Google Ads can be a valuable part of your lead generation strategy. After all, the quickest-growing law firms are the ones that excel at online marketing and advertising, not necessarily the ones with lawyers who went to better law schools.
Unlike organic SEO, which takes an extended period of time to show results, if done right, Google Ads can bring in cases almost immediately.
It’s also superior to other types of online advertising, such as Facebook or Instagram ads. Google’s pay-per-click (PPC) solution targets the bottom of funnel keywords precisely when the potential client is searching for your services as opposed to showing up on their screens when they’re casually browsing the Internet with no urgency to find a lawyer.
However, while getting started is easy given the extensive Google Ads resource library you can use to learn about the platform, running successful campaigns for law firms has its learning curve. It requires a level of expertise or else you might end up easily wasting your budget.
In this article, we’ll take a look at common Google Ads challenges law firms face and share some tips on the things you shouldn’t overlook when running ad campaigns. Let’s dive in!
Is Google Ads for lawyers worth it?
Google is among the most frequently used search engines worldwide. With over 270 million unique users in the USA alone, the majority of people turn to Google to find a trusted lawyer when they need it.
But is it worth it for every law firm out there to run paid ad campaigns on Google? The answer depends on multiple factors, such as your main goals, the type and size of your firm, competition in your local area, and most importantly budget. Google Ads can be a costly investment for those with limited resources and much more affordable for already seasoned law firms, which tend to already dominate the search results.
Cost of running Google Ads for lawyers
Let’s take a closer look at the data of popular lawyer and attorney keywords.
| Keyword | Table Header | Table Header |
|---|---|---|
|
accident lawyer |
27K |
$145.00 |
|
personal injury lawyer |
134K |
$110.00 |
|
personal injury attorney |
74K |
$100.00 |
|
personal injury lawyer oakland |
90K |
$80.00 |
|
divorce lawyer |
39K |
$30.00 |
|
family law attorney |
47K |
$20.00 |
|
family law attorney houston |
1.2K |
$20.00 |
|
social security disability lawyer |
9.3K |
$17.00 |
|
custody lawyer |
6.2K |
$13.00 |
As you can see in the table above, you could be spending as much as $145 every time someone clicks on your ad to relatively as little as $13. The costs vary greatly depending on the type of law you practice as well as the area your law office is located in.
With these price points, let’s do a quick math to see how much you’d need to allocate to ads.
For instance, to get at least 100 clicks per month for $20 keywords, you’d need a minimum starting budget of $2,000. If your landing page converts at an industry-standard rate of 3% (3 leads per 100 clicks), you’d be paying approximately $666 for each inquiry or call received.
The actual cost per click may vary based on the quality of your ads and your bidding strategy. Over time costs per click can become cheaper if your ads are well-targeted and landing pages have high Quality Scores.
To determine whether Google Ads is a right fit for your practice in terms of costs, You’ll need to do some forecasting and calculations using tools like Keyword Planner, which comes free with a Google Ads account. In the end, don’t forget to account for the time and manpower that will need to be spent on ongoing ads management and optimizations.
Google Ads leads quality
While paid ads can bring in leads almost immediately, let’s be real – not all of them are going to be qualified to meet your specific criteria. If you’re like most law firms, you probably take on only the cases that bring in certain returns.
You may decline to take on a case if you don’t believe the potential financial recovery justifies the time and expense of pursuing it. There might be a conflict of interest, or clients unable to afford your rates. It’s necessary to talk with the person who contacted you to know if the lead is qualified.
This is why it’s crucial to have a clear understanding of your ideal client’s needs and create the right set of ads to attract them to contact you. By having well-researched keywords and well-written ads, you can increase the likelihood of capturing leads that are more likely to result in successful cases.
When can a law firm see results from Google Ads?
This can be a difficult fact to take in, but the real success of Google Ads campaigns can’t be judged after the first month or even the first 5-6 months after the launch. You can only start evaluating the real performance of your campaigns when you have collected data over longer periods of time, ideally year-by-year data.
The reason for that is, Google Ads isn’t linear. There are countless external factors impacting ads performance every month, such as new competitors entering the market, existing competitors increasing their spend, changes in social trends, economical situations, and even weather conditions.
It’s natural to see dips in ads performance and revenue losses in some months. But it doesn’t always mean that your ads aren’t working and profitable overall. To determine that, you’ll need to have enough data to look at, ideally at least a year worth of it.
In addition, the legal sales cycle tends to be extremely long too. From the day the person inquired to the day you closed the case, 4-9 months might pass. Only when you have all of the numbers can you determine the real profitability of your ads.
7 tips to get the most out of your Google Ads for lawyers
If you decide to give it a go and invest in Google Ads, that’s fantastic! Here are some of the best practices you should follow to set your Google Ads campaign for long-term success.
1. Make sure to differentiate yourself
First things first, robust differentiation is an absolute must when running paid ads in a saturated field like law. You’ll want to make sure that other law firms aren’t overshadowing you or that your ads don’t sound just like everyone else.
