SEO for Lawyers: Strategies & Best Practices

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Good things can happen to your law firm when you understand how SEO for lawyers works. Some benefits of implementing a solid attorney SEO strategy include:

Your law firm’s website will rank higher in Google for searches related to legal assistance.

Ranking high in Google means you can attract more high-quality cases easily.

With higher rankings comes increased credibility — which is good for business.

You’ll save money because SEO is cheaper than other forms of marketing, like ads.

However, law firm SEO can be overwhelming, especially when it’s not your expertise.

That’s why we've created a complete SEO guide for law firms to help you develop and implement a winning strategy.

By the end of this guide, you’ll learn:

Why you should care about your law firm's SEO.

Attorney SEO best practices.

How LinkActions can help boost your SEO efforts.

First things first;

Why Should You Care About SEO for Lawyers?

If your law firm is not investing in SEO, you’re missing out. Check the stats below:

3 in 10 people searching for lawyers start with online information.

7 in 10 law firms consider SEO the most effective marketing strategy.

7 in 10 clients decide on a lawyer based on their online reputation.

9 in 10 people looking for legal advice turn to a search engine for help.

Numbers don’t lie. If done correctly, SEO can be an effective way to generate a steady stream of clients for lawyers.

However, as impressive as these stats are, the challenge lies in creating an SEO strategy for lawyers that brings in the results — which begs the question.

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How Do You Perform Law Firm SEO?

Lawyer SEO is a broad topic. However, there’s a set of repeatable steps you can follow to implement an effective attorney SEO plan. Here’s what you need to do:

Optimize for local searches

Optimize for organic searches

Optimize technical SEO

Let’s take a detailed look at each of these steps.

Optimize for Local Searches

According to Google, searches for “open now near me” have increased by a whopping 400% year over year. We can interpret this stat to mean that the number of prospects searching for the keyword phrase “lawyer near me” has grown by equal measure.

You must, therefore, optimize your law firm’s local online presence for better performance in local search results.

Local SEO for lawyers involves multiple strategies, as explained below.

Claim and Optimize Your Law Firm’s Google Business Profile

A Google Business Profile is free, so your law firm should have one. According to a recent study, on average, local businesses with a Google Business Profile receive 1,260 monthly views.

In addition, a typical business records 59 monthly actions from their Google Business Profile listings, including website visits and calls.

With such stats, it is important that your law firm appears in the top three listings results.

Here’s how lawyers can optimize their Goole Business Profiles:

Choose a more specific category, e.g., personal injury lawyer, instead of just “lawyer.

Collect as many reviews as possible.

Link your profile to a relevant location page instead of just your firm’s homepage.

Include your target keywords in service descriptions and posts.

Add as many videos and images as possible — if possible, more than your competitors.

A fully optimized Google Business Profile has the following benefits:

It lets you share key details about your firm, including contact details and working hours.

Your firm appears on Google Maps, making it easy for clients to find your office.

Prospects considering hiring can read past clients' reviews to get a peek at your services. And if you have good reviews, they'll get in touch.

It boosts your local connections. Anyone seeing your Google Business Profile is probably looking for a "lawyer near me."

Note: Creating a Google Business Profile is straightforward and takes only a few minutes.

Below is an example of a Google Business Profile for a child support lawyer near New Orleans.

List Your Law Firm on Local Directories and Citation Sites

A comprehensive local SEO for lawyers strategy includes getting listed on local citation sites and directions.

Listing your law firm on local citation sites and directions is important for several reasons, including;

It helps Google confirm your firm’s name, address, and phone number (NAP). Consistent NAP across the web adds credibility to your law firm.

It helps boost your local online presence as long as the citations and listing are current. The more your firm’s details appear in the right places, the more prominent Google will consider you.

Some good directory listings and citation sites for lawyers include SuperLawyers, Martindale, Avvo, MyAttorneyHome, Fund US Lawyers, Yahoo! Local, Angi, Yelp, and NOLO.

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Pro Tip: You must obtain structured citations to help boost your SEO efforts. So, check your law firm regularly on directories and claim any unclaimed citations. Claiming ownership allows you to update crucial details about your firm.

Below is an example of an unclaimed Yelp law firm citation.

