Lawyering Up Your SEO: 10 Mistakes Attorneys Make
Law firm websites nowadays do more than just advertise legal services to prospective clients. They explain the process of resolving cases, answer common questions, provide credentials about practitioners, and allow visitors to book consultations.
All these capabilities go to waste if your website is not found online. This is because of common SEO mistakes. Keep in mind that, according to one survey, more than 62% of respondents use search engines to deal with legal concerns. Another study shows that individuals browse three to five websites before they call an attorney.
Working on your SEO is undoubtedly important. Other law firms realize this. In one report by the American Bar Association, improving their visibility on search engines is the reason why 28% of the surveyed legal practitioners hire an outside agency or consultant.
By understanding what pitfalls to avoid, you can improve your digital presence, reach your target audience, and grow your firm.
What Common SEO Mistakes Should Attorneys Avoid?
Some of the biggest SEO mistakes attorneys must avoid often involve missed opportunities. A neglectful approach to your strategy means that your website might not achieve its true potential when it comes to client retention. Implementing cookie-cutter tactics is also another reason why your target clients may fail to discover you among your competitors. These mistakes do not help your brand. By steering clear of them, you can achieve your revenue goals faster and reach your target audience better.
Mistake 1: Overlooking Local SEO
Local SEO is the strategy of getting your website to appear in search results aimed at people in a specific geographic area. In other words, if you are a Boise-based attorney, you would want to be more visible in Google results for people living in Boise.
Given this, the answer to “What should you avoid when developing a search-optimized website?” is to target the entire state or even country. This is one of the local SEO mistakes that lawyers can make. The larger your potential client base, the higher the chance you will be competing against law firms with higher marketing budgets.
One approach to improving your chances of ranking in local search results is to create and optimize your Google Business Profile. This tool is free. It allows you to include the operating hours of your firm, links to its website, and your phone number. You can also post FAQs, like “Do you charge a retainer?”
In addition, Google Business Profile allows you to display your primary niche. You can either select “lawyer” or “personal injury lawyer.” It is ideal, though, to select the latter. The reason is that it helps you show your services as specifically as possible.
Through these tactics, your profile can invite engagement from potential local clients and improve lead-generation opportunities.
Mistake 2: Excessively Using Legal Jargon
Your Google Business Profile is one channel among many that you can work on to improve your SEO presence. The website is another way to reach your target audience. But this channel can turn off potential clients if the words you use to describe your services contain too much legal jargon.
Frequently incorporating terms like statute of limitations, jurisdiction, and discovery are some of the SEO mistakes to avoid. These words have meanings for lawyers like you. But for the average person, these are possibly as vague as the next steps they need to take after getting in a car accident or being served divorce papers.
Remember that your target market is not as knowledgeable about their rights as you are. In fact, a 2023 survey by Freedom Forum revealed that more than ⅓ of Americans are unaware that the First Amendment protects music, art, books, and movies as free expression.
Consider the term forced arbitration. It refers to the process wherein a company requires an employee or consumer to agree to waive their ability to sue as part of their employment or purchase.
These individuals may not be aware of the term. According to the National Consumer Law Center, that is because 99% of consumers do not know they are bound by forced arbitration. So when they look to Google for answers, they do not use that jargon. This can cost employment attorneys or consumer lawyers opportunities to engage with that audience.
Mistake 3: Aimlessly Researching and Inserting Legal Keywords
Legal keywords are crucial. But not knowing what to incorporate into your website can lead to squandered potential. This is where keyword research comes in. You can better structure your website content by analyzing what terms drive organic traffic.
However, if you try to rank for keywords like motorcycle injury lawyer or birth injury attorney, note that these phrases are highly competitive. In a report by Fraud Blocker, the top 25 most expensive keywords in 2024 are all legal-related.
To avoid spending a lot of resources targeting competitive phrases, use long-tail ones. The word length of these typically ranges from three to six. Some are even longer. An example would be San Francisco attorney experienced in work accidents.
Using a specific keyword repeatedly is also one of the mistakes small business owners make when using SEO. This practice is known as keyword stuffing. For example, multiple identical phrases in a single blog post can sound unnatural to your readers.
It is additionally considered spam by Google and subject to manual action. This leads to some of your pages not appearing in search results.
Mistake 4: Neglecting Mobile Optimization
Over seven out of 10 consumers use the phone to initially contact a lawyer. If your website is not optimized for mobile devices, you can severely limit its reach to potential clients.
You can also restrict your SEO success. Google now analyzes websites using its mobile version first. This practice started in 2016 and was fully implemented in 2023. In other words, if your website is not mobile-friendly, you decrease your chances of appearing in search results.
There are different ways to optimize sites for mobile. One is implementing responsive web design. This means that your web pages automatically resize across different screen sizes.
Another is ensuring that the content on your website's desktop and mobile versions is similar. For instance, instead of presenting FAQs with answers already visible, as in your desktop version, you can insert a design element that ensures these answers are visible upon tapping in the mobile version.
Not having a responsive website and having different content across various devices are examples of mobile SEO mistakes you should avoid.
Mistake 5: Not Having a Legal Blog Section
A 2023 ABA survey found that many lawyers do not maintain a legal topic blog. Only 12% run one. Not having a legal blog section on your website is another missed opportunity. In the same survey, more than half of those who engage in blogging retain clients via referral or directly.
