Remember a month ago when we suggested that you should wear your office clothes, including shoes now that you are working from home? Eh, did you follow our advice?
It’s been a month since we started practicing social distancing and switched our operations to remote working, and in this follow-up episode, Grace and Liel have a conversation about what we have learned so far.
Our conversation starts with an update on how working from home feels after this first month. We discuss the challenges that other legal professionals and we are facing and what we are doing to tackle these issues. Furthermore, we analyze the first meaningful insights into the search volumes for different practice areas based on Google data, and we also update you on how Google My Business has changed and then changed again since COVID-19.
Finally, Grace talks about the loan your law firm cannot afford not to apply for and how to do it.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
Slides
Articles
- How To Accurately Update Your Law Firm’s GMB Listing During The Pandemic
- Desktop Gains Grounds In Search Amid COVID-19
- Google My Business (GMB) Is Changing Just Like Your Law Firm
Video Apps
For personal communications
Loans
You can connect with us by visiting our website: incamerapodcast.com
Send us your questions at ask@incamerapodcast.com
Enjoy the show? Please don’t forget to subscribe, tell your coworkers, and leave us a review!
Transcript
Liel: [00:00:00] It’s been a month since many of us had to transition to working from home. What have we learned so far and is the data backing up the notion that this is the time to invest in your law firm? I’m Liel Levy, co-founder of Nanato Media and this is In-camera podcast where data and numbers do the talking.
Liel: [00:00:50] Welcome to in-camera private legal marketing conversations. Grace, how are you today?
Grace: [00:00:55] Good, how are you, Liel?
Liel: [00:00:57] I’m doing great, Grace. And, you know, it’s been almost a month now since we first started, you know, in this new adjusted reality where a lot of us are doing most of our work from home. I know for you Grace, this is your second week working from home. How’s that shift been going on for you?
Grace: [00:01:21] A lot more communication.
Liel: [00:01:23] Right. So things that were simple in the past now take a few additional steps. And that’s one of the challenges. Right. It comes with remote working. And so that’s that’s really what we’re going to be dedicating this conversation to, right, Grace? I think, you know, we were very early in putting out an episode talking about what we can do to adjust and adapt and how can we keep up our operations with as little disruptions as possible. But the reality is that things, you know, since we’ve actually put up that episode, up until now, things have changed. Some of these things have worked. Some other things required further adjustments because the reality is that it’s not that simple. Right. It’s not just about the technology and it’s not just about having an Internet connection. It requires a little bit more to that in order to be able to work. I for instance, Grace, I can tell you I’m very used to working from home. Like the whole process of having to adapt to being less the office and more working from home was not an issue for us. But I will tell you what’s been an issue is having the kids around all the time, because that takes away from the attention that you would usually put. You wouldn’t get as many interruptions as you may be getting now. Right.
Grace: [00:02:46] That’s right. And vice versa. Right. Because the kids don’t have the same space that they used to. And so now they’re in your space. You’re in their space. And I think it’s been harder for them to adjust.
Grace: [00:02:58] And honestly, I keep reading more and more about it. My daughter happens to be in college level and she’s in dense. So they had to build out basically my husband had to build out a ballet bar for her downstairs and I have to give up the entire downstairs floor so that she can actually go to school.
Liel: [00:03:16] Yeah.
Grace: [00:03:16] So yeah, it’s I mean, I think…
Liel: [00:03:18] It’s come with a lot of sacrifices at all ends. Everyone has had to do their part in order to, you know, make this work for them, for their families. And it’s kind of like we’re all in this together sort of situation. But that doesn’t mean that, you know, there’s no tensions and things are not easy. And I really like early a few weeks ago, sorry, when we had Jason like his take on use this time also like don’t fight the reality. And if you have to, you know, stop what you’re doing and embrace the moment and dedicate yourself to your family members, give them the attention, maybe, maybe that is going to be a better use of your time than actually trying to push through a project that you just cannot concentrate on, on that particular second. Right. Because there’s other things happening in your environment that also are calling for your attention. So, you know, having that flexibility, understanding when there is the time for for dedicating yourself to your loved ones and focusing on work and it’s in my case, Grace, a lot of our work right now is happening at night, like literally late at night when everybody’s already asleep. We’re actually doing a lot of our work to push through and to make sure that we’re not falling behind with any of our accounts and staying one or two steps ahead of what’s coming next.
