Integrity Marketing

Why We Love to Automate

Do you remember the paperless office? First coined in the 1970s, the paperless office was the future, when all of our information would be in personal desktop computers. There would be no need for filing cabinets and every office would be neat and tidy.

We all know that offices in general - and law offices in particular - are never going completely paperless. 

Many other parts of the “office of the future” are here, now, and available. Want to know the biggest difference between the automated office and a non-automated office?

The automated office has more time available to do the tasks that cannot be automated.

Consider the task of gathering the leads that come to your office through your website.

If you have a high performance website, your dedicated email in-box is loaded with information:  email addresses, names, etc.

If you have an automated CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system in place, your CRM is loaded with actionable information. Lead information is automatically brought into the CRM, where staff can send out emails, make phone calls or send personalized letters that bring in appointments.

When someone calls the office to schedule an appointment, you already have information about them, accessible at a few keystrokes.

Sounds great, doesn’t it?

Here’s why we encourage you to consider automating this process:

Maybe your office does run like clockwork.  But when a key staff person leaves, does that system keep ticking away?  Or does it need to be rewound?

 Let’s face it - data entry is not exactly every staffer’s favorite task.  If there are mistakes made when they are manually entering data into a computer, those errors have a bad habit of staying put.  Documents with misspelling or basic errors make your office look unprofessional.

Or worse, no one in your office has TIME for data entry, and leads are not only not being entered, they aren’t being tracked.

Sound familiar?  Give our office a call – we can make this happen for you! 

What's Your Avatar?

If you have any video gamers in your household, you know that they love their avatars – the graphic, cartoon-like characters that are their stand-ins when they do battle in World of Warcraft or explore new worlds in Oregon Trail.

But your law firm has an avatar also – it’s your brand.

Large corporations use brands to convey a clear message:  Pepsi is the next gen cola drink, modern and contemporary, while Coca-Cola is all about an authentic embrace of old school. Apple is cooler than the PC, and no one is cooler than the man driving a Jaguar. Except maybe Matthew McConaughey, when he’s cruising in a Lincoln.

Your brand sends a clear message that requires consistent delivery at every step. If your website is wonderful but you haven’t taken the leap to responsive design, then people are going to get one message – we’re great, you want to work with us – that will be contradicted if they get to your website from their smart phone and can’t get to your phone number easily.

That same message needs to move from the screen to your office as well. What do potential clients see when they come into your waiting area?

If your coffee tables date back to the 1990s and the magazines go back even further, all the website marketing in the world comes to a full stop when they get in your door.

Your website, reception area and even your parking lot are all a reflection of your brand. Make sure that they all work together to present a consistent story:  we are great at what we do, we truly care about our clients and doing the best possible job for our clients is very important to us.

Treat everything you do as an extension of your brand and your prospects will get the message!

 

How Long Does It Take for SEO to Start Working?

The first thing you need to know: SEO (Search Engine Optimization) has changed enormously (Read last week’s blog post, “Why Redesign Kyle’s Site When It’s Still Working.”).

For example, keywords are no longer the Holy Grail that drives visitors to your website. Google’s exponential rate of change has made the keyword almost antiquated. Do we still use keywords when we create content for your website and blogs? Yes, but keywords are part of the strategy and not the leading edge.

Today’s success in being found online has a lot to do with natural language, searches by humans using regular human language. People are accustomed to asking apps like Siri and Google Now to speak their searches – “I need an estate planning attorney who knows about trusts” versus typing in the phrase “estate planning attorneys Cincinnati.” Google loves these questions, because they are more specific and results are generally faster.

If Siri responds by telling you that there are twelve pizzerias near your current location, we feel your frustration; no one knows when that will start working better.

But here’s what really matters:  what leads and appointments are being generated by your website?

If your website is number one in Google search, but your appointment book is empty (and we’ve seen this), then all the SEO success in the world isn’t getting the job done.

