Law Firm SEO Snake Oil - Help us - Help your competition!

Let's say you're a Chicago personal injury lawyer. Your company takes on Big Time Consultant Web to help you "is" on line. Maybe you create a website / blog. They optimize your site / blog to tell you which keywords are relevant to your practice. For example, "Chicago personal injury lawyer."

They use "Chicago personal injury lawyer" in the title tag (one of the factors that Google uses to rank your site).

Then, another personal injury law firm in Chicago called Big Time Consultant Web. Big Time sells them Advisor Web site / blog. They optimize the website / blog for the same keywords.

They use "Chicago personal injury lawyer" in the title tag of a competitor!

Now look, I'm not suggesting that simple overlapping keywords is a huge conflict of interest. What I am saying is that by targeting the same keywords, title tags, build links with anchor text for that keyword, and concentrating most of their SEO efforts on keyword competitors, who are creating a problem for you.

I mean, do not represent the same party on both sides of a lawsuit, right?

I guess if you're the highest bidder, they "help" the most. This does not seem that fair. The problem is that most law firms have no idea that this is happening.

Unfortunately, this situation is more the rule than the exception. I can think of at least 3 large law firm web providers that use this "bidding war" approach. Also, and I'm just guessing here, I would say that these three players represent over 80% of law firms online (and this is conservative).

Find a lawyer Internet marketing company that has some form of "exclusive partnership" agreement or "no competition".