While it's well-over 2 years old, NYT Small Business writer, Kermit Pattison's post Managing an Online Reputation, remains one of the most insightful articles on the subject of building and nurturing your business and your professional reputation online:

Your customers are talking about you — and the whole world is listening.

In the time since the article, review sites, online social signals, and local signals have gained more and more importance for business owners, including legal professionals. This has happened primarily from the demand for trust online. Some social and local signals provide a trust element that just hasn't existed online in this form.

However, to me, the real insight from the article comes from Greg Sterling, a San Francisco-based Internet analyst who specializes in small business and local search:

“It’s all common sense — the best way to ensure that you have positive reviews is to offer good products, good service, have integrity and be diligent,” said Greg Sterling,. “It’s really just the rules of dealing with people in the real world, translated online.”

With all of the buzz surrounding social media, SEO tricks and secrets, and the various other forms of Internet snake oil, the truth is that effective online marketing, in many ways, parallels its offline predecessor.

Successful law firm web marketing really comes down to some simple ideas. Provide the best possible service for your clients. Develop a professional presence with informative content and get that content in front of people who are able to publicize it, link to it, and share it with your target audience of potential clients.