One of the most asked marketing questions from lawyers concerning their business is how they can use SEO to boost the rankings of their website and thus see more visitors land on their websites in the expectation that those visitors become paying clients. In truth, it is a question not unique to lawyers as it is also asked by business owners in every business niche and sector you could possibly think of.
However, it is lawyers and law firms we are going to focus on, and in doing so we want to highlight ways in which SEO can help boost their search engine rankings. If you were to study SEO for any length of time, you will soon discover that there are hundreds of ways that have been suggested as to how SEO should be done or rather hundreds of ranking factors that could be optimised.
That can seem daunting, and whilst we do not suggest you ever not seek to improve your SEO in every way you can, it needs to be done within an overall strategy. Part of that strategy should include focussing on tasks and actions that are proven to play the most significant role in producing results, aka higher rankings.
As such, we are not going to outline dozens of actions you could take but instead highlight just five. These are five steps that every SEO expert will tell you are essential and known to make a large contribution to SEO campaigns and their goal of getting a website ranking on Google’s first page. Incidentally, we recommend you follow these in the order they are presented.
Step #1 – Keyword Research
No improved and consistent search engine rankings are possible without keyword research. Without it you have no idea what searches are being entered by those searching for lawyers online, nor do you know which are highly competitive and which could be ranked for relatively easily. Keyword research can be done using software and online tools, and we also recommend competitor research to see what keywords other lawyers’ websites are ranking for.
Step #2 – Utilising Keywords
So, you know what keywords you are aiming to rank for, now it is time to use those keywords most effectively. Your keywords should be placed in the following places within your website.
- Page/Post URLs
- Content Titles
- Content Text
- Image Alt Text
- Website Metadata
Step #3 – External Backlinks, Social Media, and Citations
From internal optimisations within your website, we now move to external optimisations and actions where you not only acquire backlinks to your website but also utilise your keywords as well. Prime external locations to focus on include your social media pages and other social media groups linked to legal matters. You also want to get backlinks from relevant high-authority websites and create citations on business directories.
Step #4 – Acquiring Reviews And Testimonials
Do not underestimate the power of positive reviews both on your website, and on external websites. One of the most important of these is Google and in particular your Google Business Profile. Positive reviews here, not only gain Google’s attention when calculating your rankings, but they are also visible to those searching online for lawyers, many of whom will consider reviews when deciding which website to click through to.
Step 5 – Analysis And Further Optimisations
This last step is often what makes the difference between law firms who maintain higher rankings on Google and those who have them fleetingly. By setting up analytic tools to monitor your SEO and to identify where improvements can be made, you can take continuous actions to optimise and improve your rankings, which we guarantee many of your competitors will not be doing.