Liel: [00:04:46] Because that’s the other thing. That’s the other element is the volatile climate that is out there. And so as a marketing strategist for several law firms that are depending on those in generating clients, you cannot just think about what’s happening right now. You need to think about how things are going to evolve within the next two or three days, next week and two weeks from now, so that you can start anticipating that in your strategy. And one of the things that we’re going to be talking about now, Grace, has to do with that, how the market has been impacted. Where have we’ve seen opportunities where have we’ve seen impact, negative and positive and really…
Grace: [00:05:27] A conversation, how it’s shifting.
Liel: [00:05:27] Be able to share information with people who may still feel very anxious about what’s happening and what they should be doing. Well, at least we can share based on real data, what we already know has happened. The trend that has been set up until now and hopefully that can be used to better inform the decisions that are going to be making for the next coming days and weeks. How does that sound?
Grace: [00:05:57] Exactly, no I’m with you, and as Liel said at the beginning. And honestly, guys, this is a true private conversations that we’ve had over. That Liel and I ask ourselves have had between each other, about how we’ve managed through this process, everything from like the paycheck protection program to, you know, how we’re dealing with it. Working from home as a team individually and as a law firm.
Liel: [00:06:23] Yep, exactly. That’s really what’s been on our minds every time. Every time when we’re in the green room before starting an episode and after we finish an episode. And this is really what we are talking about. So, Grace, let’s let’s talk about a big item here, which is how Google my business has changed since COVID-19, emerged. Right. Because actually, there’s been updates, there’s been changes. Google has made a lot of effort to still be relevant and put important information and for in front of users. Right. And so some of those changes that have been made have to do with particularly Google my business. Now, here’s what we knew that happened right already.
Liel: [00:07:14] And we’re talking almost three weeks ago that these changes took place. So number one Google’s stopped publishing new reviews. Right. So it’s very important to understand people can still go to your Google my business listing and leave a review. You can still send emails for existing or past clients to leave you reviews. However, their reviews are not going to get published. And so we’re going to talk about what are our recommendations in this particular scenario. Right? Now, review replies from your obviousness to the reviews that’s been sent to you. So up until yesterday, Grace. So since mid-March, until yesterday, you could not see your replies show on your Google my business.
Liel: [00:07:59] Since yesterday, Google started again showing replies for reviews that are already published and visible on your Google my business. Right. So that’s a step forward from what we know Google will try to do, which is eventually go back to normality and be able to show reviews and allow you to reply to them in real time.
Liel: [00:08:22] Now, another aspect of my business that got affected is questions and answers since mid-March Google does not publish new QNAs. And so that’s something that we also anticipate for it to go back to normality within the next few weeks. There are no timelines. Google has not given yet any information as to when can we expect this go back to normality. Same as with new reviews. But the expectation is for these to eventually go back to normality soon. Right now, it’s not a time to build on creating questions and answers. Well, I wouldn’t say creating you can always create them, but you won’t be able to post them and see them live.
Liel: [00:09:10] Other things such as listing verification products post. Those have been unaffected. And as a matter of fact, Grace, from the post standpoint, they created a new post which is COVID-19 post type. And in this particular post type, you can actually update and sharing information about what your business is doing in order to service clients during these times.
Liel: [00:09:40] So whether it’s about their precautions, safety precautions that you’re taking in order to run your business, whether it’s about your availability to do video consultations and so forth and so on, you can use this kind of post to inform your audience on a different note when it comes down to your opening hours and such. Google has been proactive about updating certain business hours automatically based on the local guidelines that have been established by each state and each city.
Liel: [00:10:20] We noticed that law firms for the most of it did not get affected by this in the sense that Google went right ahead and changed their opening hours and operation hours automatically. However, Google is encouraging for any business that actually need any change in their operational hours to go ahead and update those under Google my business. What do you think about all this, Grace?
Grace: [00:10:47] Yeah, so. We’ve been following all of it in Gacovino and Lake. And honestly, we did the same thing and we move forward and took it a step further and put some messaging on the actual Web site as well. You know, taking them to a landing page that sort of lets them know that we’re here for them. You know, we’re still although the office may be closed. We are still taking calls and teleconferencing. So we have attempted to do, or utilize all of what Google has provided to us now, in terms of the COVID things, you just taught me a little bit about that COVID post type, I wasn’t 100 percent aware of that. So I was actually noting it just now. So, yeah. No, everything you’re saying is is exactly right. And those are all the things that we’ve done at Gacovino and Lake to, you know, keep communication lines open. And and Google has been great. I mean, I noticed right away. And tell me if you noticed this in in Texas. But when I went online shortly after the whole thing went down in terms of shutting down restaurants in particular, I saw right on the Web sites they would have an X on dine in and, you know, green on delivery if they had delivery available and takeout. So it immediately shifted to that. Did you notice that?
