Adventures in Social Media Marketing – The Mystery of The #Hashtag
My new website: www.hunterlawfirm.net
This will be a short post to “WV Lawyer – Tips and Techniques” for small firm lawyers and small businesses who are addressing the challenge of creating a marketing plan that includes something besides The Yellow Pages.
Note I did NOT say, “instead of The Yellow Pages”. I doubled my Yellow Pages budget this year after cutting back, to my detriment, in order to be able to afford nearly $1400/mo. for my Findlaw website. Like it or not, or believe it or not, but potential litigants in North Central WV still look for a lawyer in the Yellow Pages in numbers similar to those who are searching for them on the WEB.
BUT, once a client finds you in the Yellow Pages or even by a recommendation by a trusted friend or relative, that potential client is more and more likely to look you up on the WEB. So, if your Google Maps page is not claimed, or Your Google +, or Yelp, Linked In, AVVO, or Facebook professional page, or other websites, or if your reviews are mediocre or missing, then YOU HAVE A PROBLEM!
Establishing a major site with Findlaw, was quite a challenge. We had two major projects, creating, and two years later, revising, my site at www.hunterlawfirm.net . But, once established, my Findlaw site became static. Because of turnover, I never knew who to contact, a just could not and my Findlaw representative just could not answer my questions, and make the changes that I needed. And, $1200+/mo. was quite a drain to my marketing budget.
www.hunterlawfirm.net is still my url, but it is very much changed now. I spent @ $4000 with some bright young entrepreneurs, a graphic artist, and a programmer, to establish my site on a WordPress platform. My first page is shown above.
Now, for @ $200/mo. of maintenance, Dan the programmer keeps track of the site, monitoring it, making minor changes and adjustments, and answering my questions as they arise.
Recently, I noticed a colleague who has a link in his e-mail signature to a site called www.AVVO.com. I clicked on it and discovered that he and his firm had ratings of “Superb – 10.0”.
With his suggestions, I was able to move my AVVO rating from 6.5 to my own “Superb”, 9.8. If you care to give me a kind “five star review”, I might make it to a 10.0 rating myself: here it is: http://tinyurl.com/lrtybyg
At my request, Dan was able to insert a button link on my page to AVVO. , in addition to the others he had already installed, for Facebook, Twitter, Google +, and Linked In.
Here is that page. The AVVO button is lower right.
As I continued my efforts to become savvy with Internet Marketing, I went to www.Lynda.com and found a course “The Essentials of Twitter”. I was on the road, and my ATT&T data downloading was very disappointing. I will watch the Lynda course later. And, after spending an hour or so with the course, it did not explain hashtags. They are a mystery.
I went to Youtube.com and discovered an 8 minute video by #Jerad Hill . He pitched his “free course” on www.Edemy.com which I also viewed. I had to download an app for Ademy, but this course was, indeed, free. Now Edemy is trying to get me to spend $10-$100 per course on other not so free courses.
Here is the link to Jerad Hill’s course. It really does not solve the mystery, but it has convinced me that I will just try to #hashtag my key words, especially on Twitter, and see what happens. https://www.udemy.com/understanding-hashtags-in-social-media/. He suggests that we use hashtags for FaceBook, Google+, Pinterest, and photo sites.
If you like to write, as I do, and find this stuff to be fun, as I do, then dive in and see what happens.
For heavens sake, do not fail to claim your profiles on the major free sites!
My friend Dick Billick has shown me a survey questionnaire system to help me and my staff manage my reputation and get some good reviews. Write me at hunterjb@hunterlawfirm.net, and I will send you Dick’s e-mail address.
I hope found something worthwhile here. If you only claim your profile on AVVO.com, I think you did.
#hashtags ; #Jerad Hill #WVLawyerTipsandTechniques
jbh
This post was written by Burton Hunter