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.

Small firms can often feel invisible, especially in markets with thousands of other attorneys competing for clients' business.  The internet can be a great way to level the playing field—if you know how to use it right.  SEO for small business can vault your firm into the top page of search results for searches that bring in real, paying clients.  Using SEO in small business is one of the biggest trends for internet marketing today.  What's more, there are now affordable small business SEO options that can help even lawyers who are just starting out.  This guide will cover all this and more about SEO for small business, so keep reading—you need this information today.

Why Search Still Matters

Not everyone believes that creating SEO for small business strategies is still a useful way to spend time for marketers.  These detractors point to a decline in using SEO in small business marketing plans, and an uptick in the number of clients finding attorneys in ways that don't involve using search engines.

However, those detractors are largely focused on retail industries.  Businesses which emphasize services, like law firms, are still often searched for by consumers and find SEO for small business profitable.  It's still three times more likely that you'll get a new client from a web search than any other way of generating leads.  This means that investing in affordable small business SEO is still a great idea for small firms.

What's more, there are more ways than ever to help propel yourself to the top of the SEO for small business heap.  With so many ways to use SEO in small business strategies, there's almost always at least one way that will appeal to your way of doing things.

How Searches Are Changing

Even though search is still important, to be successful with your SEO for small business, you'll need to know about current trends in web searches.  Searches today are increasingly mobile, and increasingly global.  Not all affordable small business SEO packages take this into account, so you should always make sure that your provider of SEO for small business is aware of these changes.

When searches are more mobile, SEO in small business strategies becomes even more important.  Why?  Because mobile searchers are more impatient and less willing to click through multiple pages of web results.  This means that your SERPS (and therefore, the role of SEO in small business) will be much more important for mobile customers.

It also means that your web pages now need to be optimized for viewing by mobile browsers.  Even if your affordable small business SEO works well and puts you in the top page of search results, it will only help if your website draws them in.  Don't waste time and money on SEO in small business marketing strategy if you're not going to make your website capable of generating conversions from clicks.

Local searches are also becoming more common, especially for people who hire attorneys.  Any affordable small business SEO package you purchase will need to optimize your business's web pages for local search as well as more general search terms.  

Direct Ads vs. SEO In Small Business Techniques

Many law firms currently do most or all of their online marketing through direct pay per click advertising services, like Google AdWords, instead of using SEO for small business.  If that's what you and your competition are doing, this means that there's more room for SEO in small business marketing in your area.

Direct ads do have some advantages over using affordable small business SEO.  For one thing, while SEO for small business can take several months to really become effective at generating new business, ads work right away.

However, for every click made on direct ads, you'll have to pay a (sometimes quite exorbitant) price.  When you use SEO in small business, you'll keep reaping the benefits for months or even years.  SEO for small business costs a little more money upfront but does tend to have larger payoffs over the long term.

Is Affordable Small Business SEO Possible?

When attorneys start trying to use SEO in small business, they're often flummoxed by the countless rules (many contradictory) that are given by different self-appointed SEO “gurus.”  Because of this, they turn to outsourcing their SEO in small business needs.    But affordable small business SEO can seem hard to come by.  Why?  Because good SEO for small business takes time.

You should be wary about affordable small business SEO if you see a price that seems substantially lower than anyone else's for similar services.  Is it because the person who's doing the SEO for small business isn't a native speaker of American English?  Is it because your affordable SEO service is employing a slew of overseas workers?  

It's not worth it to sacrifice quality for affordability when it comes to SEO in small business.  Affordable small business SEO may generate some short term gains, but if any of it is regarded as spam by search engines, you could lose even the SERPs you had before you started.

Prioritizing Your SEO for Small Business Goals

One way to make it easier to find affordable small business SEO is to make sure that you have clear priorities.  This allows you to pay your service for some elements of your search engine optimization, without needing to pay for a complete package that includes many things you don't need.

For example, maybe you're already quite familiar with making your blog search engine optimized, but you have no idea how to bring mobile traffic to your website.  Affordable small business SEO could focus on your mobile-friendly redesign, while letting you handle your blog content completely on your own.

Decide what parts of the search engine optimization process you're comfortable doing, and then do those parts.  This will not only save you a great deal of money with your affordable small business SEO service, but will also make you more comfortable with gradually doing more search engine optimization in-house.