What really matters is not on the search page, it’s in your appointment book.

That’s why we work closely with clients on more than just SEO.  Your website needs to perform to achieve specific goals. When potential clients get to your website, we make sure that the content – which includes language, images and videos, by the way - engages them and motivates them to pick up the phone and make an appointment. And that’s the most important metric we know!

 

Dissecting Your Website – Why is that there? Part 3: Hero

Wait, websites can have heroes? Yep, you read that right! Websites can, indeed, have heroes – just not the kind in tights and capes. Today, in part three of our “Dissecting Your Website” series, we are going to talk about website heroes – what they are, what they do, and some tips to make them as effective as possible. If you want to start the series from the top, make sure you’re caught up on part 1 and part 2 first!

Hero – What is it?

The hero section is right below - and sometimes includes - the header. Our Essential Attorneys’^TM websites feature quite a range of hero designs, proving that the options for this section are quite varied. Some have textured or brightly colored backgrounds that are easily distinguished from the header, others have large image backgrounds with no division between header and hero, and some of our newest designs feature video backgrounds. The hero section has undergone the biggest changes as web design trends come and go.

What does it do?

The hero section is really your viewers’ first big taste of your brand story. I think this is one of the most critical parts of the website to design because it really sets the tone for the rest of the site. When people visit your estate planning or elder law website, they immediately want to know who you are and what you do. The hero is a great place to get that message across, whether it is by images, text or video. Effective web designs also include a call to action in this area because it is one of the first places viewers will look. 

Best Practices

Because every firm has a different, unique brand story, the right solution for your hero section will not necessarily be the same for everyone. But this is a good thing! You want your website to be unique and stand out. On the other hand, it also means that I can’t give you an exact formula of what to include in a hero section for the most effective website.

That being said, try not to over-think the hero section. You want your brand message to be loud and clear, so don’t clutter up the hero with too many elements. A great, succinct tagline with a clear call to action is all you really need. Make sure that anything else in this section is emphasizing and leading to your call to action, not distracting viewers from it.

Next week: We are going to keep on moving down the standard web page. In part 3, we’ll be talking about effective call to action items. 

The "Social" Estate Planning Attorney

How are your social skills?  We’re not being nosy and asking about your social calendar - we’re interested in your social media programs!

Facebook, along with other social media pages, plays a strong part in online visibility.  At IMS, we build out Facebook, Twitter and Google+ pages for our Essential Solutions clients so that they can boost their marketing using the social authority that these platforms create.

Our team includes social media experts. We incorporate their knowledge with our in-depth understanding of what it takes to build an estate planning practice.  Then, we add the last piece – branding.  With these areas of expertise –social media, law firm marketing and branding – we get you started on social media.

Want content for your social media campaigns?  We’ve got that too - every week Essential Clients receive a series of meaningful blog posts that have been selected with the estate planning law practice in mind.  Once you’ve posted a blog, use the content for your social media pages too.

If your practice conducts workshops, if you speak at local organizations, or if you see news items that are relevant to your market, then you have even more content to post, tweet and update. You know your market best, and you know if they are interested in local sports teams, fishing tournaments or area charities.  Getting social will get you connected!

 

 

 

Solving Kyle's Biggest Marketing Issues

This is the fifth and final part of my tell-all series of blog posts about the website redesign project for IMS President Kyle Krull’s law firm. (You can read Part One here: How Good Websites Go Bad; Part Two here: Why Redesign Kyle’s Site When It’s Still Working?; Part Three here: Website Design and Strategic Fit and Part Four here: Kyle’s Website Secret Sauce: SEO, Call Tracking, Analytics and …)

Kyle’s old website was a solid work horse. It delivered qualified leads, established an online presence, and helped Kyle build a steady stream of referrals that allows him to practice law and enjoy life – he is not constantly scheduling, promoting and presenting workshops because he doesn’t have to. His digital marketing runs 24/7 on a set monthly budget. New leads show up on his cell phone while he is meeting with clients, on holiday, enjoying dinner out with his wife … even while he is sleeping.

