when it comes to search engine optimization.  According to the most recent American Bar Association survey, there are over 1.2 million licensed attorneys in the United States.  If you don't know what a backlink is or how to get backlinks, keep reading!  You'll find seven rules that will help you become a backlinks pro in no time at all.

Backlink Rule #1: Backlinks are Different Today

Until 2012, the answer to how to get backlinks was very easy: you bought them, and you could buy them very cheaply.  Many services existed that would charge you on a per backlink basis, and these services often charged extremely low rates even for thousands (or tens of thousands) of backlinks.

Today, many web marketing professionals are wishing they never bought those links.  That's because new changes to Google have changed how to get backlinks that work.  If you have paid-for backlinks or are obviously using the same text on many websites, Google will now consider your website “over optimized” and drop its rankings accordingly.  Every backlink that those web marketing professionals paid for, they're now having to ask to be removed—a time consuming and tedious process that no one wants to have to do.

Instead, today's marketers want to focus on getting smaller numbers of better backlinks.  By making sure every backlink you build is high quality, you'll be able to make your search engine optimization better without taking any unnecessary risks, like the risk of being seen as a spammer.

Backlink Rule #2: Variation is Key

Okay, so you learned how to get backlinks a few years ago, and you've now got a mess on your hands.  All that identical anchor text that used to raise your search engine result pages (SERPs) is now detected as possible over optimization by Google Penguin.  In order to avoid this problem, you need to learn how to get backlinks that have more variation.

Try mixing up your anchor text a little bit.  Using the exact same backlink phrases over and over will make search engines see your backlinks as fake or low quality.  Brainstorm some variations of your keywords and you'll have an easier time knowing how to get backlinks that won't get you blacklisted.

Backlink Rule #3: Tough Links are Better

While shortcuts like link buying used to predominate the backlink market, today, people know that you're more likely to have a high ranking website if you get the backlinks that are harder to get.  Learning how to get backlinks from high quality websites is a little trickier than just buying links by the thousand, but you'll end up with much better results as well.

For example, let's say that you work very hard on press releases about some recent cases that your firm has taken on and won.  These press releases, if they're circulated to the right media sources, could lead to a major news network like CNN talking about the cases or asking you for a quote.  Backlinks from reputable media sources like this will be much better for your website than a backlink from a random blog that often has guest bloggers.

This isn't to say that you should turn down any linking opportunity that's easy.  It just means that effort is worth it, and that Google has decided to reward the businesses who are putting the most effort, rather than the most money, into their backlinking efforts.

Backlink Rule #4: Work Your Connections

There's nothing wrong with leveraging your social networking connections for some backlinks.  This is one of the most tried and true methods for how to get backlinks, especially for a new website that hasn't yet built up much of an online reputation or presence of any kind.  

If you're using social media, make sure that you're posting regularly about the new website.  You should have user friendly content that will draw people in and make them want to share your message without any prompting from you.  If you're successful in creating this kind of content, you may not need much more advice about how to get backlinks—the backlinks will just come to you from your website visitors after a while.

Backlink Rule #5: Never Spam

The internet can sometimes seem like a vast and wild place where it's difficult to find the right answer to a question.  Don't make it worse by putting up misleading backlinks or otherwise creating spam.  Anyone who learned how to get backlinks in the earlier days of the web may have learned some bad techniques that led to spam creation.  However, if you're learning now, there's no excuse—any guide that encourages spam-like techniques can be safely disregarded in the post-Penguin era.

Backlink Rule #6: If It Looks Too Good To Be True…

Beware of any services that say they know how to get backlinks for much cheaper than anywhere else.  It's possible that they're still using the same kinds of methods that are getting webmasters in trouble today.  These services are often not particularly ethical, and will try to obtain backlinks online wherever they can, regardless of whether the websites linking you have any relevant connection to your business.

Check the fine print, and ask to see other websites that the service has search engine optimized.  If they'll only let you access case studies that came from before the Penguin update, you should find a new provider of backlink building services.

Backlink Rule #7: Audit Your Backlinks

Periodically, it's a good idea to check where your backlinks are coming from and whether they are of good quality.  If you see a backlink that appears to be from a spam website or other type of negative SEO content, it's best to ask promptly for its removal so that you don't face consequences from Google or other search engines.

