Until very recently, many law firms of all sizes summarized their online marketing strategy in the following terms:  “Yes, we have a website.”  Sure enough, they did.  The problem with this build-it-and-they-will-come approach was that prospective clients never found your website unless they already had the firm’s name.   Sometimes, even that wasn’t enough and one had to actually be provided the firm’s website address in order to locate it.

Needless to say, such an approach isn’t an effective strategy for attracting the many prospective clients who are looking for someone who does exactly what your firm does, in the location where you do it, but aren’t already aware of your firm.  Happily, however, change is now afoot.  Savvy firms have recognized the need to do a better job of attracting clients to their online offerings and are taking appropriate action. 

Getting found

As online marketing matures, it also diversifies.  The tools available to law firms to increase their online visibility have expanded in recent years.  Some firms recognize and capitalize on this.  Most still do not.  Four key techniques your most astute competitors are currently using to ensure potential clients find them online before (or instead of) you include:
i) pay-per-click advertising,
ii) online legal directories,
iii) blogs, and
iv) search engine optimization

Pay-Per-Click advertising (PPC)

Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising consists of small text-based “ads” that appear in search engine results pages or other websites.  In the case of Google, PPC ads typically show up in a highlighted box at the top of the results page as well as in a separate column down the right hand side of your screen and are identified as “sponsored links”.  This marketing vehicle enables your firm to appear on the first page of search engine results for the search terms you specify (e.g. “Toronto lawyers”) in a matter of hours or days rather than months or years, and is results-based, meaning you only incur cost if someone actually clicks on your ad and is taken to your website.  Cost is determined according to an auction-based system with those firms prepared to be a higher cost-per-visitor appearing higher up in the results. This tool also enables firms to maintain complete control over their budgets. Your firm specifies a daily maximum budget for its PPC campaign.  If that limit is reached, the system simply turns off the ads for the remainder of the day and then starts back up tomorrow.

Online directories

If you perform a search for “Vancouver lawyers” (or Calgary lawyers, Ottawa lawyers, etc.) on Google, you typically won’t find many law firms on the first page of results.  Rather, the search results are dominated by online legal directories or lawyer referral services.  Think of them as additional front doors to your website.  Lawyers.com (owned by LexisNexis Canada Inc., publisher of The Lawyers Weekly) is one of the more high profile examples nationally. The offerings, business models, and pricing vary between services, but all of them have one trait in common: they employ sophisticated strategies to ensure they are highly visible in search engine results, and then provide lawyers and law firms with exposure on those high-ranking websites for a fee.

Blogs

You’ve probably already read a great deal about blogs as “the next big thing”.  There is substance behind the hype.  Blogs are extremely powerful and cost-effective search engine marketing tools.  They enable lawyers to build credibility, position themselves as authorities in a specific practice area, and, very importantly, gain prominent placement in search engines on the topic(s) they blog about. Additionally, journalists from reputable print publications regularly conduct background research for their articles online (read “type their article topic into Google”), find a relevant blog entry in their search results and then contact the blog author for an interview.  At a seminar on lawyer blogging I moderated last fall, one second-year associate lawyer on our panel cited as an example the occasion Rolling Stone Magazine called her for an interview after finding her blog on Internet gaming law, a topic they were about to feature in the magazine.  When is the last time a second- year associate in your office was called up by Rolling Stone Magazine requesting an interview?  That is the kind of exposure blogging can provide. 

Search Engine Optimization

Search Engine Optimization (or “SEO”) is the process of analyzing and reconfiguring your firm’s website to make it appear more prominently on search engines.  For example, several national firms have as their start pages simply a graphic with the firm logo and a language selection option between English and French.  While great from a language equality standpoint, this amounts to a horrific search engine strategy.  Search engines place emphasis on the first page of your firm’s site and focus predominantly on text and links (as opposed to graphics) contained there in determining how to place your site in the search engine results.  Do you know anyone who types “English French” as their search phrase when looking for a national law firm? Likewise, simple edits like replacing “we” “us” or “the firm” with the actual firm name will mean your site appears more prominently when someone uses your firm’s name as their search phrase.

SEO involves systematically addressing issues of this nature throughout your firm’s website, and utilizing appropriate keywords in the content of your pages to better reflect your service offerings in a way search engines can understand.  SEO does not work as quickly as some of the other techniques already noted, but can pay substantial dividends in the long term. 

A final note - rich content wins business

With the exception of blogging, (which has both search engine marketing and content components), the tools noted above are geared strictly toward driving additional prospects to your website.  In order to convert that additional website traffic into paying clients once they get there, your website needs to deliver value.  In web terms, that means good content.  Comprehensive lawyer bios.  Audio or video clips.  RSS feeds to content by subject area.  Maps to your locations.   Answers to frequently asked questions.  The more resources your website provides, the stronger a client development tool it becomes.

Doug Jasinski LL.B. is the principal of Skunkworks Creative Group Inc. (www.skunkworks.ca), a boutique legal branding and marketing agency. He can be reached at doug@skunkworks.ca.