Winning a big client who decides to keep your law firm on retainer is the dream. Realistically, most of the UK’s 208,000 law firms must continually generate new business to thrive. Although many firms continue to rely on traditional marketing, the true rewards are online.
According to the latest stats, over a third of clients start their search online before examining any other channel. This is an opportunity, and lead generation is one of the most impactful ways to snag this group.
Want to know how to make lead generation work for you? Let’s dive into everything you need to know about lead generation in the legal trade.
What is lead generation for law firms?
Leads are anyone interested in using your law firm’s services. For example, if you specialise in helping your clients through messy divorces, anyone searching for a divorce lawyer would be a potential lead.
Leads can come from anywhere. They could be someone local Googling for a “business lawyer in Manchester” or someone asking about a “road traffic solicitor in Durham” in a local Facebook group.
Lead generation aims to acquire those leads and get them to choose you as their lawyer. In other words, it’s the business of attracting and selling to clients who can benefit from your services.
The benefits of lead generation for law firms
Lead generation is viewed as a priority for marketers in every sector. According to one figure, 53% of marketers sent 50% of their total budgets to lead generation, which shows how powerful it is.
So, what’s the benefit of doing this in the legal sector?
- Grow your client base.
- Increase your conversion rates.
- Reduce your marketing costs.
- Turn to precision targeting.
- Gain a competitive edge.
- Save time and resources.
- Build brand awareness.
Finally, strong lead generation campaigns can establish yourself as the go-to legal authority in your niche. Whether you help clients with speeding fines or criminal law, lead generation positions you as the number one brand in your playground.
The lead generation process for law firms
Lead generation isn’t about throwing up a few ads and hoping for the best. In the past, this was marketing’s best-kept secret, but times have changed. Today, 61% of marketers claimed generating leads was now their biggest challenge.
Most guides treat lead generation as an abstract concept. Let’s consider what it might look like for a solicitor in the field.
- John is being sued for libel and needs legal advice. He discovered your firm through Google and signed up for a free consultation. This makes John a lead.
- You already know John is interested, but he’s probably taking free consultations with several solicitors. During your call, you learn about his case, which is scheduled for next month.
- Throughout your call, your rep found out he can afford you and lives in the same city. This makes him what’s known as a “qualified lead”, meaning John is worth pursuing.
- Your firm will then “nurture” John as a lead. This could be through personalised offers, discounts, or something else. If successful, John will convert from a lead into a customer.
Successful lead generation relies on your marketing and sales team working in tandem to bring in leads and guide them down the sales funnel. The problem is your competitors are also doing the same thing.
How can you ensure that the leads generated are high-quality?
Not every lead is worth your time. Just because someone needs legal services doesn’t make them a good lead.
For example, if you’re based in Southampton and someone in Edinburgh has found you, that makes them a low-quality lead because most lawyers aren’t going to travel the length of the UK for a single client.
Here are some simple ways to ensure the leads you’ve generated are worth pursuing:
Add more fields to your lead generation forms. Not only does this provide more information, but it also scares away people who aren’t serious about hiring you.
Make your lead generation questions more thoughtful. Again, it’s all about separating the serious people from the window shoppers. The last thing you want is to waste your secretary’s time on free consultations that won’t lead anywhere.
Although providing more hurdles to jump through and reducing the number of people you target may seem counterintuitive, it’ll actually increase your success rates while reducing the drag on your resources.
Plus, you might even find a relatively sparse niche and gain a competitive edge!
Generating leads for multiple legal practice areas
Generating leads for multiple legal practice areas is often a point of contention among both marketers and solicitors. However, since law firms may address several areas of law, you’ll need separate lead-generation campaigns for each.
It all begins with your law firm’s website. Since you’ll drive 90% of your traffic here, you need individual landing pages for each practice area. Furthermore, this will likely mean running multiple paid marketing campaigns, including SEO, PPC and social media advertising.
SEO is especially pertinent because growing your brand’s visibility as a whole will support each practice area’s lead-generation campaign. This is where hiring an SEO agency that can build these foundations proves its value.
Ultimately, you must also consider resource allocation if operating in multiple practice areas. Does it make sense to allocate half of your resources to individual libel when most of your business comes from business libel? Of course not, so campaigns must be tailored to your firm.
Measuring the success of law firm lead generation
How do you know if your lead generation campaign has been successful?
Measuring any campaign’s success is critical to optimising future campaigns. Directly attributing new business to your lead generation efforts tells you whether you need to continue with what you’re doing or change.
Follow these tips to measure the success of your lead generation campaign.
Focus on the right metrics
Concentrating on core metrics provides actionable insights into what’s working. Here are the top metrics to use:
- Conversion rate
- Cost per lead
- Revenue per client
- Return on Investment (ROI)
Set up analytics and tracking
Analytics and tracking tools are essential to working out where your new business is coming from. Without certain tools, you’re entirely blind to your marketing efforts.
Basic tools like Google Analytics will tell you about the performance of your website and its landing pages and offer insights into how your visitors are behaving. In terms of lead generation, you also need conversion tracking tools. Several platforms have native tools, such as Google Ads Conversion Tracking and Facebook Ads Manager. However, all-in-one suites are also available.
Use a reliable Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system
CRMs are essential for tracking and managing your leads. Some of the benefits include:
- Tracking interactions.
- Centralising lead data from each channel.
- Analysing lead behaviour.
Some of the most common CRMs law firms use include HubSpot and Salesforce. Some firms may prefer niche-specific CRMs, though.
Launch A/B testing
A/B testing is a technique for measuring lead generation ROI. It involves creating at least two variations of your landing pages, copy, campaigns and more. Each variation is tested against the other to see which performs best.
Constant A/B testing will tell you what works, but it relies on making incremental changes to see which alterations have the most impact. After all, the secret of lead generation is that you’ll never get the best possible results from your first campaign. It’s a long-term process.
How to generate leads for your law firm
There’s no getting around the fact that lead generation is time- and resource-intensive. Get it right, and you will see your leads increase exponentially. The transformative potential of mastering lead generation is undeniable but requires expertise.
Legal professionals are busy people and may not have the time to learn about and run lead-generation initiatives, and that’s where Tao Digital comes in. In the past, our efforts have led to one law firm increasing its leads by 174%.
If these types of results are what your firm is looking for, reach out to the team today.
Paid advertising is one of the most effective ways to get your law firm in front of prospective clients. Retargeting ads are among the most impactful ways to grow your brand’s footprint, but you need to know how to do them, or you risk spending a lot of money for little return.
In fact, one in five marketers admitted to having a dedicated retargeting budget, with most marketers focusing on Facebook and Instagram. If you want to supercharge your firm’s growth, here’s your guide to retargeting ads and how they work.
What are retargeting ads?
In an ideal world, potential clients would visit your website and hire your law firm. In reality, 96% of people who visit your website aren’t ready to act on their first visit. It’s not a slight on your website. It’s just the way it is.
This is where retargeting comes in. It’s an advertising strategy that keeps your law firm in front of potential clients after they leave your website. Retargeting ads are explicitly shown to visitors based on their activity on your website.
In other words, display ads target people who have never heard of you, while retargeting ads target those who’ve already “touched” your business. Studies have shown that retargeting ads have a 70% higher conversion impact than ordinary display ads. Why is this the case?
It goes back to the traditional marketing principle of the Rule of Seven. The Rule of Seven states a company must touch a client at least seven times before they convert.
Check out our PDF Guide to Law Firm Remarketing
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How do retargeting ads work for law firms?
Retargeting ads make it possible to show ads to your website visitors based on a range of metrics, including:
- Number of times they visited your website.
- Time spent on your website.
- Pages clicked on.
- Other behaviours displayed on your website.
This can be done by tracking pixels embedded on your website or holding the visitor’s email address. The tracking depends on the type of retargeting campaign and the action you’re looking for.
Let’s run through the step-by-step process a visitor to your legal website might follow with retargeting:
- A potential client visits your website.
- They show interest in your legal services.
