Sam Singer, the PR expert who is representing the San Francisco Zoo as it copes with the fallout from a Christmas Day tiger attack that killed one patron and injured two others, says his harsh words about defensive attorneys were not meant to be generalized.

Singer was quoted in the January 2, 2008 edition of the San Francisco Chronicle saying: "Anything that a defense attorney says has to be taken with not a pinch of salt, but a ton of salt."

The Law Firm Online Marketing Association contacted Singer by email to inquire whether he was correctly quoted and to ask whether it was his intention to impugn all defense attorneys.

Responding by email, Singer wrote LFOMA's Dean Rotbart to confirm that the Chronicle had indeed quoted him accurately. 

"I have a deep and abiding respect for defense attorneys in general," Singer explained.  "I meant this quote specifically for this case."

As previously reported, the two tiger attack survivors -- brothers aged 23 and 19 -- have hired noted criminal defense attorney Mark J. Geragos to represent them.  While Geragos himself is a seasoned defense lawyer, his Los Angeles-based law firm, Geragos & Geragos, does have a civil litigation practice.

Meanwhile, the San Francisco police flatly denied rumors that the two brothers and the 17-year-old who was killed by the tiger, were carrying slingshots with them on the day of the attack, according to ABC News. 

The San Francisco Zoo, which is co-owned by the City of San Francisco and the nonprofit San Francisco Zoological Society, has hired a high-powered communications strategist to help disseminate its perspective on the Christmas Day tiger attack that killed one zoo visitor and wounded two others.

Sam Singer, of Singer Associates, Inc. will be pitted in media warfare against Mark J. Geragos, the media-savvy attorney who has been retained by the two surviving victims of the tiger attack.

Singer, who describes himself as "one of the nation's leading corporate reputation and communications strategists," helped the President of Jack-in-the-Box Restaurants craft that company's response to a 1994-1995 food poisoining outbreak linked to contaminated beef.

"Anything that a defense attorney says has to be taken with not a pinch of salt, but a ton of salt," Singer was quoted as saying in the January 2, 2008 edition of the San Francisco Chronicle.  Singer also said that he finds it "highly unusual that (Geragos) is the only person who has the facts, when the San Francisco Police Department hasn't even completed its investigation."

According to his website, Singers clients include the San Francisco 49ers, Levi Strauss & Co., ChevronTexaco Corp., Ford Motor Co., Mills Corp., and the Anschutz Investment Corp.

Singer says he has worked for the Richmond Independent and the Berkeley Daily Gazette, as well as the Berkeley Voice.

-- Dean Rotbart

Mark J. Geragos says that he and his colleagues at Geragos & Geragos have more requests for representation than they can manage.

In response to an email question posed by the Law Firm Online Marketing Association's Dean Rotbart on whether G&G initiates discussions with potential clients or merely reponds when contacted, Geragos wrote:

"Dean, we respond to inquiries.  We are inundated with more requests for representation than we can adequately handle so we screen the cases."

The question to Geragos and his reply comes amid news headlines that Geragos has been retained to represent two brothers who were injured in a highly publicized late December tiger attack at the San Francisco Zoo.  While G&G is based in Los Angeles, Geragos's reputation as a 'pit bull' attorney is global in nature.

Many people do wonder to what extent attorneys "chase" clients who themselves are high-profile or who are involved in high-profile cases.  While Geragos did not specifically comment on the tiger case, his response to Rotbart does seem to confirm that the brothers or their family initiated the contact with G&G.

Assuming G&G did not go hunting for the tiger case, it speaks all the more to the high valuable personal injury attorneys can place on public visibility, such as that enjoyed by Geragos.  Even his decision to respond promptly to Rotbart's questions -- given that LFOMA is a relatively new organization -- displays an advanced media savvy on the lawyer's part. 

In addition to his fees for whatever settlement or judgment that Geragos may obtain for the two brothers, the publicity value of the case alone makes the brothers MVCs -- most valuable clients.

-- James Stewart

What a glorious New Year's day it will be when we can look back at the year just ended and report that there were no traffic deaths in the United States.

But we all know that day is not on the horizon.  

Here, based on recent news reports from around the country, are some end-of-the-year traffic fatality reports:

• 159 deaths in Phoenix, AZ, down 23% from 207 fatalities in 2006.
• Florida traffic deaths in 2007 were 3,093 v. 3,195 in 2006.
• Deaths in South Carolina rose 2% to 1,064 from 1,040 in 2006.
• Iowa fatalities will number at least 426 in 2007.
• For the first time in 17 years traffic deaths in Virginia surpass 1,000, up from 961 in 2006.
• Missouri deaths in 2007 will fall below 1,000. Stand at 958 on December 28th.
• 355 traffic deaths in 2007 in Kansas, down from 468.
• Oklahoma road fatalities number 711 in 2007, down from 764.
• 118 perish on Delaware roads, the lowest number since 1999's 114 deaths.

Geragos & Geragos isn't hurting for fresh clients.

That is thanks to the media persona carefully cultivated by G&G's Mark J. Geragos, whose famous clients and regular media appearances have made him quite ubiquitous on the Internet.  The fact that his law firm has 13 other lawyers isn't very well known.

Mark J. Geragos Criminal Law	Paul J. Geragos Criminal Law	Shelley L. Kaufman Civil Litigation

Search Engine Optimization through media visibility is a subspecialty of SEO optimizers.  Most SEO companies don't even try it because they don't have the expertise.  Moreover, not every attorney -- even in the right hands -- can generate the kind of successful media profile that Geragos enjoys.