But one day Kyle came to my office with a serious marketing issue.

“If I lose this card, I’m in big trouble,” he said and showed me a 4x6 index card with tiny scribbled names and notes on both sides.

As it turns out, this little card was Kyle’s financial lifeblood. All of those names and notes were his prospective new clients (aka “leads”). Everything he knew about them was scribbled on that card and losing it would mean losing a new client.

Kyle was a victim of his marketing success. He was overwhelmed with new leads and no real system for managing them. He could not remember when he had last contacted someone, and though he did have the information “somewhere,” it was not easily accessible – especially if he was not at his desk and with enough free time to search.

Kyle showed me the card and said, “Can you fix this?” (This is how most of our new ideas are born!)

He needed a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system, but not just any system. He needed a system that is

• Easy to implement and use;
• Cloud-based and accessible from a mobile device;
• Completely integrated with his Essential Solution marketing to optimize the great marketing he already had;
• Customized for his law practice; and
• Affordable.

He needed our E2 Essential Marketing CRM.

The last “secret ingredient” in Kyle’s Website Secret Sauce is integration with the E2 CRM for contact and relationship management, social media, drip marketing, and tracking.

Every contact form on his website sends information directly to his cloud-based CRM, where follow-up work flows are launched and tracked. He can log in from any device to see his pipeline and check on completed activities. He has a record of how each new prospect found him and how they interact or engage with his digital marketing; to include whether they read the blog digest, which articles they click on, when and what pages they visit on his website, if they connect with him on social media, and more. 

From the same interface, Kyle can see his marketing analytics in a way that makes sense to him. Even more importantly he can now see who is visiting his site, what content they are reading, and when and how they arrived at his website. In other words, where Google Analytics shows trends, the E2 CRM shows specifics. This new information not only helps Kyle close more business, but helps us make laser-guided refinements to his marketing system.

So now you probably think we really are finally done with this project, right? I mean, Kyle has everything – a strategic, contemporary website that is optimized across all devices, gives visitors a clear path to conversion, sophisticated tracking to monitor performance, and even a CRM to nurture the relationships that convert prospects into new clients.

But of course, we are not done. We are never done.

Kyle’s system is running now, generating new business … and new information.

We will continue to monitor and analyze that new information, along with all of the data we gather about online legal marketing, in search of trends, or blips, or glitches. We will look for anything that tells us it’s time to make the next small change, develop the next new service or abandon an old one, or completely re-think how we market estate and elder law attorneys.

One more thing – you might think we went a little over-the-top on this project because it was for Kyle Krull, our company president. Not true. We do this work, at this level, every. single. day. To the extent that clients will let down their guard, open up with us and let us become true partners in their success – we take up the challenge. And we love it. If your marketing firm isn’t delivering these types of great ideas, insights and results, give us a call. The difference is truly Essential!

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Kyle's Website Secret Sauce: SEO, Call Tracking, Analytics and ...

Kyle’s Website Secret Sauce: SEO, Call Tracking, Analytics and …

This is Part Four of my tell-all series of blog posts about the website redesign project for IMS President Kyle Krull’s law firm. (You can read Part One here: How Good Websites Go Bad; Part Two here: Why Redesign Kyle’s Site When It’s Still Working?; and Part Three here: Website Design and Strategic Fit.)

In Part Three, we finally got Kyle’s approval on a beautiful, contemporary website design with perfect strategic fit for Kyle’s practice. The website is responsive, which means it will automatically re-size for the best viewing experience on any device, whether desktop, tablet or any size cell phone. Visitors have a clear path to conversion, as well as ample educational material for those who want to browse and read.

