For many law firms, the world of digital marketing is a confusing one.
Which strategies are worth pursuing? Which ones are trends? How should we allocate a limited budget? Will any of these techniques actually move the needle and generate leads?
If you find yourself asking questions like these, you aren’t alone. But we’re here to simplify what can be an overwhelming topic and let you know that digital marketing success for law firms ultimately comes down to one crucial factor: quality content.
If you can only focus on one component of digital marketing, it should be content. More specifically, you should zero in on blogging. And we’re going to walk you through exactly how you can generate tangible, long-lasting results that propel your law firm for years to come.
Why Your Law Firm Needs a Blog
Blogging isn’t something you do to fill your time and hear yourself talk. It’s an important element of modern digital marketing and something that every law firm should be emphasizing in 2019 and beyond. A blog is important for the following reasons:
- Gives your law firm a voice. A blog is perfect for addressing topics and issues that you don’t have room to cover in your website copy. It allows for actionable, conversational content that defines who your law firm is and what its main purpose is.
- Humanizes your law firm. Outside of social media, there’s no better way to humanize your law firm than with a blog. It gives you an outlet to cut through the corporate jargon and breathe life into your firm by connecting prospective clients with your lawyers, their expertise, and their interests.
- Establishes linkable assets. If you know anything about SEO, then you know how important it is to generate backlinks to your website. Blogging can provide an arsenal of linkable assets that accelerate your SEO efforts and make it easier to generate visibility for your law firm.
- Lowers your marketing expenses. At one point, 23 of the 25 most expensive Google search terms fell under the category of law or litigation. Law firms can (and do) spend up to $100,000 per month on PPC ads alone. And while some can afford this expense, most can’t. If your firm falls into the latter category, blogging is one way you can level the playing field. Not only is it more cost effective, but it’s also far more sustainable.
A blog isn’t the end-all-be-all of digital marketing, but it’s one of the foundational building blocks that your law firm can’t afford to live without. A meager investment will yield steady returns.
5 Tips for Successful Law Firm Blogging
Okay, you get the picture – blogging is important – but how do you find success? Here are five tips:
1. Develop Editorial Guidelines
Your blog is your brand’s voice. Therefore, you can’t afford for there to be any inconsistencies. The best way to ensure your blog matches up with your law firm’s larger goals is to develop a set of editorial guidelines.
Your editorial guidelines will address things like blog and content objectives, approved topics, brand voice, rules regarding headlines, voice, and tone, formatting, keywords, image guidelines, sourcing/hyperlink requirements, and anything else that you deem important.
2. Establish a Content Calendar
You won’t generate positive results by publishing a blog post here and there. Law firm blogging is a long-term commitment that requires consistency and regularity. You can keep your efforts on track by establishing a content calendar.
A content calendar is exactly what it sounds like – a documented calendar that keeps you organized by outlining what you’ll write, when you’ll write it, when you’ll publish, where you’ll share, etc.
There are a lot of fancy tools for developing content calendars, but a classic spreadsheet may be the easiest option. Create columns for writing deadlines, topic ideas, categories, headlines, keywords, calls-to-action, publishing dates, and any other pertinent information that helps streamline your blogging process.
3. Write on Client-Centric Topics
The biggest misnomer about law firm blogging is that you should be writing highly technical topics about new legal precedents or awards that your law firm has earned. But the truth is that your readers don’t care about these things. They want actionable content that helps them in their areas of need.
Your blog will be far more effective if you write on client-centric topics. Start with how-to articles that dig into specific elements of each practice area your firm focuses on. There are hundreds of potential topics just waiting to be covered.
4. Make Your Content Digestible
Long-form content is most effective in today’s marketplace. In fact, serpIQ did a study of the average length of content in Google’s top 10 search results and found that the top-rated posts were, on average, more than 2,000 words in length.
The problem is that it’s easy to lose your audience in a 2,000-word blog post. In order to maximize the value of lengthy blog posts, make sure your content is easy for readers to consume. You can make your content more digestible by:
- Using listicle headlines to signal predictability
- Using numbered lists, bullet points, images, and subheadings to break up text
- Limiting paragraphs to three to five sentences of copy
- Bolding, underlining, and italicizing key points so that they stand out
Attention spans are short and people will click away from a blog post if it doesn’t capture their imagination. Keep things simple and straight to the point and you’ll generate better results.
5. Leverage Your Blog to Enhance Visibility
Most law firms don’t have enough website traffic to generate massive results from a blog without some sort of complementary strategy. In order to get more out of your blog, implement a link building strategy that uses your blog posts as linkable assets to enhance visibility and generate leads.
If you’re unfamiliar with link building, it’s merely the process of acquiring backlinks from other authoritative websites and blogs. When you have a wealth of valuable content on your law firm website, journalists and bloggers are far more likely to mention your firm, use a quote, or reference one of your resources.
As your blogging strategy matures, you’ll start to see the value in link building and begin running your content ideas through the filter of what makes your content appealing to other bloggers. You’ll find that data-rich posts with tangible information are more effective than generic content that can be found on any law firm website.
Outsource Your Content Writing With SEO.co
Here’s the thing: Your law firm needs to consistently publish high-quality content in order to generate positive results on the digital marketing front. However, you’re in the business of being a lawyer – not writing marketing content. It doesn’t make sense for you to spend hours of your week writing blog posts when you could be billing clients. That’s where we come into play.
At SEO.co, content is our core business. We regularly work with law firms to help them develop content, build out links, generate brand awareness, and drive leads. Through content writing, link building services, and paid marketing management, we have the knowledge to ensure your blog generates results for your law firm. Contact us today to learn more about how we can help you!
Sam Edwards
He is a recurring speaker at the Search Marketing Expo conference series and a TEDx Talker. Today he works directly with high-end clients across all verticals to maximize on and off-site SEO ROI through content marketing and link building.