What is SEO marketing going to look like in a few years?  You don't need a crystal ball to look into the future and know that SEO search engine marketing will keep changing.  While a few years ago, many search engine optimized pages looked clunky, over 50 percent of today's online businesses are using seamless organic SEO marketing.  Keep reading this guide to find out how SEO search engine marketing changes have created new techniques you can use every day.

What is SEO Marketing, and What Makes it Organic?

In the early days of the internet, SEO search engine marketing was extremely primitive.  In 2000, organic SEO marketing was basically unheard of, and most business marketing professionals would have asked you “what is SEO marketing?” if you even mentioned the concept.

When people started to get used to the idea of SEO search engine marketing, they were dealing with relatively simple search algorithms.  These simple search algorithms looked, in large part, for keyword density to tell whose results should be on top.

You've probably seen some of the web pages that this kind of SEO search engine marketing was used on.  Far from being organic SEO marketing, they're clunky, with keywords jammed in every which way.

Now that most people in marketing have advanced beyond asking “what is SEO marketing?”, changes are still afoot.  Organic SEO marketing means that your copy looks natural, rather than having ungrammatical keywords crammed so closely together that it becomes barely readable.

Do I Need Paid Ads When I Use Organic SEO Marketing?

Some of the confusion over what is SEO marketing and what it's useful for comes about because there are many different types of advertising and marketing on the web.  While organic SEO marketing is certainly a great technique, it's also a technique that takes finesse.  Some attorneys prefer to skip SEO search engine marketing and rely entirely on direct advertising, usually on search engines.

What is SEO marketing going to do to your paid ads?  Eventually, it can probably replace them.  Because about 80 percent of internet users simply do not click on sidebar search advertisements, you're reaching a much wider audience with organic SEO marketing.  SEO search engine marketing will take a little while to get off the ground, so you may want to continue running ads while you wait for it to work.

What is SEO Marketing Doing For Law Firms Today?

Whether you're a solo practitioner or part of a larger firm, you're probably wondering: what is SEO marketing going to do to impact my bottom line?  The best thing about organic SEO marketing is that it doesn't have to make your website copy look very different to your existing clients.  This type of SEO search engine marketing, because it looks natural, won't risk scaring new potential clients away or hurt your reputation for having good information online.

Of course, just altering copy isn't the only answer to the question “what is SEO marketing.”  Today, because Google now ranks link quality and weights that in deciding where to put your results on the search page, many things fall under the SEO search engine marketing umbrella.  For example, your social networking websites, as well as Youtube and other video sites, can contain examples of organic SEO marketing that will help to bring in new clients from all over the web.

How Do I Segment Audiences With Organic SEO Marketing?

Segmentation is one of the best ways to make sure that your SEO search engine marketing campaign succeeds.  Instead of trying to talk to everyone with the same organic SEO marketing copy, you can adapt your copy and keywords for each type of client that you're trying to target.
 
You can also segment audiences by actually making different websites for each of the areas of expertise at your firm.  While this may initially sound like a lot of work, what is SEO marketing without work?  If it didn't take any effort, every other firm would already be optimized as much as possible.

How Do I Analyze My Organic SEO Marketing?

Even people who have a very good understanding of what is SEO marketing can be stymied by attempts to interpret the results of their marketing campaigns.  Often, the data you get can seem confusing, or there may just be too much of it for you to guess at what it means.  When this happens, it may be a good idea to have a professional consultation with an analytics consultant.

Analytics professionals can help you learn how to interpret your own data and start taking your SEO search engine marketing into your own hands with split tests and constant analysis.  If you don't intend to do this analysis in-house, many of these professionals will do the analytics work for you.  They'll find out what is SEO marketing doing for your firm and reporting the results to you.

Finding More Organic SEO Marketing Resources

One of the best resources to learn more about SEO search engine marketing best practices is actually Google's website.  This a completely free resource, accessible to everyone on the internet.  Because Google is the biggest search engine in the world and decides how to index results, it's by far the most reliable place to start learning how to do SEO to attract new clients.

You can also keep track of websites like this one, as well as blogs about SEO search engine marketing.  When you follow blogs, it's important not to follow out of date information, as this can affect whether or not you will be successful with your SEO.  

