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Tag: Google Ads

  • How Long Does Google Ads Take to be Profitable?

    How Long Does Google Ads Take to be Profitable?

    Ambitious, growth-minded law firm owners are always looking for ways to scale their firm – fast. There are many marketing tactics that work over an extended amount of time, but if you are looking to scale quickly then you have probably thought about advertising with Google Ads.

    With pay-per-click you can reach people who are specifically looking for the service you are offering, right at the moment they are thinking about it. It’s like a faucet you can turn on and off at will.

    This is an old concept in terms of the internet, but it pays to remember that pay-per-click is one of the few ways you can do this. Google Ads is like the old Yellow Pages books, but far more sophisticated!

    However, this power comes at a cost. You pay for every click, so you want to know how long it takes for Google Ads to work. You want to make sure you get a positive return on your investment as soon as possible.

    How Long Does It Take for Google Ads to Work?

    There is no set period as to how long it will take for PPC to work for you. Success can be instantaneous if you know what you are doing from the start- that’s the wonderful thing about Google Ads.  But generally, you should plan to give Google Ads three months to run smoothly.

    There are several factors that can make Google Ads take longer to work or shorten the runway to profitability.

    Having a higher budget can shorten your runway to profitability, and vice versa. A higher budget means you are going to get more clicks and leads faster. Then you can see which keywords are leading to conversions. With lower budgets, it takes longer to collect this data.

    The amount of expertise and legal PPC industry experience of the person managing your account plays a huge factor. They can leverage their experience to avoid mistakes and implement best practices up front instead of learning on the fly.

    The amount of competition in your practice area and geographic area plays a key factor, as higher competition leads to higher costs per click.

    Your sales closing rate plays a huge factor. You must make sure the phones are getting answered, your leads are getting followed up on quickly, and that you can close a good percentage of qualified leads. Obviously, the higher percentage of qualified leads you can sign, the quicker it will work.

    The average value of a sale plays a huge factor. I could go on and on, but the point is, generally we want to give an account 3 months of runway to get dialed in. However, there are many factors that can speed up or slow down that process.

    How Long Will It Take for Your Law Firm?

    Good question! No one can promise you specific results, as there are many factors that are out of a PPC manager’s control. But it is possible to look at your business and come up with some specific revenue scenarios based on things like your competition, your average case value, etc. If you would like a free, no risk market analysis customized for your law firm, contact us today! We will review your specific situation and let you know what you can expect from Google Ads.

  • Eight Landing Page Tips for Google Ads

    Eight Landing Page Tips for Google Ads

    I was recently honored to be interviewed by John Hinson of Spotlight Branding. I shared eight tips for how to create successful landing pages so you can make more profit from Google Ads. My synopsis is below but watch the video if you have half an hour!

    1. Quality Score (Landing Page Experience)

    You need to monitor and optimize your Quality Score! Landing page experience is one of three factors in determining Quality Score. Having a higher Quality Score gets you lower costs per click, which lowers your cost per lead and increases your profits!

    2. Cater Your Landing Page to the Type of User You are Targeting with Ads

    With legal PPC, we are targeting our ads to people who need help now. Not to people who are in the information seeking phase. Your website, with all its articles and information, should be written in such a way that caters to people who are not yet ready to hire a lawyer but are in the information seeking phase (as well as people who are ready to buy). With PPC we can be a bit more direct because we are specifically targeting people who use search terms with commercial intent, such as “lawyers near me” or “best lawyer in Albuquerque.”

    What are some of the best Bugs Bunny quotes? - Quora

    3. Make Multiple, Hyper Specific Landing Pages

    Break up your keywords into different ad groups and build multiple landing page versions to be hyper specific to the search term. For example, a Google search for “lawyers near me” signifies a different mindset than “best lawyer in Albuquerque.” If they use “lawyers near me,” we will emphasize the convenience of your location. If they use “best lawyer in [insert city here]” we will emphasize how you are the best!

