Tour Bus Crash - Websites with information

A horrible accident involving a tour bus occurred near the Hoover Dam (Arizona/Border) at 4 PM today. Several web searches led to to news outlets as well as legal information about this type of accident.

This is where custom content really makes a difference. For example at Owen, Patterson, & Owen's website dealing with motor vehicle accidents, you can find information of causes of tour bus accidents. You can also see that their practice has had experience with bus crashes, obtaining settlements for the injured.

Loan Modification Fraud in California - Fox11 News mentions "The Firm"

I always learn a lot from the attorneys with whom I work - sometimes simple advice, but other times cautionary tales or even tragic stories.

One of the most dynamic attorneys that I've met to date, Robert Starr, recently added some content to his website about loan modification scams (click to read). His law office deals with consumer issues, form dealer fraud to real estate, and he recently told me about the schemes taking advantage of people thinking they are getting help with negotiation their home loan. He is currently involved in lawsuits of this very nature.

Two articles that you may find interesting: a Fox11 LA video and a Daily News article. Several Loan Modification companies and tactics are mentioned: including The Firm and Homeowners Assistance Services Inc.

UPDATE: a newer news segment - aired March 17 on Fox11 LA. Read about on my blog.

Print Media Co-Promotion - SFV Business Journal Legal Issue

To help spread the word about FindLaw's impact and highlight a Woodland Hills Law Firm I'm running a spot in the 2/2 issue of the San Fernando Valley Business Journal's legal special report.

A little digital editing and a lot of testimonial make this a really neat piece. Although I wasn't the initial consultant for this custom website (it was my colleague Eric Bersano), I've been closely working with the law office and have seen great things happen in the past year, especially after adding additional content via our interview & writing process.

Anker, Reed, Hymes, Schreiber & Cohen have offices in Woodland Hills and Valencia. The do both ligation and transactional work throughout southern California. I think recent updates to the site for the Valencia area have really paid off.

If you'd like to see great custom site, with flash images and specific content check out www.ahslawyers.com.

Three Custom Personal Injury Sites for Owen, Patterson, & Owen - Congrats!

Along with the New Year, January 1st included the launch of three custom websites for Owen, Patterson, & Owen, whose main office is in Valencia. Their Firm is the most reputable personal injury law practice in the area. The Partners (Greg Owen, Rick Patterson, & Susy Owen) and Associates (Cody Patterson & Tamiko Herron) are all active in several legal and charitable organizations throughout the Santa Clarita Valley and Southern California. In fact, Cody and Tamiko first connected with FindLaw via a CAALA event. - A few short months later and Owen, Patterson, & Owen now have an impressive web presence.

All three sites were designed by Peter Otto, and include great use of flash interactive elements. Greg Owen & Rick Patterson had very keen design directions, and Peter did an awesome job of creating original designs that fit the bill. Incidentally, I happened to be at the law office when their professional photos were being taken - it is fun to see how it all turned out from the different directions.



Check out the sites:Main Site for Personal Injury, Automobile accidents, & Motorcycle Accidents.












Besides the design, the content of these sites is quite comprehensive too- over 70 pages of custom content! The main site at www.opolaw.com has replaced their prior site, and traffic is off to a great start since it is a "trusted" domain. The other two sites are newer domains and are just starting to build in traffic an indexing. Importantly, I already see a variety of search terms bringing potential clients to the sites. Online visibility is building by the day, and

It is a pleasure to work with the attorneys and their staff. Although I am an expert in internet marketing for attorneys - I learned quite a bit about the practice of personal injury law. Check out the vast experience and impressive injury settlements they have attained.

Website helps San Fernando Valley business grow.

In the Monday edition of the Los Angeles Times I read a great article about a small company's use of internet marketing to help them grow. Chocolate Fortunes of North Hollywood makes custom message and specialty dipped fortune cookies. They have felt the recent pinch of the slower economy, but their online presence has actually increased and allowed them to keep busy. They even received a large order to provide custom fortune cookies to one of the many inaugural balls ongoing this week!

The article quotes the husband & wife owners about how the internet helps them sell the products and also has a few stories from buyers of the cookies, where they explain what drew them to choose the this business over others.

