#epic web studios

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Google AdWords for Law Firms: Get the Most Out of Your Digital Advertising Budget

Why pay-per-click advertising is the best way for lawyers to get new leads.

Digital advertising is one of the most effective ways to use a marketing budget in today’s world. In search engines like Google, keywords and phrases related to legal services are arguably some of the most competitive terms out there. Pay-per-click campaigns allow you to bid on these ever-so-popular keywords so you can target your ideal clients and maximize your total return on investment. Here are the top reasons why law firms should strongly consider advertising with Google AdWords.

1. Total Budget Control

When using Google AdWords, you have total control over where your money is going. AdWords will never go over the budget that you set. Plus, you don’t have to pay a single dime until someone views or converts from your ad (depending on the type of pay-per-click campaign you choose). Keep in mind that the more you spend, the more results you’ll see.

2. Target Ideal Clients

You can target each ad to specifically display at a defined geographic area, time of day, the specific device (i.e. mobile), or when someone searches for related keywords and phrases. You can also determine which keywords you want to bid on, how much you're willing to bid, and which keywords you don't want to show for. The key to targeting the perfect client is to think of yourself as being in their shoes. What would they type into Google when they are looking for your legal services? Our paid search team performs deep keyword research in order to determine these answers.

3. #1 SERP Display

Paid ads in Google display at the very top of search engine results in pages (SERP) above organic (unpaid) listings, Google Maps, and even featured snippets. If your ads are relevant to users, they have the very first opportunity to be clicked on and convert. Google AdWords also has more engaging displays than any other type of listing. You’re able to have a title, subtitle, link extensions, descriptions, and more.

4. Custom Landing Pages

When using pay-per-click advertising, it’s important to create custom landing pages that properly help users funnel through as a conversion. Most landing pages have very minimal content, don’t have a regular navigation, and have some sort of online form. Landing pages should perfectly match the campaign that you’re advertising for through Google.

5. Analyze & Refine Campaigns

When using Google AdWords, you definitely should not “set it and forget it”. It’s very, very competitive so your campaigns should always be monitored and refined. With Google AdWords, you can make changes to your ads on the fly to get them to look exactly how you want. When they are set up properly, you will be able to see when people clicked on your ad, where they were, and which word they typed into Google's search bar to find your ad. You have access to other valuable data such as what device they were on when they clicked or called from the ad. You can tell when they filled out a form on your website, visited a certain page, or even how long they were on the site and the number of pages viewed. The list goes on and on in regard to measuring and analyzing the precise data from a successful Google AdWords campaign.

When comparing against traditional media, such as park benches, TV, and Radio, Google Ads are highly measurable. By taking control of your Google AdWords campaign, choosing the correct keywords, and creating a custom landing page with the proper sale funnels, you are sure to find success that will substantially grow your law firm. Contact Epic Web Studios to learn more about how AdWords can help your law firm.

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How To Plan A Budget For SEO In 2019

Search engine optimization (SEO) is an ever-changing practice that requires impeccable attention to detail and creative long-term thinking. Long gone are the days where keyword stuffing and invisible text help you more than it hurts you. It’s time to get one step ahead of the game in organic search results by setting aside a budget for SEO in your 2019 plan. Here’s how.

1. Analyze your current search presence.

Understanding your position on the web is an important first step for planning an SEO budget. Do you have a website? Is your website responsive? Does it have optimized meta data? Do you update your website with fresh, new content on a regular basis? Do you have a strategy for promoting the new content? What are your competitors doing online? These are all questions that need to be addressed before diving into SEO specifics.

2. Research SEO trends in 2019.

The ways people use the web are constantly changing, Google’s algorithm is continuously getting smarter, and Googlebots are crawling deeper and deeper into websites and their content. Staying up-to-date with the latest SEO trends will give you a bettering understanding of unique opportunities for you and your business.

A few of the most popular SEO trends predicted for 2019 include optimizing for voice search, shrinking SERP real estate, mobile-first indexing, and overall user experience becoming one of the largest ranking factors.

3. Set your SEO goals.

So, you’ve heard SEO can do wonderous things for business growth but what are you actually trying to accomplish? Take a step back and think about what you’re ultimately trying to achieve.

Would you like more local searchers to find your website or come to your storefront? Are you an e-commerce business looking for more sales? Sometimes, it’s as simple as increased website traffic.