Note: Unstructured citations occur when a third party, like a blog or online news agency, references your law firm.

Get Reviews

A Thomson Reuters survey found that 6 out of 10 participants were likely to hire an attorney with online reviews. Even more overwhelming, 8 in 10 millennials rely on reviews to evaluate potential lawyers.

As part of your law firm SEO campaign, you should focus on getting as many reviews as possible.

Reviews provide social proof that’s hard to match. They help build trust with prospects. +

While you can ask for reviews on platforms like Yelp or Facebook, focus on reviews submitted through your Google Business Profile. These will have the most significant local SEO impact.

Pro Tip: Google allows you to create a special link on your profile, which you can share to request reviews.

Optimize for Organic Searches

SEO for lawyers goes beyond optimizing your law firm for local searches.

You must also optimize your listings and website to attract organic traffic from search engines — namely, Google.

While a successful lawyer SEO strategy for organic searches involves different bits and pieces, here are the most important steps.

Create Optimized Content

Content is one of Google's top three ranking factors. And with the number of legal articles published daily, the search engine works hard to find the most comprehensive and relevant content on a topic.

Here's how to write authoritative content for lawyers.

Identify the Right Keywords

Keywords are the backbone of any successful law firm SEO campaign.

Typically, the shorter the keyword phrase, the more traffic you can generate. Why? Shorter keywords are searched for more often.

The problem is, with more traffic comes high competition. So, while you may be the #1 lawyer in your city or state, going after general keywords like "attorney," "law practice," or "lawyer" may not be realistic for your initial SEO campaign.

Ranking high in Google requires more effort than throwing random keywords on your website. Here are tips to help you pick the best phrases for your law firm.

Zero-in On Your Marketing Objective

When choosing keywords, consider your ideal client or case. Ask yourself:

Is your practice city, region, state, or nationwide?

Do you practice in a metropolitan area? Are there common names for the area?

How do people search your area? Is it by county, ZIP, or city code?

The idea is to ensure you have a specific geographic area to target.

Include Your Practice Areas

There's nothing wrong with targeting you with terms like "Maryland attorney" or "Los Angeles lawyer." However, it'd be best to include your practice area. Why?

Two reasons.

The first is competition — many firms are focusing on broad keywords like those already. The other one is that you want to market to the right audience.

Including practice areas in your keyword phrases improves lead quality. For instance, if your firm handles DIUs and criminal lawsuits, you don't want to go after a general keyword like "Florida attorney" since that could attract clients who may not benefit from your services.

Ask yourself:

What are your practice areas?

What clients do you want to attract?

Are there layperson's terms for your practice areas? For instance, you may know what a commercial litigator is, but to prospects, you're a business lawyer.

What keywords would clients use to find your firm? For instance, "child support lawyer "might be a better keyword than "child support litigation."

Use Keyword Tools

There are many free and paid tools to help you with lawyer keyword research, like SEMrush, Ahrefs, Ubersuggest, and Google Keyword Planner.

Incorporate Keywords Into Your Content

Once you have the best keyword phrases, you can add them to your content. Here are a few things to remember:

Do not overuse keywords in your content. Google may consider your content “spammy” and won’t rank it.

Include keywords naturally in your content.

Use keywords in your page titles and headings and throughout the content body.

Ensure you create content that answers the keyword’s search intent.

A unique aspect of SEO for lawyers is that you need to have legal professionals write your content for you.

Google wants you to demonstrate your Experience, Expertise, Authority, And Trustworthiness (E-E-A-T) with your content. Consider writing your content in-house, hiring a lawyer, or outsourcing to an agency with the right resources.

Add Internal Links

Internal links are links to other pages on your site. And because Google has a methodical and systematic way of crawling and indexing content, internal links can:

Provide a crawl path to target pages.

Help pass link juice to other pages, helping them rank higher.

Enable Google to understand what your pages are about.

Make it easier for visitors to navigate your website.

You can add internal links to your money pages and related articles on a specific topic.

Ideally, you want to add internal links as you write content. However, apart from being time-consuming, this can lead to:

Excessive internal linking

Missing out on opportunities to add internal links

Dilution of page authority if you interlink too frequently to multiple internal pages

Broken links as your site evolves

However, you can use LinkActions to skip these mistakes.