- They leave without taking action.
- Later, they visit other legal websites.
- Your retargeting ad appears and recaptures their interest.
- The client then clicks on the ad, returns to your website and contacts you about your legal services.
Some clients may return to your website when they see one of your retargeting ads. Others may need to see multiple ads or multiple repeat visits to act. It all depends on the client.
What does a retargeting ad look like in the field? Here’s an example of what an effective retargeting ad looks like, from our own retargeting project!
Do retargeting ads work in the legal sector?
Dive into the statistics surrounding retargeting ads, and you’ll see big claims. For example, one study says retargeting ads are 76% more likely to be clicked on than ordinary display ads. The problem is most of these numbers come from eCommerce, which is by far the biggest market for retargeting ads.
So, do they work as well within the legal sector?
Although research into retargeting and the legal sector is sparse, no evidence states that it shouldn’t work. Although the needs of legal clients may differ, marketing principles remain the same. Principles, like the aforementioned Rule of Seven, don’t change because you sell legal services instead of retail items.
Finding the right platforms for legal retargeting ads
Retargeting ads can be delivered across several common marketing channels. Most lawyers will use three primary platforms:
- Social Media—Facebook and Instagram are the easiest platforms to run retargeting ads on because of their built-in platform capabilities, including features like the Facebook Cookie Pixel. However, solicitors can also run retargeting ads via X (Twitter), LinkedIn and YouTube.
- Google Display Network—The Google Display Network displays side-of-site and banner ads on sites that are part of the network. This retargeting platform is effective because it features ads on websites your audience will likely visit, meaning your message follows your prospect.
- Google Ads—Google ads follow the same principle, but they show up on the search engine itself.
These three avenues should form part of every lawyer’s retargeting campaign, but they’re not the only platforms where you can display retargeting ads. It all depends on where your audience typically is.
Setting up a successful retargeting campaign for your law firm
Marketing professionals rave about retargeting campaigns. Approximately 92% of marketers said retargeting platforms are just as effective or better than search marketing. However, no form of paid advertising can deliver guaranteed results.
Setting up successful retargeting campaigns is both art and science. Nailing a great campaign from the start requires time and constant optimisation. Here’s what you must know about creating impactful campaigns.
Firstly, you must build the infrastructure to capture and retarget those who’ve already visited your website. This includes installing the Facebook Pixel on your website and setting up Google Analytics.
These tools inform you where people spend time on your website and what they do. It’s this data you’ll feed into each of your retargeting campaigns. Over time, you can also segment these visitors to produce laser-targeted retargeting ads.
The right platform is the platform where your audience is. You need to know which platforms your ideal client uses.
For example, lawyers specialising in business law can reasonably assume that a professional social media network like LinkedIn would be a happy hunting ground. On the other hand, if most of your clients deal with motoring law, Facebook could be the better option. Market research is the only way to find out.
Retargeting ads focus more on direct conversion than other types of ads. Your targets already know your brand and what you do. The point is to create an ad that reminds them of your law firm and encourages them to get in touch.
Like any ad, it needs excellent copy, a solid call to action and imagery that draws the eye. This is where working with a digital marketing professional really pays dividends.
Ensure your audience doesn’t see your ad too many times. Too many appearances can annoy and push people away. For example, SurveyMonkey reveals that 74% of users believe there are too many ads.
Overexposure is as harmful as underexposure, so you must use frequency-limiting features. Practically all major platforms have these features to limit how many times your targets will see your ads.
The final step in any successful campaign is using the data you generate to optimise your campaign. Examining your retargeting data is an opportunity to make informed decisions to enhance the effectiveness of future ads.
Metrics to follow for worthwhile retargeting include:
- Emails sent.
- Direct calls gained from ads.
- Contact forms filled out.
- Cost per client acquisition.
Ideally, you should begin tracking these metrics before launching retargeting ads to establish a baseline to compare.
Why retargeting is a key strategy for law firms
Retargeting ads take time to perfect, but it’s a journey well worth embarking on. If you’re not sure whether adding them to your digital marketing strategy is right for you, here are the benefits:
- Highly Targeted – Retargeting delivers ads to an already engaged audience. This is effective for solicitors where clients tend to take time to research and compare different options before committing to a solicitor.
- More Visibility—These ads provide extra visibility for your law firm even after prospects leave your website, keeping your name at the forefront of their minds.
- Improve Conversion Rates – Retargeting ads are a proven method of improving conversion rates. They’re several times more effective than ordinary display ads, which you might already be running.
- Build Your Credibility – Retargeting ads contribute to improving your credibility because your name will appear on other websites. Over time, this will establish your practice as a trusted source of truth for legal matters.
Despite the benefits, mastering retargeting ads and boosting your ROI is a challenging feat. That’s why turning to an experienced digital marketing firm is essential for acquiring results and avoiding wasted funds. To learn more, speak to one of the Tao Digital Marketing team about launching your retargeting campaign today.
Marketing your law firm is essential to your survival in today’s digital world. Currently, the UK’s legal market has seen the number of registered law firms falling, with the Solicitors Regulation Authority counting 9,334 firms in February 2024.
The legal market remains abundant despite the number of operators falling from record highs. Remember, 96% of people said they started their search for legal advice online. Everyone looking up legal advice is a potential lead, but how do you target them?
It’s all about your target audience, and this guide will discuss how to reach them online.
The importance of a target audience
Your target audience is your people. If you think about all your current and former clients, these are your target audience. Yet even professional marketers often don’t know their target audience. According to HubSpot, just 42% of marketers had basic demographic information for them.
Without that information, you’re flying blind. You’re making assumptions and hoping for the best, which means wasted time and money. So, why should you know your target audience?
Of course, knowing your target audience is one thing, but targeting them successfully is quite another.
What is the typical target audience for a law firm?
Solicitors can serve every adult in the UK. Your law firm’s target audience comprises the likeliest people to become your clients. The easiest way to figure this out is to examine your current client base and find what binds them. Basic demographics include age, education level, income and occupation, but law firms must dig deeper.
According to Spotify, poorly targeted ads waste an estimated $37 billion USD annually. Avoiding wasted marketing pounds means going deeper. Some examples include:
- Values
- Pain points
- Lifestyles
- Needs
Never make assumptions because the target audience for a road traffic lawyer will be very different from a business lawyer serving the needs of companies.
How to define and segment your law firm’s target audience online
Defining your target audience leads to segmenting that audience. Remember, many law firms operate in multiple practice areas, meaning they may have several target audiences – or segments – to consider.
Here are some tips to begin learning about your target audience.
Here are some tips to begin learning about your target audience.
Analyse your current clients with data analysis
The story is in the data. Solicitors nationwide are embracing technology, with the Law Society Gazette revealing that a quarter of lawyers use generative technology. So why wouldn’t you use data analytics to learn about your target audience?
Focus on your current and past clients and identify their patterns and characteristics. This will give you a benchmark against which to continue your research. Remember, this is an ongoing process because you’re constantly acquiring data.
Moreover, you can do the same thing with your competitors’ audiences to identify gaps in the market.
Research the broader legal market
Keep sight of the broader legal market, or you risk not seeing the forest for the trees. Explore the market landscape to spot the trends and opportunities within your practice area.
Keeping up with the market doesn’t require reading dry market research reports. Instead, surveys should be conducted on current and potential clients to learn more about their needs and preferences.
Invest in psychographics
Psychographics focus on psychological variables and offer a way to understand the minds and motivations of your target audience. Examples of psychographic metrics include:
- Motivations
- Values
- Interests
- Lifestyles
Again, this is where data analytics comes in handy. Acquiring this data helps you craft the targeted marketing messages that compel your audience to act.
Segment based on behaviour
Segmentation divides your target audience into different groups. This enables you to target campaigns based on the characteristics of groups within your target audience.
Tracking what your target audience does provides clues as to what’s likely to resonate with them. Some examples of behavioural metrics to track include:
- Time spent on your website.
- Number of times visiting your website.
- Pages clicked on.
