Episode 45 – with Nalini Prasad

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Welcome to another episode of Victory to Victory. Joining us is Nalini Prasad, the Chief Strategy Officer at BluShark Digital. Nalini, has co-created a premier digital marketing agency that helps law firms build their businesses and stand out from others online. Nalini is not only a digital marketing expert, but also a passionate advocate for helping attorneys grow their firms and serve their clients better. Welcome Nalini.

Thank you. I’m so excited to be a part of the podcast.

Great to have you here. I know we just had dinner two nights ago in beautiful New Orleans, and now we’re ready to do our podcast and inform some of our listeners on a little bit about SEO BluShark and how they can find themselves great law firms through the use of SEO and digital marketing. So how can digital marketing help personal injury law firms reach and assist more victims?

Yes, I know, it seems very technical, right, and they’re like, Well, what does marketing have to do with me finding the right firm for me or the right lawyer? And at the end of the day, digital is all about bringing the right answer to the consumer. So, Google’s biggest goal is to say, if you have this problem, how do I help fix that, right? How do I get you the best answer? And one of the ways that Google is able to do that is to wade through all of the law firms out there and say — Hey, these guys actually know what they’re doing.

These guys have only been around for a couple of years. They may not be the best fit for you. And so, at the end of the day, being able to help law firms take all of their pros and put those out there in front of Google, in front of audiences, allows consumers to say — This is who I need to use. This is who’s going to get me the best results. This is who’s not going to undervalue my case, right, and being able to contact human to human.

So how can SEO make it easier for personal injury victims to find the right legal help online. You discussed it a little bit but a little bit more detail. You mentioned something about, how do you find the law firm that’s not going to under settle of your case? What should they be looking for?

Absolutely, so, I would say, especially, in New Jersey or Chicago and Miami, those states that you get a lot of TV advertisers, you have a lot of big players in the state, right, and you’ve got billboards, and you’ve got people that are in your face. I can do this for you. I can do this for you. How do you kind of decide, is this really someone who’s going to care about me, is going to talk to me, is going to get that best value that you just talked about for my case, right?

And so, I do think that the SEO aspect is allowing people to engage with a brand a little bit deeper. Okay, I’ve seen your billboard, I’ve seen your commercial. I know you get results, but what more can I learn about the lawyer that’s going to be dealing with me, right?

Reading that bio page or reading about real experiences that people have had with you, testimonial videos on your website. Reading more about those cases. I think that the SEO aspect allows your consumers to say — All right, well, this guy I know, gets big verdicts, but do they also care about me? And you can have a lot of that come through your website, right, when people are reading about that.

And then, you can also listen to those real life stories and hear from consumers that have said, they picked up the phone all the time. They came and they met with me at the hospital. They met with my family members. I still keep in touch with them, right, and I think those are the key points that as a consumer, I want to hear that my lawyer is not just competent, but cares, because if you care and you’re passionate, you’re not going to take that settlement from the insurance company, bottom line, right, you’re going to advocate for me.

So, what tips can you offer on developing helpful, engaging content that addresses these concerns and the questions that personal injury victims have?

Yes, when I put myself in the shoes of a consumer, what I really want to know is, have you helped people in the same exact situation as me? So, I always tell law firms, you want to have FAQ style content out there those really common questions that you know you get from every single person that’s been in a car accident or even in a very traumatic, catastrophic injury.

Making sure that if I’m a consumer, I’m looking up an injury lawyer, I end up on your website, that I can easily get answers, but I don’t have to get on the phone to learn everything, so that when I do get on the phone with you, we can talk about my case, very specific items, and I already feel a sense of trust with you that you’ve handled this before.

FAQ, style and then those testimonials, I cannot emphasize enough how important it is for consumers to hear from other people that have been helped in the same type of situation.

So describing these car accidents, is it a rear-end? Is it a truck accident? I want to make sure that you’ve handled someone that in that exact same scenario, relating to your consumer.

And then you could also build links to enhance a law firm’s presence and credibility. So, how does this benefit personal injury victims who are seeking a trustworthy and honest information?

This circles back to seeing the billboard, seeing the name, knowing the face, but are they really trustworthy? What are they really doing? Are they really — are they the ones who are speaking across the country and educating other lawyers? How authoritative are they?

And so, you throw up the term links, and to a regular consumer, they’re like, I don’t know what a link is? But essentially what a link is, an ability for Google to see that people in the community or other trusted websites are talking about you. So, it’s leveraging all of your real relationships, all your real authority. You, for example, Lawrence, you do speak across the country in masterminds large stages. And you’re educating lawyers on, how do you connect with these consumers, and how do you how do you become a better litigator? What are some of these really tips and tricks that will change the value of that case from here to here?

