5 Ways to Make Your Law Firm Website the Best Site It Can Be in 2016

The start of a New Year is the perfect time to jump start an online marketing campaign to take your website to the next level. Virtually every law firm has a website now, so standing out from the crowd and separating your site from the pack has become more of a challenge than ever. This year, resolve to make your site the best it can be by taking these five simple steps in 2016.

Five Key Tips to Take Your Website to the Next Level in 2016

To take your website from ordinary to extraordinary in 2016, here are five key tips to consider:

• Keep your content fresh. In addition to making sure your pages are regularly updated with new statistics and relevant developments in the law, you also want to make sure you are posting new content on a regular basis. A law firm blog is a great way to make your site more attractive to search engines and to web visitors, and to create shareable content that provides information about news that clients need. Just be sure you’re updating your blog regularly so visitors to your site get the maximum benefits and so search engines see you are always putting up fresh content.
• Ensure your site is optimized. You should have a search engine optimization plan in place and should be creating content that is focused on ranking highly for your targeted keywords. Review this plan as you move into the New Year. SEO has changed dramatically during the last few years, so consider what techniques are currently working best and which need tweaking so that your site is more likely to show up on the top of the search engine results in 2016.
• Update your credentials. Google quality reviewers are specifically focused on ensuring that pages affecting people’s money or people’s lives contain correct information. One way in which Google evaluates these pages is to make sure the pages are written by recognized experts. Be sure you have pages on your firm’s website that showcase your credentials and be sure that there are other websites online, like your Google+ profile or Avvo listing, where you have your accomplishments listed so there is independent verification of your expertise.
• Integrate your social media networks. Your website should be seamlessly integrated with all of your social media accounts. When a new blog is posted, it should be shared to your Facebook and tweeted out to your followers. By ensuring that all of your online content is interconnected and easily shareable, you’ll reach wider audiences and be able to keep in regular touch with clients.
• Focus on usability and user experience. You want your website to have more than just a great design. You need to make sure that visitors to your site are able to navigate around the website easily, find the information they are seeking, and contact you quickly to ask questions. A well-designed website is more likely to prompt visitors to explore and to potentially reach out to your firm to find out more about the legal services that you can offer.

Don’t let another year go by without making your website the best it can be. Resolve to take these concrete steps as part of your New Year’s resolutions in 2016.

Rita Chaires
Director, Web and SEO Services
American Academy of Estate Planning Attorneys, Inc.
9444 Balboa Avenue, Suite 300
San Diego, California 92123
Phone: (800) 846-1555
www.aaepa.com