- Downloads.
- Newsletter opens/clicks.
Analysing your audience’s behaviour can help you make better choices regarding every aspect of your marketing campaign.
Continue gathering and analysing
No person was the same ten years ago as they are today. The same goes for your audience. What worked a few years ago isn’t necessarily going to work now.
Law firms must continually analyse their clients and activity across all their marketing channels. This enables them to spot any client changes and adjust accordingly.
Creating audience personas for your law firm
Did you know that 44% of marketers used audience personas in their business? But what are audience personas?
Your target audience defines a group of people, whereas audience personas zoom into individual members of that audience. Personas drill down to define what an ideal looks like within the various segments of your target audience, making them powerful tools.
Here’s a short guide for building out an audience persona:
- Begin With Demographics – The foundation of any audience persona is the demographics. Understanding this provides the high-level data needed to continue.
- Know Their Pain Points – The next step is to know their pain points. In other words, what’s the problem they need you to solve, and what do they expect from you?
- Research the Noise – Noise in the marketplace stops them from acting. This is where analysing your competitors comes in useful. Understanding what others say to influence your target audience helps you find the gaps to undermine these efforts and win the client.
- The “Why”—Why should they hire your firm? Conceptualise your unique selling points to help understand why someone would hire you over your competitors. Every law firm should know this because it’s what makes you special. Without those points, you’re just another law firm.
- Finish With Emotions – People don’t always purchase based on cold, hard truths. They make them based on emotions. When creating a client persona, define the journey of working with you. Moreover, map out the emotions of that persona in both win and lose scenarios. This will help you customise your marketing messaging.
Companies worldwide spend billions of pounds on finding their target audience and building audience personas in every industry. But you don’t need to cripple your cash flow to find your target audience and boost your marketing success rates.
At Tao Digital, we specialise in helping the UK’s lawyers branch out online and achieve their goals. In one case study, we collaborated with one firm and they experienced a 174% increase in leads.
If you need a partner who can find your target audience and win them over to your brand, contact the team today.
Whether you are a sole practitioner or a nationwide brand, law firm marketing is essential to your practice’s growth. According to PricewaterhouseCoopers, the UK legal industry is growing with an average 8-10% growth in fees, with firms remaining largely resilient in the post-pandemic landscape.
On the other hand, claiming your piece of the cake requires marketing campaigns that excel beyond your competitors. According to an assessment from Thomson Reuters Legal UK, too many law firms still only see marketing rather than trying to understand the dynamics of each market.
This philosophy shows that it’s time to level up your game. One way of sharpening your legal marketing efforts is digital marketing tools. Let’s look at the most effective solutions for the year ahead.
Should law firms use tools for their marketing?
Online marketing is where the money is. Today, over a third of potential clients begin their search for a solicitor online.
Although you can carry out your marketing processes manually, this isn’t the best way of handling it. Using tools increases accuracy, efficiency and performance. In one study from Think With Google, marketers using five or more tools for analytics alone were 39% likelier to see a performance improvement.
Taking advantage of cutting-edge technology can save you time while delivering better results. However, not all tools were created equal, so choosing your tech stack carefully is vital.
How digital marketing tools can help law firms
Despite the clear benefits of digital marketing – and marketing generally – UK law firms spend just 2% of annual gross revenues on their marketing efforts. This is evidence of an industry that’s still somewhat edgy about throwing money at marketing.
However, digital marketing tools deliver positive ROIs when wielded correctly. Some of the advantages of investing in these solutions include:
Better Understand Your Audience – Digital marketing tools deepen your understanding of your target audience. Acquiring detailed real-time data helps you refine your marketing strategy by understanding what your prospective clients really want.
Maximise Your Reach – Use tools to reach as many people as possible with your marketing content. This is especially helpful for UK law firms operating nationwide or looking to expand into new regional markets.
Measure and Optimise – Stop fumbling in the dark using a costly trial-and-error strategy. Instead, use state-of-the-art tools to determine what’s working for your firm.
Save Time – Time is precious in the fast-paced legal trade. Digital marketing tools automate many tedious, time-consuming tasks like social media scheduling, lead tracking and email marketing.
Reduce Your Spend – Switching your focus to technology-led marketing can enable you to cut out many of the usual expenses associated with traditional marketing. Plus, it’s not uncommon for tools to offer flexible plans, mitigating your costs.
Intelligent Segmentation – In the past, digital marketing focused on hitting a broad market and hoping some of them become future clients. Today, tools are helping lawyers to initiate hyper-targeted campaigns, increasing their returns.
It’s easy to shirk away from spending hundreds of pounds on building your marketing tech stack, but think about the big picture. Digital marketing tools are a proven way for legal eagles to reduce their outgoings while increasing their returns.
Ultimately, the firm that uses marketing tools will always beat the firm that doesn’t.
Best digital marketing tools for the legal industry
Thousands of marketing tools exist for every task and process known to man. If you’re unfamiliar with legal marketing, it’s easy to get overwhelmed by all the options available.
This is why many lawyers bury their heads in the sand and continue managing everything manually. If you’re confused, we’ve compiled a list of the best digital marketing tools specifically for the legal industry.
Legal Marketing Strategy Tools
Before you can launch a marketing campaign, you must plan one out. Strategising is where your marketing efforts rise and fall.
Here are our favourite tools for constructing your next campaign from the ground up.
Google Search Console
The Google Search Console is part of a suite of Google-made tools for improving your SEO efforts. With the Search Console, you can conduct an initial analysis or refresh an existing strategy with an updated set of keywords.
This tool aims to do more with keywords, find errors on your site, and test how mobile-friendly your platform is. It’s also where you can see how your pages are doing on Google.
Plus, Google Search Console integrates with all other Google tools, including Google Analytics.
Google Analytics 4 (GA4)
By far, the best web analytics platform is GA4, the fourth iteration of Google Analytics. Lawyers can use this tool to acquire a comprehensive overview of how users interact with websites, apps and other platforms under your banner.
Ahrefs
Law firms looking for paid SEO tools with more advanced capabilities should look to Ahrefs. The value of this tool is that it examines your website to produce a range of actionable data, including:
- Keywords and search volumes
- Link profiles
- Ranking profiles
Other features include a site and content explorer to enable you to evaluate the performance of everything you’ve ever produced on your website.
AlsoAsked
Question-based long-tail keywords can provide opportunities to demonstrate your expertise and capture niche markets. The AlsoAsked platform gives you all the most commonly asked questions from real searchers.
For example, we typed in “personal injury law”, and some of the questions we got back included:
- How long does a personal injury claim take?
- What’s the average payout for personal injury claims?
- Should I get a solicitor for personal injury claims?
LowFruits.io
Finding keywords is one thing, but the key to good SEO is discovering high-traffic keywords with low-competition signals.
Designed for website owners, LowFruits is a bulk SERP analyser that uncovers those signals, helping you to find blue-water zones to build your authority through.
Google Trends
Evergreen content is essential, but plugging your firm into current legal trends can help you join the conversations and address real people’s concerns.
While Google Trends doesn’t offer granular data, it effectively shows the legal topics and ideas people are currently exploring.
Website and Hosting Software
In the online world, your website is your most valuable asset. This is the digital equivalent of your office. Since it’s often the first thing prospective clients see, you’ve got to get it right.
Let’s examine the best way to get your site up and running.
WordPress
In 2023, WordPress continues to reign supreme. It’s the engine behind approximately 43% of all websites on the Internet – and for a good reason.
WordPress has millions of free templates, customisation options and plugins to create the ideal legal website without coding experience.
Even better, WordPress is completely free.
Kinsta
Free web hosting doesn’t work for every business. We recommend Kinsta because of its high-end performance using Google’s C2 cloud platform (our Kinsta review gives more details!).
Kinsta’s infrastructure includes state-of-the-art security features and world-class support. Moreover, it’s highly flexible, with starter plans costing less than your monthly coffee budget.
Its lowest-cost plan includes 10 GB of storage, a premium migration and a 14-day backup.
