Basics of generating more work for your law firm in the digital era

Introduction

Whether you’re practicing solo or running a small law firm, the struggle of generating more work is real. There are times you may feel like you’re spending more time finding new work than doing your legal work. Lead generation is the bedrock of a law office in that it is directly connected to a law office’s finances and business growth. But, you’re not alone in this. Every solo practitioner and law firm goes through this stage in the beginning. So, we’ve prepared a quick guide to help you generate more work in the digital era. 

   1. Make sure your website looks professional 

Needless to say, your firm website is the first place potential clients look when they’re considering your firm or comparing it with other law firms. Your website establishes your firm’s brand and tells potential clients who you are, what you do, and why they should choose you or your firm instead of others. According to a legaltech unicorn Clio’s 2019 Legal Trends Report, 57% of consumers looked for a lawyer independently. The most common research methods were: using an online search engine (17%) and visiting a lawyer’s website (17%). 

Source: Clio 

Below are some of the basics your website should have:

• Professional design. Your website is your brand. Unless you want your brand to look sloppy in the eyes of a potential client, pay close attention to how your website looks. 
• Quality content. Bill Gates said back in 1996, “Content is the king,” interestingly, it is still true today in marketing and lead generation. Your website should contain quality contents that attract the interest of your target audience, i.e., potential clients. Content types may include blog posts, legal articles, news, videos, ebooks, infographics, webinars, downloadable guides, or whitepapers. However, don’t rush to create poor quality or sloppy content just for the sake of creating one. Always remember that your content should be professional. 
• User(+mobile)-friendliness. It should be easy to find information on your website, including your team’s experience and contact details. If you want to make it easy to contact you, consider customer support chat (just like the one you see at the bottom right corner on our website. P.S. We use LiveChat) and callback functions on your website. Many service providers allow you to add such functions without any coding easily.  Nowadays, most people search for lawyers on their phones. So, make sure that your website is also mobile-friendly. In addition, in the digital era where people are less patient, your website speed should be fast. You can use Google PageSpeed Insights to test your website’s loading speed. 
• A lead magnet is the best way to turn visitors into potential clients and build relationships with them. Many potential clients visit your website. However, only a small portion of them contact your firm and become clients. With a lead magnet, you can turn those website visitors into leads. Remember that you had to leave your email address to download content from a website, and you’re automatically subscribed to their newsletters? Just like that, you can use useful content (lead magnet) to collect emails and use the emails for your email marketing campaign. 

   2. Put yourself in front of potential clients - “Improve your presence.”

‘Improving online presence is one of the most common pieces of marketing advice given to lawyers and law firms, with ‘content marketing’ as a closely linked companion. These tactics aim to build familiarity and credibility with your target audiences - thus setting the scene to increase the likelihood of contact and referral. 

You or your law firm might be very experienced or provide excellent services. But, other than your website or Google search, how should potential clients discover you? This means you should try to put your name or profile on as many reliable and well-known platforms or directories as possible. These include social media platforms (Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, Instagram, etc.), online directories, marketplaces, etc. If you produce content or a post, it is not very difficult to copy your content on multiple platforms all at once. Social media is a great way to engage and attract the interests of potential clients and showcase your firm. As Jay Baer once said, “Content is fire. Social media is gasoline”. 

One way you can use Lexub to improve your online presence simply and directly is through hosting documents on Lexub so that your work product can speak for itself, providing tangible evidence of your focus, expertise, and specialism. Evidencing your expertise through your work product is a much more effective way to position yourself with other lawyers as an expert in your field than simply saying “Highly experienced lawyer” on your website or Linkedin profile.

   3. Implement some SEO strategies (in non-technical terms - make sure your website appears on the first pages of search engine results) 

For lawyers, Search Engine Optimization might sound unfamiliar and technical. I’ve been there. Let me explain the concept easily. Google right now “[your practice area] lawyer/law firm in [your area],” e.g., “divorce lawyer in New Delhi.” Do you see your website on the first page or two of the search results? If not, you are likely losing potential clients to other lawyers and law firms. By implementing some SEO strategies, you can allow more and more people to discover your site easily through search results. Organic search traffic is a significant marketing channel if you do it right; 

To sum up, your website should have contents that provide a quick answer to the questions your potential clients may type in. In addition, every page of your website should have tags optimized for search engines. To understand what this means, take a look at the image below. You already know that there are two parts of information, the Title, and Description when any website pages appear on search results. Your developer should tag your website content right so that the right texts appear in these sections. You should also keep in mind that the length of your Title and Description is appropriate so that the results show the right information. 

Many websites provide free SEO analyzers, like https://neilpatel.com/seo-analyzer/. They will show you your website’s SEO score and offer tips to improve its search result ranking. Even though it may sound daunting at first, SEO is not rocket science. You can get ahead of the game by implementing basic SEO strategies. 

Conclusion

There are many other steps a lawyer or a law firm can implement to generate more work in the digital era. The key is to try different strategies, evaluate the results of each effort, and keep the ones that are bringing better results. 

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