If you have any questions, asking them on these blogs can be very helpful—after all, most SEO professionals are more than willing to share their thoughts and keep online discussions going!  SEO professionals with blogs are also likely to help you by pointing you in the right direction toward the specific SEO resource you need to complete your current search engine marketing project.
 

If you're looking for cheap SEO packages, you're in good company: eighty percent of law firms eventually outsource some or all of their search engine optimization work.  In the tough economic climate today, it's always important to save money, and many people look for the most affordable SEO package they can find.  However, just because affordable SEO packages are cheap doesn't mean they'll be worth your time.  How can you know what differentiates cheap SEO packages that work and the ones that don't?  Keep reading to find out.

Why “Pure” Cheap SEO Packages Are No Longer Enough

When law firms used search engine optimization in years past, they often focused exclusively or almost exclusively on the content of their websites.  Optimizing this content to maximize the likelihood that a page would be ranked well was called “pure SEO.”  Some affordable SEO packages today may still use pure SEO, but it would be a mistake to use these cheap SEO packages.

That's because pure SEO doesn't take into account the things that matter just as much or more to Google and other search engine indexers.  For example, if your affordable SEO package doesn't include anything that helps you optimize your website for mobile traffic, what will your law firm do to attract the 20 percent of web users who are now searching mostly on their smartphones?

Affordable SEO Packages: Link Building

A huge aspect of search engine optimization today is link building.  Any affordable SEO packages that don't include at least some work on link building are not worth your time or money.  Link building refers to the process of having other websites link to your site.

You should seek out an affordable SEO package that not only includes link building but also tells you upfront how those links will be built.  Backlinks that come from paid linking programs, reciprocal linking, or spammy, low quality websites will generally be regarded as neutral to negative for your search engine results.  Some cheap SEO packages that say they include link building services use these types of methods, so caveat emptor.

Some of the ways that high quality, affordable SEO packages might help you to link build include finding guest blogging opportunities for you to take advantage of, or building profiles in high quality directories on the web.  This kind of link building will take longer and may lead to having fewer links than if you had used other methods.  However, when your affordable SEO package uses ethical methods, you never have to worry that your SERPs will be negatively impacted by the next search algorithm update.

Affordable SEO Packages: Targeting and Landing Pages

Another way that an affordable SEO package can improve your search engine results is by helping you to direct your keyword-based pay per click advertisements.  These ads can help augment cheap SEO packages by giving you immediate results.  What's more, as part of your affordable SEO package, you can ask to actually see testing done to compare which keywords and copy pay off best.  You can then use that knowledge to refine your search engine optimization copy on all of your web pages.

Landing pages are pages that are specific to one ad and that address a client's keywords very specifically before they enter your main site.  This means that you'll be able to be able to target tiny niche audiences based on their exact interests.  An affordable SEO package can help you make these landing pages.  Most very affordable SEO packages will limit the number of landing pages you can have to a fairly small number—you may have to upgrade to less cheap SEO packages when you want to have more landing pages for more niches.

Affordable SEO Packages: Video

Not all cheap SEO packages include video recordings.  However, if you can find an affordable SEO package that does include video, it's a wise investment in your marketing future.  Some affordable SEO packages actually include many videos, all recorded in the same day or week, which you can then slowly share over the course of several months to a year.

Just because you're buying cheap SEO packages doesn't mean your video should look cheap.  If you see an affordable SEO package but the video looks bad, keep moving.  That's not the kind of impression you want cheap SEO packages to leave on your visitors, is it?  A well-produced video can still be made in the context of an affordable SEO package, and you'll get tremendous conversion rates compared to an amateur video.

Affordable SEO Packages: Content Management

If you already have a great deal of content for your website, cheap SEO packages can help you put it in front of the right eyes.  By search engine optimizing your videos, social networking posts, and blog posts, then putting it online, your affordable SEO package can save you from many hours of work every week.

Content management frees you from many of the administrative responsibilities of running a law firm website and optimizing it.  Even very cheap SEO packages will typically include this service.  If your administrative responsibilities are giving you headaches, an affordable SEO package may be exactly what you need.

Warning: Don't Get Blog Content From Affordable SEO Packages

One thing you should never accept as part of an affordable SEO package is blog writing.  Think about it: attorneys go to school for years to learn the law.  How can cheap SEO packages possibly provide you with real subject matter experts when they blog?  Subject matter experts cost money, and you won't get them with an affordable SEO package.

