Law Firm SEO The 2024 Guide to SEO for Lawyers
TABLE OF CONTENTS
What Is Law Firm SEO [Search Engine Optimisation]?
Law Firm SEO is the practice of enhancing a law firm’s online visibility and ranking. The objective of Law Firm SEO is to increase rankings in search results in search engines and other online platforms, such as social media, forums and directories.
Law Firm SEO involves optimising internal and external elements to improve firm ranking and discoverability.
Effective law firm SEO initiatives drive an increase in relevant website traffic, leading to more or better-qualified enquiries and new case files.
Types of Search Engine Optimisation
Broadly speaking, and particularly for law firms, there are four main categorisations of SEO.
On-Page SEO is all the activities and improvements that can be done internally (within your own website) to help it rank better in search engine results. Think of it as everything you have control over on your own site. Discover examples of on-page SEO activities below.
Off-Page SEO
Off-Page SEO is a range of activities that happen outside of your website to improve your search engine rankings. It’s like your reputation outside of your business – you can influence it, but you don’t have full control over it. Find examples of off-page SEO activities below.
Technical SEO
Technical SEO is about ensuring that your law firm website is structured correctly. It is also about identifying what needs to be done so that it operates at a high level (performance metrics) as well as adjustments to improve the user experience. Find examples of technical SEO activities below.
Local SEO
Local SEO is another classification of SEO that is specific to attracting business to a location (as opposed to an online store). This is a commonly used approach for law firms as it is specific to the location of your office locations. Local SEO activities include both on-page and off-page SEO activities. Discover examples of local SEO activities below.
On Page SEO
Some examples of on-page SEO activities include:
▸Optimisation of Content (Page and Blog Post)
Writing and updating high-quality, relevant, and informative content that incorporates selected target keywords.
Optimisation of content includes updating of older information to ensure it is relevant (e.g. as amendments come into effect) as well as the ongoing addition of helpful content that meets audience needs. This can indicate to search engines that your law firm has the information and authority, specific to the practice area/s you work in.
▸Keywords & Meta Tags
Using specifically targeted keywords on each web page, in the content, structure and in the back end of your website can contribute to better page rankings. Meta tags are elements like page title, meta description, and header tags, which help search engines understand the content of your pages.
▸Internal & External Linking
Internal linking involves linking other relevant pages on your site together, which can assist in helping search engines discover more content on your site and understand their relationship and value. External links to relevant sources can also contribute overall to page ranking.
▸Site Speed and Mobile-Friendliness
Ensuring your web pages load quickly, are easy to read and navigate across desktop, tablet and mobile devices. If you want to do a simple review for yourself, enter webpage URLs into this analyser tool by Google.
▸XML sitemaps and robots.txt files
An XML sitemap is like a roadmap of your website that guides search engines to all the important pages on your site. Like a contents page in a text book that outlines the most important sections, that’s what an XML sitemap does for search engines. It lists all the URLs for a site along with additional information about each webpage including when it was last updated, how often it usually changes, and how important each is, relative to other pages in the site. Well structured, accurate, updated sitemaps help search engines crawl the site intelligently.
Robots.txt is a file that tells search engines where they can or cannot index on your website. Think of it like a ‘Do Not Enter’ sign on certain parts of your website. Especially important if you have a private login area, duplicate copies of web pages that you don’t want search engines to serve up to the public.
There are a number of other on-page SEO activities that can be taken into account, including a technical site audit.
Technical SEO
A site audit will help identify any techical issues that may exist with your site.
As a result of identifying the issues, technical SEO work may include include optimising the page load and performance metrics of slower-loading pages (often not visible to the eye). It might also include updating pages with duplicate meta descriptions (page excerpts that help search engines decide on rank), reduction of image file sizes, improvements to structure (so users can find what they want in 2 or 3 clicks), discover and fix broken links, check for crawl errors and much more. The issues can be identified through a website audit.
Off Page SEO for Lawyers & Firms
Off-Page SEO covers all the activities that happen outside of your website to improve your search rankings. It is like your reputation outside of your business – you can influence it, but you don’t have full control over it.
▸Backlinks
These are links from other websites that point to your site. The more high quality backlinks you have, the more reliable and trustworthy search engines consider your site to be.
▸Social Media
This refers to the activities and general visibility of your website or web pages on social media platforms.
▸Online Reputation Management
Online reviews and ratings on websites and social media platforms can influence your website’s search ranking. Monitoring and managing your firm’s reputation is one activity that contributes to rankings.
Both on-page and off-page SEO are crucial if your goal is to increase firm visibility and position in search engine results.
It’s like a balance – you need both to maintain a good stance in the eyes of search engines, social media platforms and your intended target audiences.
Local SEO for Lawyers & Firms
If you wish to target prospects in one or more geographical locations, local SEO optimisation is essential. In search results on Google and Bing, the top ranking firms appear in one of two places:
- In local online maps
- In organic search results
- Optimisation of Google Business Profile and Bing Places
- Consistency of firm details (e.g. name, address and contact number & email) across the web
- Reviews and ratings online
- Creation of locally relevant content on your site and profiles.
In Australia, as at July 2024, the market share of Google usage versus other search engines across devices is between 88-95%.
In addition to the regular ranking factors, Google local search algorithms take into account:
- Relevancy – connection to search query typed into Google
- Distances – proximity between business and searcher’s location
- Prominence – taking into account a range of information indicating notability of your firm, including information taken from across the web, including position in search results
Source: Google
How Long Does SEO Take?
You’ll appreciate this answer because you give it yourself in your daily work. That answer is… it depends.
First a website needs to be audited/ reviewed to discover any technical issues that may need to be fixed first.
Next, based on your objectives, a competitor analysis in your town, city or region, the opportunities for SEO may be varied and the timelines for seeing an impact will be varied as a result.
As a guide, for the majority of law firms in city areas, if working with our team, start to see a shift in results from around the six month mark. This is because we’re not looking for quick fixes that come undone when the search engines do their Core Updates (reviewing of how they rank web pages for better browser success and user experience).
How To Start Law Firm Search Engine Optimisation
To learn SEO for yourself, or before you engage an SEO professional or agency, start the process by ensuring you are clear on how search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo rank law firm websites. Find this information and more about legal and law firm SEO by clicking on the titles below right
How To Start Law Firm Search Engine Optimisation
To learn SEO for yourself, or before you engage an SEO professional or agency, start the process by ensuring you are clear on how search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo rank law firm websites. Find this information and more about legal and law firm SEO by clicking on the titles below.