4. Consider your resources.

When deciding on next steps for SEO planning, it’s important to make sure you’re using in-house talent, an SEO agency, or freelancers who know exactly what they’re doing. Tasking someone in-house with SEO gives you more control of the situation, but could take away valuable time and energy in other areas of your business. Working with freelance contractors is typically the least expensive, but comes with the highest risk. Partnering with an agency who specializes in SEO tends to cost a bit more at first, but most often comes with guaranteed results and allows you to tap into a wider range of expertise.

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The Woman Behind the Words, Epic’s Content Developer Becca

Where are you from?

Born and raised in Erie! A true Erie-ite at heart. I grew up right off of Peach Street near the mall. What brought you to Epic Web?

My degree is in Marketing and I knew I wanted to be in the tech industry since there's always room to grow in the digital realm. After discovering Epic's website, I knew I wanted to work here because of how fun and exciting it looked. The large variety of clients, unique and custom designs, and quirky team - the whole essence of Epic was appealing to me. Why did you choose to go into website development?

I've always had a strong interest in design in general. The first thing that I ever wanted to be was an interior designer.  I used to always rearrange my room and paint the walls. Now that I think about it, I guess you can kind of relate that to content development in a way. The programmers are the builders, in charge of the foundation, and the content developers are in charge of filling the site with visually-appealing elements and compelling words. Who has been your favorite client to work with?

That's a toughie. Every project has its unique quirks about it and I wouldn't say that I have a specific favorite. I do enjoy working with Jim Farrell at Panache because we're always brainstorming new ideas for the site and trying to enhance it. What’s your earliest experience with the internet?

Hmmmm, most definitely dial-up internet and waiting for what felt like hours to even open up a browser. It was indeed THE worst. I used to use MSN messenger to talk to my friends, too (before AIM). That was pretty fun. Oh yeah! Ebaum's World! That site will never be forgotten. Where do you think the internet is going?

I can see the future of education being 100% online, with complimentary fieldwork from the start instead of at the end. The in-person class time isn't the same anymore. If you want to get into super futuristic and idealistic visions, it would be cool to be able to actually transport through VR with all senses instead of just vision. Like, I'm going to use my lunch break to go swing from trees in the jungle. BRB. What do you do outside of work?

When the weather is nice enough, I love being adventurous and active outdoors doing things like camping, hiking, and kayaking especially when whiskey is involved. My friends and family are a huge part of my life too so I spend a lot of time with them. During the weekdays, hot yoga is my jam along with a happy hour or 2. Travelling is a part of my being. My family went to a different location every year for almost my whole life. I don't think I could live a life without exploring new places.

Read more about Becca Goldsmith and the rest of the Epic Web Studios team on our website.

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5 Big Trends and Tips for Social Media Marketing

In the last five years, social networks have acquired about 1 billion new users. Over one third of the world’s population is now accessible via social media, and companies have gone from being skeptical about social media marketing to seriously investing in it.

In this social media dominated world, marketing is heavily reliant on technology, but that technology remains focused on people. This year’s trends will help marketers reach and engage their audience on a more personal level, over social media noise. Companies will be able to fine-target their niche communities, with increased support from software solutions.

Social Media Marketing Trends and Tips

The following is a list of trends and tips for social media marketers to leverage now.

1. Investment in Visual Marketing Will Increase

Most social networks have already launched their versions of live-streaming. Twitter has Periscope, Facebook’s Live, and other networks like Blab and DubSmash support live video sharing. Live-feeds are becoming the “in-thing”. Even the US Presidential election updates were broadcast live by BuzzFeed on Twitter.

You can use live video platforms to engage you audience will near-tangible experiences. If you don’t have a Facebook Live strategy, now is the best time to get one.

With social feeds growing crowded and viewer attention spans growing shorter by year,  you’ll need powerful graphics to captivate your audience. In the last five years, the graphic design software market has expanded, giving marketers extensive options to choose from. You can put together graphics on a drag-and-drop editor to simplify your content creation process.

2. Personalization Will Become Priority

Today’s social media users are faced with ads and commercial content on multiple fronts. The receive information from multiple sources, and breaking through that barrier is becoming a tough task for brands and marketers. Personalization will help marketers slice through the chaos and reach only the people who matter.

Tracking consumers’ behaviors on social platforms and targeting them based on interests will become an essential part of marketing. Some social media marketing tools and apps are already incorporating features to support personalization and targeting. More technology solutions will appear in the time to come. You can target your high-potential market by posting content that only they can relate to, or by targeting them using data pulled from tools.

