6 Essential Steps for Lawyers to Improve Their Local SEO Rankings in 2024
Are you looking for ways to boost your law firm’s online visibility and attract more local clients? If so, you need to invest in local SEO for lawyers. Local SEO is optimizing your website and local search traffic, like “personal injury attorney near me” or “divorce attorney in Chicago.” Local SEO can position you higher in Google’s local search results, known as the map pack or the 3-pack, the top 3 companies that appear above the organic results and are located within your area.
According to a study by BrightLocal, 33% of customers pick the first result in the local pack, and 64% of citizens use Google to search for local businesses. If your law firm is showing up in the local pack, you can take advantage of a huge opportunity to get more leads and clients. The question is, how do you increase your rankings of law firms in local SEO in 2024?
Here are some of the steps to follow to elevate your law firm in local SEO:
1. Claiming and optimizing your Google Business Profile
Your Google Business Profile (GBP) is the listing that appears when someone is looking for your law firm or a related service through a Google Maps search. It is searched as an identity-builder for your business, including your name, address, phone number, website, hours, reviews, and photos. The GBP your site offers is one of the most critical aspects regarding site relevancy, prominence, and distance from the searcher. To claim and optimize your GBP, you need to:
• Create or log in to your Google account, then go to Google My Business.
• Enter your law firm’s name and address and complete your ownership verification.
• Put all the details about your law office, e.g., category, services, description, and attributes.
• Include high-resolution photos and videos showcasing your law practice and team.
• Make sure your information is precise and accurate on all the platforms and directories.
• Respond to reviews and questions from your clients and potential customers.
2. Conducting Keyword Research and Using Local Keywords
Keyword research consists of identifying and examining the words and phrases that the potential customers of your services use when searching online. Keyword research allows you to see the search intention, demand, and level of competition for your keywords and, thus, helps you to optimize your website accordingly.
• You can leverage tools like Semrush, Ahrefs, or Google Keyword Planner to find keyword ideas and measure their metrics, such as search volume, difficulty, and click-through rate.
• Create content around long-tail keywords that are more specific and less competitive, for example, “how to file for divorce in New York” or “best DUI lawyer in Los Angeles.”
• Mention locations using city, state, or neighborhood in your keyword terms, such as “Chicago personal injury lawyer” or “Brooklyn estate planning attorney.”
• Employ “geo-modifiers,” like “near me,” “in,” or “nearby” to target audiences searching for nearby businesses, for example, “lawyer near me” or “law firms in Miami.”
• Use synonyms, paraphrased versions, and related keywords to make the content natural and avoid keyword stuffing, i.e., l, lawyer, legal counsel, or office.
3. Create and Optimize Location Pages on Your Website
If your law corporation has more than one place or serves a few areas, you must create and optimize location pages for your internet site. Location pages are dedicated pages that provide statistics about your law company and your offerings in a specific region. Location pages allow you to rank for location-specific keywords and target customers looking for local organizations in their area. To create and optimize place pages for your website, you want to:
• Create a separate page for each area or place you serve, and link to them from your main menu or footer.
• Include your law firm’s name, address, phone number, and a map or directions on each page.
• Write detailed and relevant content for each web page that describes your regulation corporation, offerings, team, and achievements in that place.
• Include local-specific keywords, testimonials, reviews, and case research on every web page.
• Add schema markup, which includes LocalBusiness, to every page to assist search engines in recognizing and showing your information.
4. Build Citations and Backlinks from Local and Legal Websites
Some of the best practices of SEO for lawyers are citations and backlinks. Citations and backlinks are two of the most critical off-page factors for local SEO. Citations are online mentions of your regulation corporation’s call, address, and phone number (NAP) on different websites and directories with Yelp, Avvo, or FindLaw. Backlinks are hyperlinks from other websites that point to your internet site, including Forbes, CNN, or ABA Journal. Citations and inbound links enhance your online reputation, authority, and visibility and drive extra traffic and results to your website.
• Claim and replace your listings on popular and relevant online directories, along with Google My Business, Bing Places, Yelp, Avvo, FindLaw/, and Lawyers.Com.
• Keep your NAP records consistent and accurate across all platforms and directories.
• Seek out and request links from local and legal websites, local information stores, chambers of trade, bar institutions, law faculties, and legal blogs.
• Create and share treasured and engaging content, including blog posts, infographics, movies, podcasts, or webinars, that other websites want to link to.
• Monitor and tune your citations and one-way links using tools like Moz Local or Ahrefs.
5. Generate and Manage Online Reviews
Online evaluations are among the most influential local SEO and client acquisition elements. According to a survey by BrightLocal, 87% of consumers studied online opinions for local corporations in 2020, and 79% of customers believe online critiques are a whole lot like private tips. Online critiques assist you in enhancing your online popularity, credibility, and trustworthiness and influence your potential clients’ choice-making procedure. To generate and manipulate online opinions for local SEO, you want to:
• Claim and optimize your profiles on famous and relevant overview platforms like Google My Business, Yelp, Avvo, FindLaw, and Lawyers.Com.
• Ask your happy customers to leave reviews on your chosen structures, and make it smooth for them to do so by supplying them with hyperlinks, instructions, and incentives.
• Respond to all high-quality and poor evaluations in a well-timed, well-mannered, and expert manner, and thank your clients for their remarks.
6. Optimize Your Website for Mobile and Speed
Mobile and speed are two of the most crucial technical factors for local SEO. Mobile optimization guarantees that your website is responsive, consumer-friendly, and practical on cellular devices, which include smartphones and tablets. Speed optimization ensures that your website loads fast and performs well on all devices and browsers. Mobile and speed optimization allows you to enhance your user experience, engagement, and conversion prices and avoid dropping able customers in your competition. To optimize your website for cell and speed, you need to:
• Use a responsive web layout that adapts to extraordinary display sizes and orientations.
• Use a fast and dependable web hosting service to handle your website’s traffic and bandwidth.
• Compress and optimize your photographs, films, and media documents to reduce their length and loading time.
• Minify and combine your HTML, CSS, and JavaScript documents to remove unnecessary code and reduce the number of requests.
• Use caching and content material delivery networks (CDNs) to save and supply your internet site’s content material faster and more correctly
Are you prepared to take your law firm to the following stage with local SEO? As you may see, local SEO is not a one-time aspect but a continuous and strategic manner that requires time, effort, and understanding. By following the six steps mentioned in this manual, you can improve your law firm’s visibility, credibility, and authority in your nearby vicinity and appeal to more excellent clients looking for legal offerings online.
However, if you need more clarity using the complexity and technicality of nearby SEO, you can do it with others. You can continually hire SEO for law firms and know how to get high-quality results in your niche and location. One of the satisfactory SEO groups for regulation firms is Sensation Solutions. They have years of experience in delivering SEO campaigns for legal professionals. They assist you with everything from keyword research and content advent to backlink building and website optimization.
If you want to learn how they will help you develop your law corporation with local SEO, contact them today and get a free consultation.
Ensure you include these 6 steps to reinforce your law organization’s online presence and popularity and get ahead of your competition in 2024.