The platform uses Artificial Intelligence to identify internal linking opportunities and create them automatically.

In addition, it provides detailed analytics reports to help track internal links over time. That way, you can quickly identify new internal linking opportunities on your website as you upload more content.

And the best part is that LinkActions works with any content management system.

You can test-drive LinkActions for 14 days without upfront financial commitment to see what the tool can do.

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Build Backlinks

Backlinks are an important ranking factor when it comes to attorney SEO. Here are some tactics you can use to get decent backlinks:

Publish linkable assets that owner website owners will want to link to, like infographics, tools, calculators, eBooks, or tutorials.

Reach out to other legal blogs for guest posting opportunities.

Create a resource page with downloadable PDFs, how-to guides, videos, or anything that’ll attract links from websites looking to direct their audience to helpful resources.

Participate in publications and podcast interviews — most platforms include a link to your site when they feature you in an interview.

Blog about current legal events — being the first to post can earn you some links.

Optimize Technical SEO

Technical SEO aims to provide a good user experience for people visiting your law firm's website.

Google wants to direct users to sites that provide a quality experience. Focusing on technical SEO for lawyers helps in two ways:

It increases your firm's page ranking.

It reduces the chances of a prospect leaving in frustration.

Here's a checklist of basic technical SEO that attorneys should focus on:

Ensure your site is mobile-friendly in line with Google's mobile-first indexing. You can use Google's mobile-friendly test tool to check if your site is mobile-friendly.

Use Google's sitemap test tool to check your website's errors and ensure it's registered with Google Search Console.

Use a URL Inspection Tool to ensure your website’s pages are indexed. Fix orphaned pages and other problems.

Use Google Broken Link Checker Chrome Extension to check and remove or fix broken internal and external links.

Ensure your pages load quickly, ideally within two seconds.

Track Your SEO Progress

You must measure law firm SEO efforts. That way, you can know areas to double down your focus and what you need to improve.

Here are 8 KPIs to track when it comes to SEO for lawyers.

Conversion rates

Backlink profile

Client lifetime value

Brand authority — domain Rating

Organic search traffic — new and returning Users

Keyword rankings — your law firm’s visibility in search

Content engagement — average time people spend on your website.

Local SEO metrics — local search rankings, Google My Business performance, and online reviews,

You can track your SEO performance tools like Google Analytics or Ahrefs’ Rank Tracker for in-depth reports. Other tools include Local Falcon and Grid My Business to track your Google Map performance.

FAQs

Why is Local SEO Important for Law Firms?

Local SEO helps law firms to attract local clients. In addition, optimizing your firm’s online presence for local searches boosts visibility, credibility, and trust among potential clients.

What Is On-Page SEO for Law Firms?

On-page SEO for law firms involves:

Optimizing individual web pages to improve their search engine rankings and attract relevant traffic.

Optimizing page titles, meta descriptions, headings, and content with relevant keywords related to your legal services.

Ensuring proper URL structure, internal linking, and compressing images.

Providing valuable and informative content that addresses your potential clients' legal concerns.

How Much Do Law Firms Spend on SEO?

A ballpark figure for law firm SEO ranges between $3,000 to $15,000 per month.

However, the amount may vary based on your practice area, local competition, and needs. Law firms' SEO costs cover keyword research, content creation, link building, and optimizing web pages.

Is Paid SEO Worth It?

Yes. You see, implementing an SEO strategy can be time-consuming, not to mention the technical side of things.

So, if you don’t have the time, it’d be best to hire an experienced SEO agency for lawyers to run your campaign.

That way, you can focus on providing legal help to your clients without worrying about your firm’s online performance.

SEO for Lawyers - The Bottom Line

SEO for lawyers can be a tricky balancing act. However, if you use the right strategy consistently and aggressively, you can claim dominance in search results.

And because many potential clients are online to find information about legal services, a strong law firm SEO strategy is no longer optional.

The first step to your law firm being found online is having a website and creating content with keywords your prospects are searching. But that’s half the battle.

The other half is making sure that you optimize your content to enable Google to discover and rank it.

At the center of your content optimization campaign is interlinking. For this, you can use LinkActions to do the heavy lifting.

Click the button below to see LinkActions in action (no pun intended).