Importance of web presence for New York based law firms to acquire customers

 

To prevent crime and violence, nations around the world have created laws and legislation. Despite that, when crimes happen, lawyers play an important role when it comes to representing aggrieved parties and thereby solving civil and criminal cases. In densely populated cities like New York, law firms spend an exorbitant amount of time representing parties in civil, criminal and various other kinds of litigation.

Visibility

Web development for the legal industry has many benefits, the primary being able to create a brand identity. American Bar Association conducted a survey in 2019 on website and law firm marketing. The respondents consisted of 27% solo practitioners, 29% lawyers in firms of 2-9 lawyers, 18% from firms of 10-49 lawyers, 11% from firms of between 100-499 lawyers, 10% from firms with 500+ lawyers, and 5% from firms with 50-99 lawyers.Eighty-six percent of respondents to the 2019 Survey report that their firm has a website. But solo practitioners still lag far behind firms of other sizes; only 57% of solo practitioners have a website.

A cutting edge and search engine optimized website for your law firm will not only enhance your client base, itwill ensure that any prospective client who searches using the meta tags you have created for your website can reach you with ease. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a game changer. According to a report published by business2community.com, SEO leads have a 14.6% close rate, compared to 1.7% for outbound leads . Your law firm can use the following SEO steps to augment your clientele.

• Create a list of keywords that are most relevant to your firm’s specialization. A key pointer here is that short tail keywords are more popular than long-tail keywords.
• Optimize for search intent by creating intriguing content that will earn editorial links.
• Create engaging content by using statistics, infographs, videos and pictures. Using blogs is a popular way to engage your clients. According to Hubspot.com, 27% marketers find blogging an important form of content for their business . Updating a previously written blog content has also proven to attract readers to your blog.
• Build links to your page using popular link building strategies like broken link building, competitor analysis and evangelist method.
• Link to social media in your website boosts your visibility to a great extent. As per2019 USA Legal Websites Trends Report, 60% of individual lawyers and law firms use Facebook while 86% use Twitter .

• Ensure your website is mobile-friendly. According to WebFX, 74% of people are more likely to return to a site when it is optimized for mobile device.

Showcase your company’s USP

Unique Selling Proposition (USP) is the winning difference that sets you apart from your competitors and amplifies the reason “why” you are better. The subsequent steps will elucidate how to identify your firms’ competitive edge.

• Get into your customers’ shoes

  Finding answers to the following question will immensely help you in understanding your client.

  1. What does your prospect really want?
  2. Is your service really meeting the potential customers’ need?
  3. Is there any client need that has been unmet by your competitors?

• Your firms’ core principles

  1. Why does your firm want to provide legal services?
  2. What motivates your firm?

• Your attorneys

  1. The number and experience of lawyers at your firm.
  2. What are your lawyers’ areas of specialization?

• Keep it short

  Your USP should be short and should also serve if possible as your firms’ tag line. Clients remember companies that have unique yet functional taglines.

Amplify your credibility

Prospective law firm customers browse through multiple law firm websites before narrowing down on the enterprise they want to work with.

• Testimonials provide first-hand feedback from your existing clientele that serves as a great marketing tool and to prove your firms’ trustworthiness.
• Attorney profiles can be used to showcase the experience and the expertise of your team.
• Blogs act as a catalyst to flaunt your firms’ knowledge in the areas of your specialization. This is a great way to attract new clients. Blogs also serve the cause of engaging users who read about law and its related articles.

Automate communication

To quote Nat Turner, “good communication is the bridge between confusion and clarity.” Law firm web development can include the following features to simplify communication and to amplify its intent.

• Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) – do not underestimate the value FAQs on your website can provide to your firm. From working as an effective marketing tool to providing clarity to your prospects, FAQs work miracles.
• Document management system is an effective internal communication tool which allows your legal team to login to your website and create / update a case tracker. This real-time progress tracker is a great way to keep your team on the same page. Your team can also share documents through this system.
• Augment your firms’ client experience by allowing them to view the current progress and future actions for their case. This can be done by creating a client login to your website.
• Payment gateway can be linked to your website to ease the payment process for your clients.

With the onset of the internet era, it is imperative for a law firm based in a financial capital like New York to create an online presence and boost its client base to stay ahead of the competition. If you are a law firm in New York City looking for a New York City App Developer to help with your next project please contact us today at the link below.