PPC AND PAY-PER-CALL OVERVIEW

PPC is the marketing industry abbreviation for "pay per click". This is one of the dominant forms of online advertising, and it's what you'll see most other types of online ads compared with.  

There are many different ways to pay for a PPC campaign depending on your strategy. However, most lawyers want to generate leads first and foremost, so they usually pay for clicks on the ads that redirect to the firm's website.  

PPC for lawyers is very competitive, with some of the highest costs per click of any profession or industry. However, if you customize and target your campaigns correctly, it can be cost-effective.  

PPC typically generates visitors to your website. Those visitors might convert into leads when they use the contact forms or call the phone numbers on your website. This is in contrast with pay-per-call.  

Pay per call is a form of advertising that generates only calls. Since incoming calls are usually what lawyers want the most, this is an attractive strategy for attorneys. Although there are different pay-per-call techniques, such as search engine pay-per-call ads , we will be talking about calls you buy directly from an agency in this article

COST EFFECTIVENESS OF DIFFERENT METHODS

You will see a lot of general statistics about paper click versus pay-per-call online. You will want to keep a few things in mind when reading these numbers — but the bottom line here is you should take all of these statistics with a grain of salt.  

Most figures you encounter will be talking about the general cost-effectiveness across multiple industries. It doesn't really make sense to average fashion e-commerce in with legal services, though.  

In the right legal practice area, a single lead can generate tens of thousands of dollars of revenue. Overall, leads tend to be more valuable for law firms than they are for many other types of businesses. Depending on your practice area, the exact numbers will differ.  

There's also the issue of having recent data — or not having it, as the case may be. These types of advertising methods are typically priced based on demand, similar to an auction system. If other attorneys want to bid for the same types of calls or clicks that you do, prices will increase accordingly.

  If you really want to know the relative cost-effectiveness of these methods for your specific type of law firm, contact us at Legal Locator. We have up-to-date information from providing services to our current clients, we will be more than happy to help you formulate a winning strategy.

WHICH TYPES OF FIRMS BENEFIT MOST FROM BUYING CALLS?

Buying calls can come with some sticker shock, especially for lawyers who are used to paying for clicks or paying for leads. Remember that calls are generally a more desirable type of attention for law firms and that they tend to convert at higher rates than other types of leads. That said, here are some situations in which firms tend to benefit the most from buying calls:

Another reason is that organic lead generation strategies take time to start showing results. For example, it takes time to grow the readership for your blog or increase your search rank for a website. Both of these tools can be powerful lead generators, but buying leads is usually the best way to get quality leads while you build your presence.

● New firms or firms without established lead generation engines (e.g. SEO, social media presence, professional quid pro quo referrals, past clients, positive online reviews)

● Firms with underutilized intake or office staff on payroll

● Attorneys practicing in areas that experience seasonal lulls in lead volume

● Firms experiencing a temporary reduction in incoming leads

● Offices prioritizing a higher rate of lead conversion

● Lawyers without the time or desire to test and tune the complex strategies necessary to make PPC profitable

BUYING CALLS VERSUS BUYING OTHER TYPES OF LEADS

If you decide that buying calls is not the best choice for you right now, then you should know that there are other types of leads you can buy. Basically, you can choose to have people contacting you in other formats (other than phone calls) or, alternatively, have agencies pass along the contact information of the potential clients.

  Calls are inherently delivered in real-time, but that's not true of all leads. It's important to confirm that you get immediate delivery of any lead you buy, which is often accomplished by automatically referring qualified leads to your office.   Calls are also inherently unique; in other words, the person calling is only calling your office.

The same is not necessarily the case with some other types of leads. Be sure to confirm with the agency that you're only paying for unique leads.

With all of that in mind, buying other types of leads can make sense from a cost-effectiveness perspective. The qualifier here is that you need to be able to respond quickly to any leads you buy. This ensures that the leads are fresh and increases the chances that you communicate with the potential client before the search for attorneys continues. This responsiveness should increase your conversion rates and help you generate a return on your investment.

CHOOSING A LEAD GENERATION AGENCY

Our advice is to choose a lead generation agency that provides fresh, unique, qualified leads or calls specifically for the legal profession. Flexibility is also an issue — think twice before locking yourself into a long-term lead buying plan.

We hope you will consider Legal Locator as your lead provider . We have experience working with firms across the country, and we are ready to schedule a demonstration or consultation with you today.