Here’s what you can do to stand out:
Write unique ad copy: Create a punchy ad headline and copy that reflects your target audience’s goals and needs. Always think about the objective of the person who needs help from a lawyer like you and present it in a catchy manner. People click on ads because they see an answer to their problems or are intrigued by what you have to offer.
If you don’t charge unless you win the case, you have 24/7 customer support or offer a free consultation, mention that in your ads description.
Use ad assets: Use as many assets (formerly known as ad extensions) as possible to make your ad appear larger in Google’s search results. There are multiple assets to choose from when setting up the campaign, and while they’re not guaranteed to show up every time, they’re free to use.
Assets can provide additional information about your law firm, such as featuring your phone number, location/address, reviews, site links, etc. So go ahead and make the most out of them as you see fit.
Create highly targeted landing pages: Align your landing page content and design with the specific ad group or, better, the individual ad. That way, you can ensure that visitors who click through are presented with a page that closely matches their search intent.
Mention target keywords throughout the copy, incorporate relevant images and highlight benefits that resonate with your target audience. By creating a landing page that is highly relevant and compelling, you’ll increase your chances of converting visitors into clients. Google would reward your efforts with great ad quality scores as well.
2. Consider multiple sources of conversion points
Talking about call-to-actions, calls are important, but most Millennials would rather not talk on the phone and look for alternatives to reach out to a lawyer.
To make sure you cater for all types of audiences, consider providing multiple ways for people to contact you. In addition to having a phone number clearly present on your landing page, have a form, email address, and consider getting a live chatbot too.
3. Use video
Having a video on a landing page can increase conversion rates by as much as 80%-86%. The majority of people would go as far as checking your social media profiles, LinkedIn, and review sites to form their opinion. There’s no doubt a short video can help you establish a personal connection with potential clients in less than a minute. A video can be a great way to showcase your personality, speaking style, and expertise.
Consider turning some of your most impressive case studies or testimonials into video format too. Potential clients would trust you even more if they saw your current client’s raving about working with you in motion.
4. Have a correct campaign structure
Make sure you have a correct campaign structure from the beginning. A well-structured Google Ads campaign should consist of a campaign, ad groups, ads, keywords, and landing pages. The campaign is the top level of your account, while each ad group should contain a set of ads targeted to specific keywords.
By following this structure, you can ensure that your ads are relevant and measure the success of your campaigns more accurately.
To make this step easier, download our free campaign planning spreadsheet. The sheet is fully formatted to ensure your ad headlines and descriptions are within Google’s limits.
5. Review your search terms every 3 days
Monitoring your keywords every few days is crucial when running Google Ads. Otherwise, you might end up spending your budget on low-intent terms that are unlikely to bring in results. At the begging of a new campaign, it can be time-consuming to go through each and every search term your ads showed up, but it’s extremely important you catch negative keywords and also discover new longer search terms that you weren’t aware of before.
By completing search term reviews regularly, there’s a high chance you’ll see an increase in your overall conversions.
Pro tip: Every month, reshuffle your budget to allocate more money to ad groups that have a high conversion rate but low spending.Take away the budget from the campaigns that have high spending but low conversion rates.
This can be calculated by dividing the individual ad group cost by the total campaign costs. You then can see how much of the total cost is coming from each of the ad groups. Follow the same process to calculate campaign conversion percentages by the ad groups.
From the analysis table above, we can see that the DSA – Experiment costs more than it converts. As a result, the campaign was paused, and its budget was spread across better-performing campaigns.
6. Retargeting
Around 97% of visitors never return to a website. To turn around missed opportunities, it’s important to keep your brand top-of-mind for people who have already visited your website or engaged with your content but left without converting.
This is where display retargeting ads come into play. They can be personalized to different stages of the buyer’s journey, such as targeting users who have abandoned a consultation form or left only after viewing your ads landing page. To learn more about retargeting and its benefits, visit this article.
Important. Google doesn’t show retargeting ads for law firms that focus on finance, crime, and marital status or divorce.
7. Use a CRM to track your leads
It can be challenging to keep track of incoming leads and manage them effectively when the sales cycle takes a few months. This is where a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system can be a game-changer.
By integrating your Google Ads account with a CRM such as Clio, you can easily track and manage your leads in one place, no matter how long your closing process is. Using a CRM to track your Google Ad leads can save you time and ultimately help you get a more accurate picture of your return on investment.
Conclusion
In this ever-growing digital era, any law practice’s success is heavily dependent on the ability to market and sell services online. With the right techniques and strategies, Google Ads can be a golden tool to help you advertise your brand and attract new legal clients almost instantly.
Running successful Google Ads campaigns can be a complex long-time project, which is why we encourage you to learn about PPC advertising beforehand. Alternatively, contact Pronto, we’ve been building websites and running ads for lawyers for over 14 years.
Want to see Google Ads for lawyers in action? Check out our case study: Paid Search Case Study for a California Law Firm – Pronto Marketing