    4. High Quality Headshots and Photos

    People are visual. Make a good first impression. Photos and faces build trust subconsciously. Put your best foot forward- spend money to get professional headshots and team shots! Even better would be to embed a high-quality video! Many people are intimidated by lawyers. Use photos and videos to overcome that barrier and make yourself relatable.

    5. Use Social Proof

    In the absence of personal experience, people look to third party sources as signifiers of trust. Use everything you can to signify that you can be trusted (to someone who does not know you or your yet). This includes those badges from companies like Avvo and Expertise, as well as testimonials that are relevant to the specific search and landing page.

    And the most important thing- generate reviews! Have an outreach process for generating reviews from happy clients, and deal with bad reviews in a professional and polite way. And obviously, make sure the entire process, from initial phone call to post engagement, is an outstanding experience for the client. This will automatically generate lots of good reviews for your firm.

    6. Prominent Calls to Action

    Make sure the phone number and contact form are prominently displayed. These are the actions we are optimizing for, so remove any friction.

    7. Page Load Speed

    Make sure your page is fast loading. Slow loading pages are one of the major causes of high bounce rates. It doesn’t have to get a perfect score on those page speed tools like Google Insights, but the page should use best practices and be free of bloat. This is not often a major problem, but when it is a problem, it needs to be fixed before spending any more money on ads that lead to that page.

    Also, use a tool to automatically monitor 404’s. You don’t want to spend money on ads that take users to a non-working page. We use a script that automatically pauses ads when there is a 404. Google Ads automatically does this, but it sometimes takes many days and many dollars before it kicks in. Don’t rely on Google Ads to monitor for pages that are down.

    8. Track All Conversions

    Track all phone calls and form fills. Any way that someone can contact you should be tracked. And make sure your landing pages and your main website are integrated so that someone who lands on your landing page and later contacts you from the main website is properly tracked and the first touchpoint gets proper credit.

    Here’s an example of a typical customer journey:

    1. Jane searches Google for “divorce lawyers near me.”
    2. Jane clicks multiple ads to compare divorce lawyers near her.
    3. Jane reviews your landing page and likes what she sees. She ads you to her list of potential attorneys.
    4. Jane searches Google using brand terms. She searches for you and lands on your website via a branded, organic search.
    5. Jane calls you using the phone number on your main website.

    In this case, the original ad played a major part in Jane’s customer journey. You want to make sure your reports reflect this so you can make smart decisions when it comes to your marketing strategy. We use call tracking which dynamically replaces the phone number on the website so we can see that Jane originally clicked an ad using the keyword “divorce lawyers near me.”

    The bottom line is, make sure your conversion tracking is on point! Use data to make decisions.

    Conclusion

    It was an honor to be interviewed by Spotlight. I can personally vouch for the quality of their work, and I love collaborating with them. And did I mention that Baltzer Marketing is Spotlight Branding’s preferred partner for Google Ads?

    So if you need help getting a great website and a great content strategy, and you like working with people of integrity, get in touch with Spotlight Branding. And if you are interested in learning more about Google Ads, contact us. We can give you an estimate of how much profit you stand to make with Google Ads.

    And know that if you work with both of us, you are getting two puzzle pieces that work well together.

  • PPC Quarterly Roundup | Q3 2021

    PPC Quarterly Roundup | Q3 2021

    We have reached the end of Q3 2021, so it is time to share our top 10 important updates and announcements for the PPC platforms Google, Microsoft, and Facebook. 

    Google Ads

    1 – Sunset of ETAs – Starting June 2022, advertisers will no longer be able to create expanded text ads (ETAs). Responsive search ads (RSAs) will be the only available option.

    2 – Improvements to Search Terms Report – Advertisers can now view data for queries with a “substantial” number of impressions but no clicks in the search terms report. Data prior to September 2020 will be removed after February 2022.

