Live Chat For Law Firms - Worth It?

Is Live Chat For Law Firms Worth It?

I should be clear that the answer is almost always yes, live chat for law firms is worthwhile. However, there are a few things you really need to keep in mind…

Live Chat for law firms: worth it?

Yes, keeping in mind…

1) You may not see a drastic increase in leads

2) Live Chat providers do not market your firm, nor generate additional traffic

3) You may notice an increase in the percentage of low-quality leads

Will My Law Firm See An Increase In Leads After Adding Live Chat?

Yes, but not a drastic increase. Keep in mind that a large percentage of people genuinely interested in retaining your firm will usually initiate contact whether there’s a live chat feature on your website or not.

For instance, your 10 most-profitable clients last month didn’t place much value on you not having live chat software, did they?

Makes sense if you think about it. Put yourself in the client’s shoes… Imagine you’ve got a very serious legal matter. You’ve done your research on the best firms in the area. You’ve chosen which firm you’d like to contact first about your case. It’s very likely that your decision to contact this firm is not contingent on whether or not they offer live chat on their website.

Quick insight: generally speaking (there are caveats, of course) the most highly-qualified* leads will call your firm over all else. I.e. the more serious the case, the more likely someone is to invest their time in a phone call as opposed to sending a few quick messages via chat. Why? Because they’ve got a very serious legal matter and are thus willing to invest time in vetting potential attorneys, get a feel for the firm, have a few preliminary questions answered, etc.

*highly-qualified = likely to have a good case and therefore the most-desirable leads

Live Chat Will Not Help Grow Your Brand, Audience, Or Website Visitors

Live Chat providers facilitate the chat; they do not generate the chat. Nor do they generate the click that drove the visitor to your site. They also do not grow your audience or increase brand awareness.

Make no mistake, that all is fine. That’s not the job of a live chat anyway (it’s your legal marketing agency’s job). But, it’s still important to keep in mind. (read why in the insight section below)

Quick insight: a large reason for pointing this out is because of how some live chat providers word their reports. For example, a weekly e-mail from the chat company with a line that reads “ACME Live Chat Generated X Number Of Leads This Week.” That is misleading. As mentioned, live chat operators do not generate live chat leads, they facilitate them. If 100 people contact your law firm via phone call, you wouldn’t expect a report from your telephone provider claiming they “Got You 100 Leads,” would you?

You May Get A Fair Amount Of “Tire-Kickers”

Sometimes live chat garners questions or inquiries from people that simply aren’t important enough to warrant an actual phone call. Less-important inquiries can sometimes mean less-qualified leads (or even unqualified leads). Some examples…

  • “Hi, does your firm handle pro bono work?”
  • “Can I change my appointment time?”
  • “I had a hair in my burger, can I sue the restaurant?”
  • “My neighbor plays his music too loud, can I press charges?”
  • “Is this the law firm that’s on Main Street by the car wash?”

That’s not to say that good leads don’t use live chats – they do! But there is typically an increased propensity for undesirable leads to perform a quick chat as opposed to actually pick up the phone and call.

Quick insight: make sure you’re not paying for these types of conversations if you don’t have to. Some providers offer the ability to mark a lead as being ‘unqualified’ or as an ‘existing client’ so you’re not charged for it. Similarly, make sure you’re not including those types of chats in any sort of leads reports. For example, if 100 live chats came through last month, be sure to subtract the unqualified ones from that 100.

Bottom Line

Q: Use live chat or not?

A: Yes. Live chat is a nice feature and increases UX (user experience) for those who prefer to use it. The cost of the live chat service is often outweighed by the opportunity cost (however unlikely) of potentially missing out on your next highly-profitable client.

A Few Last Live Chat Tips…

  • Do not use AI or ML-powered chat bots. You want the potential client’s first engagement to be with a human.
  • Use a provider designed exclusively for law firms. That way, the operator will have at least some familiarity with answering questions about the law.
  • If you can, avoid per-chat pricing plans. DMG has law firm clients that have grown to generate hundreds of chats per month as a result of successful marketing and advertising. $35 per chat seems reasonable if you’re getting a few chats per month. Grow your firm to a point where it’s getting 300 per month and that $35 per really adds up.
  • Be prepared for hiccups. Live chat operators won’t be able to answer every question about your business quickly and accurately
  • Be OK with some prospects (or existing clients) getting frustrated. The operators probably won’t be able to answer questions like “can I change my appointment time” or “what’s Jeff’s secretary’s fax number?”.
  • Keep an eye on quality.
  • If looking for a good place to start, our top three providers can be revealed by shooting us a quick email.
Cookieless Advertising Tips

Cookieless Advertising: 4 Quick Tips In Plain English

No more cookies?! It’s been a while since marketers were this upset over missing cookies. Fortunately, we’ve been working towards a cookieless advertising solution. (temper tantrum avoided!)