A backlink audit can be made much easier using free web tools.  Google provides a number of these tools for free to users, as do a number of other websites, each offering different functions to help you decide which of your backlinks should stay and which should go.

When you've started the process of website link building, you'll need to know which link building strategies actually work and which ones you can leave behind.  Today, Google Penguin (the search engine's new ranking algorithm) determines your SERPs based not just on the number of your links, but also on their quality.  This guide will go over link building strategies, starting with the best strategies and working our way to one strategy that most law firms are probably better off avoiding.  Keep reading to find out whether your existing website link building strategy is a great idea or if you should consider other alternatives.

Law Firm Website Link Building Strategy #1: Produce Great Content

The first and best of the link building strategies, and one that almost any SEO specialist will tell you, is to create content that people want to read.  If your content isn't good, it's unlikely that you'll be able to do the kind of organic website link building that leads to the best search engine page results.

Great content doesn't just mean one thing, and it doesn't have to just come in one form.  Your link building strategies may rely on, for instance, producing a blog.  If you're blogging, you can do a lot of website link building just by creating interesting and informative blog entries.  If you're creating blog entries that are using good search engine optimization, you can attract blog visitors relatively quickly and some of them may pass your entry along.  If you make Youtube videos, people can watch and comment on those videos, as well as share them.

Essentially, producing great content puts your best foot forward when you're doing website link building.  It shows that you're willing to go the extra mile in your link building strategies, and that you're not opposed to giving away real, informative content for free.  Don't think of your content as a giveaway—think of it as an investment in your website's future.

Law Firm Website Link Building Strategy #2: Make Something Different

With the market so saturated with legal blogs, it can sometimes be difficult to get attention when you're trying to use blogs as part of your link building strategies.  Instead, consider doing website link building with some other type of medium.

Today's computer use studies show that a large number of users are currently spending more time using mobile apps than they are browsing the web.  You may want to make a mobile app of your own that could help your typical clients.

Even just changing the structure of what you're doing can make your website link building more successful.  For example, while many link building strategies call for using blog entries, why not make a blog that's about some different topic in the law—or even a blog for other attorneys that uses a lot of humor?  That kind of content is likely to be reposted, which is the biggest rule for link building strategies.

Law Firm Website Link Building Strategy #3: Use Social Media

In 2012, social media is one of the biggest question marks in designing link building strategies.  Why?  Because most of the major search engines, including Google, are keeping quiet about how much weight they're assigning to links made from major social media websites like Facebook, LinkedIn, or Twitter.

While some website link building professionals believe that social media links will help your SERPs dramatically, and can point to examples of firms with good search engine placement and good Facebook pages, this correlation doesn't confirm that the Facebook links caused the high SERPs.  Even so, link building strategies today would be incomplete without at least some social media presence.  Whether or not this is one of the best link building strategies today, you should learn it for future use.

Law Firm Website Link Building Strategy #4: Media Coverage

It can sometimes be difficult to get bona fide media coverage for law firms, but incorporating press coverage into your link building strategies can be a great idea.  One of the biggest reasons for this is that typically, daily newspaper websites are considered a relatively trustworthy source with high quality content.  This means that when your website is covered by a local newspaper, you're more likely to rise in Google rankings.

The bigger the coverage you can get, the better your results will be.  If, for example, your intellectual property law firm was able to get name-dropped and linked by a blogger on Wired.com, you would very likely see your search engine results skyrocket.

Law Firm Website Link Building Strategy #5: Local Directories

Since over one fifth of searches today include a local geographic search term, you'll want to do some link building with local directories.  An example of a local directory that is easy to get access to is a chamber of commerce directory.  Once you've been linked by several local directories, Google will associate your website more with your local area, and your search engine results for people making those geographic searches will become higher.

It's also key to include a complete profile on Google+ Local to make this website link building strategy work.  It will be much easier for your website to appear early in local search results when you take steps to increase your local visibility.

A Website Link Building Strategy To Avoid: Article Marketing Services

A few years ago, many law firms started using article marketing services, or article “spinners,” as part of their link building strategy.  These services took one piece of content and either copied it completely or copied large pieces of it to reuse on hundreds of unrelated websites all over the internet.

Needless to say, these sites weren't really producing quality content, and Google has recently made several algorithm changes to crack down on this form of search engine optimization spam.  If you use an article spinning service today, at best, you'll be wasting your money.  At worst, Google will think that your website is spam and lower its page rankings accordingly.

