Roles
Numerous people with different skills set have joined our team to produce our content/authority Web sites, including the following:
E. Monetization of the Web Site
H. Development of Form Contracts
J. Attorney Recruitment and Management
A. Management
1. Project Manager — CEO of the Company and manager of the entire project — James Mitchell (”JM”)
2. Web Site Manager — Each Web site has a manager, who reports to James Mitchell. The Web Site Manager manages the writer, editor and Web designer for that Web site.
B. Writing and Editing
3. Writer — A writer of a Web site should look at the top 100 Web sites covering his topic and then prepare a Master Outline of all possible pages one might write about the topic. He then prioritizes which pages are included in version 1, which are included in version 2, etc. After he writes each page, an editor edits that page. For our Web sites which have a blog, he is either the blogger or he looks for a blogger in the field. Ideally, our writers are also trained to do basic SEO — e.g., page optimization and posting links to their site on other forums.
4. Editors — Each site has two or three editors, usually three. In almost all cases, the editors are our writers. After that, the Web Site Manager (no. 2) makes a final edit and approve the site for publication.
C. Web Design / WordPress
5. Web Designer — Visual/artistic design of the Web site. In most cases, this is combined with the WordPress Designer (no. 6).
6. WordPress Designer — Implementation of the visual design in WordPress. In most cases, this is combined with the Web Designer (no. 5).
7. WordPress Expert — This person is a guru in WordPress, is quite knowledgeable about designing themes and writing plugins, and is an excellent PHP programmer. Some of the things he needs to do include:
- Designing a library of 4 or 5 themes/templates from which we will design 95 percent of our Web sites
- Developing a customer input form, to be used on our lead generation sites
- Developing a system to perform backups automatically
- Determining where on our standard Web page spaced should be placed for ads. I think we do not want ads on our landing page, although we do want a contact form for our lawyer referral sites. Aaron Wall in SEO Book says, “The vertical 160 x 600 ‘wide skyscrapers’ and ad blocks work well for me.”
- Choosing (with James Mitchell) a library of plugins and testing them, to make certain they all interact well and work with the current version of WordPress that we are using
- Preparing a standard distribution which is uploaded whenever we create a new Web site. HostGator has a Fantastico script which uploads the basic distribution, so this would be a supplement on top of the Fantastico script.
- Testing the interaction of the All-in-One SEO and Robots Meta Tags plugins. One person told us, “Make certain you have indexing for categories and archives enabled in the All-in-one SEO Pack (not checked as something to block). Otherwise, both plugins will try to block certain pages and come into conflict.” This person needs to look at both plugins and explain to us what each field does.
- Developing a system so we can update all of our WP sites (WP source code, themes, plugins) at once. Currently Fantastico can do this, but you have to log into Cpanel for each account.
D. Search Engine Optimization
8. SEO Strategist — These people set overall SEO policy and strategy and write instructions and handbooks for the SEO Implementers. (James Mitchell is also responsible for writing the instructions and handbooks.) One would think this would be combined with the SEO Implementer (no. 9) but that is not the case. The SEO Strategist is a high level analytical position, while the SEO Implementer is a lower level position that can be done by someone a few years out of college.
We expect to use three different SEO Strategists, for two reasons. First, because of the large number of Web sites we have. Second, SEO is more of an art than a science. Everyone says Google likes this or does not like that but in most cases, they are guessing, because Google does not tell you. I like to ask all three of them the same question. If all three provide the same answer, then I feel comfortable that I have likely (not guaranteed, but a high probability) found the truth on a subject. If they provide different answers, then I ask a lot of follow-up questions and I do my own research.
9. SEO Implementer —This person is much less experienced than the SEO Strategist. He implements the SEO strategies devised by the strategist (no. 8).
10. VB.Net Developer — To obtain high search engine rankings, the name of the game is in bound links from highly regarded sites. We are writing a sophisticated software program in Microsoft VB.Net to:
- gather into a database all of the domain names listed by the major search engines for particular search terms
- look up their information in the Whois database
- write to them, proposing a link exchange.
This program is being written by a VB.Net developer. We call this our Link Exchange Management Program (”LEMP”).
11. Link Exchange Manager — Once the data are written into the LEMP database, e-mails are sent automatically to the contacts listed in the Whois database. That may not be enough and we often have to call the contacts. In addition, if they agree to a link exchange, someone needs to add a link to their site on our database, and we need to check their site to make certain they are linking to us. All of this needs to be done by a human, in this case the Link Exchange Manager. This person is often identical to the SEO Implementer (no. 9).
E. Monetization of the Web Site
12. Conversion Specialist — This individual analyzes each of our sites from a conversion point of view — How do we entice the user to follow the call of action we propose?
