Episode 160 – What Does Your Online Presence Say About You And Your Law Firm

What does your website and online presence say about you? Are you positioned as a respected attorney with high status or a run-of-the-mill, low-cost lawyer – i.e. a commodity? Discover how a potential client’s perception of you can make or break your law practice.

 

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Today, I have an unusual podcast and question for you. I ask this question because it’s a question I want answered, I don’t know the answer to it. It’s regarding Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton and the 2016 presidential race. I read the news everyday and I probably shouldn’t but I’ve just gotten sucked into it. When I am seeing and just seeing although I am not saying Trump is good, Trump is bad or Hillary is good, Hillary is bad, so this is not a podcast about that. It’s about something different that I noticed.

What I noticed is Trump will go and speak somewhere or say something and news articles will come pouring out about it the same day. If you compare what the actual interview or speech of whatever it is that Trump gave and then the news articles that come out of it, they are very different. The news is spinning what he says like crazy, like unbelievably. Yes, they do the same thing for Clinton, yes they do the same thing for everybody but Trump is like a big loud guy in front of the room right now, so I am going to comment on him. I was amazed to see this and I also feel my perception of him being changed by what I read.

I feel a sense of alarm, I feel a sense of liking him or not liking him, I feel all these triggers happening inside of me and feeling’s changing as I read articles. I’ll start to believe one thing and then maybe I’ll go back and read the original transcript or speech and believe another thing but I am feeling myself swayed big time and my emotions being activated. How does this relate to your law practice and how does this relate to clients in how they perceive you? Actually it relates quite a bit. I want you to think now what is your website communicating and what are reviews saying about you and what does your online presence look and feel like?

What I encourage you to do is go online and Google yourself and see what comes up. I know no one likes to do it, it’s like stepping on the scale and seeing, “Oh no, I am 250 pounds or something like that”. It’s not fun. It’s like you want to cover your eyes but it’s important to do. But what I want you to do it from a detached point of view, if possible. Look at it, evaluate yourself and think how am I actually coming across? Am I coming across in the way I wanted to, as prestigious and respectable? Would clients want to click on my website and find out more about me? Do I have good reviews? Do I have bad reviews? Do I have no reviews? Do I have problems? Is there a Red Bluff report, for instance, online?

What’s going on with your online presence? Go to your website and look there, look through the homepage and other pages, the about you page and all that. What kind of perception are you giving? Are you giving a prestigious and elevated status one or does your website kind of look like junk or not updated lately? What are the big and the little things that are going on with your online presence that you don’t like or that you feel maybe giving you an unfair perception because even though it is a media that you control somewhat unlike the regular big media. It still will work people’s perception of you and sway their opinion. The specific guidelines on this are coming and I actually have talked about them in other podcast.

This is more of a generic take a look kind of thing. In addition to you taking a look, I want you to have other people that are not your family, that are not your staff that are not going to feel pressured to give you the happy answer that you want. I can do this for you, or any SEO company. But have someone that truly is a third party, maybe even someone that you know but you’re not really buddies with around the courthouse.

Ask people that you know and respect that won’t feel compelled to give you just a blow smoke up yours or you know what and see what they think, see what they feel, ask for their honest opinion. You may be surprised. Hopefully, you’re happily surprised but you may be surprised in a bad way. I think if you do this, and I need to do the same obviously, I do it periodically, you may be surprised at what you find. I hope this helps.

If you do need help in doing this for your website and your online presence and improving it based on what you see, email me Richard.Jacobs@speakeasymarketinginc.com, call 888-225-8594. Remember, please subscribe to the podcast and write a review because that helps us getting information out there more consistently to attorneys like you. Thank you!

 

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