Email Marketing
Email marketing is one of the most effective avenues to explore. According to one study, email marketing has a 4400% ROI, meaning for every £1 invested, the average return is £36.
However, you need the right platform for email. Check out these two options.
ActiveCampaign
ActiveCampaign is an excellent email platform choice for most law firms because of its fair pricing system. It has all the features you need to send out highly targeted campaigns to your list.
Plus, you can customise your campaigns and split-test email subject lines with ActiveCampaign to determine what engages your list the most.
MailChimp
MailChimp is another prominent email marketing platform for lawyers. Like ActiveCampaign, it possesses all the features necessary to create custom emails and gain detailed analytics from each campaign.
Moreover, building custom templates is simple due to its drag-and-drop interface. However, beware that MailChimp tends to get expensive with larger lists.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
CRM software streamlines how you interact with current and prospective clients. With a solid CRM in your tech stack, you can simplify building client relationships and supercharge the processes that lead to more business.
In our opinion, there’s only one choice for CRM software.
HubSpot
HubSpot isn’t a dedicated legal CRM, but it works equally well for all professional services. Some of the standout HubSpot features that make it the most effective CRM on the market include:
- Automated execution
- Well-configured databases
- Marketing source capture
- Marketing channel evaluation
- Full integration with other systems
Social Media and Youtube
Social media is critical for growing your legal practice. As you’d expect, plenty of tools exist for managing your social media channels, including ones designed around specific platforms.
Here are our top social media tools:
- Linkinbio – Share all your most important links in one URL to maximise your bio space.
- Actual Platform Analytics – The fact is that all of the most prominent platforms have built-in analytics tabs that provide all of the data you could ever need.
- TubeBuddy – YouTube SEO, analytics, keywords and tags. TubeBuddy is specially built for the world’s largest video-sharing platform to help with law firm video marketing.
Link Building
Getting backlinks to your content signals that your content is relevant, trustworthy and authority-led. Even today, backlinks are among the most effective ways of getting your content to the top of Google SERPs.
Other than reaching out to known bloggers directly, we recommend:
- HARO – HARO allows journalists to ask questions of professionals. If they choose your answer, they’ll reward you with a link to your website.
- Directories – Backlinks from general directories also provide some juice for your website. Ensure you’re listed on Yelp, Yellow Pages, DMOZ and others.
Supercharge your Law Firm Marketing with Tao Digital
Building your tech stack with legal digital marketing tools is the first step to accelerating your law firm. With Tao Digital, our team can help you assemble everything and gain the competitive edge you need.
If you want to learn more about the secrets of digital law firm growth, contact the team today.
Getting your firm in front of your audience is the hardest part of gaining clients in today’s digital world. In the UK, the average marketing cost for law firms ranges from 0.5% to 5% of annual revenues, far below that of other industries.
It’s no secret that law firms often find themselves behind the curve in digital marketing, but in that lies tremendous opportunities for forward-thinking legal professionals to take advantage. One such avenue to explore is email marketing.
With 59% of marketers claiming that email is their most effective channel, harnessing its power can supercharge your bottom line. But starting an email list isn’t enough. You need to go about it the right way.
Do law firms use email marketing?
Law firms are gradually discovering the benefits of email. Although stats from UK firms are unavailable, the American Bar Association revealed that 41% of law firms were using email newsletters for marketing in 2021, up from 26% in 2020.
This is far below other industries, meaning that unlike other forms of marketing, such as PPC and social media ads, this is a blue-water zone to be exploited.
What can you expect from adopting an effective email marketing strategy? According to the Digital Marketing Association, email marketing has an average ROI of 42:1, meaning for every £1 spent, you generate £42 in business.
How can law firms benefit from email marketing?
Email marketing is yet another channel solicitors must add to their marketing mix. Unlike other channels, email marketing offers several unique benefits.
Understand that an email is a personal conversation. It’s an intimate communication technique that allows you to speak directly to prospects. This is why it’s so effective at building relationships: the message can be customised and delivered to the right people at the right time. It’s an alternative to the legacy scattergun approach.
Mastering email marketing is an opportunity to humanise yourself while demonstrating thought leadership. It’s the action that builds trust and formulates genuine relationships between you, your prospects and your existing clients.
Ultimately, this results in more brand awareness, leads and business.
Considering the low-cost barrier to entry of email marketing, this is a cost-effective marketing option requiring little investment. You can benefit from email marketing, whether you’re a large firm or a one-man operation.
Creating an email marketing strategy for your law firm
Gathering emails and blasting out corporate news is no strategy at all. People want information that’s relevant to them. For example, if you specialise in tackling unfair dismissal cases, there’s little point in sending out a newsletter on human rights.
Understand that despite the high ROI of email marketing, MailChimp research reveals average open rates for the legal industry are a relatively low 22%, with a paltry 2.81% click-through rate. So, it’s vital to avoid being disheartened.
You need a strategy that reflects your firm and the interests of the future clients you’re targeting. So, what aspects make up an optimal email marketing strategy?
Target Audience – Who are your target audience, and what do they care about? This will be specific to every law firm. Typically, you should begin with your primary practice areas when divining content for your newsletter.
Competitor Research – What are your competitors sending? One of the easiest ways to conduct competitor research is to sign up for a few of their newsletters and create a database of the subjects they’re tackling.
Goals – What is the purpose of your email list? Not every firm’s primary goal is generating direct business. Some use them to create brand awareness and generate industry authority. Defining your goals establishes the line between success and failure and the KPIs you prioritise.
Content Type – What sort of content are you planning to send? This could be anything from promotional emails and legal guides to invoices and special offers.
Frequency – The frequency of your emails is another defining factor. Setting expectations early is crucial to avoid annoying/abandoning your audience. Make it clear what your subscribers can expect from you.
Thankfully, email marketing strategies don’t require a budget because of the minimal startup cost. The primary challenge for law firms is setting aside the time to write newsletters and measure the results.
Email marketing best practices for law firms
Email marketing requires constant learning and development to master. After all, the habits of subscribers change over time. However, certain best practices remain. Let’s discuss some top tips for law firms getting to grips with email marketing.
- Set Clear Goals – Every email marketing campaign should have its own goals. Whether it’s acquiring more clients, retaining existing ones, or increasing awareness of your legal niche, you need a goal because this is what influences your measurables.
- Keep Your List Pruned – Building your email list is always a priority, but so is keeping your list clean. Only 56% of email subscribers stay on a list for 12 months, meaning you may be swayed by results from emails that are no longer monitored.
- Offer Value – Your emails are not a place to discuss why you are the best solicitor in the country. Instead, seek to offer value in as few words as possible. Stay away from complex legalese and leave your subscribers coming away feeling like they’ve learned something.
- Monitor Your Performance – Pay close attention to your metrics for each campaign, and don’t be afraid to change if something isn’t working. A/B testing is as relevant to email marketing as any other channel.
- Beware of Legal Compliance – The legal industry has more stringent policies to protect client confidentiality. This extends further than legislation like GDPR. Familiarise yourself with what you can and cannot feature to prevent potential problems.
Best email marketing software for law firms
Countless email marketing platforms exist to help you write newsletters, consolidate lists and launch campaigns. Let’s look at some of the leading options law firms use today.
Active Campaign is widespread across multiple industries because it integrates email and marketing automation. Although it’s often used for B2B clients, it’s also perfectly serviceable for B2C clients.
It allows you to tag contacts based on their behaviours, enabling you to drill down into different subscriber segments for more targeted communications.
MailChimp is one of the largest email marketing platforms in the world. It’s mainly designed for small and medium-sized businesses and offers several unique features.
For example, you can build landing pages in minutes, deliver personalised email postcards, and even send surveys to gather client feedback. However, beware that MailChimp gets expensive as your list grows, so some prefer MailerLite.
Most email marketing platforms’ fees are based on how many people you have on your list. However, Sendinblue is among the few that charge based on the number of emails sent.
Newbies to email marketing will love their drag-and-drop editor to design their emails, and their customer support team is proficient in helping with things like GDPR compliance.