Liel: [00:12:06] Yes, Grace. And things have even further evolved since then. Google has made and taken steps to make sure does right now on maps. What really gets highlighted are medical centers, are places where you can actually buy takeout food, grocery stores and such. Right. So what Google is doing is it’s favoring and putting in front of users what they think is the most important information that they need right now. So all of these types of business are getting prominence. And that’s why Google really wants to understand businesses like restaurants and such. What is it that they have available to offer and what has been their adjust that schedule times of operations offering so they can integrate it, what they’re presenting out to users. But as I’ve said, for the most of it, we do see that law firms have been able to retain their operating hours and everything has stayed pretty much as usual. Nevertheless, of course, you want to make sure that, as you’re saying, Grace, right, you’re putting messages on your Web site, letting know your existing clients or prospect clients that you’re still providing services during this time and taking precautions to do so. So that’s that’s an important thing, an important message to put out there that definitely people who are considering hiring you will appreciate. And we’ve said this already before. You know, this is the time to actively reach out to your existing clients. There is not such thing as just going quiet and being silent. You need to make sure that you giving updates to your existing clients, letting them know what’s happening with their cases, even if what’s happening with your cases right now is things have not evolved, things have not really moved in any direction at this point, but just that communication, just that interest. It’s just that gesture of asking about your well-being and showing that you’re there goes a very, very long way, Grace. So I think that goes without saying. I mean, it’s been said so many times and not just by us. I mean, one of the things that we’ve noticed over the past three weeks, Grace, is how the legal community has come together.
Liel: [00:14:19] Agencies, law firms, there’s been really an overwhelming amount of valuable content, webinars, even podcasts other than ours, whitepapers, e-books, everything, right. You name it. There’s so much information out there that people have put out in order to help others go and navigate through these times.
Liel: [00:14:41] And one of the more prominent items that’s in every single one of these lists, webinars or podcast is reach out to your clients, let know that you’re there. Let them know what’s happening from your end and how you can help them. That’s amazing, right? Of course, there’s more things depending on where you’re standing. What’s your position here? Can you help your community? Can you become a caregiver to your community? Amazing. But if not, then at least do that with your existent clients. And if you’re still taking in new clients, make sure that people know what is it that you’re doing? How are you available? How you can help them? What’s your take on that?
Grace: [00:15:24] Oh, definitely. I mean, it’s all about communication. And that’s, I’ve always known that. But I think shifting and everyone’s shifting to working remotely and and or having to just telecommute nowadays. I found that we just all want to connect, you know, and that that’s, that goes for everybody. That goes for the family members at home. That goes for the people that you speak on a daily basis, and especially for your clients, because they came to you in a time of need. They came to you in a time when they were probably one of the worst experiences they’ve ever had in terms of a car accident or this or that. Right. So they’re coming to you because they needed you to begin with. Now they need you more than ever. So you make sure you communicate to them, even if it’s a simple email drop saying, hey, guys, we’re here. Well, you can still call us at this number. We will answer your calls. We will answer your questions or here. Here’s a case update, like you said, Liel, and you just tell him no, there’s no update at the moment. But we wanted to let you know we are still here.
Liel: [00:16:25] Yeah. Grace. And you know what? I will take it a step further. I would honestly and I would recommend anyone, whether you’re an agency or whether you’re an attorney and you’re trying to connect with your clients. Take it a step further. Pick up the phone call clients, call clients, have personal conversations with them. They probably will be available to take your call. So that will go a long way. Grace, one thing that my agency has always done is communicate through video. So our emails actually have videos in them and we don’t send videos for every single thing that we need to communicate. But right now, Grace, we’re we’re noticing that our clients are even responding to that even better. Right, because they’re really taking the time to watch these things. And it gives them a lot of valuable information and reassurance in that personal communication. We love to meet with our clients in person. And so whenever we can, we do so. But right now, we can’t. And so these help balance that off. So I would 100% recommend you guys to explore options that you can that can allow you to easily create personal videos and send them to your clients through text message or through email.
