Ultimate Guide To Local SEO for Lawyers

1. Optimize Your Google Business Profile

Optimizing your Google Business Profile is necessary in order to rank on Google's Local Map Pack. Google Business Profile (formerly known as Google My Business, or GMB) is a critical aspect of local SEO for law firms and attorneys. Although Google does not share search volume, it is estimated that over 5.6 billion searches happen daily with local intent. The best part? Creating, optimizing, and updating your law firm's Google Business Profile is 100% free.

What to Include When Optimizing Your Google Business Profile Listing:

• Website URL: Add your website link to the business profile to help direct users to more information about your law firm.
• Provide Clear, Consistent, and Updated Contact Information:
  • NAP (name, address, phone number)
  • Email address
  • Business Hours
• Optimize Your Business Description: Get detailed about your practice in the description by including the following information.
  • Specific and target keywords for your service and local area pages
  • The specific type of legal services and specializing areas you offer.
  • Spotlighting lead attorney(s) at your firm.
  • Including information that would help improve your E-A-T (expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness) such as:
    • Including how many years of experience you have in your field of expertise and how long you have served within your local area.
    • What level of education you have as an attorney to help showcase your expertise.
    • Highlight specific awards, certificates, and accolades that could help promote the authority of your law firm within your local area.
• Select Appropriate Categories: You can apply the appropriate and applicable business categories in your Google Business Profile which can help Google better understand what searches to rank your listing for. Don't select categories that don't apply to your law firm. If a user was to come to your site for a specific category in mind and finds your firm doesn't have it, it can negatively impact user experience and rankings over time.
• Set a Radius: Businesses can also specify a radius for the areas and communities they can provide their services to. Establish a radius for how far you want to reach a target audience to increase your positioning in a wider local range.
• Add Images or Videos: People are visual and visual assets of your practice (interior and exterior), events, and the team can help instill trust with prospective clients. It can help showcase a business's culture and add a sense of relatability and trustworthiness to your law firm.
• Manage and Respond to Reviews: Reviews are critical for local SEO and attorneys can directly manage them from this platform. Being up-to-date and responsive with your reviews, whether they be negative or positive, helps improve the quality of your Google Business Profile.

2. Citation and Directory Development

There are other authoritative and relevant directories that law firms should be added to in addition to Google Business Profile. Adding your legal business information in authoritative avenues within citations and directories can help improve your law firm local SEO. Here are a few examples of trustworthy legal directories that can add value to your practice:

• Avvo: Avvo offers a legal directory and marketing services for potential clients and law firms. Having multiple positive reviews on this directory will help improve your local search presence and reputation.
• Nolo: Nolo lets you publish articles on your law firm's profile, which helps build your law firm's credibility, online authority, and search engine ranking.
• FindLaw: FindLaw is one of the first legal directories established and continues to help customers network and find the right lawyer for them
• Lawyers.com: Just as easy as the URL says, Lawyers.com's search feature makes it easy for individuals to find the right lawyer for their needs.

When it comes to adding your law firm to trustworthy directories, prominence and relevance both grow the most within local SEO for lawyers. Directories can have the biggest influences in helping your business become more prominent by being a part of a credible legal database that clients sometimes go to first to find attorneys in their local area. When your NAP information (name, address, and phone number) is added to a trustworthy legal directory, it helps build the relevance of your site by being found in a credible resource within your industry.

The more trustworthy directories your legal site is listed in as a reliable source, the more your site develops E-A-T with search engines. E-A-T stands for expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness which all factor into the credibility of your site with search engines. It gives more trust to prospective clients to be able to find positive reviews or business information in places prospective clients are looking for reputable attorneys. The stronger your E-A-T is, the more professional and authentic your law firm becomes online for search engines and potential clients.

3. Prioritize Review Generation and Maintenance

The more positive reviews a law firm can get, the more reputable and trustworthy it appears to both search engines and prospective clients. And it's been shown that 4 and 5 star reviews can directly impact local rankings.

93% of individuals say that online reviews affect their purchase decisions. They are a direct ranking factor, and they also help build credibility for your law firm. Here are a few ways your law firm can get started on gathering reviews:

• Ask previous and current clients. Reaching out to current and previous clients helps open the door to reminding customers of the experiences they had with your law firm.
• Create business profiles across multiple platforms. Adding your law firm into multiple directories can help expand your audience reach and improve your credibility over time.
• Make it as simple as possible to leave a review. Find easy ways for your clients to leave a review, such as sending them a follow-up text with a link directing them to your review page or a survey on client satisfaction.
• Create a process and stay consistent. Find the right process and order in which your law firm can consistently manage reviews. The more consistent you are with handling them, the more prominent your profile will become.