You might think we’re done and ready for the “And they lived happily ever after” part. A lot of agencies would be done right there. But Integrity Marketing is not like a lot of agencies. For us, the real work is just beginning. So far, we have only built a solid structure. Imagine the steel framework of a skyscraper:  essential to the building, but you really cannot get much business done until the offices, staircases, ceilings and walls are built out, electricity turned on, plumbing installed, etc. As important as that framework is, it’s not enough. No one is going to start making money in that building until it’s finished and people start using it! Your website is exactly the same.

Search Engine Optimization

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is what ensures your website can be found when consumers go looking for your services on Google or Bing. We optimize your website for what’s called “local search,” which simply means we want the search engines to deliver your website to people who are searching for your services in your locality. In other words, we don’t care if your site shows up for searches in New York if you practice in Kansas.

IMS owns a subsidiary company called Local Search Authority which focuses exclusively on market research in the booming local search industry. This research division gives us an SEO advantage: organic search optimization is not as easy as you might think. Google is constantly changing their algorithms, keeping us on our toes.

Additionally, it can be difficult to determine what is “local” for your firm. For example, Kyle’s law firm is located in Overland Park, a large suburb of Kansas City. Overland Park is pretty huge, and we definitely want his website to show up whenever someone searches for estate planning in Overland Park … but there are other important local markets within driving distance of his office, too. Leawood is an upscale area contiguous to Overland Park. Olathe is another nearby suburb, but not as wealthy as Leawood. And what do we do about Kansas City – a huge metropolitan area that spans across the state line between Kansas and Missouri? These are all questions to be researched, considered and finally tested with careful tracking and tweaked for performance.

Call Tracking and Google Analytics

Getting top performance from a digital marketing program requires sophisticated tracking and analytics. We want to know more than just the volume of traffic to your site and how often a new client says they found you on the internet. While these measures are important, they are rudimentary and often lead to faulty analysis and poor decision-making. Relying solely on traffic measures and self-reporting to manage your digital marketing would be like a commercial airline pilot trying to fly by dead-reckoning. Oh sure, lots of people did it “back in the day,” and some people are pretty good at it. But there’s a reason it’s called “dead” reckoning. Seriously, all of those gauges, dials and gadgets in the commercial cockpit are not just window dressing. They give essential, precise feedback that greatly reduces the chance of disaster and makes commercial flight one of the safest modes of transportation today.

Our Certified Google Analysts installed sophisticated coding on Kyle’s website that lets us track, not only how many people visit his website, but where they came from, which pages were most popular, at what point they left the site, and the most common path visitors follow through the site.

We also installed a call-tracking number, which is a line of script that displays a trackable phone number to website visitors. This number is not published anywhere else, can only be found on the website, forwards directly to Kyle’s office, and is recorded as a “conversion” in his analytics. 

The Customer Journey

Further, and this is key, we map the Customer Journey: the path Kyle’s new clients take from online search, through his website, blog, and/or social media, and eventually to his office. We want to know how they are interacting with his entire program, define the key touch points, and enhance their experience and his marketing performance.

All of this information helps us continuously improve performance – not just of the website, but of the entire marketing program. This type of analysis is what creates the Rock Star performance Kyle gets from his online marketing.

Did I mention that Kyle’s digital marketing generates approximately 70 percent of his new business? And have I mentioned lately that research shows those professional firms who generate more of their new business online are more profitable and growing at a faster pace than those whose business comes from more traditional sources?

Now you really might think we’re done: we’ve got a beautiful, strategic website design that is optimized for local search and we’re all set to track our key performance indicators (KPIs).

But wait! There’s more to Kyle’s Secret Sauce. Stay tuned tomorrow.

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Website Design and Strategic Fit

Are You Hearing Strange Voices on the Phone?

Why Redesign Kyle's Site When It's Still Working?

Why Your Law Firm Website and Blog Both Need to be SEO-Friendly

Website Design and Strategic Fit

This is Part Three of my tell-all series of blog posts about the website redesign project for IMS President Kyle Krull’s law firm. (You can read Part One here: How Good Websites Go Bad and Part Two here: Why Redesign Kyle’s Site When It’s Still Working?)

