One of the key considerations for most lawyers before using search engine optimization as a marketing channel is how much they will pay for lawyer SEO services. There are many factors that affect the cost of attorney SEO which we will cover in the article. While cost is indeed a factor, the amount you pay alone shouldn’t be the only thing driving your decision when hiring an SEO agency.
There are different approaches to law firm SEO. In fact, the SEO needs of two law firms that specialize in the same practice area and offer similar services may vary considerably. Your law firm may benefit more from legal directories, backlinking, and social media marketing whereas another needs technical SEO and on-page law firm SEO services at the very beginning. You may also want to supplement organic search traffic with PPC campaigns as part of your legal marketing, which is an additional cost. The SEO agency may also advise you to invest in a new web design that’s more capable of converting the increased traffic into leads. The more services you get, the more you pay for attorney SEO.
Is your law firm website currently ranking on search engines like Google? How much law firm SEO is needed to get you increased visibility for relevant search terms? The SEO agency may recommend a website audit to understand what you’ve done to improve your law firm website rankings in the past. You may have been involved in some black hat SEO techniques that will take a while to reverse and get your law firm website where it needs to be. This means more time and resources will be spent, hence increasing the cost of attorney SEO.
Not all SEO agencies are created equal. There are law firm SEO companies that offer a lot more expertise, knowledge, time, and results that you’re going to pay extra for. Find out whether the agency specializes in attorney search engine optimization. Every law firm is unique and working with an agency that has offered digital marketing services to similar companies in the past gives them the knowledge and skills required to quickly get started. You have higher chances of improving your law firm’s website rankings by working with an experienced agency, even if you’re likely to pay more.
Which area of law do you practice? This is a common question that law firms get asked by SEO companies before quoting a suitable price for their services. Why should your law firm’s practice area matter? For starters, the type of law you practice will determine the level of competition at hand. For instance, personal injury law and family law are particularly hard to rank for online. This is because their keywords are more competitive than others. Additionally, the competitive practice areas will require more legal marketing resources for an effective attorney SEO campaign.
Where do you practice law? Are you looking to offer legal services beyond your current location? This is an important consideration that will impact the cost of attorney search engine optimization SEO. If you want to expand your legal business into more cities, it’s going to be much more challenging to rank for multiple local-based keywords and phrases. There are big cities where the search volumes for lawyer terms are very high and challenging to rank for. The SEO agency will have to use more resources and tools to get you more visibility in these new locations. However, if you are planning on ranking in smaller rural areas with low search volumes, this shouldn’t significantly impact the cost.
The number and quality of backlinks on your law firm’s website will significantly impact its rankings. In fact, this is one of the areas that you should get clarity on before investing in SEO for lawyers. You will need a variety of high-quality, authority websites pointing to your law firm’s website. The more backlinks you have from these quality sources, the more search engines will take notice. Thus, it will improve your website rankings. Most lawyer SEO firms will charge a separate fee for the backlinking project to be done over time.
A substantial amount of your SEO budget will go into producing great quality content for your law firm’s website. High-quality content is not only relevant and diverse but also provides keyword optimization and updates. If you don’t invest in great content, your law firm website won’t rank on search engines.
There are different types of content, and some take a lot more time and effort to produce and optimize than others.
These require experts to design the graphics, create the copy, and present it in a visually appealing manner. These infographics help summarize factual data in a way that’s easy for viewers to translate and understand.
These are pieces of content in text format, mostly on blogs and other publications. There are expert copywriters who specialize in content with specific optimization for law firm websites to rank on search engines.
Another critical type of content, particularly for law firms, is copywritten for core practice area pages. The more practice areas your law firm has, the more custom content you need for each page.
Overall, effective content for law firm websites needs to be informational. You should answer the right questions and provide quality information to your readers. SEO companies will also invest in commercial content. This is meant to sell your law firm to the people looking for your legal services.
As we conclude, you need to be realistic regarding ROI expectations when investing SEO for attorneys. Most SEO companies will look at the revenue you want to generate. Thus, help you adjust your SEO budget to match this value. It is unrealistic to expect to generate millions of dollars in revenue after spending only $1,000 a year in SEO.
If you’ve worked with SEO companies in the past and gotten frustrated, there’s a good chance that the provider lacked the expertise, experience, and resources. These are necessary to get you the results you want. Don’t settle for substandard services at cut-rate pricing. Consider the above factors when narrowing down your options for attorney SEO.
