When potential clients are searching for an attorney they typically get a mix of local law firm results as well as attorney directories such as Lawyers.com or Martindale.com. Although they have never been the most effective lead source for my clients, they should also not be ignored as it increases trust in your firm.
I have talked about this many times in the past as it’s a method of Barnacle SEO. If your website ranks high in the SERP’s but you also rank high on attorney profiles you will likely capture some of that business as well. One of the ways you can increase this rating and your overall impression online is to have great ratings from clients and attorneys alike.
That is why the Martindale-Hubbell owned Lawyers.com offers Peer Reviews and Client Reviews. Peer reviews are other endorsements from attorney’s you have worked with while the client reviews are going to be from clients who have actually used your services in the past. If you have ever tried to get a client review you know that they’re difficult to get. On the other hand its usually a bit easier to get an endorsement from another attorney. That is unless of course you are trying this process on a Martindale owned property.
In my opinion the UI for this platform isn’t very easy and asking someone to leave you an endorsement when it’s not easy is unlikely of ever materializing. In addition to this there are several other major reasons you need to know about that can cause issues. These include:
- You need to nominate 18 attorneys before you can submit them for approval.
- References must be outside the lawyers’ current organization
- They must be listed on Martindale already
- You can’t nominate more than two lawyers from any one organization
- After these are submitted they go through an additional review by Martindale.com
The good news is that if you meet this criteria you can use the guide below to get through this with less pain.
Before we get started it’s a good idea to write down a list of 18 attorneys you are willing to nominate. This way you can submit the information all at the same time. Now lets get started.
Lets Get Started
Step 1: Login to the back end of your company profile
Since Martindale.com / Lawyers.com is powered by firm profiles with attorneys assigned to them you will need to get the login for the firm you’re associated with. Once you have that information you can login here: https://csc.lawyers.com
Step 2: Once you’re logged in visit Ratings > Peer Review (As Shown Below)
Step 3: Select an Attorney
From this screen you should see a list of attorneys. Select the checkbox to the left of the attorney you want to get peer reviews from.
Step 4: Select the “Manage References” button at the top
Step 5: Select the “Nominate Peer” option & Fill it Out
To nominate an attorney you will need to select the Nominate Peer option. From here a window will open up that will ask the attorney’s personal information including first name, last name, reference type, city, state, and country. Once you have this information inputted submit it by hitting search. If the match it found it will allow you to add it to the list.
Step 6: Add 17 More
Yep this screen kind of sucks. You will need to have at least 18 references to submit the information and complete the process.
Step 7: Submit Peer References
Once you have gone through this tedious process and have met all 18 you can finally hit the awesome “Submit Peer References” button. Phew. You’re done… for now…
Step 8: Hurry Up and Wait
To keep their “higher standard”, Martindale will review these individually and take out any that do not meet their internal qualifications. Additionally not everyone you submitted might actually leave you a review.
If you’re unsuccessful after the first found they offer a secondary round where you will have to identify 10 new prospects to send the requests to. The good news is that after you have done this and the reviews are approved you will get a screen like the one below:
Conclusion
Although the process is a bit difficult it will be well worth your time. In addition to gaining a higher reputation and positioning on Lawyers.com you will also have a higher reputation when clients are looking for you.