Instead, work on your blog content yourself, and learn some principles of keyword density, semantic indexing, and so on before you write your entries.  A well-written entry that is only partially keyword optimized will still look much better to potential clients than any entries that are so full of keywords your clients or colleagues can barely read them.

You've tried everything you know about SEO, but it's still not working!  What do you do?  If you're like four out of five American law firms, you contact SEO expert services to help you figure out what to do next.  Expert SEO services can get you out of your current search engine optimization rut and think of new ideas that you haven't yet tried.  Keep reading to find out why hiring SEO expert services may be some of the best money you can spend in your marketing budget.

Why You Need Specialized Expert SEO Services

When you start looking for SEO expert services, you may be very surprised at how many of them have proliferated on the web.  Today, expert SEO services are a multimillion dollar industry with professionals working on search engine optimization around the world.  With so many companies competing for your business, it's important to pick one that specializes in helping attorneys with SEO.

Sure, it's possible that expert SEO services that don't really understand the business model of law firms could lead to positive SEO results. It's also possible that they could fail miserably.  You don't want to risk your firm on untried SEO expert services.  Instead, choose someone who can already show you multiple case studies from law firms of a similar size to yours.

You should also avoid hiring any services that won't agree to a non-compete clause in your area.  Most specialized expert SEO services will only have one client from each geographic area, to avoid conflicts of interest.  You don't want your SEO experts to be working for your biggest competitor and knowing all of your best tactics.

SEO Expert Services for Lawyers: Developing Keyword-Rich Content

When lawyers learn to write in law school, they're taught a very particular style of content.  In much the same way, expert SEO services can help you write the best content for your chosen niche markets using the latest search engine optimization techniques.

Today's SEO expert services won't stuff your copy full of keywords (and if they do, they may not be much of an expert at all).  Instead, they'll make it look polished, professional, and still appealing both to humans and to search engine robots.

Because designing optimized content often means having to include many variations on the same keyword set, hiring expert SEO services is a great way to avoid the mind-numbing tedium of making sure that all of these words are inserted at the correct density.  You can even write your own content, then send it to SEO expert services for editing that will make it more likely to appear high up in Google's search results.

SEO Expert Services for Lawyers: Identifying Niche Markets

Another great use of expert SEO services is finding out which niche markets in your area have not yet been tapped.  By analyzing keyword use in searches made near you, SEO experts can help you branch out your practice in new and exciting directions.

Attorneys who are just starting out may also want to consult with SEO experts to learn some ideas about the niches available to them and which might be best to start with.  Because niche finding is a specialized service, you'll want to look for expert SEO services that have provided niche finding to a broad range of law firm clients in the past.

SEO Expert Services For Lawyers: Sharing Your Content

Even if you're great at writing your own content, on today's web, that's just not enough to stand out.  You'll also need to find ways to share what you've done, and that's where expert SEO services come in.  These services can help you to post your content online through a variety of platforms.

Depending on what your firm needs and what its desired client base is, SEO expert services may recommend a wide range of different websites and offline places to promote your site.  Especially if your clientele tends toward younger people (less than 50), your expert SEO services may discuss ways to more effectively share the content you've made with smartphone and tablet PC users.

SEO Expert Services for Lawyers: Analyzing Campaigns

Unless you have a quantitative background that lets you do some serious number crunching, you may want to leave the math to the experts.  That's why many expert SEO services offer analytics service.  Analytics is the science of understanding not just who's coming to your website and from where, but what those traffic patterns mean.

Trying to guess what's working and what isn't in your campaigns can lead to big mistakes.  Rather than using guesswork, your SEO expert services will use reliable mathematical and statistical methods to figure out where you're going wrong and why.  What's more, expert SEO services can actually design tests on your website to figure out what content and design contributes to the highest conversion rate.

This kind of analysis is best when it's done not just once, but continuously as your website develops new and better content based on the results of testing.  You may not see great results if you abandon your analytics research after a redesign, so keep testing and working with new ideas to find out what works best.

How SEO Expert Services for Lawyers Are Changing

As quality link building becomes a more important part of search engine optimization, expert SEO services have stepped up their game.  No longer the era of the “pure SEO” agency, today's services tend to offer a wide range of services including social media, mobile optimization, and quality link building across many different types of websites.