Liel: [00:17:35] Grace, I’m just gonna put out a few applications that are good for that. One of them is Vidyard. One of them is BombBomb. I believe there’s a few other there that may not be as dominant in the market, but there’s a bunch of alternatives, right? And so definitely try that. It goes a long way and it creates better connection with your clients and partners.
Liel: [00:18:03] So, Grace, I do want to take one second here to go back and talk about the reviews part of it, because the one thing that we don’t know yet when it’s going to go back to normality is Google reviews, Google reviews. Right now, people can submit reviews, but they’re not going to be live. So so here’s the thing, Grace. I’m just going to comment here from the user standpoint, OK, right now, because the experience of the user, it’s not going to be great for them to to Google my business review. I wouldn’t recommend for people to actively ask for Google reviews. Here’s why. When you post a review as a user, you expect to hear back from the business. Now, at the moment, if you post a review, you’re not going to hear back from the business because the business is not going to be made aware that our review has been left. And so they’re not gonna see a response from you. And we don’t know how long it’s gonna take for you to get notified that this review has been left and then be able to write a response. And obviously, that’s not gonna settle well with your client. So my advice would be and going back to our episode on review generation. Is used these as an opportunity to ask for reviews for other platforms. My first choice would be do first party review generation. If you don’t have the means to do first party of your generation because you don’t have a plugin for it or such, start, use this as an opportunity to get reviews in platforms such as Avvo or even Facebook. Right? Recommendations. So that would be my take on that. And then as soon as Google my business goes back to normality, then you can go back to your standard process. I don’t know Grace. What do you think about that?
Grace: [00:20:02] I agree with you. I think that, you know, any way you can and take the time right now to try to continue augmenting these reviews into different things. So, yes, I agree with you. I think that, you know, you do what you can right now and what you just said and then you know when we go back; we all go back to normal operating procedures. I think at that point, then we can go back to our normal processes. But everything has to shift right now. The only thing constant is change. Right, Liel? So I think that we all have to change and or adapt or be stuck. And part of that is changing a little bit or tweaking our processes to help people in a better way and also help the business in a different way.
Liel: [00:20:45] Yep. So again, you can still ask for reviews in Google. They’re just not gonna be visible to the audience in general. People are not gonna, you’re not gonna get published. However, you can generate reviews for other platforms. And as I said, diversity of reviews is something that is valued for local SEO and SEO in general. And so this is a good time to create an opportunity to diversify your reviews. Great Grace. I think we can move on now to another topic, which I think it’s very interesting. And this is how search volume has trended in the month of March. Right. I think at the end of the day, we all have. We’ve all lived this past month very differently from each other. And we all have opinions and we’ve all seen how this has impacted our businesses or not. But data is data and the numbers are the numbers. And I really want us to look at how different practice areas trended during the month of March and really look at. Has there been a drop in interest or in search queries? So why do you think, Grace? Should we jump right into this?
Grace: [00:22:05] Let’s get into it. You know, I love the numbers, I’m a data nerd.
Liel: [00:22:08] Excellent. So initially, Grace, we’re gonna look at search volumes for the entire country. Right. We’re not. We’re you know, we just want to get a high level look at how the search volumes have been throughout the nation. Right. So my first search query here is car accident lawyer. Grace. What do you think the numbers go down, up or same.
Grace: [00:22:35] Think at the outset? I would have… I assume they would have gone down.
Liel: [00:22:40] They actually went up. Yes. They actually went up, they went.
Liel: [00:22:46] It’s the highest that they’ve been since the beginning of the year. Okay. And I’m looking at the overall search queries here. What I’ve noticed is that mobile is gone down a little bit, but desktop search queries have gone up. So they’re the highest they’ve been, Grace, pretty much since the summer. So that’s that’s really how car accident lawyer has been searched for over the past months. And so just speaking at a national level volume, we’re talking about close to two hundred and fifty thousand search queries that relate to car accident lawyer in the United States just in the month of March, more than February, more in January. OK.
Grace: [00:23:33] Right.
Liel: [00:23:34] We’re going to… So one thing we’re going gonna be doing as part of this exercise, Grace, is, I’m going to actually be telling you the overall search volume, whether it’s going up or down. But I’m also going to be looking at whether the mobile search volume increased or decreased. Right.
Grace: [00:23:55] Super interesting, right. Because people are at home now.