Once you begin to gather reviews, respond to all comments. This shows current and potential clients you want them to provide a great experience throughout the entire process. It also allows you to gather feedback and demonstrates your ability to follow through on your services.

Do not delete negative comments. Use that as an opportunity to gather feedback and rectify the situation, this speaks volumes with both people and search engines.

How to Remove Spam or Violating Reviews

Reviews on your law firm's Google Business Profile can be removed if they disrupt any of Google's violations:

• Spam and Fake Account: When content is posted to deteriorate the reputation of a business, this would be considered as spam or fake. The content should reflect a genuine experience and should not be duplicated and reposted over and over.
• Off-Topic: When a review is left, it should relate to a business and their services. It should not be a location to post political or social commentary that is not related to the business and their services. This type of content will be removed.
• Restricted Content: For some products or services subject to controls and local regulations, you must follow certain guidelines when posting content.
• Illegal Content: Content that is illegal or depicts illegal activity should never be posted and will be removed.
• Terrorist Content: Content that promotes terrorist acts, recruitment, violence, or celebrates terrorist activities is strictly prohibited. If posting content related to terrorism for an educational, documentary, scientific, or artistic purpose, be mindful to provide enough information so viewers understand the context.
• Sexually Explicit Content: Google does not allow content that is sexually explicit. If it is found, Google seeks to remove the content, shuts down the account, and sends a report to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) and law enforcement.
• Offensive Content: Any content that is obscene, disrespectful, profane, or includes inappropriate gestures will be removed.
• Dangerous & Derogatory Content: If there is content that implies dangerous or derogatory content that infringes on an individual's safety, it will be removed.
• Impersonation: Google does not allow individuals to falsely represent an individual, business, or company that is not themselves.
• Conflict of Interest: Writing a review for your own business is known as a conflict of interest. Google looks for unbiased content and this example shows a violation of conflict of interest.

Learn more about each of these violations in Google's policy.

How Do You Flag Spam Reviews in Google Business Profile?

If you notice spam reviews, take measures to flag those and get them taken down. Here are steps on how to flag spam reviews in Google Business Profile:

1. First it's important to read the review policy to determine whether it violates Google's guidelines.
2. Review to see which reviews to report for removal.
   1. Your law firm should only report reviews that violate Google's content policies.
   2. It is important not to report reviews due to not liking or disagreeing with what was written. Google will not interfere with client-company relationships or interactions. There is not a reliable way to determine which party was accurate or telling the truth.
   3. You should not report third-party reviews. Google will sometimes add third-party reviews to help provide additional information about the business. If you would like to report these reviews, contact the provider directly. To flag an inappropriate third-party review, contact the third-party provider directly. Once the third-party company removes the review from their platform, it will be removed from the profile as well.

3. As a law firm, you can flag the review within multiple Google tools including: Google Search, Google Maps, or directly from your Google Business Profile account.

   • How to flag reviews in Google Maps
     • On your computer or mobile device, open Google Maps.
     • Find your Business Profile.
     • Locate the review you'd like to report.
     • Click “More” > “Flag as inappropriate”.
   • How to flag reviews in Google Search
     • On your computer or mobile device, go to Google.
     • Find your Business Profile.
     • Click Google Reviews.
     • Locate the review you'd like to report.
     • Click “more” > “report review” and select the violation type.
   • How to flag your reviews in your account
     • On your computer or mobile device, sign in to manage your Google Business Profile.
     • Click “Reviews” (if a single business) or “Manage Reviews” (if multiple businesses) and then find the review you'd like to report.
     • On the review your law firm would like to report, click “More” > “Flag as inappropriate”.

Source: Google Business Profile Help - Flagging and Removing Spam Reviews

4. Use Legal Service Schema Markup

Schema markup is coding that you can add to the HTML of your website. When you do so, it helps search engines better understand the content on your legal site for them to provide more detailed and informative results back to their users. While it might be easy for humans to understand the purpose of a page, search engines sometimes need the additional coding and information to fully put the pieces together.

For local SEO for lawyers, the Attorney schema markup is deprecated and we advise using LegalService schema markup instead. It's a best practice to use JSON-LD schema over microdata; you can find examples of LegalService schema here! When implemented properly, there are a variety of benefits that come from it including:

• Improving your images
• Helps search engines better understand your location easier on platforms (i.e. Google Maps)
• A positive impact on rankings overall

5. Map Out High-Intent Keywords Per Page

Understanding keyword intent is essential for all SEO strategies. In the context of SEO, intent refers to what searchers are looking for when they submit a search query in Google or other search engines. Are they looking for a commercial landing page with business information or an informational blog article to answer a question as they're in the research and decision making phase of the buyer's funnel?

