COMMON ETHICS MISTAKES LAW FIRMS MAKE

Transcription

1 COMMON ETHICS MISTAKES LAW FIRMS MAKE Jabez LeBret and Mark

2 JABEZ LEBRET

3 LAW FIRM Legal Industry National Recognition Marketing Industry Award Winning Torch Award for Marketplace Ethics

4 OUR BOOK Includes Chapter Contributions from: AVVO Rainmaker Institute Complimentary Book

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7 TWO ETHICS AREAS Grow your leads Linkable content Backlink acquisition Onsite Search Engine Optimization Google and Facebook Ads Protect Your Referrals Reviews Branded search Website Attorney bio pages Accurate directory information

8 TYPES OF SEARCH TERMS Branded Search [Protect Referrals] Non-Branded Search [Grow Your Leads] Law Firm of Daley & Homer Justine Daley Mark Homer Mark Homer Author Estate Planning Attorney Real Estate Attorney Car Accident Attorney Divorce Attorney near me

9 KEY CHANGES IN 2017 Mobile search and traffic is continuing to increase New ads in local search Local 3 pack and even Google Maps app Voice search is changing search behavior Reviews are becoming more and more important Facebook is growing Backlinks are still king

10 REVIEWS

11 REVIEWS ARE IMPORTANT 2016 Survey: 92% of consumers now read online reviews (vs. 88% in 2015) 69% of consumers say a review must be written within 2-3 months to be relevant Only 14% of consumers consider using a business that has a 1 or 2 star rating 48% of consumers will visit the website after reading positive reviews 40% of consumers form an opinion by reading just 1-3 reviews (vs. 29% in 2015)

12 EVEN CRAZIER According to Adweek, 93% of millennials say they rely on blogs and user/consumer reviews before making a purchase. And 77% trust the reviews they read on brand websites.

13 REVIEWS

14 PEOPLE ARE CRAZY

15 PEOPLE ARE CRAZY

16 REVIEWS ETHICS

17 REVIEWS - THE ETHICS Don t make up profiles to write reviews You can t write your own online reviews Don t pay for reviews 7.2[C]: A lawyer shall not give anything of value to a person for recommending the lawyer s services except

18 REVIEWS - THE ETHICS EXAMPLE: You ask Joe Smith to leave you a review: Jim will win every time. He won $1 million for me in an auto accident lawsuit, Jim is the best Personal Injury attorney ever!! How do you control? 7.1[2] An advertisement that truthfully reports a lawyer's achievements on behalf of clients or former clients may be misleading if presented so as to lead a reasonable person to form an unjustified expectation that the same results could be obtained for other clients in similar matters without reference to the specific factual and legal circumstances of each client's case. Similarly, an unsubstantiated comparison of the lawyer's services or fees with the services or fees of other lawyers may be misleading if presented with such specificity as would lead a reasonable person to conclude that the comparison can be substantiated. The inclusion of an appropriate disclaimer or qualifying language may preclude a finding that a statement is likely to create unjustified expectations or otherwise mislead the public.

19 A CULTURE OF REVIEWS Ask for paper internal review at closing meeting or you can use an online form on your website Good review? What s their address? Ask and provide a how-to guide Provide guidance on what NOT to say It s not easy in Legal Profession

20 DIRECTORIES

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22 PROTECT YOUR REFERRALS Firm Website Sitelinks Facebook Avvo Yelp & YP Birdeye

23 Directory Listings SLIDE TITLE Body One Body Two

24 Speed of Data Updates at Major Local Search Engines days (BASIC) (PAID) TYPICAL INTERNET YELLOW PAGES SITE LOW-RANKING INTERNET YELLOW PAGES SITE days TIME TO FIRST LIVE APPEARANCE ON WEB TIME TO INCLUSION IN MAIN GOOGLE SEARCH INDEX TIME TO INCLUSION IN GOOGLE +LOCAL CLUSTER AVERAGE TIME TO INCLUSION IN GOOGLE +LOCAL CLUSTER 2012 Mike Blumenthal & David Mihm. Approved for non-commercial re-use with full attribution. Not to be re-used for commercial purposes without explicit permission of copyright holders.

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28 AVVO IS WINNING VS. CHALLENGES IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS EASTERN DIVISION For the reasons stated above, the court concludes that defendant s speech is noncommercial and fully protected by the First Amendment. IL-Courts Good article by Karen Rubin at OSBA: as long as courts continue to see Avvo as a mere phone book or worse, a magazine it will continue to expand its empire at the expense of lawyers who won t play along.

