Small Law Firms Can't Find a Trustworthy SEM Agency
Small law firms are finding it difficult to find effective and affordable marketing services. They're experiencing frustration with agencies that demand high upfront costs or deliver little value, and are questioning the overall worth of digital marketing efforts given their own limited expertise. This leads to wasted money and a lack of client acquisition.
SOURCES (60)
“I work for an agency who is not well versed in SEO (don’t get me started, they are 100% jack of all trades, master to none). I got put on doing SEO along with a million other tasks, including being client facing. Realistically, how many…”
“Companies outsource their cold calling to you? Do you have a standardized pricing structure or is each contract negotiated?”
“We’ve been struggling with Meta and google ads and would love to hear from people who have actually worked with a good agency in this space. Not looking for random agencies, only interested in people with real experience with peptide brands. submitted by /u/EnvironmentalDot9131 [link] [comments]”
“The industry I work in doesn't traditionally do a ton of marketing, but I saw this as an opportunity. To get the ball rolling, I hired a marketing firm on a modest budget to run some social media campaigns, Google ads and SEO. Once we had something established, I just followed their lead and took over myself. The only thing I haven't be able to emulate is where they were hiring actors to read off a script and record a video. This process worked well for me anyway. Our web orders increase”
“My directory is just starting up but i pay for a service that will let me create content and push it to multiple platforms on a schedule (not paid, just posts). I connect my rss feed to it and use ai for ideas and images like charts or infographics, basically i will spend 2-3 hours in the weekend creating ideas this way and scheduling out for as long as possible. This is organic, but marketing can also be right here in Reddit, or it can get organic seo if you have the talent and concentration. D”
“I’m a director of marketing at a midsized business. We have a small in-house team but not enough people to handle everything we’re doing, so we’ve relied on outside help. For years I’ve been spending $20K a month on marketing agencies to fill the gaps. They handle creative, lead gen, and outbound work for us. It worked for some time, but I’ve become increasingly frustrated with the cost given the pace they move to get things done. I don’t have an issue spending that much if I’m seeing value in w”
“This tracks with basically everything I've seen in 11 years doing this, and it's almost always the same root cause: the person with the reputation is the one who sold you, not the one working your account. I've worked both sides of this, agency and brand. Watched brands pay $25K/month for Amazon PPC management alone, and the results were fine. Not bad, not $25K good. Turned out the senior guy on the sales call was running 15+ accounts, and the day to day was three junior people rotat”
“I charge $100 for side work (which is on the lower end). My client likes that I can meet him face to face, have a beer, and discuss his project. Basically networking, he wants someone he knows, vs some online stranger.”
“Not sure. I don't do seo, but your experience is something you should post with your offer”
“Setup wise I have done for dental client. But with respect to legal firms is there anything thats different?”
“Yes of course it does and it's not a legal thing. It's going to take work from the firm too to get you set up and tell you what they want. They don't want to invest that time with someone with next to no experience.”
“Can I ask you a question honestly? I dont have experience with legal firms but if you are going to pay only when you see results does my experience matter? And yes if you feel I dont have expertise you would know within a month.”
“You haven't provided any info to tell folks if you are any good. Can you show any previous work you have done for others that have helped them? How could someone tell you didn't just read a few seo articles and now you think you can help a firm? How much work will it take from the firm to set this up? These are some of the types of questions you need to answer, unless you're just an ai bot posting”
“I’d really appreciate some advice from people who have experience with cold outreach, especially by email or phone. I’m a marketer, and I regularly come across businesses running Google Ads where I can immediately see things that could be improved: weak ad copy, poor landing pages, lack of trust elements, targeting issues, etc. I’m pretty confident I could help some of these businesses, but honestly, I’m not really sure how to approach them. I’ve been testing cold emails, but I often get “not in”
“How big is your budget for targeted paid advertising? ... If you're not an expert in that area I'd urge you to pay someone who is -- the cost of their consultancy will be less than the amount you waste on poorly targeted, non-converting ads.”
“I scrape upwork, i find the company who post the job, i find the email of the person and send a cold email. It usually works.”
“He does show you how to market, but his marketing strategies are like 6 years ancient. I think he believes that by providing daily calls, you can get the help you need with clients. I have called in a few times and they were very helpful. But his marketing tactics are awful.”