So, Kyle’s website is tooling along in the cyber-world, doing its job every day: generating leads, showing up on Google’s Page One, staying connected to Kyle’s social media and so on. Your website may be doing the same.

Why does a client, whose website is basically working well, decide to launch a redesign project?

In a perfect world, clients are reviewing their monthly performance reports, watching their Analytics, and tracking leads and revenue. When they spot a “blip,” they call and say something like, “I’ve noticed a blip. Is it a trend? Does it mean we need to make some changes?”

Alas, we don’t live in perfect world. Clients are busy, you know, practicing law. They rarely look at the performance reports we send out monthly, Google Analytics is gibberish to them, and honestly, lead-tracking is becoming increasingly complicated in this new, digital world. Most clients do not go looking for trouble, so as long as things are running relatively smoothly, they don’t rock the boat.

Most clients won’t call us about a website redesign … at all … ever. Usually we are the ones contacting you about a “blip” that should be addressed, a change in Google’s algorithms, or a performance drop that can be corrected.

Why Some Clients Will Request a Redesign

When clients do ask for a website update, many are just like Kyle and the conversation goes something like this, “I saw a really cool website that you did for another client, and I want that on my site, too.”

Yes, it’s the desire to have the newest, the best and the brightest that motivates most clients to update their sites. In Kyle’s case, I know he believes that because he is the president of the company, he should have every new shiny thing that we develop (and I suspect he thinks he should have it first, though to be fair, he has not said that).

Of course, we want you (and by that I mean the collective you, what Southerners call y’all) to have the newest, best and brightest website that will meet your goals and deliver new business to your law firm, in your market. Ahem …. I hope you noticed the second part of that sentence, because it’s important. We want your website to work for you, to deliver results. Honestly, we are much less concerned about how bright and shiny it might or might not be, long as it works.

The Biggest Mistake We Made

So here was the biggest mistake we all made in the Kyle Krull Website Redesign Project (I choose this title because it is much more polite than what many of us here in the office were calling it) that caused his project to mushroom, expand beyond our wildest imaginations, and drag on for months:

We said Yes to every client request.

You don’t know how it pains me to admit this.

We became Yes men. Because Kyle is the president of the company, and he is quite charming and everyone loves him … we gave him everything he asked for until the site became a complete and total wreck. Kyle wanted everything. Every time he saw a new thing, or had a new idea, he wanted that on his site. We started over, we revised, we tacked-on, we threw-in and we threw up our hands. The project dragged on … and on … and on … for months.

Deadlines are Good Things

Then, we ran right up into a deadline: we needed to finish Kyle’s website before going to the WealthCounsel Symposium (which was last week). I made the decision to step in and take over the process. I could do this because of the special relationship between Kyle and me – I knew that if I took control, he would let me. I was the only person on our team who could turn to him and say, “No. That is not working; we are going to go another direction.”

On a Monday, I reviewed the site and decided it had to be pared down. We threw out about half of everything. Our designers hesitated, saying that Kyle had specifically asked for each piece. “Don’t worry,” I said. “He’s going to love this.”

The new site blossomed once it was no longer weighted down with all that “stuff.” It was brighter, lighter and starting to be more focused.

We changed the color palette, which gave the site another lift.

Designing for Strategic Fit

Then we attacked the fundamental site message. We’d made a mistake that I see many clients making these days. The primary visual elements were chosen to represent Kyle’s geographic market, which is Kansas. We had amber waves of grain as a visual theme throughout the site.

Now, I live on a horse farm in Kansas, so really, no one loves amber waves of grain more than me … but they had to go!

Kyle’s business strategy is to work with responsible people who want to plan for the future: people who love their families and want to protect them, and to pass on a rich legacy. We needed the site to appeal to his strategic market, not his geographic market. We booted out the waving grain and replaced it with a keen multi-generational background video that speaks directly to Kyle’s ideal client.