One of the reasons why blogs are crucial for client retention is that 70% of potential clients view online content before calling an attorney, according to another survey. Expertly crafted legal blog sections help you cover niche topics relevant to your practice focus and geographic location. Through this, you can further engage your target audience.
Blogging also allows you to insert long-tail keywords. By using specific phrases like best business lawyer in Carson City or family lawyer in The Woodlands, you can reach people who are looking for a specific service, thereby increasing your conversion rates.
By not integrating long-tail keywords, you might find yourself trying to rank on very competitive phrases. This is one of the on page SEO mistakes you should avoid.
Mistake 6: Valuing Backlink Quantity Over Quality</h3>
Backlinks are links that lead a visitor from a website to yours. Typically, another web page links to your site because your content is valuable. As such, search engines see backlinks as votes of confidence. The more of these you attain, the better your law firm website ranks on Google results.
But this is not a straightforward equation; more does not necessarily equal better.
That is because some links to your website may not be relevant to your niche. You can decide to hire the services of a link-building agency. However, some companies may engage in practices that harm your SEO rankings. For instance, they may use spammy websites and link them to yours or comment with your hyperlink on foreign forums.
Some websites are better sources of backlinks. These include The Wall Street Journal and The Guardian. This is because these sites have a good domain authority score. A high value means that a website has great overall quality. Avoid websites that have low scores. Some of these include those with content about pornography, pharmaceutical drugs, or poker.
With backlinks from quality and relevant sources, your website can rank better in search results and avoid Google penalties.
Mistake 7: Underestimating the Impact of Website Speed
You can have the best content in your legal niche. Your website may have backlinks from authoritative sources. However, all these factors will not help if your site loads slowly.
According to Google, the chances that your website visitors bounce or abandon your web pages increase if it takes more than three seconds to load. In fact, the company’s own research shows that 53% of visitors behave that way when it comes to mobile sites.
Google announced in 2010 that website speed was a ranking factor. It still is in 2024. Given this, it is crucial to perform actions that increase the speed at which your web pages load. One way to do this is image compression. When uploading pictures, use compressors to decrease the file size without a drop in quality.
Mistake 8: Forgetting to Track Page Performance
Not tracking your web pages' performance is another mistake you must avoid. Tools accessible online can help you understand how visitors interact with your website. These platforms provide information in different areas. Some include:
Keyword rankings: What keywords bring in the most organic traffic?
Traffic source: How do your visitors reach your website? YouTube? Other websites?
Page speed: Are new changes to your website, like uploaded content, hampering how fast your page loads?
Time spent on the page: What web pages did visitors spend the most and least time on?
Bounce rate: How many visitors leave your website without doing something?
Knowing what website components meet your goals helps you avoid spending resources on Facebook or Google ad campaigns. SEO is more budget-friendly than pay-per-click ads in the long run. This is because you are only creating optimized content, not promoting it.
Mistake 9: Ignoring User Experience
User experience, or UX, refers to the feeling a person gets when interacting with your website. A well-crafted web page helps improve the time a person stays on the site. By ignoring UX, the content you have spent much time working on may be unreadable or undiscoverable.
It also does not help with your goal of ranking in search results. One of the SEO mistakes lawyers make in digital content production is using small fonts. Given that different users interact with your website through various screen sizes, it is essential that the font size — at least for body text — is 12 pt.
Navigation and layout are other components of UX that you must pay attention to. By having a well-structured website instead of a chaotic one, search engines can better understand your content.
Mistake 10: Not Regularly Updating Content
This is another example of content mistakes that harm SEO. Emerging trends and industry changes continue to rise, especially law-related ones. As such, your content must be updated to reflect these developments.
The reason why not regularly updating content hurts your SEO is that the legal field is under the Your Money or Your Life, or YMYL, category. Google places a higher standard of accuracy on blog posts, images, or videos under that category because inaccurate information can cause great harm to individuals.
Consider tax law. On average, Congress enacts 399 changes to the tax code every year. You do not have to write content about all these changes. But you do need to update existing blog posts, images, or videos to incorporate key trends. This ensures accuracy in light of these legal developments.
Without updates, visitors to your website may be misled about what to do with their law-related situation. By creating content that reflects crucial trends in your niche, you can better position your website and your brand as an authoritative source for both people and Google.
Beyond the Blunders: What Else Should Attorneys Know About SEO?
Reviews are another important factor that leads to better SEO results. It is especially crucial for law firms looking to rank on local search results, as clients can mention that they were served by a “knowledgeable and hardworking Seattle attorney” or something similar.
In one survey, more than half of respondents considered the average star or score rating first to gauge the reputation of law firms. The second is the number of reviews.
Another thing that attorneys should know about SEO is alt text and meta tags.
Alt texts are descriptions of images that appear when these fail to load. These help search engines understand your content. If your alt text is optimized, your image can appear in search results. This provides an additional source of traffic to your website.
Another benefit of alt texts is that they improve your ADA compliance. The software individuals with impaired vision use to interact with your website utilizes alt texts.
Meta tags are another form of information that helps Google know more about your web pages. These include the meta title and meta description, which provide information about your website in search results. Ensure your text is as concise and specific as possible to ensure engagement.
Mistakes can be further avoided using tools like Google Trends, Google PageSpeed Insights, and Google Search Console. With consistent application of best practices and frequent analysis of website performance, sustained growth is achievable.
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