Liel: [00:23:58] Oh, yeah. Exactly. And so we actually wrote an article about these in our on our blog earlier this week. And one thing that we have noticed since the beginning of COVID is that now the usage of desktop and search queries from desktop have increased against mobile. So mobile has lost a little bit of share and desktop has increased. And as we go along through these, I will point out, because this is a tremendous opportunity to get really, really, really good high intent keywords targeting desktop at a very, very competitive, if not low cost per click. So car accident lawyer Grace and I’m going to tell you like the cost per clicks continue to range between seventy five dollars to three hundred and thirty dollars at a national level. Right. It will defer between market to market, but we can see that the cost per click has pretty much retained its value. Okay. Now let’s look at the divorce or family law. What’s what’s your guess here?
Grace: [00:25:06] Sadly, I thought it would increase.
Liel: [00:25:09] Well, not yet. Grace, I think good. I think at least the first month of COVID, people, families are coming together trying to pull this through.
Liel: [00:25:19] Right. This is not a good time to initiate fights. We don’t know what month tour, month three of this is going to be looking like. But right now, search volumes have slightly decreased.
Grace: [00:25:30] Good.
Liel: [00:25:30] I would say they’re about there about November of last year, levels in search volume. We’re talking about 400000 search queries that relate to divorce law, particularly here. Right. So that’s how it’s looking. What’s interesting here is that this search volume coming from Mobile has slightly, slightly dropped here again. Right. So very similar then with car accidents lawyer. The search volume in Mobile slightly dropped, not dramatically. Now let’s look at criminal law. OK. Search queries for criminal lawyer Grace in the month of March. Up or down?
Grace: [00:26:12] I think down.
Liel: [00:26:14] Yes, they went down and this is one area where we knew that the impact will be immediate. Right. Criminal law went down to levels kind of like November business levels, certainly not the lowest they’ve been in the year. Like if I’m comparing them to April of last year, Grace, I’m still seeing higher search volumes than there were last spring, but certainly lower than February and January. And just a slight tiny drop again on mobile search. OK, so that’s that’s criminal law so far. Now, what do you think about estate planning?
Grace: [00:26:55] I think that would go up.
Liel: [00:26:57] Actually went slightly down. January, it’s the highest that it’s been in a very long time, to be very honest with you. February was also like the second highest search volume that it had on the past 12 months. In March there’s been a drop, but I’m going to say it’s a drop that brings that pretty much to the same search volume that it almost had consistently any other month over the past twelve months, with the exception of January and February. And so mobile volume here again, tiny, tiny, tiny drop hardly noticeable. OK. And we’re looking at overall three hundred thousand search queries across the nation that relate to estate law. Now, here’s an interesting one. Bankruptcy attorney. What do you think about this one?
Grace: [00:27:49] I hope it’s gone down.
Liel: [00:27:52] You know what, Grace? It has gone down. I think it’s early. It’s early days. I think these may not look the same next month or two months from now. But as of today, second week of April, we can tell that the search volume in March was lower than it was in January and February, comparable to the search volume that bankruptcy had months like September. Slightly, slightly less than October and November.
Liel: [00:28:26] And yes, again, here we see a small drop in mobile search overall, about 80000 search queries that relate to bankruptcy attorney in the month of March alone. Now, Grace, you know, looking at things at a national level is, you know, it’s a little bit tricky because it doesn’t give you enough information to really be able to understand exactly, you know, what’s happening in your market. It doesn’t it’s not granular enough. So what I’ve done here and we could basically be doing shauntese every single day, trying to go through all of the different search volumes for different areas, for different markerts, for different practice areas, for different markets.
Liel: [00:29:13] But just to keep these general and just give a sense to people as to how does it look like in some markets in particular. Grace, I would like to share with you how car accident lawyer search volume trended in four different states.
Liel: [00:29:29] We’re going to look at New York. We’re going to look at California. We’re going to look at Florida. And we’re going to look at Texas. So, Grace, we know New York has been one of the… Well, the most affected state, unfortunately, so far due to COVID-19 and in the month of March, Grace, how do you think search volumes did there for a car accident lawyer, particularly the state of New York?
Grace: [00:29:52] Well, particularly for the state of New York. I feel like. Hmm. That’s a good question. I think it would go down, but I’m just basing on what happened recently. You know how New York’s been kind of more on a shut down than anybody else, together with California, of course, and, you know, Washington State.
