A graduate of the University of the South (Sewanee), Mr. Myers has held several top-level management positions with finance and banking companies over the past twenty years, including his role as Senior Vice President of Corporate and Investment Banking at Bank of America for ten years. In 2002, Paul brought his financial expertise and knowledge of credit and underwriting policies to the trial law firm community when he became Chief Credit Officer at a financial services company. 

Paul currently serves as his company's Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board of Directors. His daily role at Advocate covers a wide range of activities, including client relations, strategic planning, credit underwriting, public relations, and accounting and finance.

A graduate of the University of the South (Sewanee), Mr. Myers has held several top level management positions with finance and banking companies over the past twenty years, including his role as Senior Vice President of Corporate and Investment Banking at Bank of America for ten years. In 2002, Paul brought his financial expertise and knowledge of credit and underwriting policies to the trial law firm community when he became Chief Credit Officer at Advocate Capital, Inc.

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The IRS recently released the 2013 standard mileage rates.  The rates are as follows:

• 56.5 cents per mile for business miles driven.
• 24 cents per mile driven for medical or moving purposes.
• 14 cents per mile driven in service of charitable organizations.

To read the IRS publication, please click here.

Kelly A. O’Leary, CPA, CGMA, MBA, CITP
Vice President, Finance and Administration

Ms. Jones graduated with honors from the Southeastern Paralegal Institute. From there, she went on to gain 14 years of experience as a trial paralegal and was an active member of the Association of Legal Administrators. She is currently Senior Vice President for a law finance company and  a QuickBooks Certified ProAdvisor. Ms. Jones' years of experience working in and around personal injury litigation gives her a one-of-a-kind perspective into all that is involved in managing a law firm.

Ms. Jones is a proud member of the National Association of Professional Women.

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The Small Business Heath Care Tax Credit is designed to help small businesses offer health insurance coverage.  If you provide health insurance coverage to your employees, your law firm may qualify for the small business health care tax credit.  Can you answer yes to these two questions?

• Does your firm have fewer than 25 full-time equivalent employees that earn an average wage of less than $50,000?
• Does your firm pay at least half of the cost for your employees’ health insurance premiums?

If you answered ‘yes’ to these questions, talk to your Certified Public Accountant (CPA) about your firm’s eligibility.  Click here to read the IRS’ tips regarding this credit.

Kelly A. O’Leary, CPA, CGMA, MBA, CITP
Director of Finance and Administration

Advocate Capital, Inc., is a commercial finance company that was founded in 1999. Our main focus is providing an alternative to the “interest free” loans that most trial lawyers make to their firms for case expenses. We do this through a unique combination of commercial lines-of-credit and specialized accounting services.

Our clients are the best and the brightest of trial law firms from all over the United States. Our typical client-firm is a well established, experienced trial law firm whose partners are high-net-worth attorneys at the “top of their game”. Many are leaders of state and national trial lawyer associations, and quite a few are authors and expert speakers in the profession.

Advocate Capital, Inc., has enjoyed consistent, rapid, profitable growth during its history and now has clients in over 35 states. We look forward to adding you to our family of satisfied clients!

Website: www.advocatecapital.com

The IRS recently released an informative bulletin regarding the management of your tax records.  As a Certified Public Accountant, I am often asked, “How long do I need to keep my tax returns after I’ve filed?”  Here are some of the tips shared from the IRS’ release:

• Normally, tax records should be kept for three years.
• Some documents — such as records relating to a home purchase or sale, stock transactions, IRA and business or rental property — should be kept longer.
• In most cases, the IRS does not require you to keep records in any special manner. Generally speaking, however, you should keep any and all documents that may have an impact on your federal tax return.
• Records you should keep include bills, credit card and other receipts, invoices, mileage logs, canceled, imaged or substitute checks, proofs of payment, and any other records to support deductions or credits you claim on your return.

For more information, click here to read the release.  The IRS also recommends reviewing Publication 552, Recordkeeping for Individuals, for more details regarding tax documentation.

Kelly A. O’Leary, CPA, CGMA, MBA, CITP
Director of Finance and Administration

New Google Ranking Factors: 10 of the Latest Quality Guidelines You Must Heed

By Yvette Valencia

Google’s recently leaked Quality Rating Guidelines Version 5.0 may be one of the most important 160-page documents you'll ever read. Of course, not every website manager has the time to digest all of the rating parameters that have come and gone, so we've broken it down into this                                                                                              handy list of the latest Google ranking factors.

E-A-T: Expertise-Authority-Trust - Google wants your content to establish that your website is an experienced source of information on your topic; your writers are an authority on the subject they write about; and your website can be trusted to provide the information or service that it advertises or supports.
Establish authority early - You don't need a Ph.D. to be an expert on something. Google takes people with firsthand knowledge of something like living with Crohn's disease as a type of expertise. Just make sure you have a clear "about the author" section to explain why the writer is an expert on the topic.
Watch your use of on-page ads - Google gives lower-quality ratings to pages that have too many ads, place ads in the middle of the main content, or use ad services with malware or deceptive banners.
Use a clean design - Don't design your site to maximize ad space; design your site with user enjoyment and convenience in mind.
Be transparent - Google wants to know who's running the site and how users can contact you if they have any questions or concerns. Make sure that you have a clear way for customers to contact you for support or concerns.
Don't associate with sites that have a bad reputation - Google looks at the company you keep, and if you have outbound links that go to dead sites, known dangerous sites, or any form of malware or spam, your site's quality rating will suffer.
Add supplementary content when appropriate - Including high-quality supplementary content to support your text, such as instructional videos and pictures is another factor that Google uses to determine your authority and trust.
Fraudulent behavior and bad reputation are automatic poor ratings - Google's rating team has been instructed to give an automatic poor quality rating to any sites that engage in fraudulent behavior or have a bad reputation among users.
Do not auto-generate pages - There are programs out there that can auto-generate blog posts based on search trends and other data. These posts are almost always gibberish, and Google's rating team has been instructed to rate these pages with the lowest rating.
Include an "About Us" and "Contact Info" page - Older versions of the quality guidelines have only required these pages for sites dedicated to health, finance, or well-being, but now they are a requirement for all pages to obtain a favorable quality rating.

Google's Quality Rating Guidelines are a Lot to Digest – We Can Help

Those are a lot of guidelines and factors to take into consideration, and if you're feeling overwhelmed, don't worry. We Do Web Content, Inc. is here to help your business impress Google's quality rating team with total compliance with their guidelines.

Give us a call or fill out our contact form to speak with our content team and learn how our company can help yours exceed expectations when it comes to website quality. Call us at 888-521-3880.

References:

http://www.thesempost.com/google-rewrites-quality-rating-guide-seos-need-know/

http://www.mboresourcecenter.com/googles-new-quality-rating-guide-revealed/