If you’re ready to step into the law firm email marketing world, Tao Digital is waiting to support you in growing your firm. To get started, read our Beginner’s Guide to Digital Marketing now.
In an evolving world of video marketing, PPC and social media, it’s easy to forget the humble blog. Although no longer the go-to marketing option, the written word remains an effective tool for generating new business.
With the UK legal industry seeing dramatic falls from the market’s peak in 2022, solicitors must work harder than ever to take on new cases. For example, property lawyers alone handle 40% fewer cases today than in 2022.
However, pumping out legal blogs won’t yield the results you want. Although companies that blog gain 67% more sales opportunities than companies that don’t, there must be a method to the madness.
The benefits of having a legal blog
Active legal blogs are a long-term asset for your firm. According to HubSpot, websites with active blogs receive 434% more indexed pages.
In short, the more useful content on Google from your firm, the larger your footprint; and with over a third of potential clients beginning their search online, blogging just makes sense.
Legal blogs have other benefits for your firm, too. Here’s a rundown of some of the advantages of taking the time to blog:
Improved Rankings – Blogging is part of your overarching law firm content marketing and SEO strategies. With the latter being crucial in driving traffic to your website, blogging represents one of the pillars of successful law firm SEO.
Demonstrate Expertise – Approximately 96% of people seek legal advice online. By commenting on trending topics and addressing commonly asked questions, you can provide value and establish yourself as an authority.
Hit Your Target Audience – The digital revolution shifted the initiative from traditional marketing. Although these tactics are still relevant, blogging is often the only way to hit a considerable proportion of your potential client base.
Increase Your Brand Awareness – Law firms are brand-led. People don’t just choose you because of your services, as all your direct competitors offer the same services. They choose you because of your brand. Blogging is an opportunity to stamp your brand’s unique values and story on the minds of your target audience.
Grow Your Revenues – Ultimately, marketing is about growing your business. Both through direct business and brand awareness, blogging, directly and indirectly, empowers your firm to explode its revenues.
Types of blog post content for a law firm
Starting a blog is one thing, but not every blog is the same. Solicitors have various blog content they can publish for one reason or another.
So, what are the most common types of blogs law firms publish?
- Core topics related to your practice area.
- Mythbusting posts.
- Changes to the law.
- Trending case reviews.
- Frequently asked question posts.
- Success stories.
- How-to posts.
The above is a general overview of some areas a legal blog may cover. However, having a mixture of trending posts and evergreen content is vital. Likewise, many blogs write so-called “super guides” as landing pages.
Finding blog topics for your law firm
One of the sticking points solicitors experience is determining blog topics. Traditionally, this was a trial-and-error process, which is why some law firms spent years trying new things. But time is money, and writing a series of poor-performing blogs is a net loss.
Instead of fumbling around for blog topics that may or may not work, here are a few pointers on tried-and-tested topics known to accomplish different goals.
- Understanding common legal terms.
- Legal FAQs series.
- Addressing some of the most significant legal challenges in your practice area.
- Practical advice for handling situations your clients may encounter in their daily lives.
- Legal checklists for given situations, with downloadables included.
- Promote upcoming webinars.
- Exclusive offers for your practice.
- Case studies.
- Success stories.
- Analysis of recent legal developments.
- Breaking down new laws.
- Talking about legal trends.
- Predictions about what’s in store for the legal landscape.
- Short pieces of legal trivia.
- Infographics to simplify complex legal concepts.
- Legal humour.
- Story-based blogs.
The importance of SEO in blog writing
Write the most fantastic blog in the world; none of it will matter if nobody finds it. This happens when you write a blog without heed to SEO. Optimising blogs for Google is pivotal to driving traffic to that blog and is where much of the marketing value comes from.
At the heart of SEO lies comprehensive keyword research so you know what your target audience is searching for. Tailoring your content accordingly enables you to rank, which results in clicks and potential new clients.
Likewise, backlinks and on-page SEO lend credibility to your blog and your brand as a whole. High-authority backlinks to your content signal to Google that this is trustworthy content that provides value to searchers, resulting in a higher ranking.
It takes time, and there are no shortcuts, but consistently adhering to core SEO principles in each post will elevate your law firm.
Tips and guidelines for writing law firm blog content
Writing law firm blog content requires extensive research. If an experienced legal professional writes the blog, most of the effort will be spent choosing the right angle for a particular topic.
Here are some tips for writing impactful legal content.
Identify topics of value
Put yourself in the shoes of your target audience and ask, “Why would I want to read this?”
Answering this question enables you to find the value angle in your content. It could be the answer to a single question or provide clarity on how the legal process works. Whatever it is, the topic must be relevant and interesting to the people you’re targeting.
Write with authority
Above all, you must project your authority. The only way to make your particular perspective on a subject stand out in a crowded market is to lead with your experience.
Create engaging titles
Your title is the sign in the shop window. If it doesn’t make sense, nobody will click on your post. On the other hand, it must get right to the point.
This is where competitor research and looking up high-ranking blogs on similar subjects come into play.
Write for easy scanning
Long-form blog posts can be highly effective for SEO purposes, but not everyone wants to spare 15 minutes to read every word.
Creating a table of contents at the top of your post and being specific with your subheadings makes it easy for people to scroll quickly to the section that interests them.
Ask the audience
Are you struggling to determine your next subject?
Ask your existing audience what they would like to know. If you already have an email list, send out an email blast asking them what legal topics they would like to know about. Law firms without an online presence should rely on competitor research to guide them.
Measure your success
Look to the data to discover what works. You can dig into the results once a few months have passed and enough blogs have been published.
Figure out what got the biggest response and then review that blog against other hits. Find the consistencies between your top performers to uncover patterns you can apply to future content.
However, the best way to supercharge your growth is to consult with the SEO and content marketing experts at Tao Digital. If you’re not getting the desired results or don’t have the time to learn the skills yourself, speak to the team to find out what we can do for you.
First impressions for businesses are everything – bad ones will likely make you post a bad review on Google. The same goes for your law firm. Clients who see a lot of bad reviews are unlikely to contact you in the first place.
Today, online reviews are the premium marketing currency of the Internet, with 93% of users saying they impacted their buying decisions. Service-based businesses are no exception to this rule.
As a growing brand, your law firm must consider Google reviews, their impact and how to manage them. Let’s dive into everything you need to know about making reviews work for you.
Why are Google reviews important for law firms?
Google reviews influence whether someone decides to contact you or your closest competitor. Reviews are important because 98% of consumers read local business reviews. It’s that simple.
From a solicitor’s perspective, a good review is far more impactful than any other promotional activity because reviews originate from real people with zero skin in the game.
Some of the benefits of paying attention to Google reviews include:
Building Trust – Reviews are an opportunity to build trust in a crowded market. They provide assurance that your firm is effective in legal matters and does its best for its clients. Well-reviewed firms establish that credibility before a potential client ever reaches out.
Social Proof – Social proof is critical for any business. It’s why 44% of law firms encourage clients to post reviews on third-party sites, including Google. The more feedback you receive, the likelier you are to encourage others to choose you as their legal eagle.
Increase Visibility – Reviews can help with local SEO and rankings, which adds to your overall digital footprint. Typically, Google places the best-reviewed law firms at the top of their search results.
Get More Clients – Reviews lead to sales. The average person doesn’t want to take a risk, especially regarding legal issues. If you can obtain lots of positive reviews, clients will choose you because you will be viewed as a safe bet.
Identify Growth Opportunities – Building any law firm requires listening to your clientele. Reviews are a chance to gain insights into what people think of you. For example, if reviews highlight slow response times, you know this is an area to focus on.
Above all, reviews create new relationships and reinforce existing ones. The act of asking for a review shows how much a firm cares about what its clients think. Moreover, add in personalised replies, and it’s a sign that you are relatable and, ultimately, human.
How many reviews does a law firm need?