     

    3 – Increase Predictability Keyword Matching – The update gives more control over which keyword is prioritized to a search when there is more than one keyword eligible. Relevance of the keyword is now used in addition to Ad Rank when determining which keyword is selected.

    4 – New Three Strikes System – Warnings and strikes will now be issued for repeat ad policy violations for Enabling Dishonest Behavior, Unapproved Substances, and Dangerous Products or Services. Given Google’s history of invalid ad disapprovals, we hope they have vastly improved their ad review system.

    5 – New Budget Report – There is a new budget report to help advertisers better visualize daily spend, monthly spend limits, and a monthly spend forecast. This should help advertisers gauge how much they are likely to spend by the end of the month.

    Microsoft Ads

    6 – Add Business Attributes – Businesses can now add business attributes to their advertisements to highlight how they “stand out” from their competition. Some attributes that can be added are “non-profit”, “small business”, “wheelchair accessible”, and “hearing assistance”. The four categories of attributes are inclusion, environmental, community/social responsibility, and accessibility.

     

    7 – New Automated Extensions – Advertisers can opt-in to the new automated extensions: dynamic location, dynamic multimedia, and syndication decorations. Locations will show a link with all nearby locations that goes to a map with your location marked.

     

    8 – New Insertions for RSAs and Action Extensions – You can now add searcher location into RSAs. This is similar to dynamic keyword insertion and gives the searcher a more relevant ad. You can choose from city, state, or country level. Microsoft has also added additional calls-to-action to choose from for action extensions.

    Facebook Ads

    9 – Update to Pre-campaign estimates – Potential Reach and Interests will now have ranges rather than specific numbers to help advertisers better understand the potential number of people that may see their advertisement before launching a campaign. Potential Reach will now be called Estimated Audience Size.

     

    10 – How Advertisers Reach Young People – Facebook wants to provide younger members a more safe and private experience, so they are changing how advertisers reach anyone under 18 with ads. Targeting will be restricted to only age, gender, and location if the user is under 18. The targeting options based on interests and activity on other apps & websites will not be available. 

     

  • Google Improves Search Terms Report, Maintains Privacy

    Google Improves Search Terms Report, Maintains Privacy

    Google recently announced an improvement to the search terms report in Google Ads. Last year, Google removed much of the data from the search terms report in the name of “consumer privacy.” This limited the ability of PPC managers to reduce wasted spend by setting irrelevant search queries as negative keywords.

    Google has now given us back some of that data while still ostensibly maintaining user privacy. Advertisers will now be able to view data for queries with a “substantial” number of impressions but no clicks. (Sidenote – isn’t it interesting that a data driven tech company like Google uses vague terms like “substantial” rather than specific numbers? It’s almost like they don’t want you to know too much. 🤔)

    With this announcement, you will now be able to see more queries going back to February 2021. Googles’ ads liaison Ginny Marvin indicated that “advertisers will now see on average 6.5x more queries with their reports”.

    Why it Matters

    The search terms report previously only showed search queries that resulted in a click. This prevented advertisers from being able to identify and block irrelevant search queries before they resulted in a paid click.

    For example, your account may have a phrase match keyword “divorce lawyer”. If someone Googled “become a divorce lawyer”, your ad could appear. If the searcher did not click on the ad, it would not show in your search terms report. Only after paying for the click would you be able to identify and block it. And sometimes, with the last update, you might not even be able to see a search term if they clicked an ad!

    With this update, you will be able to see this type of search term provided it has significant search volume. Last year, Google Ads updated the search term report to only include search terms with “significant” volume. Today’s announcement does not change that. Search terms with low volume may not show up regardless of whether the ad was clicked or not. 

    Advertisers now have access to more details about what search terms an ad appeared for but did not result in a click. This will help PPC managers set irrelevant search terms as negatives before they result in wasted spend. 

    Historical Data & Privacy

    The changes made last year were to “ensure user anonymity” for all searches. This change does not impact Google’s commitment to maintaining privacy. In fact, there will be on-going changes across Google over the next few months. 