<< MORE >>

LOOK FAMILIAR?	Do You Recognize Elements From Your Own Web Site?
COURTHOUSES	SKYLINES
FURNITURE	BUILDINGS & INTERIORS

By Dean Rotbart
LFOMA Contributing Editor

For the tens of millions of dollars that personal injury law firms spend each year jockeying for position at the top of the ‘organic’ results on search engines such as Google, you’d think that more lawyers would give some thought to what visitors view when they do click onto their web sites.

Having reviewed hundreds of top personal injury law firm web sites for the Law Firm Online Marketing Association (LFOMA), I can tell you that the vast majority of web sites – contrary to proven marketing stratagems, are way way too egocentric.

As a rule, here are the Top Five Most Common Mistakes we find among the “best” personal injury law firm web sites.

1. The law firms talk all about themselves and little, if at all, about their clients.

2. The sites are devoid of compassion.  It may, in the end, only be about money, but we suspect for many personal injury victims it is also about spiritual recovery and vindication.

3. Almost all the photos (other than of the partners) are canned, stock photos.  Here is our building.  Here is our city skyline.  Here is our conference room.  Here is our courthouse.  Please!  People like to see people, not structures.

4. Name us a personal injury attorney that doesn’t offer a free consultation?  Yet, each site plays up this feature of their firm as if they invented it.  Why not just invite accident victims to call you to discuss their experience and their legal options? 

5. Either law firm partners are the least photogenic people on the planet or they all share the same photographer who has yet to learn to shoot subjects in other than formal poses. 

Instead of everyone standing around a board table or some other stoic fixture, why not show your partners out in the field: investigating accident sites; making hospital visits; plowing through public filings; even playing ball with their kids?  Come on.  Many of your clients will spend years of their lives working with you – so let them know you are more than your formal headshot.

To date, I’ve not found ‘the perfect’ personal injury law firm web site, but I am on the hunt.  And I invite you to contact me if you think your firm’s web site has the right stuff.

The bottom line is simple.  You want the folks who come to your firm’s web site to put their valid cases in your hands.  Their first and most important impression of you will be what they find at your web site.  If your site is cold, impersonal, egotistical and off-putting, well you very likely are sending away some terrific potential cases that rightfully belong in your capable hands.

Great lawyers are not necessarily great marketers.  But they should be.  For their sake and for the sake of their clients.


=================================================================================

Dean Rotbart is an award-winning journalist and former columnist for The Wall Street Journal.  Rotbart has advised hundreds of companies and law firms on how to communicate more effectively with their constituents. He is the founder and executive editor of NewsBios.com.

To nominate a law firm for review by LFOMA, email our director, James Stewart, at JStewart@highvip.com. 

Google organic rankings for Atlanta Personal Injury Attorney as of January 1, 2008 @ 12:15 p.m. EST

Screen Shot of Gary Martin Hays Video

1.  Katz, Stepp & Miller
2.  Findlaw: Atlanta
3.  Gary Martin Hays (Homepage)
4.  Gary Martin Hays (Practice Areas)
5.  Injury Board: Atlanta
6.  Injury Board: Atlanta #2
7.  Shigley Law Firm
8.  Slappey & Sadd
9.  Law Offices of Michael Lawson Neff
10.  Law Offices of Michael Lawson Neff #2

Google organic rankings for San Francisco Personal Injury Attorney as of January 1, 2008 @ 11:20 a.m. EST

1.  Bostwick & Associates (Homepage)
2.  Bostwick & Associates (Office Locations)
3.  Berg Injury Lawyers
4.  Hersh & Hersh
5.  Abramson Smith Waldsmith
6.  Walkup, Melodia, Kelly & Schoenberger (Homepage)
7.  Walkup, Melodia, Kelly & Schoenberger (Areas of Speciality) 
8.  The Cartwright Law Firm
9.  Law Offices of Mary Alexander & Associates
10.  Injury Board: San Francisco

Google organic rankings for Washington D.C. Personal Injury Attorney as of January 1, 2008 @ 11:20 a.m. EST

1.  Chaikin, Sherman, Cammarata, & Siegel (Homepage)
2.  Chaikin, Sherman, Cammarata, & Siegel (Site Map)
3.  Cohen & Cohen (Recent Press Clippings)
4.  Cohen & Cohen (Same page, different URL)
5.  Stein, Mitchell & Mezines (Homepage)
6.  Stein, Mitchell & Mezines (Contact Us)
7.  Mesirow & Stravitz (Legal Juice - Daily Legal News & Features)

A Mesirow & Stravitz Web Site

8.  Greenberg & Bederman
9.  Ashcraft & Gerel
10.  ChasenBoscolo
11.  Albo & Oblon
12.  Legal Pointer.com
13.  J.E. Wingfield & Associates
14.  Mesirow & Stravitz (Homepage)
15.  Mesirow & Stravitz (Personal Injury Page)

Google organic rankings for Philadelphia Personal Injury Attorney as of December 27, 2007 @ 8:00 p.m. EST

1.  Kline & Specter (Major Victories)
2.  Kline & Specter (Profile)
3.  Master Weinstein
4.  Silvers, Langsam & Weitzman
5.  The Pearce Law Firm

Edith A. Pearce, Esq.

6.  Injury Board: Philadelphia
7.  Law Offices of Thomas Moore Holland
8.  Monheit Law 
9.  Meyerson & O'Neill
10.  Anapol Schwartz