Your overall rating is pivotal in winning new business. According to a study, 84% of people said they would never hire a law firm if they had a rating of less than four out of five stars. But quantity also matters.
The truth is that no solid numbers exist for how many reviews you need to get X amount of business. Instead, it all depends on your competition. For example, if you operate in South Manchester and the first five law firms that appear have an average of 56 reviews each, this is your target number.
It will always vary based on who you’re targeting and where you’re located.
How to get more Google reviews for your law firm
Reviews are not something that you can force. It’s a long, winding road to get more reviews because most of your clients will not take the time to leave one. One study revealed that just 12% of people “always” left a review when prompted by a business.
So, what are some of the actions you can take to get more reviews for your firm?
You’d be surprised at the number of businesses that do not ask their clients to leave reviews because they fear annoying them. It’s the most obvious yet overlooked technique solicitors can take advantage of.
The fact is most clients will not be offended or irritated if you ask. Leaving reviews doesn’t come naturally to many people, so prompting them can yield results.
Make review requests a standardised part of your offboarding process. Naturally, how you address this will depend on your specific offboarding process.
For example, if signing off with your final email correspondence, include a review request within your usual template to automate the process and remove a potentially uncomfortable interaction.
Clients won’t leave reviews if it’s complex or time-consuming. The key to increasing review rates is to streamline the process.
One idea could be including a direct link to your Google Business Profile or a QR code they can scan from their phones.
Responding to positive and negative Google reviews
Every time someone leaves a review, you should go out of your way to reply to demonstrate your interest in what your clients, past and present, have to say. But how you respond could make or break your business.
The fact is half of law firms don’t engage with review sites, and this comes across as cold and uncaring. Managing responses is easy if you receive a positive review. A quick thank you is all you need, but negative reviews are a different matter entirely.
Follow these tips for responding to Google reviews:
Respond Quickly – All reviews should be responded to quickly. In the case of a positive review, a quick thank you will suffice, but negative reviews require more in-depth responses. Ensure that you address any concerns soon after a negative experience.
Apologise for Poor Experiences – The worst thing any business can do is to push back against a negative review. Even if you are technically correct, the business never wins in this scenario. Apologise for any perceived poor experiences, even if it means swallowing your pride.
Don’t Take It Personally – Lashing out at a perceived injustice is human nature. However, this is a PR disaster waiting to happen. Get into the habit of adopting an objective stance, and don’t be afraid to walk away and take a deep breath before responding later.
Thank Them for the Feedback – Negative feedback is a growth opportunity. Yes, some people can never be pleased, but you should thank them all the same.
Be Empathetic – Be understanding of the other person’s perspective, even if you disagree with it. Empathy prevents you from getting defensive and stops you from descending to their level.
Tailored Responses Only – Everyone knows when a business uses a copy-paste response. Always take the time to tailor your response to the specific situation.
Managing reviews can be challenging, but it’s all part of the modern business landscape. Reviews are an opportunity to grow your business. Master them, and you will grow. Perform poorly, and your competitors will sneak ahead of you.
At Tao Digital, we support law firms in building their reviews and using them to their advantage. To learn more about how we can help your business achieve its goals, speak to the team today.
Are you using video marketing as part of your marketing mix?
It may surprise you that 90% of marketers use YouTube for video marketing. Yet the legal industry is slow on the take-up, with most UK law firms yet to attempt to harness the power of video marketing.
The same goes for law firms in other countries, too. According to a survey by the American Bar Association, only 24% of law firms used videos to market themselves, and these figures come despite the proven effectiveness of video marketing.
Here’s what you need to know about law firm video marketing.
What is video marketing for law firms?
Video marketing is using video to market your professional services. The goal is to help you reach a broader audience and generate new business. As a law firm, this is your ticket to breaking into platforms like YouTube and TikTok. Plus, you can use video on your existing social media channels, including Facebook and Instagram.
Nowadays, almost everyone has a pro-quality camera in their pocket, making it easy for anyone to shoot videos for their businesses. According to one stat, video is shared 1200% more than images and text combined.
Can video marketing work for professional services?
Video marketing is often associated with the eCommerce and retail sectors. Many solicitors and other professionals ask whether that success can be transferred to the service sector.
Studies have shown no decline in effectiveness when used for professional services. According to HubSpot, 96% of marketers agree that videos increase user understanding of products and services.
Even though this figure has fluctuated over the years, it has never dropped significantly below 90%, demonstrating the enduring effectiveness of video for professional services.
Why the legal industry should be using video in their marketing
The UK is a prime market for online videos. In the third quarter of 2022, online videos reached 85% of UK Internet users.
Apart from the fact that Internet users love video content, other reasons to invest in video marketing include:
It Works – Approximately 71% of B2B marketers and 66% of B2C marketers are using it. Video marketing is highly effective for various purposes regardless of industry and audience.
Strengthen Relationships – Build personal relationships by showing the real you. It’s an easy way of breaking the age-old stereotype that lawyers are naturally cold and distant. This also has the dual benefit of making yourself more trustworthy through humanisation.
Build Your Brand Image – Video content enhances your brand awareness. It’s also a showcase for who you are as a brand. Ultimately, thousands of legal professionals do the same thing you do, but your brand differentiates you from the rest.
Get Found on Google – SEO is how you get found locally and nationally. Video content is an easy way to improve your rankings, with videos being 53 times more likely to appear on the first page of Google.
Showcase Your Expertise – A significant part of video marketing is showing your authority and know-how. You want to show prospective clients how skilled you are. With explainer videos, you are already positioning your company as an authority.
With so few lawyers considering video marketing, it’s a blue-water zone you can exploit to stay ahead of the competition.
Types of video marketing for law firms
With the benefits of video marketing for law firms established, where should you begin?
Here’s a rundown of different types of videos solicitors can look into.
Brand awareness videos are designed to tell your brand’s story and the person behind it. Messages that drive brand awareness include:
- Your story.
- Who your firm is.
- What is your mission?
- Your culture.
- What you do.
- How you make life better for your clients.
These videos explain a little about what separates your law firm from the rest by digging into how your firm came to be and where it’s going. It’s not about telling people how great you are; it’s about telling people who you are.
Law firms themselves are driven by the partners and legal professionals within them. Nobody looks to hire a leading law firm. They want to hire a leading lawyer because that’s the person guiding them through the legal system.
As part of brand awareness campaigns, it’s wise to include some solicitor profile videos highlighting your firm’s key figures. Again, focus on what makes them unique and their stories.
It’s all part of humanising your firm and demonstrating the real people behind the curtain.
Client testimonials are precisely what you would expect. They are opportunities for some of your former clients to discuss their experience working with you.
This is one of the most effective types of marketing for law firms because the recommendation comes from an independent party, not you.
Informational videos focus more on the “education” aspect of the legal business. Many people are confused by the legalese they see and hear on TV.
These videos explain different legal concepts, provide an understanding of your rights, and go into the process of filing a case or defending against one.
Some ideas for informational videos include:
- Explaining legal terminology.
- What to do if involved in X situation.
- Debunking common legal myths.
Posting videos on traditional social media channels is highly recommended, but the key to law firm marketing is to build a following on YouTube.
As the single largest video-based platform in the world, YouTube is a “must-have” as part of your marketing mix. If you’re eager to get subscribers quickly, you could even post some Shorts, which are Youtube videos of 60 seconds or less.
Ad campaigns with video are among the highest ROI paid advertising options available to law firms.
These videos offer brand awareness, reach and engagement on specific social media platforms. It can be tricky to get an impactful ad, so be prepared to indulge in A/B testing.
Retargeting video ads focus on hitting the people who have seen your ads or engaged with you before. Two types of retargeting exist:
- Video Watcher Ads (VWAs) – Ads served to people who have already watched a previous video.
- Video Content Ads (VCAs) – Ads served to users who have performed specific actions on your site.
In all cases, retargeting video requires a tracking pixel placed on your site to follow users and what they do.
How to create a video marketing strategy for your law firm
Before you can dive into creating videos, you need a strategy. This includes knowing your market, keyword research and determining your goals.
