Paying for website traffic is a great way to get into the world of online marketing because it can instantly bring prospective clients to your website. That can help get the phone ringing now, while you take time to develop other online marketing strategies, like search engine optimization, that will keep the phone ringing for […]

In this edition of "Ask the Experts," Holli McVean, office manager at Carscallen LLP, and a member of the Association of Legal Administrators, has great advice for getting all the information you need — efficiently and politely — from cold and warm calls. Question: What’s a good way to handle calls from salespeople? There are too many asking me to listen to their pitch, and not enough time to see them all. Yet some may have products or services we need. ... READ THE ANSWER

I'm frequently asked how much a law firm — especially a small law firm — should spend on advertising. The cost of advertising will differ for every law firm, of course. Advertising costs will be based on the firm's location and size, and even practice areas. Competition and target audience also come into play. Given all the variable factors, costs can be difficult to estimate. There is, however, an action every firm can take to gauge the effectiveness of its advertising. Just ask one simple question at every initial client meeting ... READ MORE

I have long believed that one of the most effective ways to build business is to build communities. And, with the popularity of social media, this view has only been reinforced. Seth Godin, the popular author and speaker, uses the term “tribes.” He says human beings have always been part of tribes, which he defines as follows: “A tribe is a group of people connected to one another, connected to a leader and connected to an idea. A group needs only two things to be a tribe: a shared interest and a way to communicate.”

Nothing trite. Nothing cliche. Just lots of specific ideas for those hard-to-please attorneys!

Collegiality is often viewed as a defining hallmark of a felicitous legal career. With the advent of virtual offices and the tethering of humanity to Internet devices, though, much of what made for traditional law firm interaction has vanished from the scene like a meteor-struck Yucatan dinosaur. What if there was a way to bring it back (even expand it), by using the very same technologies that served to rot out the personality of professionalism in the first place? Well, Mootus, a question-and-answer service for lawyers, is making the attempt. ... READ MORE

Now that you’ve mastered the basics of web traffic sources for your law firm's website, and embraced the importance of direct traffic, it’s time to tackle referral traffic.

Computer security can’t be stressed enough in law firms. It's tempting to think you personally don't really have to pay attention to "security stuff," or that your firm is "too little" for bad guys to be interested in. But you’d be wrong. As with so many things, size is not important when it comes to client data security and confidentiality.

There is significant debate in law firms about whether to produce electronic holiday cards or mail a printed card to clients. People want to know what works best so, in the absence of any definitive research, I took an online poll to find out what lawyers, themselves, like to receive. The result? Of the 140 lawyers and law firm professionals surveyed, 62 percent said they preferred receiving printed holidays cards. That’s right, printed. Only 10 percent said they would prefer to receive an e-card, and 28 percent reported it didn’t matter what kind of card was sent. We got responses from corporate, transactional, defense, family law and plaintiff's attorneys who work in local, regional and national firms. READ MORE

Every law firm needs to know who else is representing their clients and hottest prospects. The following five tools make it easier than ever for us to find out. None of the tools is 100 percent comprehensive or 100 percent accurate, not even the “for pay” databases. However, they keep us from having to pore over individual filing documents and search individual law firm websites. READ MORE