When you hire SEO expert services today, you'll also have to decide which of those aspects of complete search engine optimization you want to emphasize.  While many agencies can do any type of SEO, they're bound to have their strengths and weaknesses, and you should be prepared to identify those and prioritize what you believe is most important for your firm to improve.

Everyone in law marketing today wants to talk about niche markets.  But what is a niche market, really, and what niche market will provide you with the biggest profits in both the short and the long term?  When you're trying to compete against hundreds or even thousands of other law firms in your area, you need a way to differentiate yourself from the competition.  That goes double once you decide to market online.  In this guide, you'll not only learn about a history of legal niche markets, but also about how to find a niche market that helps your bottom line and your career satisfaction.

A Brief History of Niche Markets for Lawyers

Just a hundred years ago or so, most attorneys didn't have a particular niche market in mind when they started their practice.  In that much more rural America, being able to be versatile and flexible, handling all types of cases, was more important than asking what is a niche market.

Even in that era, though, some attorneys learned about niche markets and specialized in particular kinds of cases.  Some attorneys became private criminal defenders and began to carve out a niche market in the criminal court system.  As divorce became more common in the United States and no-fault divorces exploded, many attorneys started finding niche markets in family law.

The internet changed the answer to what is a niche market.  While a niche market used to just describe attorneys who'd chosen to specialize in a particular legal field, that's no longer enough.  In just your area, there may be a hundred other people working in, for instance, personal injury plaintiff's litigation.  You'll need to figure out niche markets to successfully compete against people who are already marketing heavily online.

What is a Niche Market Today?

Today's niche markets are smaller and more specific than ever before.  It's no longer enough to just answer “what is a niche market” with a basic practice area.  Instead, you're going to need to think about narrowing your field further.  For instance, instead of just practicing personal injury law, or even using vehicle accident plaintiffs as your niche market, you need to be more specific.

Consider specializing in a particular kind of vehicle accident: for instance, accidents that occur at stoplights, or drunk driving accidents.  This kind of specialization can make it much easier for you to generate web traffic for so-called “long tail keywords,” which happen when people type a very long list of search terms into a search engine.

Can Niche Markets Help Even if I'm a Solo Practitioner?

Sometimes solo practitioners in today's competitive market feel a need to try to take literally any new business that comes through their door.  When this is your legal philosophy, your question isn't so much “what is a niche market” as “why would I want one?”

What you may not realize is that by trying to be all things to all people, you may actually be cutting off your own best routes of getting new business.  You're never going to be able to compete with your biggest firm competitors in every area of the law—why not develop niche markets where you can be the big fish in a small pond?

A great niche market can be the foundation of a highly profitable solo practice.  While other solos are still trying to be generalists and haven't even asked “what is a niche market?” yet, you can be well on your way to niche success.

Getting Help Choosing Niche Markets

Marketing consulting agencies and computer tools can both help you to find a niche market if you're not confident about your niche marketing ideas yet.  Using an agency is usually the better idea if you have a large budget for your niche marketing, but if your budget is smaller you may have to rely on inexpensive or free tools.

Niche market finder tools are becoming popular with businesses all over the country who want to know what niche markets are in high demand and short supply in their area.  Remember, though, that computer tools don't always tell the whole story, especially if your niche marketing idea involves populations without a lot of computer use.

What if My Niche Market Gets Less Popular?

Sometimes, you can actually choose niche markets that you know won't be as popular in a few years.  What is a niche market with this kind of short period of viability?  Let's say that you want to make a niche in plaintiff's law for people who've been hurt by, for instance, a recently recalled vehicle or prescription medication.  If that vehicle or medication has been pulled off the market in response to lawsuits, you won't have that niche market forever.

However, that doesn't mean that these are bad niche markets.  What is a niche market good for if it doesn't last forever?  Well, you can make a lot of money in the meantime as one of the few attorneys operating as a specialist in those niche markets.  Just keep an eye on the market, and when it starts to run dry, start a new website for a closely related niche market (for instance, another recalled car or medicine).

Choosing Niche Markets Through Demographics

Another way to choose a successful niche market is to look at demographics.  What is a niche market that is demographically based?  Well, let's say that your law office is in or right next to a neighborhood with a high population of an ethnic group.  If that group tends to speak a different language than English, they may have a difficult time finding competent legal help when they have a problem.  If you're fluent in the language already, or can at least hire a translator to help you, you'll have much better success with the niche in your area.