This is a great example of a specialized business, catering (great pun!) to people searching for something that fits distinct needs. I actually did a few searches, and found lots of companies in the custom fortune cookie field. But I did like the design of www.chocolatefortunes.com and they are high in SERP (search engine results page) for "chocolate fortune cookies".

Reading the article really reinforces two key concepts: Marketing in a slow economy is a necessity and a big picture approach (visibility, design, & content) makes internet marketing return several fold on the initial investment.

Attorney Robert Starr quoted in Los Angeles Daily News

On December 14th, the Daily News posted an article about the Marek Fire Victims being overshadowed by the Sayre fire. Being interested for a variety of reasons (including the fact that I live within 10 miles of the fire's devastation) - I've been reading several online articles about the aftermath.

I was very pleased to see one of FindLaw's clients quoted in the Daily News article. Robert Starr is a Consumer Rights attorney in Southern California, and he is representing Sky Terrace residents in potential litigation against the management and owners of the park. Robert's current FindLaw website focuses on the consumer issues of lemon law and dealer fraud, but keep your eye out for his upcoming upgrade to a comprehensive site - including details of the many class actions lawsuit Robert and his colleagues have resolved.

Did you know, Robert is mentioned in wikipedia article about a class action lawsuit involving the Audi TT?

Lawyer Website Success Stories - Los Angeles to San Diego

The better half of today was spent with 16 fellow FindLaw Legal Marketing Consultants. Most of us worked in the lower half of California, but we all had stories to share of our clients success.

• Criminal defense attorney who received 6 new clients in the first part of this year as a direct result of a recent content/design upgrade.

• Consumer rights/civil litigation practice taking on at least one case a week since switching to a FindLaw website from another service.

• Business attorney with an office in a Los Angeles suburb securing a retainer from large multi-national company requiring local expertise in real estate issues.

• Large personal injury firm with 8 settlements last year as result of their website - each settlement worth over $800,000.

Our story telling was just a small part of our day spent in the U.S. Bank Tower building downtown (the tallest building west of the Mississippi river). We shared our favorite attorney videos and website designs, especially the bad ones (not FindLaw developed, of course).

We also discussed how the current economic conditions may be very detrimental to small website development companies and they clients they serve - will the companies be around to support the attorney websites?

name search; referalls, branding for Los Angeles Immigration lawyer

Here's an interesting situation - your firm name contains part of a brand name or common name. Can you still be found?

Check out searches for Ronzio & Associates, Immigration Lawyer Los Angeles. The firm has a very well designed website, and the visibility for "Ronzio" is just under the food brand at #3 in my search engine results page (SERP). Not Bad.

Now if a firm was named, "Google & Yahoo, LLP" it might be different story. But even so, people will refine the searches to get the result the suites them best. For example, about five websites will be examined if someone is looking for a lawyer online. What search terms will be used? A whole lot of them most likely.

This gets back to the "long tail" of search engine marketing. Your firm does want to be found by all sorts of terms: referrals, situations, locations, etc.

Los Angeles Divorce & Child Custody Lawyer

Congratulations to Robert Gantman on the release of his FindLaw site at www.gantmanlaw.com. His website discusses a child-focused approach to legal help with divorce, custody, and support. This focused strategy works well with the amount of content on a template site.

This content, in conjunction with a FindLaw.com directory SpotLight, will bring the type of clients that Robert and his staff have immense experience in helping. For example, Robert has represented clients well known in the entertainment field in very complex child custody matters.

If you are interested in celebrity divorce news, check out Celebrity Divorce blog. Some very complex family law situations can be viewed there.

Cut & Paste print into Web marketing: San Diego Haircuts for men

In previous posts I've mentioned the perils of simply displaying an image as a web page, where the content is all jpeg, bitmapped, or some other non-textual format that the search engines cannot "read". Here is a story related - a friend needed something up fast, and he was able to properly get a one-page website up based on a print ad. The webpage is for San Diego Men's Haircuts - SportClips. Although more content is needed, the site does have a few things going for it - branding, imagery, and links to locations. It will be very interesting to see how he grows this website, and the visibility it achieves.