    This includes how they handle historical data. Search query data prior September 2020 will be removed after February 2022, if it does not meet their new privacy thresholds. That gives you some runway to export your data if you want to be able to reference it in the future.

    Help is on the Way

    In the next few months, we will be getting additional resources to understand search query themes. These resources will be on the Insights page which is currently in beta.

    Insights will allow advertisers to identify trends and changes to search interests. You will be able to see changes to clicks, impressions, and cost over time. It will also include data regarding trends for search terms & keywords, and even help to identify new search terms. 

    The search trends within Insights will contain search query data that did not appear on the search query report. In theory, this should help advertisers get a better understanding of search traffic, even if we don’t see the search term.  

    Our Insights

    This is a step back in the right direction to grant advertisers more visibility to search term data. It shows that Google actually listens to feedback and puts it into action while still maintaining their commitment to privacy. 

    We are eager to learn more about the additional resources for the Insights page and how it can help us tailor campaigns to current search trends. We hope that Google continues to listen to feedback from advertisers and continues to provide more insightful data into search traffic and trends.

  • Google is Ending Expanded Text Ads in June 2022

    Google is Ending Expanded Text Ads in June 2022

    Google announced that starting June 2022, responsive search ads (RSAs) will be the only ad type that can be created or edited in Search campaigns. That means you will no longer be able to create expanded text ads (ETAs) after that time. You can read the full announcement here.

    While this is a big announcement, it hardly comes as a surprise. Google has made it increasingly difficult to create ETAs both with new campaigns and within an existing ad group. Within hours of the announcement, the #PPCchat community on Twitter was abuzz.

    This is just another move by Google Ads that hinders advertisers’ ability to exercise control over campaigns. Over the last few years, we have seen the elimination of broad match modifiers, a reduction of intelligence in the search terms report, expansion of close variants, and the planned removal of third-party cookies. All these changes make it increasingly difficult for advertisers to create and run successful PPC campaigns.

    In Google’s announcement, they indicate RSAs are a great example of how automation is done. They stress that automation is key to keeping pace with new search queries and shifts in consumer trends. With RSAs, they use machine learning to show ads they believe are the most relevant out of up to fifteen headlines and four descriptions.

    I must respectfully disagree that they are more relevant. In our accounts, RSAs under-perform ETAs a majority of the time.

    Google wants you to “include more keywords in your headlines” and then delivers ads that have similar headlines in both positions one and two. While you can pin positions for both headlines and descriptions, Google will then rate the ad strength average or poor. A poor ad strength can result in a not eligible or limited ad delivery status, which means your ad is not being shown.

    In the images below, you can see their suggestions for improving ad strength when an ad is ranked Poor or Average.

    Picture of Google Ads Poor Ad Strength Improvement Suggestions

    Picture of Google Average Ad Strength Improvement Suggestions

    By diversifying your headlines, they sometimes give an RSA a low “ad strength.” When you include more keywords, they deliver ads that do not make sense.

    When you pin headlines and descriptions so your ads make sense, they give you low ad strength. You can see how this could become a circular problem. And now, this will be the only ad type. #smdh

    Reactions from the PPC Community

    Reactions from the #PPCchat Twitter community came quickly. They ranged from resigned, to angry, to grateful (for the advanced notice), and to pragmatic (brainstorming workarounds).

    Below, you can see a few of the reactions on Twitter.

    Conclusion

    Overall, PPC professionals are an optimistic bunch, and they have grown used to these types of changes from Google. There are a bunch of brilliant people who are quick to offer helpful suggestions for how to make it work. At Baltzer Marketing, we will take this announcement and learn how we can best use it to help clients continue to succeed with PPC.

    Along with many others, we hope we will retain the ability to pin headlines and descriptions. We may use Eben Lowy’s suggestion to create three headlines and two descriptions and then pin them into the appropriate positions. This will enable us to continue A/B testing to find the top performing headlines and descriptions within an ad group (which we then add to the RSA in the same ad group.)