Liel: [00:30:11] Well, Grace, no, not would actually stay consistent with Feburary and consistent with January. It did not. And mobile search queries also did not drop.
Liel: [00:30:23] So we had about 10000 search queries in the whole state of New York, up for car accident lawyer. And I would say that about a third of them came from mobile devices. And again, why do I point out so much mobile devices? Because particularly when your preferred method of conversion is a telephone call, then you should care a lot about what device is being used by the users who are searching about you. Because those who are doing it over a mobile device are going to be way closer to convert than those who are doing it over a desktop. So as a general rule, right, that doesn’t mean that there’s not people that are searching cross-device. They’re in their laptop and then they may switch to their phone to start a conversation with you. But generally speaking, your mobile traffic is gonna always convert at a higher rate than your desktop traffic. So it did not drop, Grace. That’s for the month of March, right? How do you think another state that was heavily impacted by these, which is California, is actually doing for car accident lawyer search volume in the month of March?
Grace: [00:31:30] I guess I would think a slight increase maybe as long as it’s not. Yeah. Possibly a slight increase. That was just my guess.
Liel: [00:31:39] Okay. Well, I think it was a wild guess, Grace. But it’s actually right. It went up, and not just by a bit, substantially. Like a good 20, 30 percent increase over the previous month.
Grace: [00:31:52] Wow.
Liel: [00:31:53] It’s the high is the search volume has been for the past 12 months. The high is the search volume has been for the past twelve months. That’s meaningful. It’s a lot.
Grace: [00:32:03] It’s a huge difference. It’s like…
Liel: [00:32:04] The difference, Grace, let me let me give you some other staggering numbers, okay? The average cost per click between one hundred and thirty four dollars on the low end. Four hundred and seventy one. At the high end range. Four hundred and seventy one dollars Grace.
Grace: [00:32:26] That’s crazy.
Liel: [00:32:28] It is. But it shows that there is demand.
Grace: [00:32:30] Yeah, that’s true.
Liel: [00:32:31] There is demand. Sixty thousand search queries in the state of California in the month of March. In the middle of corbit 19. Car accident lawyer.
Liel: [00:32:43] It’s higher than any other month over the past twelve months. It’s very meaningful. It’s important. The search volume over mobile device. I must say though, it’s dropped a bit compared to the last three months. But the desktop traffic in general exceeds any other month, as I’ve said already, too many times over the past twelve months. So it’s a it’s really, it’s really interesting to see. Right.
Grace: [00:33:12] Yes.
Liel: [00:33:13] Now, Grace, let’s move to the great state of Texas. OK.
Liel: [00:33:20] And I want to take your guess here. What do you think happened in the month of March in Texas? Car accident lawyer.
Grace: [00:33:27] I think. And from what I know of Texas being not that hard hit, I could be completely wrong and you’re going to correct me. I think it would have increased.
Liel: [00:33:40] It increased, Grace. It increased. It’s the highest it’s been this year so far. Higher than in January. Higher than in February. Tiny drop on mobile compared to the previous two months. Not the highest like California as it has been another months, but it’s certainly the highest it has been pretty much since the holidays. And so it’s again, a very, very meaningful statement to be made as to how this has impacted particularly personal injury, car accidents. Right. So that’s how Texas is doing. And Grace, I’m going to take you now to your state of Florida. What do you think happened there? Car accident lawyer.
Grace: [00:34:30] I thought it would go down because of what was going on, but I know that they left it open past spring break, so I would think up.
Liel: [00:34:38] Ok. Well, actually, Florida grace light slightly like hard to tell the difference between February and March, but slightly less. Mobile search volume stayed the same though, overall it had a tiny drop. You probably know if the month of February was forty thousand then probably march was around thirty seven thirty eight thousand search queries. Right. So a very, very, very slight drop. Of course, these numbers are sort of like the search volume is kind of consistent to what you’ve had over the past three months and still higher than, for instance, you get on once like November and October. Of course, August and September are months where the search queries just kind of go through the roof. But comparing it to the past last three months, you wouldn’t necessarily see a difference, a major difference, Grace. Now, there’s one last number that I’d like to share with you. Right. Because, you know, we are a legal marketing agency that specializes on Spanish marketing, Hispanic marketing. And I want to share with you also the numbers for search queries in Spanish. Abogado de accidentes. Right. And I’m just I’m now actually going to share them for the whole United States because obviously we would spend another 15 minutes here if we were to do, again, every single state. But just overall in the United States, Grace. What do you think happened with Abogado de accidentes compared to other months, previous months?