The key = building and using first-party data. Then, layering with complimentary third-party data sets. Finally, running cookieless advertising campaigns programmatically.

Here Are 4 Tips For A Cookieless Advertising Strategy

ONE: Build A Sitewide Tagging Infrastructure

How: have a web developer install Google Tag Manager. Then, have a data analyst make sure first-party cookies are being tracked for all of your most important conversions.

Why: to collect info that users share when they interact with your website.

Insight: this seems obvious, I know. You might be thinking “I already have this set up!”… You’d be surprised, though, how many clients aren’t tracking ALL of their site’s important events. (or, think they’re tracking them but find that the tracking is misconfigured or suboptimal)

TWO: Incentivize Logging In

How: Get creative. “Sign up for our newsletter” is boring. “Download our ebook” is stale. Do they work? Sure. Scalable? Ehhh. Unique? Definitely not. Think outside the box, then test it!

Why: Creating an account at checkout / signing up for a newsletter / entering your email to get a coupon code will only ever convert x% of website visitors. The additional y% requires some strategy. (always chase that y%!!)

Insight: First-party data is earned, not given. Ask yourself… what can my business offer in exchange for someone’s information? You’re asking for personal information, so you should offer something good!

THREE: Leverage Partnerships

How: make a list of non-competitor brands that may compliment your business. Then, consider a B2B partnership or deal to help build up your first-party data and reach a broader audience.

Why: you’ll need a viable way of reaching prospects separate from those who have already visited your website.

Insight: this is going to become very popular. We’re already starting to see it… GoPro & Red Bull… Pottery Barn & Sherwin-Williams… brands who are not in direct competition with each other but whose audience segments are very much aligned.

FOUR: Pivot To Programmatic

How: retain a programmatic ad agency (such as DMG). They can optimize your marketing budget. Objective = cut wasted spend. Then, reallocate dollars to programmatic media.

Why: programmatic media platforms often come equipped with access to third-party data aggregators. Advertisers can tap into massive data sets with relative ease.

Insight: there are dozens upon dozens of programmatic advertising platforms. Each have advantages and disadvantages. Some will be a great fit for your unique objectives. Many will not. The major benefit of working with an agency (ehemm… *DMG*) is experience and expertise. They know what to look for in order to maximize ROI.

Programmatic TV For Law Firms

Reaching A Qualified Audience With Programmatic TV Advertising For Law Firms

Pinpoint The Most Likely Prospects With Programmatic TV

Leverage the latest in AI and ML advertising capabilities to ensure you’re reaching the right audience at the right time with the right message.

How Does Programmatic Work?

Advanced targeting tactics and real-time bidding are used to target audiences likely to be in need of a lawyer to get the right message in front of the right audience at the right time.

The Key Takeaway: Programmatic TV uses real-time bids to show your commercials to your audience, regardless of what program they are watching, when they are watching, and how they are watching. In comparison, traditional TV requires advertisers choose a combination of networks, dayparts, and programs in attempt to reach its audience in hope that the audience happens to be tuned it to the particular program or network when the firm’s commercial ran. 

Major Benefits Of Programmatic Media For Law Firms

  1. Data-driven targeting
  2. Real-time bid optimization
  3. Full-funnel attribution
  4. Multichannel scale and reach
  5. Brand safe
  6. Intelligent insights
  7. Granular geotargeting

 

PLUS…

Track and measure results. After a person is shown the firm’s commercial, it is possible to track website visits, mobile click-to-calls, website form submissions, and in-store visits to effectively gauge performance.

Target your audience by zip code. No more wasted spend from needing to run commercials in large geos like DMA, city or county. Target the areas that are most important for your business.

Where Can Programmatic Ads Run?

Across…

  • Connected TVs (CTV)
  • On-Demand Programming
  • Streaming Platforms
  • Over-The-Top Setboxes (OTT)
  • Linear TV (where available)

The advantage? To reach the right audience at the right time across multiple touchpoints.