That makes you a real authority. But how does Google learn that? How does Google learn that? Lawrence is the guy that people go to and ask these questions, it’s by making sure that when you speak at these conferences, your bio is on their website, and Google sees that these people are now endorsing you.

And so, when somebody stands in Jersey and they say — I need the best Injury Lawyer, Google’s able to say — Oh, Lawrence speaks everywhere. All these websites talk about him, so I’m going to make sure that he is one of the first results that these consumers see, so that I am getting the consumer to the right lawyer.

So, in the same light, if they’re looking for a digital marketing agency, you would be one of the authorities you and Seth Price speak all over the country and educating attorneys and others on how to have a good digital presence.

Absolutely, right. So, it’s and it’s even if you’re in the community. So, if you are sponsoring little leagues, or you are sponsoring a turkey trot, whatever it is, Google sees those as trustworthy points, These are touch points that say you’re a real firm. You’re doing things with the people. You’re engaging with the people and being able to pull that into their knowledge base, and Google to be able to say, this is what they do, this is who they are. That helps make sure that the best results are at the top of page, one for those consumers.

All right, so now let’s go to a website. Why is it important for a law firm to have a technically sound website, and how does it impact the user experience for a personal injury victim?

Absolutely, So, let’s say you have taught Google that you are the smartest person in the room. Now, you’re the result there, so the consumer is badly injured, looking for that injury lawyer as soon as possible, they click into your site and it’s a mess. They can’t find the information. They click the play button on the testimonial video, it’s not playing. What happens? That consumer is now upset, that consumer bounces from your site, that consumer goes on to number two, who may not actually be the better lawyer.

It is so important that if you are that lawyer out there who truly takes these cases to litigation, who is the best fit that you also complement that with a website presence that allows people to get information properly, without barrier. I think more importantly, it’s we can talk about ADA compliance here, right, when you’ve got folks that have disabilities and they’re not able to work and read a website in a traditional way, you need to absolutely make sure that your site has all the technical coding and all of the features to make sure that people can listen to your site and that they can engage with your content.

Well, 10 years ago, we didn’t really have to worry about social media, but now social media is with us, and it’s probably with us for at least the near future. So, what strategies can law firms use on social media platforms to offer support and resources to people looking for a personal injury attorney or a medical doctor if they’re an injury victim?

Absolutely and you say, for the near future. I say social is going to be extremely important. It’s going to blow up. It’s not to say that your site is not important, but there’s so many people who are just scrolling at night time for their break, or just constantly on social.

And so, social has two components for law firms to get in front of folks. There’s the always branding, always staying in front of the consumers, letting them know you’re there, giving good information, so little guides. If you can put together a one-pager guide of — Hey got in an accident? Here’s step one through five, right after you’re in an accident, Do you go in the ambulance? Do you do you go get checked out? How often do you get checked out? How quickly — these are things that people don’t know if they’ve never been in an accident and have never worked with a law firm, But up there in your head, you’re like — duh, this is what you do.

So, these are little tips that on social you should be putting out to people so that they know this before they are in an accident and it makes you an authority. It makes them look at you as not just billboard guy, but billboard guy and helpful.

You’re giving me real information. That’s one side of social. The Other Side of social is that you can really last in front of so many people that authority through testimonials, testimonials of real people, and then, as you have, let’s say, a Facebook page or an Instagram page. You post something really engaging, now you’ve got real consumers and real people who are like each other speaking.

They’re commenting on your on your post. They’re talking to one another. They’re sharing their experience with you, and that is just a natural way for people to talk about their experience with you without you having to say — Hey, you’ve worked with me, let’s do a testimonial video. But on social, it is a network. It’s a community, and people are going to talk to each other. So, making sure you have a brand, making sure that you’re using it in many different ways to stay in front of people who will need you in the future.

Well, it’s amazing how many people are now just scrolling through social media. I love when you give some of the statistics, but what are the statistics for people, say under 40? How many actually watch television anymore, as opposed to scrolling on social media?

It’s all scrolling on social media. It’s OTT, it’s not traditional TV. We all have these different weird satellite and cable programs now where you’re just using Netflix, you’re just using Hulu, subscription based, and so the world is changing in terms of how you get in front of people, and you’re right. It’s an age thing too.

The younger folks are driving cars too. Lots of them probably recklessly, because they’re looking at their phones. So I mean, in at the end of the day social is where the majority of eyes are, and I think in the future too.

Yes, I have to agree. I have three kids between the ages of 15 and 22 and they never watch traditional television ever. They’re only scrolling. They’ll be sitting down in the family room, and they’re just scrolling through their social media accounts all the time. So it’s, it’s really the wave of the future, and well, it’s actually the wave of the present,

Yes, and you know, one more thing that I’ll add in, there’s a little bit of a bonus. We talk about social and a lot of people just automatically think of Instagram and older folks, maybe the Facebook, but YouTube, we should not be sleeping on YouTube. And especially, I will say, for younger maybe under the 15, maybe your 15 year old as well. How many times have you seen them watching an episode of a real show on YouTube? It was like YouTube does that. You can watch TV on YouTube now.