3. Brand Advocacy Will Grow Popular Among Marketers

Ad saturation is driving brands to look for alternative means to reach their target markets. Investment in advocate marketing has seen a steep increase (by about 191 percent) in the recent times. Micro-influencers could be the key to increasing your brand’s reach on social media, because they are more influential and credible than your brand can be.

Employees, customers and social fans are among the micro-influencers that brands are activating. There a quite a few great employee advocacy guides and case-studies that you can look at for inspiration in building your brand advocate outreach programs. You can use an advocacy platform to build and run your brand advocacy program.

4. Native Content Promotion Will Expand

In Joe Pulizzi’s words, native advertising is content marketing’s “gateway drug”. The modern audience is wise to commercial ploys, and traditional advertising alone may not be a great option for branding your company. Native ads help you create awareness without disrupting users’ activities. Content delivered in this manner can help you connect with your audience without being too pushy. According to a study, native ads are set to to grow to $21 billion by 2018.

Content discovery tools, content distribution platforms and content amplification tools are interesting means to having your content shared organically on social media. You could use one of these solutions to have your content positioned where it can earn you some traction.

5. Marketing Automation Will Go Mainstream

Companies with constrained marketing budgets may have not used marketing automation until now, but according to a study, 92 percent of these companies are losing revenue because of that decision. 2017 may see business of all types and sizes adopt marketing automation. 91 percent marketers are convinced that automation is an indispensable part of marketing.

Each social network is unique in terms of demographic and use-cases. This may force businesses to be present on more than one of them to keep consumers and prospects engaged. Managing social pages can be a time intensive task, without the assistance of a supporting social management tool. The idea is to use the tool to automate tasks that don’t require personal attention – like posting created content to multiple accounts and catching mentions of your brand. You can also curate content with a tool and take the final call on what to share. It all comes down to the extra-time that you can save to better invest elsewhere. Managing content on a central platform can also help you maintain consistency across different pages.

Wrap

Social media marketing is set to evolve into a highly tech-focused and detail-oriented effort. To succeed  at reaching and engaging your target market, you need to explore and stay abreast of the latest developments and technologies offered for social. The areas mentioned on this post are good places to keep tabs on.

This article was originally published on January 19, 2017 by Jessica Davis on  smallbiztrends.com

If you would like to learn how social media and content marketing can improve your business, reach out to Epic Web Studios today. Epic Web Studios can be contacted any time at 814-746-6987 and on their website: www.EpicWebStudios.com/contact

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Owning Your Audience Through Personal Connections

After reading Julian Mitchells article on Forbes about Ryan Leslie’s use of SuperPhone, I started to wonder if the idea of scalable personal messaging would bring as much success to larger corporations as it does for the individual music artists and entrepreneurs in the article.

By now we all know how important it is for businesses to establish connections, fans, and followers on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram. Besides brand awareness and direct targeting, platforms like Facebook also collect a large amount of data with specifics about the people who are engaged with a product or brand. However, some music artists and entrepreneurs wanted a closer look at who their top fans were, something they believe social media does not provide. 

This is where SuperPhone, a bidirectional mobile communication system, crosses the line to build a more intimate relationship with only the customers and fans that are most invested in their music or brand. SuperPhone is a SMS service that allows artists and entrepreneurs to communicate via text message directly to the phones of their top fans, those who are most willing to buy their music or support their business. The idea behind this is that most people will like a Facebook page, follow on Twitter, or provide their e-mail address, but rarely -unless they are truly invested- will they provide a personal phone number.

While SuperPhone SMS messaging has brought great monetary benefits to music artists and entrepreneurs like Ryan Leslie at Disruptive Multimedia, it will be interesting to see how this service will benefit larger brands and corporations in the future. As technology continues to advance and create new ways for people to connect, share, and engage with one another on larger and more personal levels, we continue to see innovative ways to reach the people who matter most. As for now, our favorite social media platforms will continue to be the main connector to our most dedicated and loyal audiences.

What do you think about SuperPhone SMS services as a consumer? Would you like to receive text messages from your favorite companies and brands? What do you think about SuperPhone SMS services from a business prospective? Would you like to reach only your top customers at this level of intimacy?

Andrea Velez is a Digital Media Strategist at Epic Web Studios, a web development & strategic planning firm in Erie, PA. Learn more about her, here. If you have questions about running a successful digital advertising campaign, contact Epic Web’s Social Media team today!  

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5 Instagram Stats You Should Pay Attention to Now

 Originally written on the Simply Measured Blog by Lucy Hitz

“Are you already planning for Q1 2016? Are you wondering what the biggest brands are doing on Instagram right now, and how you can implement their successes on your own profile, whether it’s nascent or in full bloom?