- Analysis of navigational structure
- Redesign of each page to address the psychological and other needs of a typical user
- Redesign of customer input forms
- Rewriting copy to increase the effectiveness of the sales pitch
- Analysis of lead bait, including suggesting other potential types of offers that will incent visitors to fill out lead forms (e.g., case studies, tools, white papers, contests)
13. Advertising Manager — This person is responsible for finding suitable ads for our sites, in almost all cases using one or more of the major advertising brokers. This person does testing to see which ads make us the most money for any particular site.
14. Affiliate Marketing Manager — In addition to ads, we often sell products on our Web sites. This person is responsible for managing all of our affiliate marketing relationships.
F. Systems Administration
15. LAMP Systems Administrator — LAMP is the software stack used by HostGator — Linux/Apache/MySQL/PHP. Systems administration of the basic software stack we use. This is a different role than our WordPress Expert (no. 7), who is responsible for keeping our WordPress installations up to date. Much of this role is performed by our WordPress hosting company, HostGator, so this may not actually be a real role.
16. Microsoft Systems Administrator — In addition to LAMP, we use Microsoft Technologies in running our business and our databases — Windows Server, .Net, VB.Net. We have a file server which is used by most of the people involved in our project (except our writers). In addition, our LEMP database is written in Microsoft VB.Net and SQL Server.
When we upgrade something (memory, hard disk, number of users), Bay State and Intermedia whack us with another $10 or $25 per month charge. Once you do this several dozen times, you are talking about real money. So our intention is to purchase our own Dell server, load it up with everything we might conceivably need (more memory and hard disk storage than we could use in the next decade), and then have it hosted by a colocation company.
One may ask, why not use the LAMP software stack for these tasks?
- Different people working on this project access our file server in different ways. Some access it via Microsoft Terminal Services (”MTS”), other through a virtual private network (”VPN”), a few through a VPN combined with off-line folders using Synchronization Manager. With Linux, there is no obvious VPN technology to use. I have spoken with several LEMP zealots and each of them has come up with a hodgepodge of different packages, which if cobbled together they think might work. I am not certain I even know someone who is successfully running a VPN using Linux. In addition, in 2008 Microsoft introduced Windows Server 2008, which is a huge advance for mobile workers. It offer a substantial improvement for Distributed File System, which will make using off-line folders much easier.
- As for using .Net and VB.Net to develop LEMP, this was solely due to our familiarity with those tools. We could have just as easily used PHP and MySQL. JM knows SQL Server reasonably well and he contends the administration tools for SQL Server are light years ahead of PHP MyAdmin.
- With our database, we need to design forms to enter and maintain data and to create ad hoc queries and reports. There is simply no tool close in power to Microsoft Access for this purpose. If we wrote our forms as Web forms, for example, what would take one hour would take several days. We simply do not have the time for that level of inefficiency.
- All of the managers work off one mailbox (writers@kensingtonllc.com), which means all e-mails are available to everyone else. Exchange Server (”ES”) is clearly the best technology to do that, JM is not aware of any other e-mail package that comes close to ES. ES only runs on Windows Server. (One needs a client to access ES, and Outlook is the only client that works well with ES.)
G. Miscellaneous
17. Bookkeeper — Collects all revenues for all sites into a centralized checking account, prepares monthly financial reports for each site, disburses monthly payments to each partner via check or electronic funds transfer
Attorney Referral Sites
Some of our sites involve making referral of potential clients to law firms. In addition to the roles listed above, such sites need additional personnel.
H. Development of Form Contracts
18. Form Contract Developer
- Develops a generic form contract for attorneys
- Develops a generic form contract for clients
I. Web Developer
19. Web Developer
- Develops a Web form to be used on all of our lawyer referral sites, where potential clients enter their information
- Design information system to process prospective attorneys and clients, including table design in Microsoft SQL Server
- Development of forms, queries and reports using Microsoft Access
J. Attorney Recruitment and Management
20. Attorney Relationship Manager
- Searches for prospective attorneys using such services as Martindale-Hubbell and the Yellow Pages
- Approaches prospective attorneys and negotiates referral fees with them
- Aproaches prospective attorneys and negotiates referral fees with them
- Prepares contract for them to sign and negotiates various issues with them
K. Client Management
21. Client Relationship Manager
- Client intake
- Evaluates the merits of the case
- Prepares contract with clients and discusses any concerns the client may have
- Introduces the client to prospective attorneys
- Maintains contact with the client as his or her case progresses, through settlement or trial
- After case is over, ascertains how happy the client was with the attorney, for us to decide if additional clients should be introduced to that attorney