Voila! Once we made that change, the rest of the site fell very easily into place. From a design standpoint, it was perfectly balanced. And the visual message finally fit with Kyle’s strategy.

I called it a win and Kyle loved it.

Take a look at the new site here: www.kylekrull.com, I think you’ll see what I mean.

But of course, the story doesn’t stop here. So far, we’ve only explored what you can easily see online. There’s way more going on behind the scenes. Stay tuned tomorrow to discover what really makes this website a Marketing Rock Star!

Why Redesign Kyle's Site When It's Still Working?

Part Two of my tell-all series of blog posts about the website redesign project for IMS President Kyle Krull’s law firm. (You can read Part One here: How Good Websites Go Bad)

Kyle’s “old” site was launched in June of 2013. It incorporated everything that was true at the time about online marketing. And it worked very well.

But the pace of change on the internet is rapid and lots of things have changed since 2013. In fact, so many important things have changed so dramatically that we knew Kyle’s website needed a complete overhaul if it were to continue to perform at a “rock star” level.

For instance:

In 2013	In 2015
Consumers used Google search primarily to gather information, so Kyle’s website offered lots of education about estate planning, including free downloadable reports.	More website visitors are more ready to make a buying decision. They don’t want to sift through pages and pages of information. Instead, they want to find key information about you, they want to verify that information through social media and in online reviews, and they are ready to schedule an appointment. Kyle’s new website makes it very easy for visitors to do this.
Paid ads on search got lower click-through rates than organic listings, so we focused on getting Kyle’s website listed on Google’s page one organically.	Consumers show they are much more willing to click on those paid ads and in fact, consumers who are ready to purchase prefer clicking on a paid ad because these clicks usually avoid all of the “information” pages of a website and take users directly to the pay-off pages where they can request a consultation.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) algorithms favored larger sites with more keyword-rich content, so we built out an expansive website and made sure every new blog post or update was indexed with his site.	SEO algorithms still evaluate the quality of content on a website, but they also include other important factors such as social authority and “user experience,” as measured by time-on-site, bounce rates and conversions. Kyle’s new site is carefully designed to engage visitors immediately, keep them on the site and lead them to convert.
Mobile optimization was an emerging trend (but less than one percent of visitors to Kyle’s site accessed it from a mobile device).	You heard about Mobilegeddon, right? Google now insists that your website be optimized for mobile devices. Kyle’s new site design is “responsive,” which means it automatically resizes for optimal display on any device, whether desktop, tablet, or any size cell phone.

 

Things certainly have changed in just two short years!

There’s an old saying that “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Let me just be clear, to avoid any misunderstandings: This does not apply to your digital marketing.

Do NOT wait until your digital marketing is “broke” to make changes.

Why not? Waiting is too expensive.

If you’re thinking you will save money by postponing your website redesign for six months or a year (or more), then you need to think again. Every day that your digital marketing under-performs, you are losing money, and probably more than you think.

Kyle’s website generates two to three inquiries per day, or almost 100 inquiries every month. Of course, not all of those inquiries result in new clients, but a good portion of them do. For the sake of argument, let’s say Kyle closes only 25 percent of those 100 inquiries and he gets even a very low average fee of only $1,000 per case. That means his well-performing site is driving $25,000 in new business to the firm every month … or about $300,000 a year.

Now, let’s say his marketing performance does not crash, but just starts to taper off. He goes from having a rock star program generating 100 inquiries every month to a mediocre program that generates 60 inquiries per month. Apply the same 25 percent closing ratio at the same $1,000 per case and you drop from $25,000 a month to $15,000 a month … or from $300,000 a year to only $180,000.

Now, a digital marketing program that generates $180,000 a year is a good program.

But seriously, would you pay more than $120,000 for a website redesign?

That’s the cost of waiting 12 months to “fix” something that isn’t really “broke” yet. 