So, How Is Programmatic TV Better Than Traditional TV Advertising For Law Firms?

A quick example…

Linear TV Buys For Law Firms:

  *Hope* your target audience watches the shows and networks in your schedule.

  *Hope* they are watching at the time your commercial ran.

  *Hope* they will soon be in need of a lawyer and remember to call your firm.

Programmatic TV Buys For Law Firms:

  *Know* you’re reaching your audience with advanced targeting capabilities and   massive third-party data sets.

  *Know* that they’re seeing your commercial because you’re buying views against an actual user, not impressions on a particular network or program.

  *Know* that they’re likely to be in need of a lawyer by leveraging behavioral   analysis capabilities and the latest in AI and Machine Learning tech.

Launching A Campaign With DMG

DMG is regarding as one of the Top Legal Marketing Companies, and is fully capable of proposing a custom campaign to help hit your business’ objectives.

Google Local Services Ads Example

Google Local Services Ads | 5 Quick Pros & Cons

Google Local Services Ads

Thinking about running Google Local Services Ads? Here are five pros, five cons and two recommendations. Quick, easy, to the point.

Before we begin: unfamiliar with this new feature? You can read all about them here.

PROs

  1. LSAs show at the top of search results (above regular PPC ads, organic results, maps, you name it).
  2. Billed using a pay per lead model (as opposed to the standard pay per click model).
  3. On average, can result in lower CPAs (versus comparable PPC campaigns).
  4. Only three ads show (hopefully yours + two other competitors; three max).
  5. Great for beginners (create an account, set it and forget it)

CONs

  1. Highly automated. Very little ability to optimize. The best google ads agencies won’t particularly enjoy having their hands tied by being this limited.
  2. Leads tend to be less qualified. As one example, this is because of the inability for SEMs to do basic things like optimize bids, keywords, etc., and also because of…
  3. A lesser ability to optimize for the full customer journey. For example, legal marketing agencies know that a quality personal injury lead is less likely to see a Google ad and then immediately call that firm. Their case could potentially be worth millions of dollars. They want to spend time on the firm’s website. Read a bunch of pages. Look into the firm’s reviews. Check out other websites. The customer journey does not start and end with an impression an subsequent click-to-call. The customer journey just isn’t that simple.
  4. Impressions and ad rank are largely based on proximity. What if your office is in a major city but your target audience resides in the surrounding suburbs, for instance. That’d cause an issue.
  5. Extensive application process to become Google Screened. Frankly, it’s a bit of a pain to get approved for a ‘Google Screened’ badge. Plus, assuming you already have a Google Ads dashboard, requires a completely separate account and management dash.

Should You Use Google Local Services Ads Or Not?

If room in the budget, run both.

Else, stick with regular paid search ads. The ability to optimize campaigns is much greater with traditional paid search accounts. Plus, for businesses with more expensive services, often outweighs the ability to simply “appear at the top.”

Still Unsure?

Contact DMG. As one of the Top Search Engine Marketing Companies, DMG is fully capable of reviewing your digital marketing strategy and making a recommendation.

Google Smart Campaigns Worth It?

Five Things To Know About Google Smart Campaigns

Ahh… Google Smart Campaigns…

The latest and greatest in Google ad tech. AI and ML algorithms set to maximize results on Google campaigns… AND do so while darn near running on autopilot. Google Smart Campaigns… the future of advertising, no?

No. We’re not quite sold. At least not yet.

Look, not saying you should or shouldn’t run smart campaigns. Actually, there are instances where smart campaigns can be quite effective. In most cases, they’re at least worth testing on a small scale.

Just be careful. Google Smart Campaigns can be deceptively tricky. The results? Also tricky.

In lieu of a long thesis on how Google Ads’ algo really works on these smart campaigns, here are five quick things you should be aware of with Google Smart Campaigns.

Five Things You Should Know About Google Smart Campaigns

1.) You’ll need to relinquish all control.

Google’s going to show your ads where it wants, when it wants, and to who it wants.

Generally speaking, there’s not a heck of a lot you can do about it. For instance, you usually cannot target different audiences, demographics, keywords, placements, device type… you name it.

Additionally, most of the “levers” you’d normally look to “pull” when it comes to optimizing a campaign aren’t there. Even some of the most basic and fundamental optimizations cannot be made.

Example: wan’t to bid higher in the Philadelphia DMA on Monday mornings when people are using a mobile device? Can’t do it.

