If you feel like digital marketing trends are evolving at an increasingly rapid pace, you are far from alone. The last few years have seen seismic changes in how companies market their products and services to potential customers, particularly through the customization of targeted marketing campaigns that interact with clients in personal ways. The legal marketing landscape is no different—as more law firms are turning to social media advertisements and other forms of online marketing, potential clients face a broadening array of legal services and law firms that claim to help them achieve their desired results. As your small or mid-sized law practice thinks about improvising its digital marketing efforts, it’s essential to devote some time to debunking the most common legal marketing myths that stubbornly refuse to go away. Failing to address these legal marketing misconceptions may cause your law firm to lose out on potential clients, diluting the reach and impact of your digital marketing efforts. This post will highlight some of the most common digital marketing myths for law firms and set the record straight on the results-oriented legal marketing strategies that are worth your time and resources. Let’s debunk some of these stubborn myths and gain some insights about how to maximize your law firm’s marketing strategy to attract and retain more clients.
Myth #1: My Current Website is Just Fine
Although having an operational and engaging website to market your law firm is essential, it’s not enough to set up a website and let it be. The internet is a living organism, and it adapts and evolves every day. Even if your law practice has taken the time to set up an organized, informative, and client-centered website that communicates your firm’s mission and values clearly and effectively, search engine algorithms like Google are constantly updating their criteria for evaluating and ranking websites. The ranking algorithms prioritize websites that are refreshed and updated regularly with keyword-heavy (yet naturally sounding) content that anticipates and addresses common search queries. If your law firm is hoping to remain visible to potential clients in need of legal assistance in your area, you should consider adding a blog feature to your firm’s website that explores topics that your clients may find interesting and relevant. Every time you add a new post, spread the word using your firm’s social media accounts and email the link to your current and former clients. Search engine algorithms will notice that your website is evolving and updating relatively frequently, making it more likely that the algorithm will propel your website to the top tier of the search results. Finally, it’s essential that your website is optimized across multiple devices. You want to know that your website will display well on a laptop computer, desktop, tablet, or smartphone. If you notice that your website does not load quickly or display properly on a particular device, enlist the help of a digital marketing expert to correct this issue.
Myth #2: Tracking Leads is a Waste of Time
Before you can optimize your law firm’s digital marketing strategy, you need to understand how your potential clients are learning about your legal services. For example, you may assume that most of your clients are contacting you because they stumbled across your website when the reality is actually much different. Instead, maybe most of the new clients that contact your law firm are doing so because your former clients have recommended your legal services, either by word of mouth or through online reviews. Consciously implementing tools to track and measure where your leads are coming from can help you create more informed and data-driven strategies to improve your efforts and make them more effective. Your firm can use case management software to streamline the data collection and retrieval process, enabling all case information to be stored in a secure and centralized location. These metrics can lead to surprising insights, like realizing that very few clients view your social media advertisements. Once you have gathered and reviewed this feedback, you can set targeted marketing goals and develop results-driven strategies to generate more leads across various channels. As you refine your marketing strategies, you can increase your ROI (return on investment) to ensure that the campaigns and tools you are using are actually delivering you the results you’re after.
Myth #3: Investing in SEO is an Unnecessary and Dated Practice
The term search engine optimization (SEO) was hugely popularized several years ago. Unfortunately, many businesses have come to view SEO practices as a relic of the past (and, therefore, not worth pursuing). However, a robust SEO strategy continues to be vital in today’s legal marketing landscape in order for your law firm to remain visible and attractive to potential clients. People still turn to search engines for guidance about a legal topic or to look for an attorney who can help them resolve their issues. When someone in your area is looking for a personal injury lawyer, they will likely enter terms like “Car accident lawyer near me” and review the top results that appear. Since most people will not scroll past the first page of results, it’s critical that your law firm optimizes your website using relevant search terms and keywords that will match common search queries. You can work with your digital marketing expert to invest in an SEO strategy that will boost your website’s visibility and generate more leads.
Myth #4: Keeping in Contact With Former Clients is Not Important
Once you have helped your client resolve their legal issues, you will likely go your separate ways. However, maintaining ongoing and genuine relationships with your former clients is a solid and effective way to grow your law practice and become an integral part of your community. When a former client feels like you viewed them as so much more than just a case to be solved, they will refer other clients to your law firm and share their positive experiences by writing online reviews. Consider maintaining an email newsletter that shares updates about your firm and celebrates recent successes, keeping your former clients up-to-date on your commitment to serving the needs of your clients. Finding ways to make your clients feel valued and appreciated does wonders for your firm’s reputation and trustworthiness—making it more likely that a potential client will seek you out when the need arises.
If you’re ready to create and implement a results-driven, client-centered digital marketing strategy to grow your law firm, the dedicated and friendly team at LegalRev is ready to help you achieve your goals. Give us a call today at (800) 893-2590 to get started.
