Our Wealth of Data Brings You A Return On Your Law Firm’s Web Investment
Determining what provides the highest ROI for a law firm Web presence is often a challenging task. At Consultwebs, we spend a lot of time evaluating what works best for our clients. We have an advantage in analyzing data since our company is focused solely on law firm marketing. We have spent more than a decade developing expertise in the legal field, and we have collected a proprietary wealth of data. This experience has given us rare insight into what works – and what doesn’t – for law firm Web marketing.
To gather data on what works and what does not, we mined data from more than 200,000 visitors to law firm websites. These visitors came from different geographic areas, and their legal concerns were just as varied. They involved personal injuries, accidents, traffic citation defense, business litigation and specific medical disorders to name a few.
This data reveals ways you can work to secure more cases from your Web marketing strategies.
Use Topic-Specific Sites
We observed that Web properties that were topic-specific had higher conversion rates – regardless of overall traffic or even bounce rate. Since bounce rate often indicates relevant traffic, we had actually expected to find a link between bounce rate and conversion rate – but the data was not conclusive on this.
What we discovered was that topic-specific websites – RSD, traffic ticket defense, veterans’ disability, etc. – have almost twice the conversion rate as general practice law firm websites. Note that these are inquiries – not necessarily signed cases; many are individuals looking for information and guidance, rather than directly seeking immediate representation.
Our Recommendation: If your long-term Web marketing strategy does not include any topic-specific marketing initiatives, it is time to reconsider.
Design for Results
True or false: A lower/better bounce rate indicates that a site will deliver more inquiries. The surprising answer: false. Our data shows that bounce rate alone does not directly indicate conversion rate.
When a law firm’s website has a very low/good quality bounce rate but a terrible conversion rate, the likely culprit is a poor design. Not enough expertise has been applied toward converting visitors to inquirers.
In addition to collecting and analyzing usability indicators from more than 200,000 law firm website visitors, we pulled data for more than 50,000 individual visitor clicks. We evaluated the heat maps/click patterns for these visitors.
This analysis of click patterns on attorney Web pages revealed many opportunities for improved conversion specific to law firms, such as:
- Watch your words. The most visited pages on a law firm’s website are the homepage, attorney profiles and contact us pages – closely followed by verdicts/settlements. In our review of 50,000-plus clicks, we found that click-through rates depend on how these pages are labeled.
For instance, “Our Attorneys” works better than “About Us.” “Questions & Answers” is preferred to “FAQs.” While “Results” may read more persuasively than “Verdicts & Settlements,” it is the latter than gets clicked more often. Visitor activity on “Free Consultation” pales in comparison to the more direct phrase, “Get Legal Help.”
Our recommendation: Be direct in your language. “The Contingency Fee Process” isn’t catching your visitor’s attention? Then rephrase it to, “How We Get Paid.” The difference is dramatic. - Link it up. Are you losing visitor contacts because you don’t know where your potential clients are clicking? Understanding your visitors’ click patterns can point to opportunities for improved conversion. Results from our data analysis illustrated this very well.
Our recommendation: Your potential clients like to click your phone number. Be sure to link it up! Visitors to law firm websites also often try to click the first mention of your firm’s name in the content of your webpage – link it to a relevant page!
Web users’ behavior changes depending on the dynamics of the marketing environment. Behavior patterns differ whether we are trading stocks online, purchasing a retail item or looking for legal representation.
The professionals at Consultwebs.com serve as a knowledge base for our clients. We provide access to a network of attorney-specific data and resources and more than a decade’s wealth of law firm marketing expertise.
Partnering with a company that offers a comprehensive understanding of Web marketing for law firms can mean the difference between maximizing your investment and simply spending money.
Law firms from across the country and a variety of practice areas have partnered with Consultwebs.com, Inc., on their Web marketing campaigns. They cite numerous reasons for choosing us, including our proven record of securing search engine rankings, our unparalleled client service and our customized marketing strategies. If you would like more information about improving your Web presence please contact us to help with your law firm’s Web presence at marketing@consultwebs.com or (800) 872-6590.
Lisa DiMonte says:
September 14, 2011 at 4:08pmThanks for the great advice, Dale. I especially like the language recommendations. Very helpful. Law firms may also wish to consider hiring a business writer with expertise in writing content for law firm websites.
I highly recommend Doug Stern, http://www.doug-stern.com. We just interviewed him on our Talk Radio Show.