The ways in which consumers use the Internet to find information, goods, and services vary significantly. In fact, it would be an effort in futility to try to describe all these different ways here. Even within the segment of online legal services consumers, there is great diversity in usage.
Understanding the differences between these different types of users is critical to marketing your law firm online. For example, let’s take a look at two of the most common types:
The Researcher
This online legal services consumer wants information. They will typically perform multiple searches and their searches will be topical in nature. In other words, they are more likely to search for the issues related to their need for legal services than to search for a more general “lawyer” or “law firm” term. For example, if The Researcher has been arrested or charged with a crime, they are likely to search for terms related to their crime.
With regard to website usage, The Researcher wants information. She wants to find specific detailed information about her legal situation. In order to “convert” her into a potential client, the law firm website needs to demonstrate their expertise in handling her type of legal issue.
One of the best strategies to appeal to this consumer is a law firm blog. Your blog can be used to demonstrate what you know about your field of law. It can share relevant firm news and other pieces of information that position you and your law firm as specialists in your practice area and geographic location.
Education-based marketing also strongly appeals to The Researcher. Offering e-books, whitepapers, and other informational items for download, is an excellent way to engage this type of online legal consumer.
The Yellow Book’er
At the opposite end of the spectrum is the Yellow Book’er. This online legal services consumer has had years of experience using the Yellow Book to find the goods and services she needs. She will typically perform very few searches to find a law firm. In fact, many Yellow Book’ers will perform only one search.
These consumers will search for much more broad terms. They may search for a practice area / geographic / legal key phrase (like “chicago injury lawyer”). They may even search for extremely broad terms like “lawyer” “attorney” or “law firm”.
When it comes to website usage, many of these consumers will never even get to your law firm’s website. Many of them will call a number displayed right on the search results page! The Yellow Book’er has a very short attention span and even shorter patience.
While some “law firm marketing gurus” might tell you that people don’t use the internet this way, it’s simply not true.
The truth is that in order to have success with your online marketing efforts, you need to appeal to both. That means that your need to have high visibility in search engines AND you need to have strong education-based content on your law firm website.
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