According to CallRail research, optimizing your law firm’s website for the search engines is the most important digital marketing strategy for lawyers and law firms. As most clients turn to search engine results pages before any transaction, a well-optimized website is the key to getting search traffic and clicks from potential clients.
Link building for lawyers is one of the key strategies to make your website stand out on Google and other search engines. Additionally, it helps boost the online credibility of your law firm and attract people actively searching for your legal services.
With this link building guide, we’ll explore proven techniques you can use to secure high-quality backlinks for your law firm’s website from relevant websites.
Why Does Link Building for Lawyers or Law Firms Matter?
Building links for your law firm’s website goes beyond improving search engine rankings and getting more clicks. It’s like getting a recommendation from a trusted source — you build link equity and credibility in the legal industry and attract new clients.
Here are some reasons why link building is important to lawyers and law firms:
- Improved search engine rankings: When high-quality websites mention or link to yours, search engines see this as a sign of your expertise. This can lead to higher rankings in search results, which means more potential clients finding your firm.
- Better credibility and authority: Backlinks signal search engines and potential clients that your law firm’s content and web pages are trustworthy and authoritative.
- Increased visibility and traffic: A strong link profile can significantly boost your law firm’s online presence, making it easier for direct users to find your services in the legal community.
- Competitive advantage: With high-quality backlinks from authoritative sites, you’ll outrank other law firms on Google in the competitive legal market. You stand to attract more targeted leads from anyone who searches for a relevant query.
How to Build High-Quality Links for Lawyer Websites
Building high-quality, relevant links helps improve your search engine rankings and generate leads for your legal services. Here are various effective law firm link building methods you can use:
1. Create link-worthy content that can attract natural links
High-quality content serves as a magnet for attracting backlinks from other websites. When your content is valuable, informative, and engaging, other websites cite it and link to your website as the source.
Your goal should be to create link-worthy content in the legal industry. You can use the following types of content to attract natural links and organic traffic:
- Legal guides and educational materials: These are in-depth guides or explainers on relevant legal topics like:
- Child custody agreements: what you need to know
- What are wills and trusts and how can you use them to plan your future?
Here’s an example of a legal guide from a law firm in North Carolina:
- Videos answering common legal questions: Video content is engaging and easily digestible. You can create short, informative videos that address frequently asked legal questions for link building.
Source
- Infographics that visually represent complex legal information: Legal matters can be intricate. Infographics that break down complex information into clear, visually appealing charts and graphs that reputable websites and creators in the same domain will find link-worthy.
- Case studies to highlight your law firm’s successes: You can showcase your expertise and build trust by sharing successful client outcomes (while maintaining client confidentiality, of course). Take inspiration from our SEO case studies.
Source
2. Publish guest posts on reputable legal websites
Not all links are created equal.
Certain high-domain authority sites are trusted sources for legal news, updates, and commentary for the public and legal professionals alike. You should find guest posting opportunities on these publications to reach wider audiences, build valuable backlinks, and establish yourself as an expert.
You can guest blog, offer expert quotes, or share bylined articles on these websites.
- Write opinion pieces on trending legal cases. You can identify trending cases and offer unique insights using an opinion piece.
- Write authoritative articles leveraging your legal expertise. You showcase your expertise with in-depth guides to fill knowledge gaps in your practice area.
- Collaborate with other websites on legal case studies. You can partner with complementary legal websites to co-author anonymized case studies demonstrating your firm’s success.
How can you find a reputable legal website to publish on? You can use a simple Google search query from the ones shown below.
3. Get your law firm or website listed in legal and local directories
Legal directories are online directories or databases that list and categorize lawyers and law firms. Just like Yellow Pages, these directories help potential clients find the best lawyers based on location, practice area, and other filters.
Many reputable legal directories have high domain authority and a link from them can result in higher search engine rankings for your website. They also give you more visibility and credibility, especially in your local listing.
Here are some legal directories that can offer you high-quality backlinks:
You can narrow your search by your preferred legal practice area or location to get more relevant directories. For instance, look for directories representing your location with search queries like “legal directory [your city name].”
You can start by listing your law firm in free directories as part of your law firm link building campaign.
4. Claim your unlinked brand mentions from website owners
Unlinked brand mentions are instances where someone mentions your law firm online but doesn’t link back to your website. Think of it as a free advertisement but missing a key element to drive traffic.
Here’s how you can build links from unlinked brand mentions:
- Use Google Search or brand monitoring tools like Mention and Google Alerts to find mentions of your law firm name, lawyers, or awards.
- Prioritize the mentions from relevant websites with a good reputation like legal blogs, law firm websites, and news websites.
- Reach out to the website owners, publishers, or editors and politely request them to add a link to your website. You can explain how adding the link would benefit their readers and improve their user experience.
- If you don’t receive a response initially, send 1-2 follow-up messages after 3-7 days to remind them about your request to add a link to your law firm’s website. However, don’t be pushy.
Many legal firms get their maximum links as brand mentions on other websites. Below is the example from Akin, a global law firm:
5. Use niche edits and broken link building
For niche edits, you find existing content on different websites relevant to the legal niche and then add a link to your website within that blog post or article. This is a good link building strategy that demands less time and effort than guest posting.
Broken link building involves finding broken links on other websites that are no longer active (i.e., the linked page has been deleted), like legal resource pages or articles. You can ask the website editors to replace the broken link on their page with a link to your valuable resource.
6. Pursue legal awards and associations to increase visibility on search engines
Winning reputable legal awards can boost your law firm’s reputation and build links from legal niche websites, press releases, and news sites. This link equity is good for your search engine optimization.
Some notable awards for lawyers and law firms include:
- American Bar Association (ABA) Awards
- American Association for Justice (AAJ) Awards
- National Law Journal Legal Awards
- Who’s Who Legal Awards
- State-Specific Bar Association Awards
- Chambers USA Law award
- The Legal 500 Awards United States
- Brandeis Award
7. Use social media channels for lawyers link building
Create your law firm or lawyer profiles on social media sites like LinkedIn, Facebook, and X (formerly Twitter) and include a link to your website.
Although social media links are “nofollow,” they can drive lots of referral website traffic and help you reach new audiences.
Remember to share high-quality content that provides value to your audience and engages them. When you participate in legal industry-relevant discussions, add links to your website for more tips or info on the topic (whenever appropriate). This will help boost your visibility in search results for relevant queries.
Here’s a table showing the different platforms law firms use to market themselves and LinkedIn tops the list:
8. Disavow bad links to your law firm website
Sometimes, your website may get low-quality links from spammy, irrelevant sites that may harm your rankings. Disavowing is telling Google to ignore those links pointing to your website, which is again a crucial part of a good link building strategy.
When you find questionable backlinks, use Google to disavow – or deny responsibility for – low-quality links. This will help you avoid Google penalties. However, use it cautiously so as not to disavow high-quality links accidentally.
Leverage Lawyer Link Building to Boost Your Search Engine Rankings
Link building is a long-term investment for your law firm. Building links from high-quality websites helps you boost your domain authority and attract targeted leads interested in your legal services. This link equity enhances your credibility and reputation — especially when you build links from leading directories and niche sites.
You should combine SEO link building expertise and a thorough understanding of the legal landscape to succeed. That’s where our specialized link building services fit in.
We help you craft a targeted link building campaign that secures high-quality backlinks from the most relevant sources in the legal industry and increases your organic traffic and leads. Hire our link building experts today to get more high-value backlinks and leads for your law firm website!
