attorney-marketing-09112015

What does it take to do effective content marketing for attorneys?

Content marketing for lawyers is an increasingly important topic for firms and practitioners looking to grow their business. From the smallest start-ups to the most successful firms in the country, more and more businesses around the country are finding success in creating content tailored specifically to increase their internet visibility. For those looking to establish themselves as a leading authority in their particular field of law, never fear! It is surprisingly easy to begin producing effective online content to increase your virtual presence, just by following the following simple rules.

Editorial calendar.

You will only stick to creating great content for your website if you have an editorial calendar. Your editorial calendar is your plan for your content marketing efforts.

Your editorial calendar should include the following:

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  • The title of your post.
  • The date of publication.
  • An outline.
  • The keywords you want to include within the body of your post.
  • Links to relevant content on your site.
  • External links to relevant content.

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Write for an audience.

Create a reader profile. Who is your reader? Are they mostly men or women?  Are they entrepreneurs or individuals? What is important for them? How do they make decisions?

Use your target keywords.

Include relevant keywords within your content. Don’t over do it. There is no point in stuffing keywords all over your content, but when it makes sense use them.

Think what keywords people would use to search for an attorney in your field.

Consider the following regarding your target keywords:

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  • Combine your geo target area. For example, “san diego divorce attorney”, or “trademark lawyer in san diego”.
  • Don’t just focus one of two keywords. Any attorney should have at least 10-20 target keywords.
  • Think of variations of your keywords such as:
    • divorce attorney
    • divorce lawyer
    • divorce specialist attorney
    • family law attorney
    • family law lawyer
    • local divorce lawyer
    • best divorce lawyer
    • top divorce attorney
    • hiring a divorce attorney
    • divorce attorney free consultation
  • Don’t try to optimize a page for more than one keyword phrase. For example, you should have a page dedicated to the keyword, “divorce attorney”, and another for “divorce lawyer”, etc.

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Stay focused.

First, avoid going too broad. You want to make sure you have a well defined area of expertise to focus on. People now have the ability to find content that is tailored specifically to meet their needs. Concentrating in on one niche market will allow you to meet the needs of your audience, rather than struggling along as a small fish in the big pond that is the world wide web. Your goal should be to establish yourself as the primary resource on the web for your particular field.

WordPress is your friend.

Take the time to familiarize yourself with the popular publishing platforms. They each serve a different purpose for their users and are suited to different types of content. Blogs, social media, websites, and microsites can each play a particular role in your plan. Use WordPress as your website platform to bring it all together. WordPress can quickly connect with your social network accounts, simplifying publishing..

Make sure you are playing to your strengths with each piece of content you create. Don’t be afraid to include a variety of forms of media in the content you create. Spice up your creations with plenty of pictures, video, slide shows, and even a bit of humor. Anything you can do to separate your content from the rest of the crowd is worth doing.

Quality vs. Quantity

Publish great quality content. It is good to have a lot of content on your website, but only if it is excellent quality. The best quality content is shared while fluff is ignored.

Here is what you need to have great quality content:

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  • Keep it original. Avoid rehashing stuff that’s already out there.
  • Create strong headlines.
  • Longer content is better. Try to make every blog post at leas 1000 words long, 1500 – 2000 words is even better.
  • Improve on what’s out there. If you want to write a blog post, see what is already out there. Then, write an article that is longer and better researched.
  • Use effective images. The image you include within your article should be carefully selected.
  • Make your content actionable.

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Engage with your audience.

It is important that you establish yourself as a prominent voice in your particular area. The best way to do that is to engage with the existing discourse community. The trend of newsjacking can be a helpful way to accomplish this. Basically, you need to react to and comment on the latest issues that are affecting your niche. You can create a Google alert for any subject of interest, allowing you to react quickly to any breaking news.

Even if you are not involved in the most talked about or intriguing cases in your specialization, that does not prevent you from weighing in and joining the conversation. The higher profile the case, the more media visibility you gain from engaging with the topic. This increased visibility can help establish you as an expert in the eyes of the public, which will in turn lead to a larger audience and more clients.

Keep up with the very latest trends. Many lawyers have begun using the social networking platform Pinterest to share infographics related to their field. This practice has exploded recently and would be a great start to researching the ways that you can use innovative content marketing for lawyers to promote your own business.

Are you struggling to come up with content for your law practice? Here are some content ideas:

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  • Weekly blog posts. It is important to post regularly, the more frequently the better.
  • Publish detailed attorney bios.
  • Write ebooks.
  • Case studies.
  • Search for questions related to your practice on Quora and other forums and respond to them on your blog.
  • Create presentations.
  • Podcast.
  • Testimonials.
  • Tutorials.
  • Publish videos on Youtube.
  • Record your webinars.
  • Press releases.
  • Cheat sheets.
  • Checklists.
  • Reports.
  • Write detailed answers to FAQs.
  • Publish guest posts.
  • How to guides.
  • Design infographics.
  • Interview experts or attorneys in your firm.
  • Publish articles on LinkedIn.
  • Respond to news stories and how it relates to your practice.
  • Newsletters.
  • White papers.

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It is great to have great content. It’s even better when people share your content.

Here is how to get your law firm content shared:

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  • Use sharing buttons on each page of your website. If you make it easy to share, it will be more likely done.
  • Email your network every time you publish something new, but no more than a couple of times per month.
  • Stay active on your social media accounts. You don’t have to be everywhere, but you should commit to at least one social platform.
  • Every time you post, make sure it is automatically posted on your social accounts too.
  • Share content from other blogs. Often the favor is returned.
  • Include great images in your blog posts.
  • Use Google+.
  • Periodically, re-share your older content.
  • Update your content at least once a year, so it stays relevant.

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