You can also use age demographics to successfully target your niche marketing ideas.  For example, if you're in an area where many people are retiring, you may want to develop a practice based on asset management, wills, and trusts.

282 million Americans—nearly the entire population of the country—will be using the internet at some point this year.  Today, more than eighty percent of consumers report doing research on products and services online before deciding on one.  Finding the best link building service for your needs can make the difference between mediocre search results and top results.  Keep reading this guide for six easy to use tips that can help you compare link building services and pick a good link building service for your law firm.

Tip 1: Not All Links Are the Same

When you're starting to use a link building service, you need to keep in mind that search engines don't rank all links in the same way.  Building inbound links is part of the puzzle that link building services can help you solve, but the best link building service will help you to create quality links, not just any links at all.

What does a quality link look like?  A quality link is from a website that generally is considered to have a great reputation—people tend to post links from that website and it is generally popular.  However, the more outbound links that a website has, the less weighting any individual link will give you.  

For example, a website like Youtube has a good reputation online and used by many people.  However, with so many links on Youtube, each new link to your website only helps your search engine results pages a little bit.  On the other hand, if your law firm's website was linked by a major online magazine that only has a few links every day, you might see a significant jump in SERPs.

Tip 2: Not All Link Building Services Are The Same

Because links are weighted differently by quality, the best link building service will always emphasize quality over quantity.  You should be wary of any link building service in today's internet world that tries to tell you about the sheer number of links that will be generated for you.  Many of these link building services fall under the old “article marketing” category, which reposted articles on many websites.

A link building service that wants to just copy your articles and put them all over the web isn't the best link building service you can use.  You should be on the lookout for link building services that offer innovative ways to build your web presence, like setting up guest blogging opportunities or other ways to trade links with other real attorneys.

Tip 3: Know How Link Building Services Can Hurt You

While the best link building service you can hire will certainly help you to improve your SERPs, using a bargain basement link building service can actually harm your website's rankings.  Why?  Because many of these link building services are actually using seriously unethical ways of posting your links.  Some of them will post links as comments to completely unrelated articles on completely unrelated blogs—a terrible way to bring in new web traffic, and a tactic likely to get your website labeled as spam.

In some cases, if your link building service is trying to include terms about other attorneys in your website or links, you could even be subject to disciplinary action.  State bar associations are still working out their rules for advertising online, and link building services have periodically come under fire as unethical.  You should consult with your state bar association if you have any questions about best link building service practices or any practices that may be prohibited.

Tip 4: There's No One Best Link Building Service

While of course there are higher and lower quality link building services, the only best link building service is the one that is best for your law firm.  For example, the first link building service you contact may be able to show you great case studies that make you feel confident that you'll improve your SEO results.  However, if they've never done link building for lawyers before, they may not know how to make link building work in a legal services context.

The best link building service for you will usually be one that can show you some real results from other law firms or similar service-oriented industries (for instance, a link building service that has worked extensively with CPAs or medical professionals).  Link building services without this kind of experience may be more focused on selling products, not services, and are unlikely to give you good results.

Tip 5: Track the Progress of Your Link Building Service

Don't just take the word of your link building services that their package is working.  If you've gotten the best link building service available, the people working for the service will usually show you an analysis of your web traffic, as well as the search engine results pages your website now displays on, and how those two things have been influenced by the link building efforts they've handled.

While link building services can't give you overnight results, you can expect to start seeing changes within a few weeks or months.  Keep in mind that even the best link building service won't be able to increase your conversion rate—keep your website content high-quality so that the people driven to your website by your new link building efforts are impressed.  If your link building service hasn't delivered within six months, it's time to try a new strategy or a new service.

Tip 6: Find Link Building Services That Use Best Practices

One way to find the best link building service, whether it's 2012, 2013, or beyond, is to investigate the current state of best practices for link building.  Because these best practices are constantly changing, understanding the latest state of the art link building techniques can help you decide which link building service is best for you.  Keep in mind that any link building service using techniques that are even a few years out of date is sacrificing your web traffic.

