Lawyers: What Makes Your Competitors Websites a Success?
Hey guys, my name is Viktoria. I’m the lead legal SEO at BSP Legal Marketing. It is my job to get lawyers to the top of Google.
Today I’d like to continue this series that I started last time, which is to look at websites that are ranking really well and some websites that are ranking, maybe not so well. We’re going to take a look at what they’re doing right, what they’re doing wrong, and give you some ideas and tips for how you can improve your own internet marketing presence and how you can get more clients, which is basically why we’re all here right? Okay. Let’s get started.
So today I’d like to take you to Texas. I already did a search for a criminal lawyer, and I found a couple of good websites for you. This is going to be our case study, and this is another attorney and his website actually does pretty good. But the reason why I wanted to bring this one up is because, with a few small changes, he actually could make a huge difference for himself.
Clear Title Description
So let’s start with this website that’s ranking number one for this area. And obviously, he will do pretty much everything correct. So let’s take a look at his description at his title. His title is very clear “Houston Criminal Defense Lawyer” and then we have his brand. Very clear. You can’t get any more clear than that.
Now let’s take a look at our website that’s doing okay, but could be doing better. “Dunbar Home”, “Rick Dunbar”, “Attorney At Law”. Doesn’t really tell Google anything. “Abilene, Texas”. Okay. “Criminal Law”. No, he’s saying “Criminal Law”, not “Criminal Lawyer”. Why does that matter? Because if we go to Google and we look for “Criminal Law”, what is Google gonna give us? It’s going to give us a bunch of information about criminal law. If on the other hand we use “Criminal Lawyer”, it’s going to give us criminal lawyer. So you have to use the terms you want to rank for right? So in this particular case, it’s “Criminal Defense Lawyer”, you could use “Criminal Defense Attorney” as well. “Criminal Law” doesn’t work as well. It’s okay, but it could be better.
Headers and Pictures
Let’s take a look next at the header. When we create a header, it is very important to use as much personality as possible within limits of professionalism of course. Uh, you want to use a picture of yourself if you can at all, if it’s at all feasible. Why? Because you don’t want your website to look generic. You want people to feel like they can trust you. They have some knowledge of you.
When we look at this website here, we don’t have a picture and a header. I’m not sure why. When I start scrolling, I actually see this wonderful image of this guy who looks like James Bond. I don’t know why they put it all the way down. I would have put it all the way up because he looks friendly. He looks polite. And you know, he looks like somebody you would work with as a lawyer.
Great picture here. We got the Texas flag. So he’s showing some relatability. Great picture.
Proper H Tags
Next thing that they’re doing, let’s take a look at their H tags. I always talk about H tags. It is basically a way of communicating to Google, who you are, what you do. Usually, an H tag would be something, you know, like “Criminal Lawyer in Texas”, “Criminal Attorney”. They’re using a few more keywords here, but that’s okay because they’re still using “Criminal lawyer”, which is the main keyword. It’s a little bit interesting. A little bit unusual. It’s fine.
Now if we take a look at this gentleman’s H1 tag, he doesn’t have one. So what is he telling Google? What is he? I don’t know. He’s not telling Google anything. His H2 tag, which is like the south category of H1, like the subheading of H1 is “24/7”. 24/7 limo service? 24/7 gambling slots? Who knows, right? Not a good H2 tag. Easy to fix. Put in a good H1, get a couple of good H2. And look at his H2 tags “Criminal Defense Practice Areas”, “Recent Criminal Case Results”, “Why Hire Our Houston Criminal Defense Lawyers?”. I mean, this guy is feeding Google information.
Youtube Videos
Now let’s take a look here. He is doing a YouTube video at the top. By the way, a lot of people don’t realize YouTube is owned by Google. So does it help you to put a YouTube video? Probably. I’ve tested this. It does. I don’t know if you would want to put it this close to the top, but it’s fine.