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How Good Websites Go Bad

Is Your Website Still in the Dark Ages?

How Good Websites Go Bad

We just launched a new website for Integrity Marketing President Kyle Krull! You can see his new site at www.kylekrull.com. I think this is one of the more exciting re-designs we’ve launched over the past year and represents a significant upgrade for Kyle’s marketing. 

I’m Jennifer Campbell Goddard, CEO of Integrity Marketing and Kyle’s long-time business partner and friend (yes, we’ve been in business together for 20 years this year!) Because of our unique relationship, I am able to speak perhaps a bit more candidly to and about Kyle than I might another client. This can lead to some pretty animated conversations …

Now it’s my turn to tell-all in a series of blog posts about how a great website goes bad, and why it takes strong strategy and a team of professionals to save it! Join me this week on a tour through Kyle’s new website, and the process to create it. In this unique peek behind the curtain you will see just how a great marketer stays at the top of his game. You’ll also see how even great marketers like Kyle can make some of the same not-so-great mistakes that may be plaguing your own marketing!

Let’s start with why we had to redesign the site, which was only about two years old. (By the way, if your website is two or more years old, it’s ancient. Web Years are even more accelerated than Dog Years!)

Digital Marketing is Not a Once-and-Done Proposition

Just as estate planning is a lifetime process, so is digital marketing. You know that estate plans must be updated to reflect changes in life circumstances as well as in the law; well, your website needs to be updated for similar reasons. Everything from changes in Google’s search algorithms to changes in consumer behavior impact your website’s performance and can mean you need to make a change.

In Kyle’s case, it’s been about two years (June 2013) since we last redesigned his site. Since that time, Google has placed more emphasis on mobile, social, and user experience … and less on keywords, number of pages indexed, and volumes of content. Not to say that these things no longer matter, but they matter less in relation to mobile optimization, social authority and “user experience” as measured by time-on-site, bounce rates and conversions.

It’s All About You Now

Online consumer behavior has changed radically. Yes, even over the past two years. Consumers visiting your legal website are further along in the Customer Journey (or, deeper in the Sales Funnel) than they used to be. Whereas before, most of us used the internet to gather information and turned to valued personal referrals before making a buying decision offline, we now are much more comfortable making purchases directly online using online information. Consumers used to visit your site to learn more about estate planning, or powers of attorney, or wills and trusts. Increasingly now they visit your site to learn more about YOU, and to make their final decision before scheduling an appointment.

Mobile Optimization

Kyle’s new website is designed to keep Google happy, and appeal to visitors who are ready to choose an attorney. The entire site is “responsive,” which means it automatically re-sizes for optimal viewing on any device – whether desktop, tablet, or any size cell phone. Google considers this “mobile optimized” and is more likely to deliver Kyle’s site higher in search results.

A Faster Route to Your Office

Note the “Request a Consultation” button is prominent, near the top of the page and repeated lower on the page as well. We’ve done this because we know that many visitors are ready to do just that, and we want to make it easy for them.

Making Information More Fun

The site still contains lots of rich content, but we’ve incorporated navigation into a fun, easy-to-use “lifecycle” graphic located lower on the page. Visitors who are still in the information-gathering stage will find plenty to hold their interest.

A Little Help from Our Friends

And because we’ve all started checking references online, depending on reviews from previous clients or customers to help us make our final choices, Kyle’s site guides visitors to read more than 150 online reviews.

Kyle Gets Social … and Even a Little Dark Social

What about social authority? Notice that Kyle’s site links not only to the usual Facebook, Twitter and Linked-In accounts, but also to his blog, Pinterest and Google Plus. We even made an effort to shed light on some of the Dark Social sharing with a share button that includes an email share. What is Dark Social? Basically, it’s the nearly 70 percent of social sharing that occurs in private digital communication tools such as email and instant messaging.

Now that you’ve seen the final result, stay tuned this week to see where we started and the (sometimes painfully circuitous) route we took to get here!