For law firm's or individual attorneys, it is critical to map out the high-intent keywords being used for each page to avoid competition between pages on your website and to capture the full potential of each search term and the supporting content.

Map out keywords based on search intent and match them up to the most applicable page on your website or create that page if it doesn't exist. For example, let's assume you have a page on your site all about personal injury. Using keywords such as “injury” or “personal injury” show low-intent. Search engines will show informational resources for these types of keywords. Instead, use keywords such as “personal injury lawyer” or “injury attorney” when performing on-site optimizations for that page. Using these high-intent keywords will help achieve first page rankings more easily. They also help drive potential customers with intent to purchase or take action on the site.

Some other keywords that law firms can use in their local SEO strategies include:

• “Near me” Searches: Searchers will often use “near me” at the end of a keyword phrase to search based on proximity. Using the term “near me” within the meta description and where it makes sense organically helps with your local SEO efforts.
• Location-specific Keywords: Use these terms to target the regions you want to rank high for. For example, using keywords like “Boston criminal defense attorney” or “accident lawyer in Orange County” will help improve your presence within specific locations.

6. Optimize On-Page SEO Elements

SEO has a variety of moving parts that all work together to help your law firm local SEO strategy work progressively over time. The on-page, also known as onsite, elements that are a part of your site need to be optimized to be fully responsive and effective. On-page elements refer to some of the foundational elements that are embodied in your website and are aspects that you can control. Without these elements, it would be harder for your website to be found by users or be able to rank in search engine listings.

It's important to optimize your keywords a step further by incorporating keywords into these on-page elements. Utilizing high-intent keywords within on-page elements helps your site and the specific pages within it be found with the right intent and rank higher over time. Including location-specific keywords and “near me” searches within these on-page elements search engines understand which regions to rank your site for in the Local Map Pack. Here are a few examples of on-page elements and how to incorporate keywords within them:

• Meta Titles and Descriptions: Include your focus keyword within the meta title and descriptions to help further improve and optimize the intent of the keyword.
• URL Structure: Just like your meta title and description, include the focus keyword within the URL structure if possible.
• Image File Name: Including a high-intent keyword within the image file name helps search engines and users have more clarification of the image while also helping to optimize the image.
• Image Alt Text: The image alt text helps describe the image without seeing it visually. When you're able to incorporate a keyword within the image alt text it isn't always necessary, but could benefit by doing so.
• Headers: Having a location-specific keyword within your headings can help increase your chances of ranking high in Google's SERPs since header tags hold more weight than regular body copy.
• Content: Having optimized keywords within your content helps amplify what you're showcasing or offering. However, be sure to make the keywords sound fluid throughout the content and not just copy and pasted into random areas of the content. The goal is to create content that sounds like a natural conversation instead of writing for bots.

When you're able to incorporate optimized keywords into your on-page elements, the more optimized, purposeful, and meaningful your legal website becomes to users and search engines.

7. Optimize or Create Content for Local SEO

Creating relevant and engaging content is another crucial aspect of local SEO for attorneys and lawyers. Informative and intriguing content will offer value and draw in potential clients. Law firms should have the following pages created and optimized to rank well for local searches:

• Home Page: Don't forget about the home page, it's one of the most important and authoritative pages on the entire site! Optimize the content for a keyword if it's applicable, but ensure that the user experience (UX) is seamless and that the home page links out to the most relevant and important pages. This will transfer value to other pages helping improve the authority, visibility, and keyword rankings.
• About Us Page: Having a page designated to explaining the history of the law firm, mission, and achievements over the years can help increase trust and develop authority with prospective clients as well as search engines. It's also a great place to internally link to individual attorney bios (see details below).
• Individual Attorney Pages: Creating an Attorney Bio page for each of the attorneys in a law firm can help develop the website's E-A-T to both search engines and people. This is the time to boast about each attorneys' achievements, formal education, continued education, accoldates, etc.
• Contact Us Page: This is the spot to list out your contact information, NAP (name, address, phone number), directions, and possibly even a map of how to reach your law firm.

• Location-Specific Pages: Regardless of whether you have one office or multiple spread across different cities or states, creating location-specific pages can help you capture the local audience and rank high for local search terms. However, site owners can quickly run into problems, like doorway pages, if this isn't executed well.