More than three in four Americans have used the internet at some point in 2012, and even the most technophobic lawyers are getting on board with search engine optimization strategies.  Link building, or the practice of getting new links going to your website, can help to improve your search engine results.  Legitimate link building is harder than ever today, but there are still many link building tools that can help you to get your links online fast.  Here are ten that lawyers can use today.

Link Building Tool #1: Blogs

If you're a lawyer without a blog, what are you thinking?  Almost any attorney can start a blog—it's free, and it's fairly fast to set up, especially if you're not focused on making your blog's visual appearance completely unique.  Blogging is one of the best link building tools that you can use, and what's more, it brings in new clients all on its own.

The topics of your blog are limited only by your practice areas and your imagination.  You can comment about publicized cases happening right now in the court system, or about the likely effects of a new or proposed law.  You may also want to talk about the process of hiring an attorney, or the costs of attorneys, if you often seek cost-conscious customers.  This makes blogging one of the most versatile link building tools, as well as one of the most effective.

Link Building Tool #2: Press Releases

Press releases are link building tools that can help you garner media attention and new website viewers.  However, not all press releases are equally effective.  To make good use of press releases as a link building tool, they need to be from a legitimate public relations source and announce something genuinely interesting.

Many “press release websites” aren't actually public relations companies.  They're just places where anyone can post an article online.  While these link building tools may seem easy to use, they're also not particularly effective.  They contain a high amount of spam and other low quality content, and aren't really read by web users.

Link Building Tool #3: Facebook

Facebook—the one thing that unites your great aunt, your co-workers, and your third best friend from high school in addiction—can be more than just a time sink.  Because it's so easy to share links on Facebook, this social media website has become one of the best link building tools of 2012.

To use Facebook as a link building tool, you'll want to have more than just generic status updates.  Try doing something creative, or linking to a blog entry.

Link Building Tool #4: LinkDiagnosis

If you want to see how your linking stacks up to the competition, one of the best online link building tools you can use is LinkDiagnosis.  This tool lets you run reports to analyze the biggest inbound links that are affecting the traffic of your website and the websites of your competitors.

LinkDiagnosis is a great way to see how the other law firms in your area are handling link building, and whether they're using any link building tools that you haven't started using yet.

Link Building Tool #5: Ratings Websites

Whenever you have a client talk to someone else positively about your legal services, you're getting a good recommendation.  But what if you could make sure that your clients' reviews were seen not just by their friends and family, but also by anyone looking for information about your firm or your website?

Ratings websites are great link building tools because they not only give you a new inbound link, they give you new ways to show potential clients what you're capable of.

Link Building Tool #6: Local Directories

Don't neglect local chambers of commerce and city government websites when you're looking for link building tools.  These websites often have local directories of businesses, and if your law firm is included among them your website can bring in more traffic.  These link building tools may be of limited effectiveness in some areas, but particularly in smaller towns and cities they are one of your best link building tool options.

Link Building Tool #7: Youtube

Videos can be fantastic link building tools that also work hard to drive conversions.  Youtube is one of the easiest video platforms to use as a link building tool.  Youtube makes link building easy by helping you to get your video hosted and providing an easy to use form so you can enter a search engine optimized description and title for your video.

Link Building Tool #8: Social Bookmarking Sites

Using “bookmarking” sites doesn't just mean adding a website to a personal list of favorites.  Rather, it refers to the process of posting a link for viewing and user comments.  On many social bookmarking websites, like reddit and digg, users determine which links are most prominent and which ones will be seen only by a few people.

Link Building Tool #9: Forums and Question Sites

By entering internet forums or question websites and answering questions for other people, you'll be able to build inbound links while providing a valuable service.  For example, you may want to try using Yahoo Answers as a link building tool.  Try answering a few questions that are very closely related to your expertise.

When you answer questions, make sure that you're including a link back to your website.  This is what makes question sites effective link building tools—without a link, you'll be wasting your time and effort.

Link Building Tool #10: LinkedIn

To round out this list, we have to talk about the link building tools available on LinkedIn.  Not only can you have links to your website in your profile, but you can also use LinkedIn Answers to answer the questions of other real professionals and build networking connections locally, regionally, and globally.  Using LinkedIn as a link building tool is particularly powerful for law firms that primarily have a B2B focus.  If you're B2C focused, Facebook and Yahoo Answers may provide you with better leads and link building.

