Does Every Attorney Need a Law Firm Website?
Friday, February 27, 2015

Yesterday, I spotted an interesting infographic on the Legal Productivity website entitled, 10 Surprising Stats on Law Firm Websites. You can scroll through it below.

40% of small law firms don’t have a website. Some of the best attorneys are in small firms or solos and they have all the work they want. Most of this work comes from word of mouth and building relationships.

Nothing wrong with that, certainly. And if you have all the work you want and will continue that trend for the rest of your career, then you just may not need a website.

But how do you know what is true today will be true tomorrow?

Forget straight lead generation for a moment. What about just letting people know you exist? The fact is, even when someone gives a referral, the person they are referring you to will undoubtedly do a little checking up on you before placing a call. And the first place they are likely to go is on the Internet.

What will your absence say about you in this case?

If you want a thriving business today, you need a strong presence online. This doesn’t necessarily mean you need a robust lead generation site if you have all the work you can handle. But you need something. Maybe just a blog that shows how expert you are in your field of practice. Something.

Probably the most troubling stat below is that only 14% of law firms send a triggered email to a visitor who submits an online form. This means that your website is generating leads for you that are going exactly nowhere. For very little expense, you can get software that will allow you to respond immediately to inbound leads from your site without any intervention from you, and lead prospects down a predetermined path to becoming a client.

The last stat in the infographic below– that 35% of legal consumers start their search for an attorney online — is a bit misleading. A comprehensive research study conducted by LexisNexis® Martindale-Hubbell® in 2012 found that 76% of consumers who sought an attorney in the past year used online resources. Maybe 35% start online, but 76% go online at some time in the selection process — which is the more compelling statistic for me.

At any rate, what these stats mean to me is that there is still lots of opportunity when it comes to legal marketing for solos and small firms. Unless you already have all the work you will ever need or want.

Does Every Law Firm Need a Website?

 

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