Second Example: want to acquire new customers instead of target past customers? Nope – can’t segment or exclude either.

Third example: want to only show your ads to F, 25-54? Your ads will show to whomever Google deems appropriate.

2.) Reporting is lacking in a few key ways.

Not being able to see search terms is probably the biggest downfall, depending on which type of smart campaign you’re running.

You’ll also run into headaches mining for insights based on audience reports and ad schedules, too.

Note that, again, some of these examples depend upon the type of smart campaign you are running. But, still.

Perhaps the biggest downfall isn’t just the lackluster reporting, but that the data that is available cannot be used to optimize the campaign.

Example: you might be able to get performance data by device type, but won’t be able to adjust bids accordingly. The same goes for placement reports…

3.) The quality of clicks and placements is often poor.

Granted, the clicks are usually pretty inexpensive, but frequently result in high bounce rates, low on-site engagement rates, and low conversion rates.

As far as the placements, DMG has seen ads receiving a concerning number of impressions on completely undesirable, blatantly irrelevant placements.

First Example: on mobile apps for children.

Second Example: on YouTube channels with lullaby songs for toddlers that play on a loop.

Third Example: websites written in Mandarin…

…and, this happens with considerable frequency, and there is not much you can do to prevent it.

Think about that. The fact that you are paying for an ad to appear on children’s videos is bad.

What’s worse? Imagine the goal for this campaign is to increase awareness and drive traffic to your website. Because the impressions and clicks on these children’s videos are cheap, Google’s ML will actually buy more ads on the video (and others like it).

The result: it appears you’re hitting target CPMs. CTRs and CPCs are good, and you’re driving more and more traffic to your site… except, the traffic is junk!

4.) The quality of leads can be unacceptably poor.

While this may not apply for d2c brands or ecommerce sites, advertisers looking to generate lead conversions might be left disappointed.

Glance at the Google Ads dash and conversion metrics (Conv., Cost / Conv., Conv. Rate) and the data might look pretty darn good. Take a closer look at conversion quality, however, and you might be surprised at what you’ll find out.

First Example: recorded calls reveal people calling your business for totally unrelated matters.

Second Example: recorded calls of Robocallers dialing your business with an automated.

Third Example: phone call leads that came from a children’s nursery rhyme video with a call duration of :01 seconds.

Keep in mind three things…

First, at a glance, your conversion metrics are gonna look great. It’s not until you peel back the layers that you start to find red flags.

Second, you’re paying for those junk leads.

Third, Google’s ML is going to optimize the campaign in order to (unknowingly) get you even more junk conversions!

5.) Cross-channel & conversion funnel analyses and/or optimization is poor.

This is largely because Google will automatically target new users, retarget past users, and remarket to past or current customers, all in one campaign.

That might be OK for in-house SEMs working for an SMB with little experience & working on a small budget.

But for the rest, that can cause big issues…

First Example: the inability to market new users differently than past visitors or existing customers breaks fundamental marketing principles. It’s a step backwards, not forwards.

Second Example: the inability to easily distinguish which campaigns are best for Acquisition, Retargeting, or Remarketing.

Third Example: the inability to easily answer questions like “What is our CPA on Google Ads?” vs “What is our ROAS on retargeting campaigns?” vs “Can we increase buy rate using Google Ads?”

The Verdict’s Still Out, But…

    1. If you are working with the best Google Ads agency possible, you should be OK. The best SEMs will likely have a thorough understanding of how these smart campaigns work. They can apply the human element needed to avoid any wasted spend and maximize performance.
    2. If you’re still unsure, create a test campaign. Generally speaking, 30 days should suffice. But, keep a close eye out. Remember what to look for. Bookmark this list and come back to it if need be.

Are You Running Smart Campaigns?

If you are and would like a second set of eyes, a Google Certified Partner here at DMG would be happy to peak under the hood. Just give us a shout!

Final thought…

Having been Google Ads Certified for many years, I should give the platform and its software some credit. In fairness, I must acknowledge the fact that Google’s Smart Campaigns will likely make great advancements in time. Google’s track record in the MarTech and Digital Search space is impressive to say the least.

But for now, it is DMG’s experience that a well-trained digital marketing expert is needed “behind the wheel” of these campaigns.

May We Ask A Small Favor?

Have experience with these campaigns?

Let us know your thoughts in the comments section.

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