SEO has become a huge industry in recent years, and today, most law firms report that they are using some type of search engine optimization strategy.  If you've been having difficulty implementing these strategies and are on a budget, you may be thinking of hiring a cheap SEO service to help you figure out what else you can do to enhance your web traffic.  While not all cheap SEO services are worth the money, hiring the right service can greatly enhance your ability to drive new clicks to your website.  Keep reading to find out how to tell the difference between a cheap SEO service that works and one that doesn't.

Does “Cheap SEO Service” Mean Poor Quality?

It doesn't necessarily have to, but the truth is, you should be very careful about the quality of cheap SEO services.  Remember, those cost savings have to come from somewhere.  Because of this, you should always be skeptical about any cheap SEO service that is offering a much lower price than you've seen advertised anywhere else.

Of course, you may think, if you can get such cheap SEO services, it may be worth the risk—after all, isn't the worst that could happen that your traffic stays the same?  The sad truth is that this isn't even close to the worst that could happen.  If your cheap SEO service decides to use practices that violate Google's terms of service or their quality guidelines, you could actually see steep declines in your traffic.

Where Can a Cheap SEO Service Save Money?

There are places where cheap SEO services can reasonably be expected to conserve some money without having it affect their quality of service too much.  For example, your cheap SEO service probably should avoid paying for any links.  In addition to costing additional money, paid links are usually considered to be low quality links by search engines.

You may also be able to save money by writing a lot of your own content instead of having cheap SEO services draw your content up from scratch.  Even if your cheap SEO service has to edit and rephrase some of the content you've written, this will usually take less time and money—and your words will have what is unmistakably your voice.

Don't Skimp on These Parts of Your SEO Strategy

No matter what, though, there are some parts of search engine optimization that are much tougher for a cheap SEO service to manage.  For example, if you do want original content created for your law firm's website, cheap SEO services may be a really bad idea.

Why?  Because in order to get such inexpensive content, a cheap SEO service is very likely to be using non-native speakers of English who are writing your content from halfway around the world.  Cheap SEO services can't usually afford the rates of professional writers who can make polished, error-free content.  While some types of websites might be able to get away with internationally outsourced content, attorneys are expected to present a very professional image at all times.

Mobile is an increasingly big part of SEO strategy.  If your cheap SEO service hasn't learned much about mobile and isn't planning to help you implement mobile search engine optimization, you should consider looking for a better service.  Great SEO services today are focused on the mobile traffic revolution, which will be responsible for over fifty percent of total web traffic in less than 18 months.

Signs A Cheap SEO Service Isn't Worth It

Cheap SEO services can be very different from one another, but there are some signs that should tell you that your working relationship wouldn't be very productive.  One of these signs should be whether they're aware of new changes to Google and other search engines, and how those changes will affect search engine optimization strategies for 2012 and 2013.

You can also tell that a cheap SEO service isn't worth your time if the people working for the service are unwilling to provide you with case studies showing how their search engine optimization strategies have benefited other law firms like yours.  SEO for law firms is substantially different than SEO in other industries, and it's critical that the cheap SEO services you're looking at know how to get legal clients clicking.

Finally, a cheap SEO service should probably get crossed off your list if they focus their work on creating reciprocal linking.  This “you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours” philosophy helped a lot of cheap SEO services create links that got search engine attention, but new algorithm changes have limited how helpful reciprocal linking can be.

Monitoring the Progress of Your Cheap SEO Service

When you hire cheap SEO services to handle your search engine optimization account, you should have a regular schedule for updates.  Your cheap SEO service can help you understand the data that has been gathered by your website for the purpose of analysis, and what the trends in those data are saying now.

If you're not happy with how much progress cheap SEO services are making after several months have passed, you may want an analytics professional to take a look at your website's data.  The analytics pro can tell you whether what's failing you is your content itself or your search engine optimization strategies.

Is Doing It Yourself Better?

With some cheap SEO services having definite negatives, you may be wondering if you should just buckle down and study on your own.  While this may seem like a good idea initially, even a cheap SEO service is putting a great deal of time into research into techniques.  Keep in mind that any time you're spending (or having an employee spend) looking into SEO is time that isn't being spent attending to other firm business.

