If you’ve been a regular reader here, then you know the heart of my law firm marketing is Internet marketing. Incredibly, I still occasionally get push-back from some attorneys who are doing just fine with no Internet marketing whatsoever, and can’t imagine why I go down that road. I know one attorney in particular who is very involved with the Loyal Order of the Water Buffalo (I don’t want to call him out by citing to his real organization, so I’ll use Fred and Barney’s). He relies entirely on work he gets from that group and referrals, and has no need for Internet marketing.
That’s great! The best form of law firm marketing is the one that works for you. But I can’t help others by touting the virtues of joining the Loyal Order of the Water Buffalo; first because I have no experience with that form of marketing, and second because if every attorney joined the Water Buffalo, soon it wouldn’t be a very good place for referrals.
The one form of law firm marketing that I can successfully apply to any law firm is Internet marketing. Bringing us to today’s example.
One of my very narrow niche websites had an especially good month and brought in four cases this month. Typically it brings in only two cases per month. (It may actually bring in more, but I really stink with my tracking, so I am only referring to those cases where the client specifically told me they found me through that site.)
“Just two to four cases per month? That doesn’t sound like a very successful site,” you may be saying. Well, actually, that’s why I’m discussing this particular site. According to the WordPress Analytics, some of my sites get over 10,000 visitors per week, but this site illustrates that you don’t need a lot of traffic to a site to generate clients.
Let’s have a little fun with numbers. This niche site came about because I noticed I would receive occasional calls about a certain motion that clients needed. (I was going to use the actual site and motion as an example, but as you’ll see in a minute, stealing my specific idea might be too tempting for some, so I’ll just discuss the motion in general terms.) The calls usually came from clients who had filed their own action, and had run into the need for this motion. Faced with losing the action, they decide it’s time to bring in an attorney for the limited purpose of bringing this motion.
These motions are a pretty big deal and generate some good fees, so I thought if I actually put up a niche site devoted just to this specific motion, it might generate more calls and more business. I created the site, which costs me $5 per month to host, and sure enough it went straight to number one on Yahoo and Bing because the search term is a very narrow niche. Google can be a harsh mistress, so it doesn’t rank as well there, but between the three search engines I now get the aforesaid two to four calls per month. The conversion rate from caller to client is close to 100% because the callers are in immediate need of the motion, I take the time to talk to them, and I have a great deal of success with these motions. (Another major benefit of niche sites is that it gives you added credibility, because your site is focused on that one topic.) The 100% conversion rate is a huge added bonus because I’m not having to field 50 calls to find one case I want, like some of my other practice areas.
With the client interview, research and preparation of the motion, review of the opposition, research and preparation of the reply, traveling to and arguing the motion, and preparation of the notice of ruling, the process takes a total of 14 hours; sometime a little more, sometimes a little less. The average cost for the motion at my current hourly rate is about $7,000. Averaging two of these motions per month brings in $14,000 per month, adding $168,000 per year to the firm’s bottom line.
Well over $150,000 from a static website I put up once and haven’t looked at since. Do I mind paying $5 per month for a site that brings in $14,000? Actually, it annoys the hell out of me because it is one of my early GoDaddy sites, where I am paying $5 per month per site. Later I realized that I could host an unlimited number of sites on HostGator or Bluehost for about the same $5 per month. But I guess I can live with spending $60 per year to make $168,000.
To keep the Feds happy, let me state the obvious. Your mileage may differ. My point here is not to say that every site you put up is going to add $100,000 to the bottom line. This is a very specific set of circumstances that you may not be able to duplicate because of your practice area, failure to gain traction on the search engines, or whatever. The point rather is that with very little effort or cost, niche sites have the potential to add greatly to the bottom line. They are a great adjunct to the other, far more time intensive blogs you should be publishing.
This is the power of niches. You dominate on the search results because they are based on a narrow practice area, and even if they only bring in a few cases a year, that can add up to some real money. Take your practice area, break it down, and then break it down some more until you find a good niche of your own.
There are added benefits of having your own law firm and marketing it with content marketing. One of them is that you can help more people than you could ever help one-on-one. Next, it’s time to get warm and fuzzy about your contribution to humanity.
If you came to YourOwnLawFirm.com through this article, and want to get the full benefit of the site, then please click on the START HERE button to begin at the beginning. I’ll show you step-by-step how to launch your first niche site. If you already have a website where you are utilizing content marketing (or want to try something different), then here are some more articles on how to market your law firm.