Grace: [00:36:15] Me being Hispanic along with you. I think it went up, but I don’t know.
Liel: [00:36:22] Grace, it stayed the same. We had the same as February, and this is across the nation, right. If we were to go granular. And start looking again at New York, at Miami, at Texas. We would see different things, right? Nevertheless, at a national level, it stayed the same. Now, here’s a really staggering statistic, Grace, that I just want you to know overall and this is consistent, like I’m having a chart in front of me that is showing me search volume for the past 12 months. Okay.
Liel: [00:36:53] The search, out of all of the search queries that come any given month for search term like Abogado de accidentes, in Spanish. More than two thirds of the search volume comes through mobile devices.
Liel: [00:37:11] Now, when you compare that to what the same keywords in English would drive in same different markets or across the nation, the mobile search volume would be a fraction of the entire search volume, maybe a tenth or a fifteen percent of the entire search volume. And when you look when you zoom in, you look at the Hispanic search habits, most of it comes from mobile devices. And that’s one of the reasons why the conversion rate on Spanish campaigns is higher than it is in English campaigns. And well, that’s a whole different conversation. But it’s interesting now that we were going through so many markets and we’re looking at so many keywords. How does it compare? So, Grace, I mean, what can we learn out of this search volume review that we’ve just completed?
Grace: [00:38:11] Don’t stop doing digital marketing. Keep continuing to communicate. I mean, those are the first two main points of what, everything that we’ve just discussed just now. You know, I mean, we spent 30 something minutes on the search volume and the beginning of it about coronavirus as a whole for a reason and communication, because we need people to communicate. This is not the time to go to sleep. This is not the time to rest on your laurels. This is the time to work on your business, including your marketing strategy. And we are here to give you a couple of really good input and information. And of course, as you guys know, you can always go back and we can help you find these search notes. If you want to send it to us at ask@incamerapodcast.com. We can share the slides or some of this information with you.
Liel: [00:39:02] Right, Grace. And here’s the thing. And, you know, I mean, ultimately, these are difficult times for many. And, you know, the best decision is the one that you have to take in order to stay afloat.
Liel: [00:39:15] And, you know, you do what you have to do. But at the end of the day, what the numbers are telling us here is that there is a lot of opportunity. And so anyone who’s backing away from paid search campaign, for instance, the only thing that you are doing is giving more opportunity to your competitors to leverage the market. So it’s not that there’s been a decrease in demand across the board. There is still a lot of demand for most practice areas. Right. And by you walking away, you are just making it opening up opportunities for your competitors to get ahead. That’s my initial take. Now, I don’t think necessarily it’s just about, you know, investing on your actual advertising. This is also a good time, as we’ve heard many, many times, to create other types of marketing. Like, for instance, content. Right. We’ve said this many, many times. Grace. Right. Do your practice videos, do your e-books, do your blog post. This is a good opportunity if that’s what you want to do. If you feel that that’s the best use of your time right now. Go for it.
Liel: [00:40:23] Grace, I have to mention another thing, which is something that we’ve seen and these are numbers from our agency is that Facebook, the CPM dropped dramatically by at least 50 percent. I would say 40 or 50 percent. Right. Because we did not change the budgets of the adspend for our clients in the month of March. Yet our impressions increased by at least 50 percent across the board. And with that came more conversions and more retained clients. And so right now, Facebook is a very, very, very, very hot platform to go and invest in advertising. Right. Definitely. If your thing in Facebook is the organic content and it works and and you have data that proves that it works, then go to your organic route, whatever. But the reality is, graces that a lot of people are spending a tremendous amount of time right now in social media. Right. And this is a good time to show ads social media. And honestly, Grace, I see it on my feet, like the amount of ads that I’m exposed to a day. It’s crazy. And I click on them and sometimes I convert.
Grace: [00:41:40] Definitely.
Liel: [00:41:41] Yeah. Absolutely, Grace. So, Grace, we’ve talked about Google my business updates. We talk about search volume and social media. What about the loans? Like we’ve had a brief conversation about it. You and I yesterday and you’ve shared some really interesting information that I think our listeners may want to know.
