By Lawfuel editors – Google+ for lawyers is important.  Indeed it’s vital and has been the social media network that snuck right up, powered by Daddy Google in a manner that will ensure it succeeds totally (after an initial slip-up by Google in the social media stakes).

Google+ is a social site that you have to conquer as a lawyer if you want high rankings.

When you write your blog, you need to post on a regular basis using keywords and integrating those keywords and your blog with Google+ in the “about” and in the “video” sections.
You need to also be linking back to your own website where possible also improves your Google+ and personal website optimization.
Creating a Google authorship for you and your most frequent posters helps your posts appear higher in search results, with the bonus of a personal author photo.

If you have your image listed beside your listing then you can increase organic – that is, FREE – web traffic to your law firm site by a massive amount.  By massive, we mean up to 150 per cent or more.

The infographic to the right gives some indication of what you can do to increase your Google+ visibility and engagement.  But by leveraging your authorship as well you can increase your rankings and drive traffic to your law blog.

Google Authorship

Make sure that you have a profile picture of yourself that is a good headshot and that your byline contains your name on each page of the content.  You also need to make sure that your byline matches the name on your Google+ account.

Make sure you verify your email address on the same domain as the domain that has your content.

Video Use

You can also share videos that relate to your law firm, which will  help generate further engagement.

Use Questions

Good questions posted on your blog will help generate further contact with your clientele and audience.  They should relate to your law practice and be stimulating enough to provoke comment focused on your area of interest.

Use Google Ripples

As Google+ notes on their website, “Your content is your social currency.”

Google+ launched a feature known as ‘Ripples’ in late 2011 and it lets you see how much you are being notice on the network.

It’s easy to overlook this feature in all the lists of features provided in your Google+ account, but for lawyers and bloggers wanting to promote their site it is one of the best functions they have.
Google Ripples is basically an interactive circle graph showing who has publicly shared a particular post.

To see if your (or any other) post has been shared and by whom, just click on the small down arrow in the upper right hand corner of the Google+ post and click “view ripples.”
The Ripples graph shows the original post in the center and who shared it, in circles radiating outward. If someone else shared from one of those other circles, another, smaller circle will appear with their name and so on so you get a full picture of what is happening with your posts.
By hovering over the name you can see any comments the re-poster might have made. Apart from getting a good idea of who finds your posts interesting enough to repost, you can also see how important each re-poster is by the size of his or her circle. The larger circles mean that other people have read their re-posting of your article and have then shared it with others.

What is the impact of your followers sharing?

It’s a great way to very quickly see which of your followers has the most impact in the sharing of your posts.

Knowing your most important and influential followers is incredibly helpful, especially with Google+’s circles aspect. With it, you can group your most influential re-posters and send them important content, valuable coupons and anything else you might want to spread quickly and immediately to as many readers as possible