Doesn’t it feel like our whole lives are online these days? Paying bills, communicating with your child’s teachers, or buying groceries—these are just a few things we do online now rather than in real life.
Yet when it comes to marketing, the internet IS real life. The web is where people go first to find professional services like legal representation. Your website, your reviews, and your social platforms are the face of your firm in a way that your physical location simply isn’t.
But do-it-yourself marketing requires time and resources that law firms rarely have. What’s more, spending your time on in-house marketing typically doesn’t make sense when you could be doing billable work and charging much higher rates.
The logical choice is to find a digital marketing team that will understand your firm’s vision and convey that message online in a way that gets you noticed.
There are lots of options among digital marketing agencies. So, how do you choose the right partner for your law firm?
Laying the groundwork for your search
Looking for service providers online can feel like so much scrolling. Here’s how to start your search without falling into a clickhole.
Know your goals—before you start looking
Before choosing a marketing agency, think about your services and who your clients will be. Ask questions like:
- Who are the clients you wish to attract?
- What kinds of cases do you want to take on?
- Do you want to focus on clients in a specific geographic area?
- Has your firm received any positive press worth mentioning?
Clarify your mission and values
What are your main goals for your law firm? What values guide your firm’s operations and client relationships? How do these factors differentiate your firm from your competitors?
Your marketing should reflect your firm’s vision and identity and convey integrity. These qualities will resonate with your potential clients and build trust.
As your business partner, the right marketing agency will work closely with you to develop an effective advertising and marketing strategy that reflects your brand values and attracts leads that align with your firm’s mission.
Identify what services you’re looking for
A good law firm marketing agency will help generate leads by means of a digital marketing strategy.
Each strategy should be personalized to the needs of your practice but might consist of elements like blogging and attorney copywriting, search engine optimization (SEO), organic social media, PPC campaigns, email newsletters, email drip campaigns, or website development.
Blogging and attorney copywriting
The best marketing agency will keep your website copy fresh and relevant. An experienced firm can develop a marketing plan that pinpoints how often you want to post new content on each platform and helps you stay on track.
Create a schedule to decide whether to post blogs and articles weekly, biweekly, or monthly to attract readers with updated material.
SEO
Search engine optimization (SEO) acts like a specialized net that attracts certain kinds of fish, particularly unpaid internet traffic. The bait, so to speak, is placing appropriate keywords in strategic locations online to increase your rank in search engine results based on your web content.
The more effective your SEO is, the higher up on the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) your website will be when users are searching for a law firm. Incorporating specific, effective SEO will help you catch the right “fish.” Digital marketers are skilled in researching and using appropriate keywords for effective results and consistently monitor optimal placement.
PPC campaigns
Pay-per-click campaigns (PPCs) allow you to pay for search engines to feature your material above other websites. This marketing tool can be a highly effective form of digital advertising.
While there is an initial outlay in cost, PPCs are popular because they work. Essentially search engine advertising, PPCs give you an extra boost in ratings when users search for key terms or phrases used on your website description and content.
Organic social media
Although some law firms choose not to pursue this, having a robust social media presence is essential to an effective marketing strategy. Depending on your firm’s target audience, this includes platforms like LinkedIn, X, Meta, Instagram, or even TikTok or YouTube.
While there are perils to social media, ignoring this valuable way to reach potential clients could be unnecessarily limiting your audience.
An excellent digital marketing agency understands it’s essential to choose wisely and focus on a few well-considered platforms that suit your needs. Experienced marketers won’t simply say yes to all the ideas floated without carefully considering the effort involved and the potential return on that investment.
Email marketing
As part of a campaign offering, email marketing is a cost-effective way to reach potential clients and keep current ones engaged. A monthly, biweekly, or weekly email newsletter can be sent to subscribers, targeting different audience segments based on specific services or needs, which fosters ongoing engagement and keeps your law firm top of mind.
Law firm marketing agencies have various tools to reach your ideal customers online. They monitor your value-added—the impact on your firm’s value and brand identity—and evaluate the metrics that indicate how well your marketing strategy delivers.
Website development
Your website is one of your most important digital assets. As the face of your law firm, your web pages should:
- Contain compelling content that articulates your services AND your value
- Offer a good user experience with fast load times and intuitive navigation
- Provide opportunities for contact and conversions
- Be reliably hosted
- Include at least baseline SEO
Anything less misses vital objectives and potential clients, as well.
Make sure your marketing firm knows legal
Law firms aren’t like retail stores or real estate firms. Attorneys have a specific purpose and must follow stringent ethical and regulatory guidelines (including advertising rules).
That’s why it’s so important to work with a marketing agency that understands these considerations and is well-versed in legal compliance issues. A specialized digital marketing agency with experience in your industry will help you avoid costly errors and missteps.
Assessing whether your digital marketing services are working
Digital marketing agencies understand that your law firm is looking for a solid ROI on their investment. The best way to evaluate that is through clearly articulated—and tracked—metrics.
In the world of marketing, metrics make the world go ‘round. They keep digital strategists and clients informed about which tactics are delivering and which are falling short.
Here are some examples of digital marketing metrics:
- Conversion rate: Also known as the goal completion rate, this measures how many visitors to your website turn into leads or paying clients. Conversion copy is the key to a successful web presence.
- Bounce rate: This is defined as the percentage of visitors to a particular website who navigate away or “bounce” from the site after viewing only one page. Monitoring this metric is important because a high bounce rate can mean your website has a technical problem, it contains content that doesn’t meet users’ needs, or the keywords and SEO are targeting the wrong users.
- Exit rate: This web traffic metric measures the percentage of visitors
who leave a website after viewing a specific page. It differs from your bounce rate in that interaction exists at more than just a moment’s glance.
- Impressions: This number reflects how many digital views or engagements occurred from a piece of content, usually an ad, social media post, or website. Impressions can also be referred to as an “ad view.” They are used in online advertising, which often pays on a per-impression basis.
- Click-through rate: The click-through rate or CTR is the percentage of people who click on an element like an ad or sponsored search result after being introduced to it. The CTR measures how successful an item is at gaining users’ attention.
A digital marketing agency will set these measures in place by working with a platform specializing in providing site analytics, such as Google Analytics or Adobe Analytics.
(But a final word on digital marketing metrics: think long-term because it takes time for digital strategies to deliver. SEO, for example, may take up to six months or longer to see results. Patience and communication is key!)
Let FocusWorks get you noticed online
Your firm can have a bigger impact and reach more customers online by engaging the expertise of a digital marketing agency that caters to attorneys and legal practices.
At FocusWorks Marketing, we specialize in delivering law firms content that converts. Our one-on-one, personalized service includes content marketing, web development, SEO, and more. Let’s discuss how we can boost your law firm’s digital marketing results. Drop us a line today.