    Another idea I thought of was to proactively create several ETAs for ad testing prior to June 30, 2022 and pause them until we are ready to A/B test them. One thing is for sure; the PPC industry will adapt to Google’s changes. However infuriating they may seem.

  • Does PPC Work for Law Firms? Yes (If Done Correctly)

    Does PPC Work for Law Firms? Yes (If Done Correctly)

    Whether you are brand new to PPC marketing or currently running ad campaigns, it’s important to know what you are investing your money into is creating a positive return on investment. We will discuss everything you need to know about PPC, how it differs from SEO, why both can work for law firms, and how a PPC agency could help. 

    What is PPC?

    We need to start by explaining what PPC is. PPC stands for pay-per-click and is a form of internet marketing. The most popular form of PPC is Google Ads (formerly known as AdWords). With Google Ads, you do not pay for an ad unless a user clicks on it

    When someone searches for a keyword such as “divorce lawyer near me”, multiple text ads will show up. The order in which the ads show on the page is determined by ad rank. There are a lot of factors that go into ad rank, but ultimately, it’s important for an ad to show up on the first page above the organic results. 

    With the ad preview below, you can see that this ad appears above the organic search results and Google Maps. Organic search results are search results that are not paid for. They can, however, be improved by search engine optimization (SEO).

    Ad Preview for search "divorce lawyer near me"

    It Does Not Need to Be an Either-Or with PPC and SEO

    A lot of law firms look at PPC and SEO as an either-or decision. It doesn’t need to be that way. They are two different online marketing techniques with different results and timing. 

    The main difference between PPC and SEO is that PPC is paid advertising while SEO impacts organic search results. They both are used to reach potential clients when they search for a term relevant to your law firm. A law firm doesn’t pay when someone clicks an organic listing. They do pay for any SEO services that resulted in the organic listing showing up on page one. 

    PPC is considered a faster way to generate high-quality leads because you can start showing up at the top of the page almost immediately. SEO can take several months to a couple of years to reflect major changes in organic results. Therefore, a marketing strategy should not be an either-or between PPC and SEO. A law firm needs to take a holistic approach to their overall marketing strategy and determine how to best combine their PPC and SEO efforts. 

    Why PPC Works for Law Firms

    Increasingly more people are going online to find a law firm to help them with their legal matters. They are less likely to ask family & friends for referrals. This is especially true with more private legal matters such as divorce and child custody. 

    Most people searching for their first lawyer will not know about sites like Avvo or Super Lawyers. That means, they will go to Google or another search engine to find the type of lawyer they need. According to Google Trends, in the last five years the search term “lawyer near me” has had about a 400% increase in interest and the search term “attorney near me” has had about a 690% increase in interest. 

    People using terms like “lawyer” and “attorney” in their search query are usually at the “bottom of the funnel.” That means they are beyond the information gathering and decision stage and are ready to hire a lawyer. The only question is, who to hire? It is your job to show up so you can be in the mix and put your best foot forward, so you stand out from your competitors.

    Oftentimes, the organic search results display websites to find a law firm rather than for a specific law firm. As you can see in the image below, a preview of search results for “custody lawyer near me” shows results for FindLaw, Legal Match, and Yelp. This means someone searching for a child custody lawyer would have to sort through multiple results before finding a law firm. 

    Organic results for search term "custody lawyer near me"

    By running PPC, a law firm can have their ad listed at the top of the search results. This gets their name and information prominently displayed exactly when someone needs it. Even if they are not ready to hire a lawyer at that moment, they are still exposed to your firm’s name and are more likely to remember it when they are ready to hire. 

    PPC for Lawyers – Keys to Success

    Legal PPC can be highly competitive and expensive. If a law firm does not properly set up ad campaigns with the appropriate settings and target audience, it will quickly result in wasted money with no new clients in return. 