Social Credibility
Again, we have a picture. We are using some brands here that’s he’s listed on. This is good for social credibility. So he’s establishing credibility by using other brands. Unfortunately, the gentleman here is not doing it, although I’m sure he has them. It makes for a more elegant website, but in this particular case, maybe elegance is as much as I like a beautiful website. It’s not what’s necessarily needed.
Disclosure
I always like to check to see if they have disclosure. They do have a disclosure. Because it’s so funny, you will be surprised how many websites I find with no disclosure. So this gentleman right here does not have disclosure. This has nothing to do with Google, but you know, you’re a lawyer. You should have disclosure that this is not legal advice.
Sometimes I find a text where clearly the SEO or whoever the writer said, “We’re an expert in something”. Those are also very iffy.
Money Pages
Let’s look at a money page. A money page is anything that is designed to convert, otherwise known as a practice page. So let’s just compare their Criminal Defense pages. So this is interesting. It’s only “Criminal Defense”, not “Criminal Defense Lawyer”. I would say “Criminal Defense Lawyer”, but it’s okay.
And let’s take a look at this criminal defense page here. I think this website is a little bit slower too. “ Criminal Law Services” I don’t know anybody who Googles for “Criminal Law Services”, probably “Criminal Defense Lawyer” would be better here.
Sticky Menu
Let me just check something really quickly. Okay, good. So you notice when I am scrolling, this is called a sticky menu, right? The menu never goes away and it’s going to be the same thing on mobile. This makes it easier for me to convert if I’m okay.
Fine. I’m convinced I’m sold. I can basically just click on here and call these guys, email these guys.
When we scroll here on the other hand, as you can see my menu, which does have our phone number and everything, goes away. So it makes it a little bit more difficult for me to convert. Is it going to negate my conversions? Probably not, but it doesn’t help. Also when I hover over here, it’s giving me the option of just click to call, which is good. It’s programmed correctly. Let’s take a look here. Okay. That also gives me an option of click to call. Perfect.
Word Count
So, let’s take a look at the amount of words. Now remember, this guy is ranking number one for the entire Houston area. And the other guy’s kind of on page two, page three, something like that. We have 1,964 words, right? And we have 570 words here. Now, why does it matter? Google is a machine designed to present the most relevant content to its readers. For some reason, Google has determined that a criminal defense lawyer must have approximately 2000 words on the page in order to rank in this area.
If you are only offering 500 words, Google is not going to rank you as highly. So what’s the solution? You have to create words. It has to be the right words with the right subheadings. They have to mention the right things. It’s not just random words. Because Google understands what you’re writing about. It can read, it can interpret. But these are clearly good words.
Client Reviews
This is one thing they’re doing really well. I like it when we use client reviews like this. I don’t see this as a conversion element on this page at all. We don’t have any reviews. I think if you don’t have reviews on your page, you’re really leaving money on the table. It’s so much easier to call a lawyer when there’s so much social proof, right? When somebody says “Oh, they were great”. So it’s an easy, easy aspect to convert.
Another thing that’s very interesting. When we look here, we have all of these different money pages. We have 10. On here, on the other hand, we only have one money page, “Criminal Defense”. He might have more, but he just mentions all the other charges, these are not pages. So it’s going to be hard for you to rank for anything if you don’t have a page about it. So for my clients, we constantly have new pages coming out for them. I think I have one criminal client with like 30 pages at this point. And as you could see, they’re doing something right. They are linking from their category page, which is “Criminal Defense Attorney” to their other sub-category pages. So if we look at this, they’re doing this correctly. We have a URL of criminal defense and then we have white-collar crimes. So they’re really explaining to Google in a way that Google understands who they are and what they do.
Need Help?
That’s my time. That’s 10 minutes already. I hope you guys have enjoyed this presentation. If you are a lawyer and you need a little help with your website, your marketing. You’re not growing as fast as you would like to be. Reach out to me. You can get a free analysis. There’s no pressure, no big sales pitch. We’ll just have a chat. I’ll show you what your competitors are doing wrong. What you can fix. My name is Viktoria. My website is BSP Legal Marketing. Chat with you soon.
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