Wonder no more! Our just-released 2015 Instagram Industry Report offers a specific, vertical-by-vertical breakdown highlighting what the top brands in the world are doing on Instagram and the results they’re seeing, from automotive to tech to alcoholic spirits — and everything in between.

But it also contains information which transcends industry boundaries and is universally applicable. Let’s take a look at these stats and explore what they mean for you, the social marketer.

#1: 90% of Interbrand 100 Companies Now Have Instagram Accounts

Instagram has gone from “nice to have” to “need to have,” becoming an essential network for social marketers.

Brands on the Interbrand 100 list range from sporting goods and luxury products to energy and financial companies. Regardless of the industry, there’s now an interested audience on Instagram. The network boasts 400 million monthly active users, 80 million posts each day, and 3.5 billion daily likes.

An audience that engaged is hard to ignore, and as of today, 90% of the top brands in the world are using Instagram to get their piece of the proverbial pie.

Standalone apps like Boomerang, Layout, and Hyperlapse have made creation on Instagram easier than ever, and brands are investing more and more every day.

What You Should Do: If you have an Instagram account, don’t ignore your brand’s presence there. Resolve to post more often in 2016, and make sure to measure your activity so you can optimize. If you don’t have an Instagram account and you’re wondering whether it’s time to invest in one, wonder no more.

#2: Engagement per Post Has Grown at a Rate of 53% Year-over-Year

As brands have gained access to better Instagram analytics solutions and developed best practices for their activity on the network, engagement has grown at a rapid rate.

Hashtags and location tags have proven to be useful tools on Instagram.

What You Should Do: It’s time to do some testing. Make sure you include a hashtag and location tag in every post for a week and see if your average engagement per post increases.

#3: Photos See More Average Engagement Than Videos

Videos might be winning brands massive engagement on every other social channel, but photos remain king of the hill for the biggest brands on Instagram.

For the Interbrand 100, curating audience-appropriate photos still reaps more rewards than posting videos.

What You Should Do: Feel free to use clips of digital video content you’ve created for your other channels on Instagram, but don’t create videos specifically for Instagram. Make sure the photo content you’re putting up is visually unified and compelling.

#4: 70% of the Most-Used Hashtags Are Branded

Among the Interbrand 100, brand captions included 5,596 hashtags, equating to 2.5 hashtags per brand post.

Of the most-used hashtags, 70% were brand related, with #BMW and #MercedesBenz ruling the roost.

What You Should Do: Come up with a hashtag around your brand, whether it’s simply your brand name or a creative twist on your brand name, and use it consistently on posts throughout the next quarter to aid brand discovery and awareness.

#5: Love Wins

Emojis are everywhere, and Instagram is no exception. Between emojis and hashtags, brands are finding creative ways to spice up captions.

The heart emoji is the second-most used emoji by brands, and the most engaging.

What You Should Do: Consider including one of the top ten most engaging emoji in your future posts, and look at posts which use these emojis to understand the context of their success (so you can replicate it!).

For more details, brand profiles, and complete industry breakdowns, download the full report below.” 

Get Simply Measured’s 2015 Instagram Industry Report

This content originally appeared on the Simply Measured Blog and we are re-posting it here because we believe Simply Measured is one of the best sources online for information on marketing your brand on the web in 2016, which is no small task! If you are interested in learning more about our thoughts on what’s going to happen in 2016, please reach out and schedule a meeting with our team in Pennsylvania. 

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10 Laws of Social Media Marketing

This article was originally published on Entrepreneur by Susan Gunelius  

Leveraging the power of content and social media marketing can help elevate your audience and customer base in a dramatic way. But getting started without any previous experience or insight could be challenging.

It's vital that you understand social media marketing fundamentals. From maximizing quality to increasing your online entry points, abiding by these 10 laws will help build a foundation that will serve your customers, your brand and -- perhaps most importantly -- your bottom line.

1. The Law of Listening Success with social media and content marketing requires more listening and less talking. Read your target audience’s online content and join discussions to learn what’s important to them. Only then can you create content and spark conversations that add value rather than clutter to their lives.

2. The Law of Focus It’s better to specialize than to be a jack-of-all-trades. A highly-focused social media and content marketing strategy intended to build a strong brand has a better chance for success than a broad strategy that attempts to be all things to all people. More>>

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 Epic Web Studios can be contacted any time at 814-746-6987 and on their website: www.EpicWebStudios.com/contact