So, some people will use just YouTube, which is owned by Google, has its own algorithm. If you’re creating videos, make sure you’re putting them on YouTube. Biggest tip that you can take away from today, engage with YouTube.

Can you share some real life examples of how digital marketing successfully helped personal injury law firms grow and support more victims?

Yes. So, I would say I’ve heard a couple of different things too. One, sometimes you end up going to the internet and or not the internet, You get a referral. You just kind of use somebody that, again, you saw on a billboard, or something like that, and you end up getting a little bit into this, and you say, I don’t want to use this lawyer anymore. I don’t think they’re the right fit. And so, you probably have this happen a lot, where you get people that come to you and they’re like — What can you do different? And then you show them so much better of an experience. But then they go to the internet, and they start to really read the websites that come up, one, two and three. They really engage with this. They look at the reviews and when they do talk to that next lawyer that they found, that Google said was a good lawyer, you find that they are now being asked different questions.

Their backgrounds being checked into that helps the case in a way that the other lawyer didn’t even tell them about.

I think the biggest thing is that a lot of times you have folks who graduate law school, who are savvy business people, and they want to. Play the Google game, and that’s fine. They put money into it, and they can rank themselves pretty quickly over the firm who has been there for 40 years, but is a little hesitant to get into digital.

If you go with the young buck, sometimes you’re going to find the young buck doesn’t have that trial experience, and that’s where you see that undervaluing of the case. It is so important that those firms that have been around forever, that speak, that have the authority, start to teach Google that, because then the consumers can see — Okay, this is who I really should be using, because they have all of this information.

And at the end of the day, that real life example is that those firms that I do work with who have been around for 40 years, or who have real litigators on staff, we often find that when they get that diamond in the rough case, we are seeing that they absolutely get higher verdicts. They have the money to spend on that litigation to get the right kind of visuals for you.

As a consumer, people don’t think about this, but being able to invest in the right expert for your case, being able to invest in the right graphics so the jury sees exactly where your damages are, those are important. And if you’re with a firm that can’t do that for you, you are absolutely not going to maximize your case value and set yourself up for all of the accommodations you’re going to need in the future.

That’s one thing really personal injury victims don’t know, is how much it costs to really develop a lawsuit. And a minimum amount is $10,000 per case to really develop it correctly. Because just to put a as you’re aware, just to put a doctor for a deposition on a video is $4,000 at least.

I think that’s good for them to hear. I don’t think consumers understand that. And so, when they look at these beautiful website, they’re they see an ad, they’re like — Oh, that’s great. Let me go with this person. Has that person taken multiple cases through trial? Do they understand what it is to find the right expert? Has that firm been around long enough to know that, or are they co counseling with somebody that will do that, at least for you? Whereas, when I look at a GGL, you guys have tried and true, tested all of that. You’ve done all of this. You’re at a point where you’re saying, here’s my best expert, and I’m looking for even a bad one, and that’s the kind of firm you want to align yourself with, someone that has an experience.

Or, just to give you an idea, we have over $3 million in outstanding costs right now on our existing client base, and that’s what you need. You have to have that, what we call a war chest of funds to go to war with. We touched upon this a little bit earlier, about testimonials. So, how can previous client testimonials help influence the decision making process of somebody who’s injured in an automobile accident, construction accident, medical malpractice, whatever the case may be?

I haven’t quite figured out if it’s testimonials or past verdicts and settlements, right results that are more meaningful to a potential client, but I think that both of those are the most important. We always talk about two for Google when you want to rank at the top of page one, reviews are so important. So, we don’t think about just testimonials in a video format, but a review on your Google business profile is important. When you do show at the top of the page, the consumer has three people that they can choose from, right and they’re going to look immediately at the number of reviews you have, the quality of those reviews to see if they even want to pick up the phone and call. So, testimonials, reviews are extremely, extremely important to even get the phone call for even a consumer to engage with you. I can’t say enough of how important that is.

So, we need positive reviews, and we also need some great testimonials on our website. How else can law firms improve their website accessibility to better serve personal injury victims. You said you have to make sure you’re ADA compliant. What else is important on a website?

Yes, I think that ADA compliance is the most important from state to state, there’s all sorts of bar ethics and rules and things like that we’ll say this state needs this or that. But there are a lot of implications where if you don’t have that ADA, compliance, your website’s just not legal. It’s not allowing the most people to see things. But I’ll say it again. I think the way to a consumer’s heart is access to fast answers, to information without barriers. The more they have to click, the further and deeper they have to go into your site to find an answer, the less likely you are to keep them engaged with it’s quite simple. Make sure it’s easy for them.