“Yes! This! His marketing videos are from 2019. I emailed them and said they needed to invest in someone who is truly a marketing and social media expert. Because he is not. I saw the info for Akadian and wished I had seen that first. I’ve signed up for a cheaper version of Akadian so that I can learn more of CAS. My thing is that he is telling anyone that they can do it. And you can tell by the questions being asked on FB and in the weekly calls that there are people who should be told they can’”
Ask them, send a survey and give them 1 month free if they answer.
“Many bad agencies are quiet on social media too. Not they’re busy making money. In fact, if they do well, they should be able to afford social media manager to maintain their online presence.”
“Agencies charge 5-10x and throw projects to junior, or outsource freelancers. You pay large budget to their layers of management, and sale person commision. These people are not the ones who handle your project. Usually, the underpaid freelancers or broke employees are real workers. This mean, no one will take full responsability. The employees have many projects to do and burnt themselves out, while the charming sale person who spoke with you is busy closing another deals with different leads.”
“For this model, targeted outreach to agencies, consultants and freelancers with overflow work seems far more promising than traditional affiliate directories.”
“I am looking for meta ad expert who can generate quality and qualified US leads. I am interested in paying per qualified leads. If you can help me with that, please drop me a message. I would love to connect with you. Thanks submitted by /u/ResidentMonth5213 [link] [comments]”
“What % of leads increased from the SEO work? What revenue does that equate to? Is it more than the cost of the SEO? Will SEO continue to deliver their value yet over year? Personally I think SEO is a tackle it once expense then refurbish once a year. At the very least every month they should be sending you a statement of hours so you know exactly what they are doing for their 1.7k.”
“I don't think all agencies are scams, but I do think there's a huge difference between hiring an agency and hiring the person whose expertise convinced you to sign. The biggest red flag for me would be the lack of accountability and communication. Delegating should reduce your workload, not turn you into a full-time quality-control manager auditing expensive mistakes. At your stage, I'd probably lean toward building a small team of specialists directly. Start with the area that's”
“I believe these services are business without guarantee of outcome. I was an agency owner, until 2 years ago. If I had the money to hire an agency, I would instead do this: Learn marketing and sales myself, its the core of every organization, no sales = break. Even cases of companies without revenue (a la instagram when founded) need marketing and sales skills to raise capital. After learning the basis, Id hire a young person, who has no skills but good attitude/professional behaviour (as much a”
“I know you have a lot of experiences, what do you think about digital marketers? Do you have em?”
“I've been doing marketing automation work for small service businesses for about 4 years now. Along the way I've watched clients waste money on the wrong things over and over, so here's my honest breakdown of what actually moves the needle and what just sounds cool. Worth it: 1. Replying to new leads fast. This one is boring but it's everything. Someone fills your form and you reply 4 hours later? They already called someone else. Even a simple instant "got your message, wil”
“Questionable cold calling strategy aside, you're paying $15 / hr for an account manager role that would be paying thr salaried equivalent of around 35-45/hr at any established org. Extrapolate from that.”
“I run a full-service marketing agency, so obviously I’m coming at this with that perspective, but I’ve worked on both sides of this and I genuinely think the answer depends on where your business is at and how much of your marketing you’re trying to hand off. If you have one specific thing you need help with, I think hiring a freelancer is a great place to start. If your website needs work, hire a great web person, if SEO is the priority, hire someone who lives and breathes SEO. You don’t need a”
“My firm has struggled with marketing for years. We run a small personal injury practice in a Midwest midsize market. We are considering hiring a fractional CMO to assist with our marketing efforts. Has anybody else had success with this model and/or have any recommendations for vendors? submitted by /u/ConceptRepulsive5336 [link] [comments]”
“I came across this company called Bark. Promised that there are tons of people looking to hire digital services or any other services. I tried it but I find the price is too high to connect with leads. Researched for a while and they got very bad reviews on Reddit saying all those leads are scam and it’s not worth buying it. Have you guys tried it? How was your experience? submitted by /u/Pristine_Orchid_5568 [link] [comments]”
“The thing that changed for us at the top of the range was that people started asking who else uses it, by name. At 50 nobody checks, at 149 they want someone they can actually ring. Worth lining up two customers who will take that call before you push the price any further.”
“A freelancer can also be a better alternative, since they charge less and properly more experienced in specific than agencies.”