Here’s a quick rundown of some of the steps you’ll need to cover for lawyer video marketing:
Set a Goal – Setting a goal draws the line between success and failure. Is the goal to educate, generate business, or build your brand?
Conduct Competitor Research – Check what your closest competitors are creating and note what they’re doing to inform your ideas.
Do Audience Research – Use your analytics to determine your ideal audience. Then research how to reach them. Areas to focus on include age, location, gender and interests.
Determine Keywords – Keywords are just as crucial for videos, but not for SEO purposes. Instead, keywords help you figure out which questions your audience are asking, allowing you to build videos around them.
Track – Finally, once published, diligently track your video metrics and how those metrics translate to site metrics, such as visits, click-through rates and inquiries.
Regarding platforms, put your content where it will best be received. TikTok is geared toward short-form content, whereas YouTube is better for long-form content. You may also want to embed videos on your site where relevant. However, there’s no reason why you cannot use a social media scheduling tool to post your videos everywhere.
After all, what have you got to lose?
Law Firm Video Marketing with Tao Digital
Interested in harnessing the potential of a video marketing campaign for your legal practice? Get in touch with one of our marketing experts to learn more about what could work for your law firm.
We’ll run through everything from your current market footprint to your goals and expectations to determine the best legal video marketing solution. To learn more, contact the Tao Digital team now.
Link building is a staple of law firm SEO. Successful link-building campaigns can elevate your brand to the top of Google’s search results for the most lucrative keywords.
For example, the first Google result holds a 28.5% click-through rate. Understandably, reaching these top spots can deliver more eyes and business for your law firm.
So, how do you run a successful link-building campaign?
The purpose of link building for law firms
Link building means getting other websites to insert links pointing to your content. It’s a critical signal Google looks for. It is thought, based on data through many studies, that the more backlinks from reputable websites, the more trustworthy a page is.
From a law firm’s perspective, link building is one of the key performance indicators for their SEO campaigns. Solicitors across the UK build links to boost their rankings and attract more traffic.
However, it can also be used to build and solidify relationships within the industry, which can support their businesses in other ways.
What do backlinks accomplish for law firms?
Backlinks accomplish a range of goals. The obvious benefit of attracting backlinks to your website is bolstering your SEO efforts. According to Search Engine Land, backlinks are one of the top two criteria Google looks at when determining their rankings.
Not all backlinks are equal, though. It’s all about quality over quantity. This is why a backlink from the BBC News website will always outweigh backlinks gained from local UK newspapers.
Besides rising up the Google SERPs, why should your law firm invest in link-building campaigns?
Expand Your Reach – Naturally, the higher you rank, the greater your reach. Hit the top three spots, and you’ll get the most traffic from that search term. A more extensive reach means more business.
Build Industry Relationships – It’s also a chance to enhance your site’s credibility and forge relationships with others in your line of work.
Open Collaboration Opportunities – Every time sites link to each other, a professional relationship is launched. This can result in future collaboration opportunities online and perhaps even in the real world.
In short, if you consider online to be an essential channel for attracting clients to your practice, you cannot afford to ignore the role of backlinking in digital marketing.
Basic link building terms to know
Unfortunately, link building takes time and patience. Approximately 41% of SEO experts agreed that link building was the most challenging part of optimising a business for the web.
Whether you’re managing your link-building campaign in-house or outsourcing it, it’s important to know specific terms. Here are the top 10 link-building terms with definitions.
Backlink – A link from one website to another.
Anchor Text – The clickable text of a hyperlink.
Link Juice – The value passed to a website through a backlink.
Internal Linking – Links that go to other pages on your website.
NoFollow Link – A link tag that tells a search engine to pass no authority to the page you’re linking to.
DoFollow Link – A link tag that tells a search engine to pass authority to the page you’re linking to.
Link Building Outreach – Connecting to other websites to acquire backlinks, such as through pitching post ideas and networking.
Broken Link Building – Gaining new backlinks by finding broken links on other websites and offering your content as a suitable replacement.
Domain Authority (DA) – Developed by Moz, DA predicts a website’s ranking potential based largely on link profile. The higher your DA, the likelier you are to rank higher.
Natural Link – A backlink acquired organically without any intention on your part.
What makes a good backlink?
Most marketers begin by examining the domain authority. According to Aira, 65% of marketers begin their journey by assessing a website’s domain authority to evaluate the quality of a backlink.
However, remember that Google hasn’t developed the “authority” metric. On the other hand, since link-building works, we know that Google definitely evaluates authority, somehow, within its algorithm.
Nevertheless, five factors should be used to evaluate the strength of a potential backlink:
- Organic Traffic – Large amounts of organic traffic indicate that Google believes a website to be trustworthy and reliable, making it more valuable.
- Relevance – How closely related is the subject website? As a law firm, a link from another law firm is more valuable than one from a cleaning company.
- Anchor Text – Anchor text is part of what Google looks at when ranking a page. In short, anchor text should accurately describe the page a link is pointing at.
- Placement – Where is the backlink placed? More prominent locations in a piece of content increase the likelihood of users clicking on it, which makes it more valuable in Google’s eyes.
- Destination – Obviously, you want to win more business, so a link to your contact or home page is incredibly valuable. The same goes for content-rich pages that can prove your authority and professionalism.
Generally, you should aim to get links from websites that already rank highly. Lots of backlinks to no-name websites won’t offer much in the way of value.
Link building techniques for law firms
Building backlinks is a time-consuming process, and SEO experts claim that the process is taking longer than before. In fact, 46.4% of SEOs said the process now took one to three months more than it previously did.
Commit to the ongoing process, and you’re likely to get the results you want. Let’s examine some actionable strategies for building backlinks.
Build the content that people want to link to. Link-worthy content in the legal business is often relevant and newsworthy.
For example, many UK lawyers published content in 2023 about the UK government’s courtroom loss on their Rwanda asylum seeker plan. Obviously, ensure that anything you create relates to your speciality.
While not as powerful as it once was, getting your practice into UK legal directories and claiming your social profiles on sites like Yelp is a great idea.
Some examples of prominent directories to tap include Infolaw, LawFirms.co.uk, and The Law Society.
Writing content for another site in exchange for a link is a prominent strategy solicitors use for getting backlinks when their online presence is small.
Choosing reputable, high-quality websites is the key to making the most of guest posting. If you’re struggling, consider tapping your professional network for potential guest posting opportunities.
It’s also a great chance to get other industry figures producing content for your site.
Appearing in your local newspaper for a major case or because you did something noteworthy is an excellent way to build backlinks quickly.
Some law firms with a budget have even launched programs like scholarships or apprenticeships just to get into the local newspaper.
Suppose you don’t have time to build your content, be a resource for someone else. Help a Reporter Out (HARO) is one such network that connects experts and reporters worldwide.
In exchange for providing your legal knowledge, you’ll get the chance to have your name and link appear on the publication’s website. HARO regularly attracts big-name websites, including Forbes, so it’s worth doing this.
The above five strategies will enable you to set the foundations for a successful link-building campaign; but, you can employ hundreds of different strategies and ideas to build up your profile.
Here are just some of the other ways to build backlinks:
- Get interviewed as an expert.
- Appear on a podcast.
- Leverage your university connections to produce content in educational settings.
- Do something newsworthy.
- Answer questions on Quora.
- Hire a link-building specialist.
How measure the success of link building for your law firm
How do you know if your link-building campaign has been a success?
Since we don’t have access to the innards of the Google algorithm, measuring link-building success isn’t an exact science. Generally, you can expect to focus on six key metrics, including:
- Quality of backlinks
- Anchor text optimisation
- Quantity of backlinks
- Link position
- Referral traffic
- Return on investment (traffic, clicks, social media interaction, increase in business)
Finally, you can use the same tools to measure your website’s DA to see how your link-building campaign has impacted your business.
However, successful link-building begins and ends with execution. If you demand excellence in execution (and why wouldn’t you?), connect with the brand that increased one law firm’s leads by 174%.
