Caught Stealing… Why Your Local Spam is THEFT and Not “Marketing”
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August 29, 2017
A month or so ago, I gave an amazing webinar with Local Search nerd and founder of Sterling Sky, Joy Hawkins Frankly, the webinar was awesome because of the subject matter and Joy… this is no humblebrag. Joy and I spent the better part of an hour talking about Local spam…. the underhanded dirty practice of faking office locations as a marketing tactic to artificially expand a law firm’s geographic reach.
During the webinar I made the comment, that this practice is not a marketing tactic, but instead theft… that law firms are stealing business from other lawyers with fake locations. One of the webinar attendees commented, “thank you, thank you, thank you for finally calling this out for what it is.”
So here goes again: Those of you engaged in local spam are stealing, not marketing. And those agencies helping you do so should be shunned.
If there’s any question note this: according to a Google study, 43% of prospects select their law firm based on the proximity of the lawyer – so lawyers faking locations are screwing not only their competitors, but their clients as well.
I’ve seen the devastating impact on the bottom line of many firms who suffer from competitors virtually elbowing their way into a market. In any given month, 10% of our clients’ marketing investment is targeted towards combating those fake listings.
To date we’ve been quiet and private about those firms and agencies marketing with Local Spam caught stealing from our clients. That stops today. More to come….