For small firms and solo practitioners, a law firm website is more important than ever – it’s both an integral part of your marketing and your practice as a whole.
Having a compelling website that attracts and converts clients is essential to building a thriving practice. Here are some tips for how to create a dynamic, engaging experience that attracts better leads and converts more visitors into paying clients for your firm.
Understanding Potential Clients’ Search Behavior
If you’re interested in driving more business to your firm by using search-based methods, you need to first understand the search behavior of potential clients. 84% of people are using Google 3 or more times a day and 92% of search queries use long-tailed keywords – keywords or keyphrases that are more specific and generally longer than common keywords. This means potential clients are relying on Google now more than ever to find answers to their legal questions regardless of the complexity.
Potential clients are typically interacting with law firms online on a couple of levels:
- They are actively searching for legal representation, or
- They are performing research on their case or matter.
If a potential client already knows they need an attorney, they are most likely focusing their research on who is the best attorney for their legal issue. This is where the searchability of your website is key.
Having plenty of well-written, informative website content is the most reliable way to appear further up in the searches of potential clients. Once the potential client has landed on your website, user experience begins to come into play.
User experience is how your potential client interacts with your website. A website with good user experience will have client-centered information that makes them confident you can help them with their problem and should guide them from one topic to the next, leading to a way to reach out to your firm. This experience influences whether a client may find it difficult to get to the information they’re seeking and could be a determining factor for a client when choosing between attorneys.
If a potential client is searching for answers to their legal questions and they have come across your website, this is great news for multiple reasons. One, you have led a new potential client to your website where you can impress them with your expertise and win their business. Second, you have adequate amounts of content relating to this issue that has been easy for Google to index for future searches. The search behavior of people researching a legal issue tends to point to the use of long-tailed keywords and complex questions. Instead of searching for “Atlanta DUI attorney,” for example, a potential client may search “do I need a lawyer after getting a DUI” to be connected with an attorney that shows up in their local search results. Because potential clients have specific legal questions, their searches are more likely to be based on who, what, where, when, why or how. A good rule of thumb is to think about what questions clients typically ask you and mirror this on your website to best match what potential clients are asking in searches.
Whether a potential client is sure they need legal representation or they are just trying to find answers to their legal questions, your website is the first impression they will have of your firm. Consider your website a storefront with curb appeal being as important as ever to help build trust with your potential clients by delivering the right information in the right layout.
Your Website as a Cost Effective Driver of Traffic/Conversions
Using your website as the foundation of your marketing yields better ROI over time. A powerful website will pay itself off many times over by working harder for your firm to generate new business and appreciate over time with the input of content efforts. An investment in your website is an investment in the assets that you own, control, and can rely on for its predictable ROI in contrast to disposable advertising efforts that require constant replenishing.
Prioritizing your website pays off for your firm by building credibility with both potential clients and Google. Attorneys have a great opportunity to prove themselves as experts in their fields to potential new clients by establishing their website as a trusted source of information. This is also important to Google, which is looking to prioritize the most useful and relevant information in search results. Together, your high-quality website and Google’s goal to match users with useful search results will work to drive traffic to your firm’s website and generate new business.
Investing Now Saves Time and Money in the Long Run
Investing time and effort into your firm’s website up front proves to have long-term benefits. A good website can convert potential clients today but also train new clients to use your website as a resource for their needs. Implementing integrations into your website such as a payment portal also works to lead clients back to your website while increasing the productivity for your firm. Using your firm’s website as a hub of information and resources will ultimately produce better aligned clients with your firm and its objectives.
The initial work put into your website will benefit your firm consistently over time by working to convert clients far past when you have created your content. You never know how or when a potential client will find you and it will make the difference to have an approachable and useful website available to them to make them confident in hiring you.
Another benefit of putting care into the creation of your website is that it creates a solid foundation for your firm to grow from and, when using the right technology, creates space for quick changes and the ability to pivot quickly as needed. The law may not change suddenly, but situations in which your potential clients are interacting with the law are always evolving and so should your website.
User Experience
Website Design
User experience is a very important factor to Google’s ranking system but also vital to keeping potential customers on your website. A great starting point when creating a website that is meant to attract potential clients is the overall design. First, it’s helpful to understand what your potential clients need from your website’s design. Unlike an e-commerce website or a social media platform, your website visitors are more likely to come to your website with a specific question or issue in mind. This intent influences what is important to potential clients when considering your website design. Unnecessary elements such as flashy design detract from the purpose of your website – to provide helpful information about your firm and the legal services you provide – and could distract a potential client from their original intent and hurt your likelihood of converting.
Website Navigation
An easy way to aid in user experience is to start with a simple and easy website navigation. As a foundation, begin building out content for your practice area pages starting first with general summaries of each. This will give you room to expand on each practice area later on with subtopics that you can build out underneath the general practice area. This sequence of topics, if clustered properly, will be intuitive for the visitor to follow and help you convert more clients with your website. You can create and edit website content easily with LawLytics to keep your content and its structure up to date.
Calls to Action
Having several touch points throughout your website for a potential client to contact you increases the likelihood they will reach out. This also avoids any frustration or confusion that would result in a lost opportunity if they weren’t able to quickly find your contact information. Touch points, or calls to action, may look like prominently placed phone numbers, chat features, contact forms and a dedicated contact page.
Page Speed
Good user experience for law firm websites isn’t complicated and is based on simplicity and speed. In the age of instant gratification, your firm’s website also needs to be instant. The use of unnecessary and flashy website elements can slow down your page load times and be distracting to visitors. Quick load times and quick response times once a potential client has made contact are key to landing new clients. With the combination of straightforward design, built-in security, and optimized page load speeds, LawLytics ensures that your website is always performing at its best for your firm.
Website Content
Google frequently emphasizes the importance of high-quality content as a ranking factor in search results. There are also direct correlations between good website content and higher online lead conversion rates. This means attorneys should be focusing their efforts on writing engaging and informative content – something that is quick and intuitive using LawLytics.
Effective website content focuses on the potential client, their intent for visiting your website, and any questions or concerns they may have. Make sure to outline exactly how your firm can help with all of the above using a cadence that matches the conversational style of your ideal client. If you must use legal jargon, complement it with a plain-language explanation and clear examples.
Outlining your practice area pages are a great place to start when creating website content. From there, you’ll want to build out other pages such as your attorney bio, client recommendations, and case results. All of these pages help to build trust and authority with your potential clients and are very easy to complete with LawLytics. The platform is equipped with tools to help you optimize your pages such as easy drag-and-drop formatting and the ability to request and receive client recommendations within the platform
Additional elements on your firm’s website such as a FAQ page, forms, and downloadable resources or documents are also great ways to add value to your website and engage visitors. The more opportunities you take to create useful and trustworthy content for your website, the harder your website will work for you to grow your business.
Attorneys have several avenues for creating and maintaining their website content that aids them in performing better in search results and converting more leads. Try a variety of content methods throughout your firm’s website to help build both an emotional and intellectual connection with your potential clients.
Making a Successful Law Firm Website is Easy with LawLytics
Attorneys who use LawLytics to build their websites need no prior technology, marketing, or search engine experience. Your content is made up of what you already discuss with clients in your practice daily, and LawLytics helps you take that expertise and transform it into an effective marketing strategy that provides you with a predictable, long-term ROI.
A platform built specifically for attorneys, LawLytics takes away the guesswork of what you need to have for a successful website that works harder for your firm. To learn more about how LawLytics makes it easy for attorneys to produce website content that ranks on Google, schedule an interactive 20-minute demo.
