How one family law firm in Florida was able to sell their business after just a few years because of Internet leads

Damian Turco Esq. of Mass Injury Firm was one of the speakers at the Suffolk University legal marketing conference this May and had a mind-blowing story of how he used the Internet at very young age to start and sell a law firm. Damian moved from Massachusetts to Florida in order to start a family law firm. He grew it to 10 employees solely through driving traffic to his website via blogging, content and social media, capturing leads, and closing deals. In a matter of three or four years, because of the huge amount of leads coming from the Internet, he was able to sell his firm and move back to Massachusetts to start another one.

He had some really interesting things to say to those who are afraid of the Internet, blogging, and social media because of ethics and compliance issues. He claims that it will take you a mere 15 minutes to read through all of the rules on ethics in web marketing for law firms.

Here are some links to Massachusetts Bar Rules for law firm websites and attorney advertising, etc.:

• Massachusetts Bar Rules and Helpful Information
• Rules of Professional conduct in Massachusetts
• About false or misleading communication on law firm websites
• Attorney ethical questions and inquiries in Massachusetts
• Supreme Judicial Court rules and court opinions etc. in Massachusetts

While it is not an issue to be belittled, many lawyers are using fear of compliance problems as an excuse to not develop content, while others are getting their heads around what they can and can’t say online, writing great content, making great websites, and getting rich because of it. Seriously rich. I know — I’ve helped a lot of them, and web leads can be a total game changer. Not all areas of law are going to be perfectly suited for web leads, but in the majority of cases, even if people don’t find you from the web, they are going to go to your website, to see if they can trust you enough to hire you.

Damian said that 25% of his traffic was from his blog, and while that doesn’t sound like a lot of traffic, he had 800 monthly visitors to his family law website. Family law in Florida is not exactly a celebrity gossip site or Comedy Central, but it’s amazing with such a small amount of monthly visitors he was able to get enough leads to actually sell the firm.

He claims that blog frequency directly impacts customer acquisition, and that until you have 50 to 100 pages, you won’t get much traction. HubSpot, a leader in the Internet marketing space, says something very similar — they claim that 100 to 200 pages should be your minimum website count.

David White of White, Breakstone and Gluck, at the same conference, mentioned that one-third of his business comes from referrals, one-third from former clients, and one-third from the web. So many lawyers tell me that 85% of their business comes from referrals and the rest from past customers, and only a handful from the Internet. My response is that you are not getting leads from the Internet, not because it is impossible, but because you are not doing enough. I know and work with many law firms that are getting at least one-third of their business through the Internet and are good examples of how the landscape of attorney marketing is changing. Make sure you don’t look back one day as your firm dissolves beneath your feet and say “coulda, shoulda, woulda.” Plan carefully, but then just do it before some young gun buries you.

Question: What kinds of content do you feel would legitimately put you at risk, and what types of content do you feel are appropriate?