Doing it yourself should usually only be attempted if you haven't been able to find a cheap SEO service that meets your needs.  You should also have a strong background in computers or statistical analysis (and preferably both) before you start handling all of your search engine optimization needs.

When you outsource search engine optimization, you want the best SEO service you can afford.  But how can you tell if a particular SEO service is great—or whether they're just pretending to be?  Here, we'll take a look at some different indicators that you might see when you look into the best SEO services.  You'll find out whether these indicators add up to say that the service you're using is the best SEO service available, or whether you should consider looking for different services.

SEO Service Good Sign #1: Quality Links Over Quantity

The best SEO services today know that great links are more important than just having an abundance of links all over the internet.  Quality links are much more likely to help your website rise in its search engine rankings.

What's more, a single quality link can organically generate several other links when people see your website and re-link it.  The best SEO services today will never just generate inbound links to your website by posting them on spam pages full of other links (also known as “link farms”).  The best SEO service also won't just join link networks so that you can have a larger quantity of links.

Instead, the best SEO service will help you to create relationships with other bloggers, local directories, and even local news media so that you can use quality link building techniques.  The best SEO services will always build your links organically—that is, they won't pay for the results they're getting, but rather will get them from having good content.

SEO Service Red Flag #1: Lazy Link Building

It's an old saying that what's right isn't always easy, and that what's easy isn't always right.  This is very true when it comes to the best SEO services.  You know that you're not dealing with the best SEO service when you hear that they can get you onto thousands of websites within just a few days.  Think about what that would actually entail, if those links were actually high quality—and now think how low quality those links would have to be to generate them so fast.

Search algorithm updates mean that the Google of today focuses on links that took hard work.  There's no longer an easy way to simply get links without having to provide real content.  The best SEO services work hard for you, rather than taking the easy way out.

SEO Service Good Sign #2: New Techniques

In the SEO industry, which seems to change almost from day to day—and certainly, sometimes, from week to week—it's important for the best SEO services to keep up to date in their use of search engine optimization techniques.  For example, you may have recently heard of a new technique called latent semantic indexing, or LSI.  If you haven't heard of it, don't worry: the best SEO service you can find already knows exactly what it is.

Under the principles of latent semantic indexing, the best SEO services will use many different variations of a keyword rather than just one or two keyword phrases over and over.  Why does this work?  Because Google now includes similar words to the ones you searched for when you perform a search.  For example, if you look up “houston tx dui attorney,” you'll also get results that include the word “lawyer”—which will be highlighted just as if you had searched for that term.  The best SEO service knows this, and takes advantage of it to produce natural-sounding copy that also reads better to search engine indexers.

Understanding how to use new methodology is one of the things that sets the best SEO services apart from the merely good ones.  The best SEO service should be able to tell you about several new techniques that they are currently evaluating, and several techniques that have already been proven to work.

SEO Service Red Flag #2: Old Solutions

If the agency handling your SEO sounds like they walked out of a search engine optimization guide from 2006, it's time to send them back and get the best SEO service you can.  Keyword stuffing is a long-dead strategy, and none of the best SEO services use it any more.  If your service's keyword density seems really high, it may be time to look for a new one.

Another solution that worked in times past (even for the best SEO services) but no longer is “article marketing.” This, in its most spammy form, meant spamming hundreds or even thousands of websites with identical or near-identical content packed full of keywords, along with links back to your website.  The abuse of article marketing services led to Google changing the way it ranks search results, so the best SEO services don't use anything like article marketing today.

SEO Service Good Sign #3: Slow and Steady

It's crucial for everyone involved with SEO at your law firm to understand that results can sometimes be slow to come.  Even the best SEO service won't be able to get you onto the first page of results in a few days if you're currently on page thirty.  Good search engine optimization takes time, and the best SEO services know it.

What you should see, if you're using the best SEO service you can find, is slow but steady and trackable progress.  If you don't seem to be making progress after some months have elapsed, or if you're backsliding, it's possible that you're using a subpar SEO service.

SEO Service Red Flag #3: Promises Instant Results

It's just about a guarantee: if a service promises to give you a guaranteed amount of traffic or instantly boost your website's search rankings, it's probably lying.  The best SEO service won't promise anything instantly.

These kinds of promises are often signifiers of an agency that is great at self-promotion, but not much else.  You'll want to get the best SEO service for law firms, and that means making sure that whatever service you hire understands the likely pace of the results you'll get.

