It is now just as important for law firms to have an Internet presence with a website as it is to be found on the search engines for prospective clients that are searching every day.
Today’s online law firms must build a strong web presence as an extension to their current efforts, not as a replacement. It is now just as important to have an Internet presence with a website as it is to be found on the search engines for prospective clients that are searching every day.
CORE ELEMENTS OF A STRONG WEB PRESENCE:
- Must have a Website
- Website MUST be appealing and easy to navigate
- Website MUST be optimized for the keywords pertinent to your firms practice areas
- Website MUST be optimized for the keywords pertinent to your firms partners
- Website MUST be lead generating (Example – Contact Submission Form)
- Website MUST integrate and use web analytics
Appealing Website + Optimization of Practice Areas and Partners + Lead Generation + Analytics
Any law firm website that does not integrate all 6 of the parameters above is, in my opinion, failing to establish a strong web presence. I have noticed this more and more lately and have also noticed that the bigger law firms with big expensive sites are nowhere to be found in the search engines. Surprisingly, many lawyers and law firms ignore this reality, and have no Internet presence.
Let’s take a look at some revealing statistics from the Pew Internet & American Life Project Report:
- 68 percent of American adults (approximately 137 million people) use the Internet
- 65 percent of legal services buyers have gone online to locate a law firm
- 38 percent search online for legal services at least weekly
- 89 percent use search engines to find law firm Web sites
- 86 percent go directly to a law firm’s site
- 71 percent enter law firm Web sites through portals such as Findlaw and Martindale Hubbell
To be effective, your Web marketing should also include a budget for the Website and a separate budget for online marketing campaigns and strategies. Monitor your marketing closely to determine whether you are attracting visitors and turning them into clients. Your competitors also use the Web, and your next new client is almost certainly using the Internet, searching for you.
CAN YOUR FIRM’S ATTORNEYS BE FOUND WHEN THEY ARE GOOGLED?
I usually notice that bigger law firms websites are not optimized and sometimes you can’t even find key partners when you “Google” them, let alone finding the firm’s site for keywords related to their practice areas.
I would think that bigger law firms with big marketing budgets would do more with search engine optimization and law firm pay per click marketing. This is good news though for the smaller firms of the world because they can now compete and beat the bigger guys in online advertising.
MOST LAW FIRM OWNERS & MARKETING DIRECTORS DON’T UNDERSTAND SEO
Usually, the bigger law firms that do recognize the value of search engine optimization have a sharp law firm marketing director. Yet, I find most law firm marketing directors don’t seem to understand how important it is to have some optimization done on the firm’s site, at the very least make sure your firm and its partners can be found at Google, Yahoo! and/or MSN (preferably all three).
There is a small light at the end of the tunnel though because more and more lawyers are recognizing that online marketing is the wave of the future and will ultimately replace the yellow pages and other traditional ways to advertise.
SOLO LAWYERS VS. BIG LAW FIRMS
I am also seeing examples of solo attorneys out performing big law firms. Just today I reviewed a big law firm’s site that has multiple locations and over 100 attorneys. They have a very old site that has a domain name from 1994, which is and should be a good thing. It has a Google PageRank score of 6, which is very good and it has 244 links counted from Google, which is a decent number (not great but not bad either).
These three things combined, an older domain name, a high PageRank score and a lot of links should mean that this site is well ranked but the fact is that it’s not ranked at all for any keywords related to its practice and in fact many of the partners aren’t even coming up if you Google them by name.
There are many different law firm sites, including solo attorney sites that maybe have a PageRank of 3 or 4, have about 20-30 links, yet are ranked in the top 10 for many different keywords and get a lot of website traffic as a result. This shows you that it’s a combination of things that have to happen and that certain things must be done in order to get results at Google.
LAW FIRMS ARE MISSING A GREAT OPPORTUNITY
Most law firms have not paid any attention to search engine optimization and are just starting to realize how important it is. If you have a site that has been around for awhile, has plenty of links from other sites, is in the right search directories BUT isn’t optimized for the keywords pertinent to your firms practice, then you’re probably missing out on a lot of focused traffic.
About the Author:
Robert E. Ferguson is a Strategic Online Marketing Consultant specializing in Search Engine Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Pay-Per-Click Advertising, Local Search Marketing, Social Media Marketing and Online Reputation Management. He has helped Independent Law Firms in areas such as Property Tax Relief, Debt Relief, Foreclosure and Real Estate as well as general legal services online strategies. Robert is a Google AdWords Certified Professional, Yahoo! Search Marketing Ambassador, MSN adExcellence Professional, and a SEMPO Certified Professional Search Engine Marketer. He is an active member of SEMPO (Research Committee), the Web Analytics Association and was recently invited to attend Yahoo’s 2nd annual Traffic Quality Council. You can reach Robert by email and can read more articles on law firm marketing as well as online marketing strategies in general at his website: www.fergusonseo.com