Grace: [00:42:04] So there’s a few things out there right now, particularly from the SBA. The, you know, U.S. Small Business Administration. What they do is they put out a lot of resources for, to help you get through what’s going on right now. And if you keep your employees, they are going to give you a what is called a paycheck protection program. It’s essentially a loan that turns into a grant if you keep the employees that you’re covering with this paycheck protection program. So we went ahead and did that for Gacovino and Lake and for, you know, the other companies that we are part of, persist communications and so on. And, you know, luckily, we’ve been able to keep our employees and keep them working and, you know, been able to apply for this as soon as it was made available. For those of you who don’t know about it. It’s something that you can do through your local bank. I have seen a bunch of emails where X social media will help you with it. If you’re a pill mom member, they also have a link that you can go through and they will assist you with that as well. But the quickest and easiest way to do this is through your bank. They have all of your tax information. A bunch of people were asking and receiving responses in terms of what documentation they are requiring. And that happens to be your tax information and sort of your standard accounting information that you would have. So make sure you get with your accountant and or CFO and your bank and you have all your docs in a row and just apply. It really is very straightforward. You can find out more about it on SBA.gov.
Grace: [00:43:44] They have the paycheck protection program is what it’s called. And they have specific information on who can apply the loan details and forgiveness program. Again, this ends up turning into essentially a grant. So for those of you who have not heard of it yet, make sure you go and you check it out or you ask your local bank or the bank that you actually bank your business with and you make sure you go on there because there’s lender forms. There’s all kinds of very specific information. And I promise you, it’s not as hard as it seems. There’s just a lot of information out there and a lot of people that are trying to help other people. So don’t get too confused. Just go straight to SBA.gov. If you’re a small business, small to medium sized business and take a look on there to see who can apply. And it gives you all the information you need, including the forms. Again, we went through this and we applied, I believe, last week. I heard a couple people that had applied literally as soon as it came out, including some I.T. companies that we work with. And they were literally approved within a few days. Obviously, now it’s taking a little longer for most people because more are on it and more are actually applying for it. However, that doesn’t stop you from actually applying and or getting approved. So just if you’re not sure if you you can apply, just apply, you know, and do it because if you can get this money to help your firm continuing forward, then why wouldn’t you? Right?
Liel: [00:45:16] Absolutely. Grace. And so if I understand correctly, kind of like the main thing is like you have to retain your workforce to qualify for this.
Grace: [00:45:25] Correct.
Liel: [00:45:25] That’s kind of like the…
Grace: [00:45:27] That’s front and center, the main point of it. Yes.
Liel: [00:45:27] Excellent. Which is really, you know, what we’ve been advocating and saying all along. Right. At one point, we’ll be past these. Right. And we don’t know, it may come back, or not. We really don’t know Grace, like you probably are aware as much as I am, that the conversation started to arise about what will happen in the fall if this comes back. So I would like to go back to our initial work from home episode where we said we have to make sure that if this happens to us again, we definitely need to be ready to quickly shift back into this mode and be able to sustain ourselves. And the thing is that the reality is that we may be not going out of these and never coming back do it again. So I think this is going to help a lot of business to build a sustainable model within these new circumstances.
Liel: [00:46:24] Grace, I think what a great conversation. I think all of it. Our takeaways. Right. So check out your Google my business use COVID-19 like posts if you can.
Grace: [00:46:35] Yes.
Liel: [00:46:36] Good time to leverage on diversifying your reviews. Right?
Liel: [00:46:42] If you are doing a SEO or search engine marketing, don’t stop, there are still people who need your help and they’ll need it more than ever. So stay strong. Don’t forget that in all aspects organic and paid. Google Rewards consistency, last but not least, there are loans out there to help you support.
Liel: [00:47:03] Grace. Thank you so much for your time. I hope you have a nice Easter.
Grace: [00:47:07] Thank you. You as well and everybody. I think the hugest and most important takeaway out of all of this is communicate, communicate, communicate, communicate with your family, communicate with your team, communicate with as many people as you can as often as you can. And as Liel said, pick up the phone and call them, because that’s all we need right now.
Grace: [00:47:28] We want that human connection. And I feel the same way. And I know you do too Liel, because you and I just constantly talking about all of this stuff that’s going on. So thank you as well. And thank you, everybody, for listening today.
Liel: [00:47:41] Next week, another legal marketing conversation. Bye bye.
Liel: [00:47:46] If you’d like our show. Make sure you subscribe. Tell your co-workers. Leave us a review and send us your questions at ask@incamerapodcast.com. We’ll see you next week.
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