Jump to: In fair lending, omission can lead to digital redlining AI is not perfect in addressing fair lending risks in target marketing Develop an inclusive, fair lending targeted marketing strategy The specifics of fair lending rules continue to evolve, but their core anti-discriminatory tenets should remain key to any financial services organization’s policy. Banks, credit unions, and lenders should not deny their offerings based on factors such as race, color, sex, religion, national origin, disability, and marital status. Finding a financial services official unaware of these prin ..read more

The verdict is in: Many people aren’t fond of attorneys It’s no coincidence that nearly everyone has heard a lawyer joke. While it’s difficult to admit or acknowledge the negative feelings that people have toward one’s own profession, the numbers don’t lie: in a Gallup poll from 2023, only 14% of respondents rated the “honesty and ethical standards” of lawyers as “high” and only 2% as “very high.” In that same poll, 22% rated attorneys’ honesty and ethical standards as “low” and 9% as “very low”. A landmark study for the American Bar Association found even harsher truths underlying the popular ..read more

Jump to: Promoting project-based learning A real-world design thinking challenge Putting design thinking into practice Working and volunteering at a human-centered agency When you meet members of LaFleur Marketing, you will quickly recognize that our values guide our team within client relationships and our community. As Community Engagement Leaders and Senior Designers, Lauren Martelli and I have had several opportunities to share our design thinking experience with high school students in West Michigan. Collectively, Lauren and I have more than 26 years of experience using design thinkin ..read more

Jump to: • The power of storytelling • Design and a seamless user experience • Leveraging data for success • Start creating a successful website today Your website is the hub of your marketing efforts. But, with so much to consider, building an optimized site that attracts and converts ideal clients can feel daunting. To create a high-performing and on-brand website, legal teams must leverage storytelling techniques, user-centric design, and data insights.  Our comprehensive guide outlines ten key elements for shaping an effective law firm website. In each section, you will also find simp ..read more

Merger brings a modernized approach to market research in the West Michigan tech and digital space    GRAND RAPIDS, MI (August 16, 2023) – Orchard Insights, a market research firm based in Chicago, has joined the LaFleur One organization and will now operate as a sister company to LaFleur Marketing.   This merger brings Orchard’s proprietary data analytics tool under the LaFleur umbrella – a move that will change the marketing and innovation game for LaFleur Marketing clients, the West Michigan tech space, and beyond.   “The Orchard product is a unique quantitative mar ..read more

Jump to: • The basics of marketing strategy• Your strategies should be human-centered• Data, when used wisely, bolsters the human experience The marketing industry sells you tactics, but you deserve insights and strategy. The marketing world is evolving rapidly. A year ago, we were just starting to talk about ChatGPT and the Helpful Content System; SGE, BingChat, and Google Perspectives were just glimmers on the horizon. Today, these are picking up momentum and are (or should be) starting to affect everything we digital marketers do. (We’ve been closely monitoring these for a while now). Howev ..read more

Google’s been busy. Over the last few weeks, the company made a series of notable announcements at both Google I/O and Google Marketing Live, its annual developer and ad-focused conferences. And there was one common theme: generative AI. Here’s what you need to know as you prepare your marketing strategies moving forward. 1. You Might See a Drop in Your Search-First Content’s Performance Last year, Google launched its Helpful Content System, which prioritizes people-centered, informative content over search-first content. You’ve encountered search-first content: the kind of clickbait that ratt ..read more

How to make the most of your data in a post-Google Universal Analytics world  When it comes to GA4, there are three types of marketers: those who are excited and have used it for years (like the data nerds at LaFleur), those who set up a GA4 property but believe it is a necessary evil, and those who didn’t do anything with GA4 until the official switch on July 1.     GA4 is an improved analytics platform that can deepen your insights and improve your marketing. And if you didn’t take the necessary steps to switch to GA4, Universal Analytics (UA) stopped tracking your data on Jul ..read more

Throughout 2022, Google published 10 different updates to its search engine algorithms throughout 2022, including two core updates in May and September. As is often the case, these updates sent a lot of marketers and businesses scrambling to respond as they saw previously successful webpages tumble down the rankings. It’s important not to overreact to short-term changes in page performance and rankings right after an update – sometimes a ranking drop will correct itself over the next few weeks. But in other cases, pages rank lower permanently, and content strategy needs to adjust because ..read more

There’s a good chance that you consider “word of mouth” one of your company’s top lead generators. That’s because humans are pack animals. Research shows that when humans weigh difficult decisions, they find assurance and security in other people’s opinions. We all tend to think that if other people have used a product and service, and are happy with it, it’s probably a good option for us too. Marketers refer to this phenomenon as “social proof.” In this article, we’ll explore the power of social proof and how you can leverage client stories and testimonials to expand your reach and get more c ..read more