    There are many critical components of running a successful PPC campaign. Some of the most critical elements are:

    • Keywords
    • Match types
    • Demographic targeting
    • Geographic targeting
    • Ad copy
    • Bidding
    • Budget management
    • Conversion tracking
    • Landing pages & Conversion rate optimization (CRO)

    For example, if a law firm does not have the correct match type keyword or are unfamiliar with Google’s close variants, it could quickly waste thousands of dollars. Close variants are terms that Google has determined are similar enough to have the same meaning. For example, the terms “lawyer” and “attorney” are considered close variants; however, so are “family court lawyer” and “family court”. While the terms lawyer and attorney are used interchangeably, the terms family court lawyer and family court have significantly different meanings. People searching for “family court” are often looking to call the courthouse. If your ad shows at the top of the page with a big “Click to call” button, you will be paying to have people call you to get the number for the courthouse. Fun!

    If geographic targeting is not optimized, a law firm could be paying for clicks from users who live outside of their targeted area. If demographics are not considered, a law firm that only represents women will show ads to men (Google Ads currently allows gender, age, and household income targeting).

    A good PPC program will have a strong process for reviewing, maintaining, and improving campaigns. If all of this is in place, a law firm will exponentially increase their chances of PPC success. 

    Your Time Is Valuable. Having an Agency Can Help

    Do you find yourself thinking, “It seems like a lot goes into running and managing a successful PPC campaign, why even try”? The truth is it can be overwhelming to manage a PPC account on your own. That’s why it is important to take the time to think about the ultimate goal for your law firm now and in the future and carefully plan how you want to execute your goals. 

    Your time is valuable. Spending time managing PPC is not the type of thing successful attorneys spend their time doing. By working with the right agency, you get the benefits of working with an expert. 

    When executed properly, PPC works for law firms. All it takes is a little planning and working with the experts to make sure everything is set up correctly and running smoothly. 

  • What the FLoC? The End of Google Remarketing

    What the FLoC? The End of Google Remarketing

    Last year, Google announced its intent to remove support for third-party cookies. Those are the cookies that allow ads to “follow you around” on the internet, like when you look at a pair of shoes and you start seeing ads for those shoes everywhere. Google is being pressured by companies like Apple, who already block third party cookies in their Safari browser, as well as by ongoing legislation being developed worldwide that is focused on privacy.

    Historically, remarketing is one of the least expensive and high ROI tactics in the playbook. Many nervous marketers have been wondering what Google is going to replace it with. Is there going to be some workaround that allows advertisers to do what remarketing does without the use of third-party cookies?

    The answer is not really. In a recent blog post, Google explicitly stated that once third-party cookies are phased out, they will not build alternate solutions that track individuals as they browse across the web. So, what’s next?

    What the FLoC?

    Instead of using individual identifiers to serve custom ads based on browsing history, Google will now place people into large groups based on browsing history. This is called the “FLoC API.” FLoC is a way to help advertisers perform behavioral targeting without tracking individuals with third party cookies. So, if you visit Zappos.com and look at a pair of brown leather shoes, you may be placed into a group of people who visited Zappos.com, or a group of people that have recently looked at leather shoes. The key distinction is that there will be enough people in each group so that they are not individually identifiable.

     What This Means for Lawyers

    This is probably going to be a net positive for most lawyers. At worst it’s a nothing burger. Most areas of the law are already restricted from using remarketing due to rules against using personalized advertising to target personal hardships (divorce, criminal, personal injury, etc.) and marginalized groups (i.e. immigration).

    Google already offers audience targeting, so I’m not sure how different FLoC is from the mysterious black box audiences they offer now. However, any improvements in audience targeting should be beneficial to lawyers.

    —

    Interested in talking to us about PPC? Contact us today!