As more Americans use the internet as part of their daily lives (282 million at the last count), more of them have started learning how to effectively use search engines.  Part of effectively using search engines to effectively search for products and services is using local search terms.  Attorneys, due to the local nature of most law firms, can benefit tremendously from understanding how to use local search SEO.  In this guide, you'll learn seven easy to use local SEO tips.  Each can help your law firm get on the path to local search SEO that actually works to make your SERPs better.

Local SEO Tips #1: Picking Your Keywords

It's a mistake to think that just because your law firm is located in a city, you can't also market to people in the suburbs.  In the same way, if you're located in a rural area or a cluster of smaller towns/cities, you may feel that geographic searches and local search SEO actually hurt, instead of help, your business.

You can fix that feeling by choosing keywords that represent more than just the area where your office is.  You can include the names of several other cities in your webpages, and most local SEO tips will suggest including suburbs or neighborhoods as long as those Google searches are being made.

Local SEO Tips #2: Claim Your Profile

On many local search SEO directory websites, your law firm may already have a listing.  For example, it's very likely that as long as you're listed in the phone book, you'll have already been listed by Yelp and Google+ Local.  However, the automated systems that input these entries are limited.  They will usually only be able to identify the name of your law firm, its location, and its telephone number.

That's where these local SEO tips come in.  By starting an account at these websites, you can claim your profile and begin to work on providing more information through this profile.  This enhances your local search SEO by showing that you are located in the area, and that you are active locally.

These local SEO tips won't just help you to appear sooner when people search for terms relating to your law firm.  They'll also get you new customers, just like an advertisement.  An increasing number of consumers are turning to ratings websites and directories for attorney recommendations.  Local search SEO is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the reasons for making one of these profiles.

Local SEO Tips #3: Check Your Website

What if you've followed all the local SEO tips you can find and nothing seems to be happening in terms of your bottom line?  Have you made sure that you're actually seeing an increase in traffic due to your local search SEO efforts?  If traffic is up but conversions are down, you may need to alter your content accordingly.  Conversion-ready content will include direct calls to action for the consumer, as well as clear and engaging copy that isn't littered with legalese or jargon.

You should also make sure that your website is running fast.  Google now includes this metric to determine, in part, where your pages will be displayed in search results.  If your website is running too slowly, you may be sacrificing search engine results pages just because of some poorly optimized code or a bad hosting provider.

Local SEO Tips #4: Use Google Instant

Have you noticed how when you start to type a search term into Google's search field, Google actually tries to guess what you're searching for?  This is called Google Instant, and it's designed to get better at anticipating web needs based on extensive user data.

By playing with Google Instant, you can find your own local search SEO tips.  How?  Just type in your location and a search term people might use to find your law office, then see what else comes up.  You may also want to include these terms in your local search SEO to get more clients, because apparently people are already searching for those exact terms.

Local SEO Tips #5: Use Local Directories

Asking for a listing from the Chamber of Commerce may sound like an antiquated marketing strategy.  You may be surprised to learn that many local SEO tips suggest taking this exact course of action.  Why?  Because local search SEO depends on being linked not only by other websites, but by other local websites.

When a listing for your website appears on a large number of local directories, you'll show up as a better match for people who are looking for a law firm in your area.  While many directory listing services are no longer worth it, local search SEO still requires local directory use to be truly effective.

Local SEO Tips #6: Update Your Profiles

If your law firm changes names, locations, or focus areas, you need to make sure that your local search SEO has been updated accordingly.  An outdated profile can lead to major SEO trouble.  Make sure that somebody at your law firm has been assigned the responsibility of updating these profiles routinely.  You may also want to consider adding new information along with your updates, like photos of your firm or links to videos.

Local SEO Tips #7: Get Reviews

One of the biggest ways clients today use local searches to find lawyers is by using Avvo.com, Yelp.com, Google+ Local, and other rating and review websites.  It's easy to see why: these websites make it easy to compare past client reviews quickly.  When looking for a lawyer, the vast majority of clients will choose the lawyer with reviews instead of the lawyer without them.

This means that in order to make your presence known with local search SEO, you should be encouraging your clients to leave reviews for you.  Even issuing a call for reviews from clients who are LinkedIn connections or Facebook friends can help you to get the extra edge you need.