If you told me I was a terrible salesman, I’d be fine with that. I don’t try to be a salesman, I simply try to provide my expertise to meet the goals of my clients. Successful SEO is elusive, especially because of the Hard Truth of Law Firm SEO - no matter how many try, only a few will succeed.
I don’t have to push anything on anyone. In fact, SEO might not even be right for you.
Here are a few evaluation points, as well as alternatives that can provide you value without sinking money into solutions that can’t profit your firm.
Let’s Get Real - Competitive SEO is Expensive
The number one question if SEO is right for you is if you can afford it. If you are in a high competition practice area, it isn’t going to be cheap.
Here’s the test for your firm: can you hire a new paralegal for 2-3 years without a significant improvement in revenue?
If the answer is no, then I don’t recommend investing in SEO. If you do, you may be trapped by the allure of lower-priced SEO solutions which simply fail to deliver. They’re either with snake-oil salesmen working for big brand name companies, and they never touch your website after a few months but convince you they’re still “doing SEO;” or they’re an inexperienced person who you can’t really know will deliver you results.
It’s not that reality means you’re going to have to pay tens of thousands of dollars a year and get nothing for three years. But if your firm can’t absorb that, you may feel some budgetary squeeze. It isn’t unheard of for a firm to disregard cautions and expect to make tons of money quickly. Those situations result in a bad relationship between your firm and your SEO provider, and it isn’t as effective as a great relationship.
If you can shoulder that kind of financial cost without much worry, then you should have no problem with retaining an experienced law firm SEO agency. Actuals should prove to be far better than the “hire a paralegal” test, but you won’t stress about speedy results. Are You A Referral Firm?
Are you in a practice area that largely depends on referrals? Is it because of a relatively niche practice area, such as corporate law or working on retainers with a relatively small client roll?
No worries! You’re paying the bills and hopefully doing well. If you have room to grow, I’m not going to say that you need an expensive SEO campaign.
There are alternatives, and not everyone needs a big expensive campaign.
Brand Presence Alternatives
If you can’t afford SEO or are a business model that leans more on referrals and long-term relationships with regular clients, investing in brand presence can be more important.
First, beef up your LinkedIn profile. If you’re up for looking for some new cases to augment your referral-based business, try their Pro platform, and use it to try and prospect for a foot in the door for a new client. Even having a better LinkedIn profile and interacting with your existing network can increase your referral leads.
Second, look at a basic website. You need to communicate who, what, when, where and why concisely in a way that reflects positively on you or your firm. Invest in a good photographer taking some nice stills (the depth of field effect with blurry backgrounds make great website photos). Photos make all the difference on legal websites.
If you’re a prestigious or well-established firm that just needs to update their brand presence, go with more established design firms to reflect your stature in the design. If you’re more budget-conscious and want to limit costs, there are options that range from free to a few thousand dollars that can give you a professional brand presence website.
The most important point to get across here is that cutthroat SEO campaigns aren’t for everyone. I’ve seen way too many lawyers and firms dump a lot of hard-earned money into solutions where people promised lots of cases and they were taken advantage of. I’d rather help educate the legal community on realistic expectations of expenses and return than contribute to the masses of salesmen trying to charge you a lot and provide little value in return.
Smart alternatives can provide you value and don’t have to break the bank.
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If you’d like to schedule a FREE consultation with a law firm SEO expert, shoot us an email using our online contact form, and I will personally reach out to you as soon as possible.