  • Why Hire a PPC Agency

    Why Hire a PPC Agency

    5 REASONS YOU SHOULD HIRE A PPC AGENCY

    #1 – Confusing PPC Terminology

    Do you know what these common PPC terms mean: Impressions, CTR, CPC, CPA, search impression share, quality scores? Depending on your experience with PPC, you likely know a few. Learning the terminology is just the beginning. You need to understand how changes you make can impact each of these metrics. Minor changes can have huge impacts which ultimately affect how much you pay per click. Our agency takes the guesswork out of the terminology and provides new clients with a terminology cheat sheet and include a key within our reports.

    #2 – Complicated Keyword Research

    You know what services you provide to your clients, so finding the right keywords isn’t that complicated, right? It’s not quite that simple. With PPC, there are different match types and various other factors to consider when choosing the right keywords. Pick the wrong match type and your client may not see your ad. Have too many keywords in an ad group and your quality scores may suffer. We continuously monitor your account to make sure the keywords are generating leads and remove those that are not. We regularly perform keyword research to expand keywords and remove irrelevant search queries.

    #3 – Complex Campaign Set-up

    Setting up a brand-new campaign can be complicated. You know the services you want to advertise, who you want to advertise to, and where you want your ads to show.  You still need to know what bidding strategy to use, how to track conversions (aka leads), ad rotations, and if you should use dynamic search ads. All we need to know is what services to advertise, who your ideal client is, and how much you want to spend. We take care of the rest and handle all aspects of building a new campaign, so you have nothing to worry about.

    #4 – Troubleshooting Low Conversion Rates

    You have a campaign set up and ads are running, but you are not seeing conversions (aka leads) and you do not know why. The first thing to consider is if you have conversion tracking set up properly. Tracking conversions is complex and takes technical expertise to make sure you are capturing the correct data. After that, you would want to check click-through-rates, landing page experience, and ad relevance. You can identify potential problems, but you would need to know what do to fix it. Sure, you could search online for how to improve CTR or landing page experience, but you likely do not have time for that. Our PPC agency strives for high conversion rates, so that you get more leads. We work with you and your web developers to ensure that once someone clicks on your ad, they are more likely to become a lead when they get to your website.

    #5 – Better Use of Your Time

    And last but not least, your time is better spent on something else. Think about how much time your law firm spends reviewing and optimizing campaigns. Now think about what else you could do with that time to grow your business. Your business is your bread and butter. Wouldn’t you rather spend time deepening client relationships, networking, and creating new blog & video content? Our PPC Agency gives you the freedom to not worry about generating new leads and focus on what matters to you most.

    STILL NOT SURE YOU NEED A PPC AGENCY?

    Complete the quiz below and we will be in touch with your results.

     

  • New Google Ads Feature for Lawyers – Lead Forms

    New Google Ads Feature for Lawyers – Lead Forms

    Google is rolling out a new ad extension to help generate leads directly from ads. It’s called “Lead Forms,” and it’s an awesome feature that lawyers should implement ASAP!

    The extension adds a call to action button to your ad, which you can customize.Google Lead Extension

     

    When the user clicks the extension, they are taken to a lead form which you can customize with your business name, a 30 character headline, and a 200 character description. A background image is also required. This is essentially a Google hosted landing page.

    Google Lead Form Extension

    Once the user fills out the form, they are taken to a “Thank You” page and it is counted as a conversion.

    In order to receive the leads you either have to download them manually in the Google Ads interface, or you can have them delivered to your CRM via webhook. You could also use a service like Zapier to have them delivered via email, using Zapier’s webhook integration.

    Lead form extensions are currently in beta and are not yet available to all advertisers. However, we are seeing them in most of our accounts, and they should be rolling out to everyone soon.

  • Why PPC Can be Perfect for Lawyers

    Why PPC Can be Perfect for Lawyers

    Going beyond referrals- it’s a challenge most growing law firms face on their path to greatness. Referrals are fantastic, but they are not very scalable. There are many ways to go about scaling up your lead flow, and it can be difficult to decide how to go about it. So what’s an attorney to do?