You’ve touched upon some compliance issues. So, what are the ethical boundaries and what are best practices for marketing, legal services to personal injury victims?

Again, I mean, I think we can full circle here too, when we kind of talk about the advertising, Some states are much heavier in TV advertising. They have people with fun names like the Texas Hammer, or Law Dogs, whatever you got going on. But at the end of the day, I really appreciate that these state bars have code of conducts, let’s call it, to make sure that advertising does not get too outlandish, that it’s not over the top, to make sure that there’s not excessive, gimmicky and misleading advertising.

So when it comes to the ethics, I think the most important way that the bars are checking lawyers is to make sure there’s just not everyone saying I’m the best firm. I’m the they’re forcing firms to say, here’s why I’m the best firm, through those testimonials, through showing their case results. And while not against bar ethics, I think just being tasteful is a big deal in your advertising. A lot of consumers look at personal injury lawyers as ambulance chasers. We’ve all heard the term, And so, making sure that you are respecting people’s privacy, that if you’re seeing that there’s a big truck accident in this — on an interstate or something like that, that you’re not putting their names in a vlog that you’re writing to try to attract that as business.

Those types of really kind of black hat marketing tips, they don’t come across well to consumers. They don’t want to work with you if you’re doing things like that. So the bars, the ethics there, the boundaries, they’re both real, where the bar says, Don’t do this but then lawyers also need to kind of reel themselves and I think that the more tasteful that your advertising is, the more likely someone is to want to work with you.

What else would you like to add that we haven’t talked about, to let victims of personal injury cases know what they should be looking for when they’re looking at a website or comparing digital marketers?

Yes, I think, you know, I’ve given a lot of different perspectives, from young guys out of law school or women out of law school, opening firms, versus the firm that’s been around for 40 years. I think the important part is doing your due diligence with the research.

I am not here to see that the billboard person is not also the best. I’m not here to say that somebody who’s brand new is the best? What I think is going to be the best is for you to look at those answers that Google give you, 100% I think you should be choosing someone that Google also believes is the right answer, because Google has all these data points and reasons to believe that they’re the right answer, free.

So if you see one of those top three, don’t just engage with one kind of do a little bit of research, look into their sites, really read the bios about the lawyers, and maybe do a call with one or two, just to make sure that your values align.

Make sure that you’re looking at, first and foremost, their results, how long they’ve been in with the industry. Maybe even asking about, how do you support a long-term litigation? I think that’s really important, and something that maybe consumers who are listening today did not even think about that, and that is such a good question, Lawrence that you bring out that people should be asking about that. How will you support my case financially? Are you guys prepared to take this into an 18-month battle,

So, I think the biggest thing that I see is do your research, make sure that you feel good about who you are pulling the trigger with. At the end of the day, there are a million answers for law firms across this country. And just, you know, there’s going to be a bunch that are good for you, to make sure you’re finding the one that’s right for you.

One of the big questions I always find, if I’m looking for a doctor, how many times have you performed that procedure, just like when you’re talking to a lawyer, how many cases have you tried? Because you’re only as good at the end of the day as the lawyer that’s walking into the courtroom with you? So that’s I always find that to be a very important question.

It’s a huge deal. It’s a huge deal.

So, Nalini, when somebody’s looking for a digital marketing firm, how do they find BluShark Digital?

Well, we can, you know, BluShark Digital.com you can go learn about us. I say, do your due diligence, but we actually spun out of a law firm ourselves. So, the owner of our company is actually a managing attorney of a firm here in DC, Maryland, Virginia. If you want to learn more about us, you can go to our website. Lawrence, feel free to share my cell phone if people have questions or want to touch base, but it’s really important. And what I think I love about this podcast is that I know that I’m often helping firms scale their business and hire more attorneys and hire more paralegals, but at the end of the day, they’re also helping more and more victims of personal injury accidents.

And so, it is really cool to kind of connect the dots there and understand that what you do here at marketing levels really is connecting you to all of these people that are being helped and so, it’s for a greater good.

Thanks, Nalini, I look forward to seeing you at our next speaking engagement.

Yes. Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it.

My pleasure. Thank you.

Thank you for tuning in to Victim To Victory the personal injury playbook. We hope you found today’s discussion insightful and helpful as you navigate the complex legal system. If you or someone you know suffered from a personal injury, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at 1-800-489-0004. Our team is here to help take you from victim to victory.

Remember, taking legal action after a personal injury is a critical step in protecting your rights and securing your future. So, don’t wait, make the call today and let us help you fight for the compensation you deserve. We’ll be back next week with more expert insights and information.

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