Reach out to us about link-building by contacting our team now!
Local SEO has grown, with every type of land-based business taking advantage of it.
Countless statistics illustrate the effectiveness of local SEO and why you should pay attention to it.
For example, “near me” keyword searches have grown 900% in the last two years, and we already know that searchers actively visit the businesses they learn about in this way. So, it makes sense that law firms should also be working on getting in on the act.
Want to know what local SEO for law firms looks like and how to do it? Let’s jump in.
What is local SEO for law firms?
Law firm SEO is working to boost your brand’s website and online presence to acquire more visibility and leads through search engines. You may be doing this by:
Countless other techniques exist for boosting your SEO; but what is local law firm SEO? Essentially, it’s the same thing, but you’re targeting a specific geographic area.
With 40% of smartphone users relying on Google to find out about local solicitors in their area, this isn’t something you can afford to ignore.
Why is ranking in local search results important for law firms?
Running a law firm means you’re likely already snowed under with all the tasks that come with being in the legal profession.
So, why should you worry about ranking in local search results?
Let’s start with the obvious. Approximately 99% of consumers said they used Google to discover local businesses, and those looking for legal help will be looking for a local solicitors practice.
Other than that, more benefits include:
- Better overall online visibility.
- Appear before other law firms in your area.
- Increase your in-office traffic.
- Tap into the local shopping boom.
- Gain more targeted web traffic.
All this adds up to more qualified leads that ultimately become paying clients for your law firm. Over time, this will only increase your law firm’s stature, resulting in more work and a bigger bottom line.
In other words, concentrating on your ranking is an investment that pays off every time, over time.
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Local SEO ranking factors
Ranking factors are the areas that SEO experts focus on in terms of getting the most results based on search engine guidelines. In other words, they’re the core battlegrounds your law firm should focus on.
So, what are the key local SEO ranking factors in 2023?
Google Business Profile – Formerly known as Google My Business, establishing your profile is vital to building your local presence.
On–Page Signals – This includes everything from the page titles you use to your meta descriptions and contact details.
Online Reviews – Well-reviewed law firms will consistently rank higher than poorly-reviewed ones. The more positive reviews you have, the more favourably Google will look at you.
Local Backlink Profile – Named in your local newspaper or recently won a community award? Google will see the links to these various articles and announcements and factor them into your local rankings. The same goes for online citations.
Searcher Proximity – Based on your map location, Google will rank businesses higher based on where the searcher is searching.
Searcher Behaviour – Click-through rates and the time a visitor spends on your landing pages will influence your rank.
Countless ranking factors exist, but focusing on the above will usually be enough to enable you to stand head and shoulders above the competition.
Suppose you have a well-optimised site that serves your target audience and a business name respected in the community. In that case, you’re already most of the way towards dominating your local SERPs.
Local SEO on Google
Whenever anyone talks about SEO, what they really mean is Google. Yes, Bing exists, but Google controls 83% of the search engine market, meaning this is where you should focus if you’re looking to improve your local SEO.
What exactly are the elements of local SEO SERPs? Or, what are the critical parts of the page you see when searching for a local business? Remember, 97% of first-page results will contain one or more of the following elements:
- Featured Snippets at the top of the page.
- Top and bottom page ads.
- Video carousels.
- Rich snippets containing extra information next to specific search results.
- Site links.
- ‘People Also Ask’ boxes.
Some elements are more relevant than others. In particular, there are three elements law firms targeting local SEO should look at.
Local Packs, also known as the “Map Pack, ” contains three local results for a particular type of business and a prominently displayed map. These are the top three brands as designated by Google.
They also have a separate algorithm that contains many of the elements detailed above, but Local Packs focus more on your Google Business Profile and getting great reviews.
Local Services ads are paid ads that enable local businesses to collect more leads via message requests and phone calls.
These are far more effective for local law firms because they are guaranteed to finish at the top of SERPs.
Previously known as Google My Business, your Google Business Profile is integral to your success (or lack thereof) in the local SEO battleground.
Claiming your business enables you to control how your business appears in local SERPs. This is where you can set your law firm’s address, map positioning, opening hours, phone number and more.
With 46% of all Google searches possessing local intent, not having a Google Business Profile is akin to being invisible.
Optimising your law firm’s Google Business Profile
Claiming your business and optimising your Google Business Profile isn’t rocket science. In fact, it’s so easy that a solicitor with no SEO experience can do it in just a few minutes.
To begin optimising your Google Business Profile, follow these simple steps:
- Visit the Google Business Profile website and either claim your law firm’s listing or create it.
- Ensure the business information you provide is up-to-date and accurate.
- Craft a business description that sells.
- Add high-quality images and videos.
- Collect as many reviews as possible from your clients.
- Share interesting content with the post feature to improve your discoverability.
- Leverage the Q&A section to provide helpful information about your legal brand.
Above all, ensure that the information on your Google Business Profile remains relevant and correct. Outdated information will only hurt your SEO footprint.
Or, use our “done for you” Google Business Profile service with Guaranteed top 3 ranking.
Local organic SEO for law firms
Local SEO is a slightly different beast, because whether you show up or not depends on many factors outside your control, such as who’s searching for you and where they’re located. However, hitting all the right local SEO ranking factors will improve your organic traffic, resulting in more leads.
Location pages
Law firms with multiple locations face a problem in ensuring they can individually target different geographical areas without causing any confusion.
For example, if you’ve got offices in Manchester and Liverpool, you don’t want someone from Liverpool clicking on your Manchester office and vice-versa.
Sadly, many businesses get these wrong because they don’t provide unique value and essentially copy-paste what’s already on their websites.
In other words, optimising for each location means making each location page unique so that you’re more likely to rank for each location search. This means creating separate but unique pages for your core areas, like ‘Family Law Solicitors Manchester’.
Local page optimisation
How do you optimise a location page to get the best results? Firstly, you should have a separate map pack and updated information for each location. It also helps to provide detailed information about every office’s service areas, complete with FAQs.
Here are some additional optimisation tips for managing multiple location pages:
- Don’t duplicate content to save time.
- Avoid spamming location-based keywords, such as “Best solicitor in Nottingham” or “Nottingham solicitor”. Add where needed (i.e. in your heading), and leave it at that.
- Follow basic best practices, such as optimising URLs, meta descriptions and images.
- Write content that’s specific to your location. In other words, what makes your Nottingham office different from your Leicester office?
- Take original photos of the area.
- Connect with other businesses local to you and show it.
The big takeaway for local page optimisation is to ensure it’s unique. Treat each location as a distinct business instead of just another part of your legal empire.
Building reviews for your law firm
Positive reviews for your law firm are one of the leading ranking factors in local SEO. Google’s philosophy is always to put the best businesses in the face of searchers to deliver value.
Naturally, a law firm with 500 reviews and an overall rating of 4.7/5 will be interpreted as the superior business compared to a law firm with ten reviews and a rating of 3.9/5.
So, from an SEO perspective, building up your Google reviews must be a priority. Other than providing an excellent legal service, you can generate reviews by:
- Asking your satisfied clients.
- Make the process simple, such as by providing a QR code.
- Educate your clients on how important reviews are to you.
- Integrate a “Leave a Review” button directly into your website.
Above all, there are no shortcuts to getting reviews. It’s a long-term process. Don’t try to game the system by paying for reviews for a quick SEO boost, as it will only cost you later.
Getting your firm featured in local directories and business listings
Getting your firm featured in local directories, business listings and publications is a primary local SEO ranking factor. It lends authority to your brand and proves you are a reputable staple in your community.
In most cases, this is as simple as searching for said directories and listing websites and either doing it yourself or asking them to feature you.
But like any local SEO strategy, it’s not about taking a single action or focusing on one area. It’s about your law firm’s overall digital marketing strategy, and that’s where Tao Digital comes in.
Our expertise has enabled countless UK law firms to generate more leads and win more business while they focus on serving their clients. To learn more about online success in 2023 and beyond, reach out to us now.