The Best Affiliate Marketing can Return Serious Results

Affiliate Marketing Statistics You Should Know

The best affiliate marketing websites, and blogs especially, can generate profits of six figures if they have a large audience and successful marketing strategies. 

According to the Marketing Resource Index, the average cost for every lead associated with marketers mainly focusing on outbound leads is as high as $346.  The cost for inbound markets is only around $135. 

How to: Affiliate Marketing Starting Tips

1. If you’re just starting a campaign, you need to do your research first of all.  The best affiliate marketing promotes the best products out there before they become widely accessed by the public.  Timing is the key, so you’ll want to look for trends for legal products and services in the future. 

2. After you’ve chosen what products or services you’re going to market, you’ll have to choose a domain and a webhost.  A blog is an easy way to start

the best legal affiliate marketing campaign, and according to the Marketing Research Index, budgets for blogging have increased from 9% in 2009 to as much as 21% in 2012.

3. One of the strongest recommendations in the “how to” of affiliate marketing is to create different pages or even set up several different websites or blogs, especially for legal marketing.  The best affiliate marketing campaigns will clump together similar products on the same website and devote another website or blog to other types of products or keep from starting a campaign on the other website.

How to: Affiliate Marketing Content Tips

1. One of the best affiliate marketing strategies is to include product reviews on your website—especially if you’ve used the products personally.  Be honest within the reviews, and focus on how you set up the reviews.  Make the headlines compelling in order to try and make the readers read further on.  Highlight and bold important facts for the readers who will always skim the articles. 

2. Another important point in the “how to” of affiliate marketing is to convince the readers that they need the product!  For example, have you used the

product or service yourself because you cannot offer similar services? If so, how has it made your life easier, added to your knowledge, and more?  Don’t be pushy though.  The best affiliate marketing will present truthful facts and testimony. 

3. The best affiliate marketing is updated a couple of times every week.  If you’re writing product reviews on a platform such as a blog, you’ll want to write AT LEAST 2 articles every week.  The articles don’t necessarily need to be long; they just need to get the information across in order to enhance your chances for a lead and a sale.  Because the majority of companies use PPS compensation, you need to generate as many leads as possible.

4. Another important point in the “how to” of affiliate marketing is adjusting your content to your audience.  If you find that readers are coming to your websites and they suggest products that they want you to cover, use the advice.  Offer readers a chance to give you feedback so you can adjust to their preferences.

How to: Affiliate Marketing and Tracking your Results

1. You’ll want to monitor the results of your campaign every single day.  Use tracking software such as AdSense or other similar tools to track the results on your webpage, but don’t change the content immediately—especially if you’ve just begun your campaign.  The best affiliate marketing campaign will make adjustments not only to content but the structure of the website in order to bring in more traffic. 

2. Track the amount of leads you’re creating.  The more leads you have, the more you increase your chances for a sale for the merchant’s product.  A general rule in the “how to” of affiliate marketing is that you’ll receive a sale for every 100 leads that you generate.  The content of your legal website can increase these figures, but the percentage is standard even within the largest and best affiliate marketing campaigns.

How to: Affiliate Marketing and the Keystone of Social Networking

Compared to even the largest companies, smaller firms are spending more on social media affiliate marketing in percentage.  There are several advantages and add-ons that social networking can add to even the best affiliate marketing campaigns, and some specific advantages are listed below:

1.       Trust: the most important rule in the “how to” of affiliate marketing is the trust factor.  With a social ad or even a product review that is posted to your wall, you automatically have the trust of your readers because they are your friends, coworkers, peers, etc.

2.       Simple: not only is setting up an ad on Facebook easy, it’s easier to promote than on a website.  A social ad or product review is perhaps the best affiliate marketing because you can reach a huge audience in a small amount of time. 

3.       Targeting: another reason why Facebook offers some of the best affiliate marketing is because you can target your ads based upon age, location, and most important, interests. 

4.       Related Content: Facebook will automatically adjust ads based upon content as well.  If Facebook users are reading certain pieces of material or searching for certain types of services, advertisements will appear that relate to those queries. 

How to: Affiliate Marketing Conclusion

The best affiliate marketing campaigns can take years to develop.  You need to be patient while starting the campaign because you don’t want to adjust your material too fast or you won’t develop a group of readers that are devoted to your website or your social network.  As mentioned above, the best affiliate marketing strategy will include new material on a frequent basis, and the material will be relevant to your readers and area of law. 