29 YELP

30 DIRECTORY ETHICS 7.2 [6] Except as permitted under paragraphs (b)(1)-(b)(4), lawyers are not permitted to pay others for recommending the lawyer's services or for channeling professional work Paragraph (b)(1), however, allows a lawyer to pay for advertising and communications permitted by this Rule, including the costs of print directory listings, on-line directory listings, newspaper ads, television and radio airtime, domain-name registrations, sponsorship fees, Internet-based advertisements, and group advertising. A lawyer may compensate employees, agents, and vendors who are engaged to provide marketing or client-development services, such as publicists, public-relations personnel, business-development staff and website designers. Moreover, a lawyer may pay others for generating client leads, such as Internet-based client leads, so long as the lead generator does not recommend the lawyer,

31 DIRECTORY ETHICS Ethics issues arise when you Claim the listing Business description: Categories / Services (Rule 7.4) (a) A lawyer may communicate the fact that the lawyer does or does not practice in particular fields of law. (d) A lawyer shall not state or imply that a lawyer is certified as a specialist in a particular field of law, unless: (1) the lawyer has been certified as a specialist by an organization that has been approved by an appropriate state authority or that has been accredited by the American Bar Association; and (2) the name of the certifying organization is clearly identified in the communication.

32 DIRECTORY ETHICS NAP + Website + Business description + Categories + Practice Areas + Hours Caution: you could be responsible even if you hire a firm to claim your directory listings Rule Responsibilities Regarding Nonlawyer Assistants

33 DIRECTORY ETHICS 7.1 Communications Concerning a Lawyer's Services A lawyer shall not make a false or misleading communication about the lawyer or the lawyer's services. A communication is false or misleading if it: (a) contains a material misrepresentation of fact or law, or omits a fact necessary to make the statement considered as a whole not materially misleading; (b) is likely to create an unjustified expectation about results the lawyer can achieve, or states or implies that the lawyer can achieve results by means that violate the rules of professional conduct or other law; or (c) compares the lawyer's services with other lawyer's services, unless the comparison can be factually substantiated.

34 WEBSITES

35 ESTABLISHING YOUR WEBSITE Design & Structure Conversion Content Ethics

36 WEBSITE COMPONENTS Name / Brand Where are you located? How can I get a hold of you? Phone Number / Contact Form / Chat / Text? Do you understand my problem? What can you do for me? Proof I should call you? Easy to navigate and find things Schema Markup for Google (business, attorney, and reviews) - ask your webmaster

37 How do I Name/Brand Your Website contact you? Easy to Navigate What can you do for me? Proof I should call you

38 Do you understand my problem?

39 Proof I should call you

40 WEBSITE ETHICS Take frequent backups of your website and keep them on file Tell your webmaster: daily for 7 days weekly for 4 weeks monthly for 12 months yearly 7.2 [5] Paragraph (b) requires that a record of the content and use of advertising be kept in order to facilitate enforcement of this Rule. It does not require that advertising be subject to review prior to dissemination. Such a requirement would be burdensome and expensive relative to its possible benefits and may be of doubtful constitutionality.

41 WEBSITE ETHICS Make sure your web and content developers understand what you can and can t say about your experience, expertise, trial publicity, etc. Hiring Someone: the partner or lawyer must take reasonable efforts to ensure that the [company] they retain's actions are within the professional obligation of the lawyer and not violate the Rules of Professional Conduct

42 WEBSITE ETHICS Do not mislead with your website copy Communications Concerning a Lawyer's Services No testimonials on website without consent (re-post online reviews?) Avoid saying "I can save your business" or "higher my firm and you will walk free" - nothing that could lead someone to expect results Don t compare your firm to another like "Our firm is better than Smith and Smith" unless you can factually substantiate

43 WEBSITE ETHICS Watch the content of your website pages Comparative Speech in title tags, meta descriptions, copy If you have pages in another language, e.g. In Spanish, then you must have a disclaimer in that language. Simple stating that your firm Hablamos Espanol does not require a Spanish disclaimer Disclaimer on your website should be on every page.

44 YOUR WEBSITE DISCLAIMER

45 BLOGGING/CONTENT ETHICS No Names Please Do not talk about clients without consent in blogs or online content Trial Publicity Tread lightly if you are going to talk about the case at all Hunter vs. Virginia (1.6, dismissed, but..)

46 WATCH WHO YOU HIRE - ETHICS Indiana disciplinary matter illustrates one potential risk. A lawyer with over 40 years of experience and no disciplinary record received a private reprimand for using a pay-per-lead service whose advertisements failed to comply with the Indiana Rules of Professional Conduct. The Indiana Supreme Court concluded that the lawyer should have known about the improper marketing methods and stopped using the company s services.lawyers need to understand how these new marketing arrangements operate and cannot ignore how client leads are generated on their behalf.

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48 MOBILE TRAFFIC ON THE RISE Leads are also coming from mobile devices 45% of leads came from mobile devices* *from GNGF data

49 MOBILE WEBSITE Body One Body Two

50 ETHICS ON MOBILE WEBSITE Even on mobile it is still a website. Don t forget the disclaimer If required to say this is advertising at a certain font size in your state, make sure the mobile doesn t scale it too small.

51 Questions? Book Form

52 OUR BOOK Includes Chapter Contributions from: AVVO Rainmaker Institute

53 THANK YOU Jabez LeBret and Mark Homer