Why Your Law Firm Is Losing Search Result Rankings

 

Have you ever searched for lawyers in your area just to see if you come up in the search results? Of course you have. If you care about your practice, that’s an important thing to do.

Have you ever been frustrated by the results? Let’s talk about 12 real reasons that you may be losing in search results.

1. The Site Isn’t Optimized for Mobile

People search on cell phones more than ever before. So, search engines place more emphasis than ever before on how pages look on mobile devices. A site can load and look differently between desktop and mobile. If your site doesn’t look good on a phone, your firm may lose in search.

2. Your Content Is Too “Salesy”

Search engines want to provide people with information. They want to answer questions. Content that is too blatantly a sales pitch may be valued lower than content that more concisely answers a user’s questions.

It’s okay to have a call to action. It’s okay to say that you offer services. Just don’t overdo it. Be sure that you’re offering quality content to the searcher.

If you’re a car accident lawyer in Las Vegas, provide answers to questions related to car accidents, slip and falls, workers’ compensation and other practice areas that are helpful to users, rather than a pitch for clients.

3. Marketing Slogans Are Drowning Out Search Terms

Along with content being too salesy, making marketing slogans the most prominent content on a page can hurt you, too. The most important topic of a page should be your H1 header. That should be something that a person would search for – not a trendy marketing slogan.

That doesn’t mean marketing slogans are off-limits. A piece of text doesn’t have to be the biggest on a page to be in an H1 tag. Be sure that you understand how headers work. Incorporate both design and search-engine-informed content to stay ahead of the competition.

4. You Don’t Have a Google My Business Listing

Today’s Google is all about local search. Google My Business is your opportunity to tell Google that you exist. It allows you to clearly state your firm information to Google, who, in turn, can then send it out in search results. It’s much harder to be competitive for the coveted Google Map Pack if you don’t have a Google My Business Listing.

It’s critical to make sure that your information is stated exactly the same in all the places that you list your business on the internet (your website, social media, Google My Business, etc.).

5. The Content Doesn’t Work for Featured Snippets

A search engine wants to provide the best answer to the user’s question. They want to be as efficient as possible. Search engines use featured snippets more than ever before. They appear before the searcher even clicks on a link. Featured snippets build your authority and attract clicks.

To receive a featured result, you have to write in a way that is attractive to the search engine. There is an art to this kind of content creation. If you’re not creating content targeted to earn these results, you may be missing out in search.

6. Little Emphasis on Local

When it comes to search, it’s best to start in your own backyard. You should create a site that targets your town, your city or your region, depending on where you’re located.

Then, if you want to branch out to other office locations or target the entire state, you’re in a good position to rank well. However, if you start by trying to win your entire state or the country, it may cause you to ultimately lose out in search.

7. Competing for Video Results Takes a Back Seat

Great articles are only a good start. No matter how great you are with a keyboard, video results matter, too. In fact, today’s search engines display video results. Often, these results are placed ahead of URL results. You need to be on video explaining basic concepts of law and explaining your services. Overlooking the importance of videos may cause you to lose out to a competitor.

8. Not Using Schema Markup

Schema is a special piece of code that’s a part of a web page. The user never sees it, but it spells out specific information for the search engines. The details can be the basics of your law firm, but you can also put things like lists and question-and-answer sections in schema.

Using schema makes it easy for the search engine to identify the information, categorize it, and return it to the user in search results. Being silent on schema is a missed opportunity to earn results.

9. The Competition Has Better Content

When someone searches the internet, they want information. A great law firm website provides informative content complete with references to law and citations. If a web page is weak on citations, or if it offers a very cursory explanation of the law, it’s not going to rank well against detailed, well-prepared content.

Good writing for law firms reflects both an understanding of the law and an ability to write technically sound content that caters to search engines. In turn, search engines reward a site that is both content-rich and targeted to meet search demand.

10. Spelling and Grammatical Errors

Even the best content developers sometimes make typographical errors. Although it happens to everyone, it’s worth taking the time to make sure your pages are error-free. Poor spelling and grammar mistakes can impact search engine results.

11. Indexing Issues

For a search engine to find and rank a web page, it has to be able to find the page. There are a variety of reasons that a page may not appear in search results. These are things within your control, but you have to know how to identify them. When you understand and fix these errors, you can compete in search results.

12. Cannibalized Content

When it comes to winning in search results, there is such a thing as trying too hard. If two pages are very similar, the search engines may not know which one to rank. Sometimes, the result may be that each page ranks more poorly than if only one strong page existed. More is usually more when it comes to content. However, you need to make sure that your content is unique. Duplicate content may cause you to lose out in search results.

If you want to boost your law firm’s rankings in search engine result pages, be sure to stay on top of technology and optimization trends. Follow these 12 tips to improve your website and you should see an improvement in your rankings.

Author’s Bio

Attorney Adam S. Kutner has spent more than 29 years fighting for fair compensation for victims of personal injury in Nevada. With more than 40,000 settlement cases behind him, Mr. Kutner knows his way around the court system. As a former insurance defense attorney he knows how to get clients the maximum settlement promptly and trouble-free. Adam S. Kutner, Injury Attorneys has also been recognized by the Las Vegas Review-Journal to be Las Vegas’ Best Accident Lawyer of 2020.

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