  • Do not create duplicate content. Find unique information to feature for each of the locations so your web pages don't compete against one another.
  • Be intentional with your content. Utilize detailed descriptions and directions on how to get to an office, mention landmarks and nearby locations (Google will pick up on this), embed Google Maps to the page, and talk through unique features if they change depending on the location in question.
• FAQ Page: An FAQ is a great way to get more valuable information featured on your website. This can be a standalone page or it can be a section at the end of each service page. FAQs allow you to dive deeper into answering the most common questions people have pertaining to the services you can offer or about the legal industry as whole. Beat out your competition by answering these questions first so you can rank in Google's SERP for it when the next person searches that question.

With each of these pages, there are elements you can utilize when creating and optimizing your legal site. You can use keywords in the places that make the most impact such as title tags. For example, the H1 tag is especially important as it is often the first place users and search engines will look when reviewing a page. You could also incorporate internal links to the pages that you want to build up authority the most to, are most valuable to your services, and the pages that keep readers engaged longer on your site. It's also important to include keywords with matching intent into the content you're creating. Otherwise, your webpage will never rank for that keyword.

Optimized content on your law firm's site is not like a light switch that you can turn on and off. Creating engaging content is an ongoing process that will take careful strategy and planning.

8. Develop Links to Authoritative Local Sites

Building your law firm's local SEO through link building helps create multiple opportunities and benefits for your legal site over time. When you're able to add a link directing back to your site from an authoritative third-party website, the more credible your site becomes in a search engine's eyes. These authoritative local websites could be from legal directories, local legal blog articles, etc. Being included in higher authority websites helps build your legal website's credibility and rankings over time.

Quality is more important than the quantity of backlinks you create with other sites. While it's nice to be featured in a variety of resources, it's equally as important to make sure you're building links with trustworthy websites, not ones with low reputation scores or spammy sites.

If your law firm is associated with multiple spammy links, this factor alone could drop your rankings and tarnish your overall online reputation. Be cautious of who you're sharing and building links with.

Along with credible websites mentioning and backlinking to your website, you can also build your authority by externally linking to trustworthy sources from your own website. By referencing other credible local links, it adds a stronger local presence for your law firm. It could be added within your content, blog articles, and anywhere that adds value to your legal site. Overall, it's important to make sure the link quality is genuine and you're not stuffing your site with spammy or unnecessary links.

9. Create a Seamless User Experience

User experience affects SEO performance, it's not just about content, keywords, and links. Designing a website that is easy for visitors to find information will help gain the trust of potential clients. In contrast, a poor user interface will increase your bounce rate and create a poor experience for website visitors. User experience optimization can include many factors such as:

• Mobile Responsiveness: This should come first! In 2021, mobile devices, excluding tablets, generated 54.4% of global website traffic globally. Optimizing the mobile responsiveness of your law firm's site will help retain website traffic. Use Google's Mobile-Friendly Test to determine what aspects of the site need to improve for an improved mobile experience.

• Site Speed Optimization: Along with improving overall user experience, optimizing your law firm's site speed is a direct ranking factor. When your legal website takes too long to load, you could lose the client's interest which then leads them in choosing a competitor who might have a faster site than your own.

  Your law firm can utilize tools and processes to help fix these site speed issues. One effective tool to help test your page speed is Google's PageSpeed Insights. You enter in the URL of the page you want to check and it will give you a report of how fast your site speed is.

  You could also go through your website and reduce image sizes as needed and limit the number of videos per page. Another good process is to remove any excess coding and redirects for each page. Lastly, you can work on server optimization. Server optimization works to utilize a CDN (Content Delivery Network) and improve the server response time.

• Site Navigation: Your law firm's website should be intuitive and easy to navigate. Implement your most important pages as close to the main navigation menu as possible. They should not be hidden in the site or pushed down away from the home page and main navigation too deep. Simple site navigation can lead to more leads and traffic for your website.
• No Broken Images or Elements: Images that don't load properly, or links that go to the wrong place, are considered broken. Optimizing images will help the site to load faster and enhance the site's design. Fixing broken pages (404 errors) and links will directly improve SCO-friendliness and lead to a better overall user experience.
• Text: The website text (copy) shouldn't be too small and should be easy to read. The minimum font size should be 16 px. Don't include or publish any cut off or overlapping text as this will make the information difficult to read.
• Clickable Elements: Buttons, links, pictures, and other clickable elements shouldn't be too close together on a web page. This data is easy to find in Google Search Console reports. Search Console will find whether the clickable elements are too close to each other.

Overall, utilizing these user experience factors will all go towards helping your local SEO efforts for your law firm over time.