1 out of 3 people looks for an attorney online—are you doing your law firm’s marketing the right way?
See, marketing is crucial for any business on the planate earth, and law firms are no exception.
However, the challenges are even greater when it comes to legal marketing. The lawyers have to follow certain ethical guidelines and regulatory restrictions when marketing their services, which are quite limited.
Also, there is so much competition in the legal field that it becomes difficult to stand out. These challenges raise an important question: what is the biggest marketing struggle for a lawyer?
Let’s discuss this in detail.
Strict Ethical Rules and Regulations
The rules of marketing are quite strict in the legal profession. For example, bodies like the American Bar Association (ABA) impose many restrictions on lawyers when they advertise. Lawyers have to ensure that their advertising is not misleading and does not make any unethical promises.
For example:
— Lawyers cannot make direct solicitations, especially if they do not have existing contact with the client.
— Comparative advertising that makes you look better than other lawyers also has to be avoided.
These guidelines are necessary to maintain the dignity of the legal profession, but they also restrict marketing strategies.
Highly Competitive Market
Competition exists at every level in the legal field. Either you are solo practitioners or large law firm, everyone wants his name to come first when a potential client searches for legal help. Appearing in the top results on Google or generating word-of-mouth referrals is a constant struggle.
Another side of competition is specialization.
Every lawyer or firm claims to be an expert in its specific practice areas, such as personal injury, family law, criminal law, or corporate law. But when everyone is showing their best, it becomes difficult to differentiate for potential clients. This is why lawyers have to work more on their marketing strategies and positioning.
According to Google Ads, 78 of the top 100 most expensive pay-per-click terms are legal — as high as $500 per click just in specific locations — not even nationally. See the image below:
Balancing Professionalism and Approachability
It is important for a lawyer to maintain his professionalism, but it is equally important to appear approachable.
If the marketing message is too formal, clients feel intimidated. If it is too casual, professionalism is compromised.
Maintaining this balance is a unique challenge that is not seen much in other industries.
Attracting the Right Clients
Attracting the right clients is the biggest marketing struggle for a lawyer.
Every lawyer wants clients who match their specialization, but in reality, this is quite challenging. Many times, lawyers receive inquiries that are not relevant to their expertise, have bad quality or have really low value to the firm.
For example:
— A personal injury lawyer receives inquiries about an accident with no injuries or a a prospect slip and fall at the road with low to no insurance.
— Corporate lawyers receive requests for small claims disputes.
— This mismatch not only wastes time but also reduces the effectiveness of marketing efforts.
Okay, we get it.
Many of the lawyers are not able to attract the right kind of prospects to their way. So, let’s discuss what could be the reason behind.
Why Your Law Firm is Struggling to Attract the Right Audience?
Why is it difficult for lawyers to attract potential clients?
There could be several reasons behind this that make legal marketing even more challenging.
1. Lack of a Clear Marketing Strategy:
Many lawyers or firms do not have a defined marketing plan. They run general campaigns but do not specifically target their ideal clients.
If your target audience is not clearly defined, your marketing message becomes diffuse.
Example: If a corporate lawyer advertises to a general audience, the chances are high that he or she will receive irrelevant inquiries. The solution is that lawyers should identify their niche and target audience and restrict their campaigns to them.
2. Poor Online Presence:
In today’s digital age, online presence is vital, but many lawyers’ websites or online profiles are not up-to-date or are not being optimized to attract clients.
Slow, unoptimized, and poorly designed websites do not gain the trust of your prospects.
3. Low to No Availability on Local Listing Sites:
Many of the law firms don’t have Google My Business (GMB) profiles and they also have not listed themselves on other local legal directories. Sometimes you have outdated or incorrect details on the local listings and that could be the reason for losing leads.
For example, if a potential client searches for a “family lawyer near me” and your GMB profile is not ranking, incomplete, or outdated, he will contact your competitor.
4. Difficulty Navigating Paid Advertising:
Paid advertising platforms like Google and Facebook can be very effective for lawyers.
However, the legal industry keywords have a very high cost-per-click (CPC). Poorly managed ad campaigns can burn your budget fast without a satisfactory return on investment.
If lawyers are unable to find the right law firm PPC agency to work with them, most probably their budget would be wasted without getting the right clients to the firm.
5. Time Constraints:
Lawyers do not have time for marketing activities because they mostly focus on serving clients and preparing cases. Because of their busy schedules, It becomes tough for them to maintain consistent content creation, looking into the website, social media updates, advertising, and marketing efforts. This results in inconsistent marketing, which fails to generate the right kind of leads for the law firm.
Final thought
Marketing for lawyers is complex, influenced by ethical guidelines, intense competition, and clients’ misunderstandings about legal specializations. This issue is worsened by generic marketing strategies, a weak online presence, and the high costs associated with legal paid advertising.
These challenges are not insurmountable. By adopting a clear and strategic approach—such as defining a target audience, optimizing online profiles, building a professional website, and maintaining an active digital presence—lawyers can effectively position themselves as a go-to choice in the market.
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