Future Firm Weave your web with a clever SEO strategy

An online marketing campaign using smart search engine optimisation strategies can help law firms win business, but there are some rules to consider, writes Llew Jury.

SEO: This stands for ‘search engine optimisation’ and refers to the process of improving the visibility of a website or a web page in search engines using ‘natural’ or unpaid search results. All major search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing produce such results, whereby web pages and other content such as videos are shown and ranked based on what the search engine considers most relevant to users. There is no payment.

Google AdWords: This is the highly popular system Google has developed to assist companies with marketing through the use of a placed text ad that appears when people search for phrases related to their service offering. It appears as a ‘sponsored link’ and is a pay-per-click system, which means you can dictate where your ad appears through bidding for a series of phrases.

Google+: This is Google’s social networking site and boasts hundreds of millions of registered users.

How can an online marketing campaign work for a legal firm? Is search engine optimisation (SEO) really a viable way for firms to source new business? Operating in a regulated industry, law firms are often hesitant to explore modern marketing techniques such as SEO. When using SEO, the most important thing is being able to clearly define a firm’s key positioning and determine its points of difference over competitors, which in turn helps decide which keywords to target. SEO activities also involve technical considerations, site architecture, content optimisation research, and the use of offsite platforms for promotion.

This is one medium where the firm with the higher budget is not guaranteed better results (as may be the case when using Google AdWords), so with SEO it is important for firms to have a unique and highly targeted strategy.

The online world and techniques such as SEO are increasingly competitive; it is not a set-and-leave strategy. You need to be sure your target market is searching for the service you want to market, in the place (or medium) you decide to use. Detailed below are some key things to keep in mind when developing your own unique SEO strategy.

1.  Keyword targeting
With such a high focus being placed on generic terms like ‘Personal Injury Lawyer’ and ‘Family Lawyer’, for example, a larger range of geographically targeted keywords should also be researched and integrated into the keyword targeting. A keyword such as ‘Car Accident Lawyer Sydney’ will produce a far more qualified lead, despite the lower search volumes, while it is also much less competitive and therefore easier for which to secure better rankings.

2.  Service specific pages
Google places a very high focus on quality content, and rewards websites that develop pages specifically around service offerings. While a clean website with a small number of pages may look good, it is not search friendly and will not be able to gain enough traction in a highly competitive industry. For instance, ensuring your family law website has a page dedicated to ‘divorce law’ means that, if properly optimised, users searching for this term will land directly on this page. They will find the information relevant to their search more quickly, and ultimately be more likely to convert.

3.  Relevant content updates
Given the nature of the legal industry, news and updates may often come across as bland and irrelevant to the prospective client or end user and, as a result, readership and ultimately site interaction is traditionally low. Creating new and interesting content that is relevant to a typical user on the site will encourage interaction and build site and brand authority. This can be developed in-house, discussing recent industry changes and topics that are being debated in the industry. To ensure this content is being picked up by Google, linking the blog authors with their Google+ profiles will produce a more quality piece of content for both Google to read, and the end user to connect with.

4.  Conversion optimisation
Search volumes around law-related keywords are typically much lower than other industries. It is, therefore, vital to make the most of every user who visits the site, and implement calls to action and enquiry forms on all relevant pages. Furthermore, it is important to implement conversion tracking on all website forms, as this will provide data around the best converting keywords and whether these conversions were produced as a result of the SEO campaigns. Phone tracking using 1300 numbers is also an option and can be set up to provide data on which keyword and traffic source produced the phone call.

5.  Paid advertising
Often, when targeting regional areas, there is very little to no search volume around local geographically targeted keywords. It is in these areas that a well-structured Google AdWords campaign can be set up to target the generic keywords that are difficult to obtain in the organic listings. Further to this, adding remarketing codes to your website will enable you to re-advertise via the Google Display Network to that small audience which has visited your site in the past.

Llew Jury is the founder and managing director of Reload Media. He works with leading brands on all aspects of their digital strategies, including search engine optimisation, social media, search engine marketing and website usability. Llew is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Management.
http://www.reloadmedia.com.au .