“In most agencies, people who do the actual works are burnout with 10-50 clients like you. And they properly get pay below 50k a years. While the sale persons are good at making promise and account managers are master of calm things down in the meeting. If they have a lot of clients like 30+ and their team member is below 15, it's a sign they won't have much time doing your work properly.”
“are you a solo marketer or do you have a team? because if its just you, the real problem isnt time management, its that leadership expects one person to cover what should be 3-4 roles. thats a resourcing conversation not a productivity one”
“Hi, I'm a financial advisor and I started studying marketing and social media ads to help myself get more leads. I know I can pay someone to do it but I always prefer learning by myself. I understood the basic of running ads, CBO vs ABO, Creatives but I'm missing an important piece. THE CRM So which CRM should I use, I hear some people build them and others pay for ready to use CRM that already integrate to facebook and even send texts to lead that filled up a form. Any recommendation on”
“Do you girls know where I can find a reputable agency / marketer ? submitted by /u/OrganizationOk8606 [link] [comments]”
“from my lens it's worth noticing that every reply so far is someone offering themselves or their network, which is kind of the answer to your question and also the problem with it. the real answer is referrals, mostly, and thats useless advice because you cant act on it. the more useful question is what you do once you have three names, so heres what id actually look at. the detail in your post that matters most is that you already have channels working and a content foundation. that changes”
“One question before the hire that saves a lot of pain. Do you already have a channel that half works? A first growth hire can scale something showing signs of life. They almost never find the channel from scratch, and if you put them on a 90 day leash to do that, they will spend the whole time testing and have nothing to show you at the end of it. adeelraza86 is right about defining the number first. I would add how to test for it in the interview. Ask them to walk you through something they ran”
“Looking to better understand my current position/situation. My company is a CM firm making $10M+/year (or thereabouts) in a major metropolitan area. At the moment we've got 2 marketing folks — myself as Branding & Communications Coordinator (6y+, part-time by choice at about 20-25 hours/week) and then a Sr. Marketing Coordinator (4y+, full-time). I handle things like visual branding/messaging standards, LinkedIn scheduling and posting, website updates, quarterly newsletter, the presentat”
“Here's something I noticed running content for a client's SEO agency. We were bidding on "SEO agency" and "hire SEO expert." Expensive and competitive. Then I looked at what people search before they even know they need an agency/SEO guy, things like "what is domain authority" or "what does CTR mean." Turns out way more people are searching for that than "hire SEO expert." And almost nobody was making content for it at the time. We starte”
“I've been looking at this from the law firm side and it's a mess. Google Ads reports 47 conversions. Meta Ads claims 32. The call tracking vendor logged 61 calls. The attorneys signed 9 retainers. Every platform takes credit for the same leads and the numbers never reconcile. When you line the dashboards up side by side, you realize you've been paying three vendors to fight over the same phone call. The client who actually signed came from one channel, but all three platforms counted”
“Be careful with pay per appointment since they can book junk and you eat the ops cost. Ask for 2 live call recordings and a recent client ref plus how they handle DNC and consent in NC. If you test in house first you can pull a tight list of property managers and high end areas with SocLeads and run a 2 week trial before signing anything.”
“the website being created in february is worth being suspicious about but it doesnt automatically mean theyre lying, alot of agencies rebrand or spin up a new domain when they pivot into a new niche or ownership changes, so before writing them off id just straight up ask them directly, were you operating under a different name or domain before this and can you connect me with two or three current clients doing similar high income residential work so i can hear how its actually going. a legit age”
“Worth questioning the channel before you gather the three quotes. There's a reason your searches keep turning up ads and SEO shops instead of call centers. Cold calling US homeowners is a legal minefield, most residential numbers sit on the Do Not Call registry and the fines run per call, so reputable agencies quietly got out of consumer cold calling years ago. What's left is mostly the ones who don't care, and the high income homeowners you're targeting are the least likely to a”
thanks for the info! do you work with clients in NC or NY?
“I've been exploring different avenues to generate leads and am running into one hell of a time. The Angi's, Thumbtack, Houzz, etc. are all charging pretty high prices for less-than-mediocre leads. I want to build relationships with Architects and Designers, but I don't have enough of my own work to showcase. Any thoughts or suggestions? Thanks in advance. submitted by /u/baby-key-bumps [link] [comments]”