    With so many marketing channels, it can be hard to decide what is right for your law firm. Facebook, Google Ads, SEO, radio, TV…  there is just so much to choose from. So, here’s my opinion on the best ways to use marketing to scale up your law firm.

    Make Sure Your House is in Order Before You Invite People In

    First of all, I believe the most important thing for law firms to do (as pertains to online marketing) is to get your basic SEO in order. You need to make sure your local citations are in order. Your name, address, phone number, and website URL should be consistent across the internet. You need to make sure your website is set up properly to be crawled and indexed by Google (this is known at technical SEO). These things will help ensure that you appear at the top of the search results when someone searches for your brand and will help you show up in organic search results (especially Google Maps.) These are the basics (let me know if you want me to audit your web presence for those factors). But once you’ve got your citations in order and have ensured that your website is technically sound, I believe the best way to quickly drive relevant leads for your law firm is through PPC.

    PPC & The “Zero Moment of Truth”

    The primary reason I decided to focus on PPC for law firms is that I’ve always known that PPC and law firms go together like peanut butter and jelly! As an example, when someone searches for “personal injury lawyers near me,” they are clearly looking for a personal injury lawyer. There is no better indicator of commercial intent than that. With Facebook, you can target things such as demographics, psychographics, online behaviors, heck, maybe even people who are (supposedly) in the market for the service you provide. But at the end of the day, you are interrupting them with an ad. They are on Facebook to browse their timelines, look at cute puppies, post baby pictures, etc. Even if they are in the market for the legal services you offer, they are most likely not in that mindset at that precise moment. Google AdWords revolutionized the advertising industry by giving you the ability to reach people looking for exactly what you offer at the exact moment that they are in the buying mindset. It’s called the “zero moment of truth.” “Zero moment of truth” is a term that was coined by Google back in the stone ages (like 2011 or so), but it remains as true now as ever. When people need a product or service, they go on the internet to conduct research. PPC enables you to reach those people during their research. It’s how Google got rich.

    Facebook can be amazing for some businesses. For example, let’s say you own a gym. It makes a lot of sense to use Facebook to advertise a gym. Fitness and health are things we are thinking about all of the time- it’s not a one time life event. You can serve me with multiple ads offering a free trial at your gym and I may just take you up on that. But what if you served me with ads for divorce lawyers? Unless I happen to be in a situation where I need a divorce lawyer, this ad is going to be completely irrelevant to me. It may even trigger anger if I am going through relationship problems and believe that Facebook is serving me these ads because they are “spying” on me. But if I am Googling “divorce lawyers near me,” I’m not going to get annoyed by an ad for divorce lawyers. As my search suggests, I am clearly looking for divorce lawyers and Google is helping me solve my problem.

    Now, it’s not quite as simple as that. Cost per click in the legal industry is high for a reason – it works! PPC ads are an auction, and when there are more people bidding the price goes up. You need to make sure that your landing page is optimized to capture the lead once you’ve paid for the click. You need to make sure that your copy is tailored to appeal to your target market. You need to use negative keywords to avoid paying for clicks from people who can’t afford you who are searching for things like “pro bono” or “cheap lawyers.” You can use things like income targeting. Yes, there are many factors that go into running a successful PPC campaign, but my point is, there is not another advertising channel I know of that gets you in front of your potential customers at the exact moment they are ready to receive your message like PPC does. SEO can work for this, but it is extremely difficult to rank ahead of the Findlaw’s and Justia’s of the world for generic commercial queries like “divorce lawyer.”

    By no means am I saying that marketing channels such as Facebook can’t work for lawyers. It absolutely can! However, there is not a better, more scalable advertising channel than PPC for law firms. It is not magic, and it does not relieve one of the need to produce great content and build an audience. However, if you have a marketing budget and are looking for rocket fuel to fill your funnel with potential clients, there is no better solution than paid search.