Easy Steps to Get More Twitter Followers for your Firm

How to Get More Followers on Twitter

Of course, you can increase the amount of Twitter followers you have by using a promoted account, launching an advertising campaign, and then tracking your results with Twitter Analytics.  However, there are simpler ways to get more Twitter followers that can prove to have dramatic results. 

How to Get More Followers on Twitter

The following recommendations on how to get more followers on Twitter may seem trivial, but the fact is that many of the most successful profiles on Twitter offering legal services have used the following techniques:

1. Establishing a Good Avatar

The first step to increasing your Twitter followers is creating a scaled and professional avatar.  Many firms make the mistake of posting an image for an avatar that has too much going on.  For example, if you want to use a group photo of all the people in the firm, the picture may seem cluttered and reduce your chances to get more Twitter followers. 

Instead, a good idea for an avatar is the firm’s brand or logo.  If the firm is small, a picture may work as long as you upload a larger image and let Twitter scale down the photo. 

2. Set up an Intriguing Profile Bio

This is another important step on how to get more followers on Twitter.  Your bio should be short enough to keep the Twitter follower’s interest and should say some interesting facts about your firm.  Additionally, you should consider placing the links of your official website, your blog, and more in the bio in order to get more Twitter followers and encourage them to visit your professional material. 

3. Tweet during Peak Hours and Make Adjustments later

One of the best tips on how to get more followers on Twitter is to send messages and tweets during the peak hours of 9 a.m., 12 p.m., 3 p.m., and 6 p.m. You’ll want to adjust the tweets for time zones to increase Twitter followers as well.  Also, if you’re targeting clients in other countries, you’ll have to adjust your posting hours to get more Twitter followers as well. 

4. Send Top Users @Messages

This is one of the greatest and most simple marketing techniques on how to get more followers on Twitter.  You can send private messages to increase your Twitter followers, but this technique can forward your services to people who aren’t following you.  For example, if you post a @message, the message will appear on your profile for all to see.  If the person responds to the @message, all of their followers will see the message as well.  Hence, you’ve greatly increased chances to get more Twitter followers. 

5. Link to Sites that can Help Followers

Another good way to get more Twitter followers is to post interesting or supplementary links for your services.  Apart from posting links to your own blog or website, think of how to get more followers on Twitter by using certain websites.  What materials might your followers need before or after they access your website? 

6. Repost Important Information

Another great way to get more Twitter followers is to repost your most important information.  There is some skill involved here though.  You don’t want to repost simple and general information; you want to repost your most important information in order to increase your Twitter followers.  You may want to post the information a couple of times a day at various different peak hours or even outside of peak hours. 

7. Ask Engaging Questions

This is another great tip on how to get more followers on Twitter.  For one, if you’re asking engaging questions, followers are more likely to respond to your posts.  Secondly, if the follower reposts, all of their followers will see what they have posted to your account and you’ll increase your Twitter followers.  If you ask more questions, it’s likely that you’ll get more Twitter followers as long as the questions are engaging and important. 

8. Focus on Divisions and Subdivisions

If you want to know how to get more followers on Twitter, you need target large and small groups at the same time.  For example, let’s say that you’re a real estate attorney and you’re trying to get more Twitter followers.  You’ll want to post tweets that can relate to all appropriate clients, but you’ll also want to target subdivisions.  What will you post about taxes, the market in your area, available property, changes in law, and more? Targeting specific subjects and areas will increase your Twitter followers. 

9. Post as Many Photos as Possible

Let’s face it; you’ll get more Twitter followers if you post more pictures.  Twitter followers are much more likely to look at all of your photos instead of all of your tweets containing only text.  Make sure the photos are professional and relate to your services.  Don’t post random pictures or pictures that confuse the degree of your services.

10. Link to Other Social Networks

Perhaps the best tip on how to get more followers on Twitter is to link your Twitter account to your Facebook account and your LinkedIn account.  It’s likely that a large percentage of your Twitter followers are also your Facebook friends and LinkedIn peers, but some professionals don’t access Twitter as much as the other networks. 

How to Get More Followers on Twitter: Conclusion

If you follow the techniques in this article, you’ll get more Twitter followers and probably see the results immediately.  Make sure to keep your account updated so the public is aware of any changes in your services.