Larry Bodine Law Marketing Blog : Law firm marketing, legal editor, legal marketing, attorney marketing, business development, marketing consultant, legal consultant, business development

Research shows that search engine optimization (SEO) is the No. 1 best way for law firm marketers to boost traffic to their firm website and generate leads. See SEO and Email Better for Law Firm Marketing than Social Networking for proof in a research report by Marketing Sherpa.

Lawyers know this and frequently ask me to recommend an SEO company.  For advice, I turned to Dale Tincher of ConsultWebs in Raleigh, NC, whom I've used myself and consider one of the  top website designers and SEO experts in the business.

He's got a great video on YouTube entitled, "How To Choose or Evaluate An SEO Consultant"  Spend 10 minutes on this video and save yourself thousands of dollars. 

Here are the high points:

• Many companies claim to provide high search engine results, but you should test them.Check their list of clients; if they don't have any online, move on.
• Type the vendor's top clients into Google check their search engine ranking, If the top clients aren't on page one of the search results, move on.
• Type the vendor's own targeted search terms in to Google and see how well they do for themselves. Type in "law firm web consultant" or "law firm SEO consultant" or "law web marketing consultant" into Google. If they can't get good rankings for themselves, move on.
• Call the vendor's clients and see if they're getting higher rankings and leads from their web site as a result of the SEO optimization.  If not, move on.
• The vendor should be legal-specific. They'll have a network of legal sites that can link to your site. You'll also save a lot of time because they'll be familiar with ethics rules and legal-content issues.
• Look for a vendor who specializes.  If the vendor also sells books or research, they may focus their best people on more profitable areas. Contractors go where the money is.
• SEO firms often go out of business. Find out how long your prospective vendor has been in business, and whether they're a one- or two-person firm or has a big team of people.
• Make sure the vendor does the work themselves, or farms it out overseas. If the work goes overseas, move on.
• Ask the vendor if they can provide advice and setup services for Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, Twitter and other social networking sites.

Don't be bamboozled by a fly-by-night SEO vendor. Find a company that knows what their doing, and enjoy checking your weblogs for all the new traffic.