Return On Investment is the top priority for every PPC campaign. If you want to maximize your law firm’s ROI with Google Ads, you need to reevaluate these 8 ways that might be costing you money. 

As digital marketing professionals, we’ve heard multiple stories of law firms that haven’t been able to succeed with their PPC campaigns and increase their caseload with SEM. Google Ads are a powerful tool for your law firm’s digital marketing strategy, but several common mistakes can prevent you from getting the maximum ROI. Highly relevant, fine-tuned legal Google Ads campaigns can be your ticket to a maximized return on marketing investment, and today we’ll explore the eight most important mistakes that prevent you from obtaining the best possible results. 

Let’s get right to the 8 tips that will help you save money and generate more qualified leads for your law firm.

      1.  Nothing is optimized by default.

If you are new at Google Ads for your Law firm, or if somebody else was previously handling your PPC, you have to keep in mind that you have to check all settings by yourself. If you are starting from scratch, it’s more straightforward, you have to research the best practices, understand what suits you best, and add your Google Ads settings. If, however, in your particular case, somebody else was the administrator of your account, we’d recommend you to check all settings and take nothing for granted. Ideally, we’d suggest you run an audit on your account. If you need any help with that, in English or Spanish, don’t hesitate to contact us, we are the leading bilingual legal digital marketing experts for law firms.

Remember: Negative keywords are crucial for your success with Google Ads. Make sure to optimize them for maximum ROI.

       2.   Don’t use the defaults.

This one is closely related to our first point, but let’s look a bit closer. If you don’t adjust the defaults for your campaign, you’re at high risk of spending your budget on irrelevant topics and/or areas. There’s no one size fits all strategy for your law firm’s PPC. For example, you are a Personal Injury Attorney, based in Austin, TX, and you don’t configure your default geo-targeting. You might end up showing your Ads in other locations, getting expensive clicks from clients you cannot assist. Sounds simple but geo-location is often overlooked, especially the target options since by default  your ads will be eligible to show for people based on where they’re likely to be located or the places that they’re interested in. Take a moment to think about it. You definitely don’t want to show your ads to a family in Atlanta who is planning a trip to Austin and is therefore considered “interested” in Austin.

      3.   Competitor Analysis.

If you are following our blog, you already know that we insist on that on every chance we get. If you think that just by targeting the right keywords, you’ll get the desired win in legal PPC, then you’re only half-way right. Understanding what your competitors are doing right (or wrong) is a crucial element of your law firm’s SEM strategy. Benchmark against them in terms of bidding and expenditure, compare your Ad copies, find any keywords that you were missing, and understand how they are impacting your performance. 

     4.  Find the right match type and extensions for your law firm.

That’s part of your keyword research. Understand how the different campaigns or ad groups perform and identify the perfect match type for each of them. You can start with broad match modifier if you are just launching your campaigns, but keep in mind that you have to follow your performance metrics and narrow them down even more until you get the desired ROI. Combine your keyword strategy with the proper Google Ads Extensions for optimized results. 

       5.  Identify opportunities in your areas of practice.

We live in a constantly changing world, an economic environment that is currently affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. It means that what you considered your best bet a few months ago, might not work as effectively anymore. On the other hand, another practice area might gain increased importance. Think, for example, of bankruptcy. If your law firm is capable of handling such cases, it might be a good time for you to start investing in Google Ads for bankruptcy cases. 

         6.  Hispanic Audiences.

If your law firm is capable of handling Spanish speaking clients, but you are not investing in Spanish PPC, then you are simply missing out on a great opportunity for new cases with a fraction of the cost of Google Ads in English. According to Nielsen reports, US Hispanics are super mobile, super consumers. What does this mean? That they search online, they act online, especially from mobile devices. Smartphones are high intent devices. If a searcher looks up for “abogado de accidentes de auto”, using a mobile device, he/she is more likely to be in need at that particular time, rather than just researching. It means that your click can potentially lead to a call. It’s not a coincidence that Spanish campaigns have high CTR rates most of time. 

       7.   Monthly Audits are important.

If you’ve read our first tip, you know that you should run an initial audit before activating your law firm’s Google Ads. Is that enough? Well, not really. You should consider conducting Google Ads audits at least once a month. That way, you’ll manage to achieve the following:

  • Find areas of potential waster ad-spend
  • Understand your audience, with insights that can be applied to your current efforts, as well as new legal digital marketing channels.
  • Validate the assumptions you made when you launched your PPC campaigns.
  • Find new opportunities that can help your law firm grow further. 
  • Identify any blind spots in your ongoing Google Ads management. 

       8.  The value of a holistic approach.

Google Ads can work as a standalone digital marketing effort. Does this mean that they can’t or shouldn’t get all the positive effects of a holistic approach? What do we mean by that? Your law firm’s brand awareness is beneficial in every part of the journey. The same applies to your content strategy. Unique, rich, and relevant content for your law firm can help so that the searcher, your prospective clients, get a great overall experience when visiting your website. If possible, don’t let your PPC operate in a silo. 

 Conclusion:

Time, money, and knowledge are your law firm’s tools in your PPC journey. Use them strategically, and they will yield optimized results. Miss any of the important details, and your investment might be at risk. No matter if you are starting from scratch or you are inheriting a Google Ads account, you need to make sure that you check all the details that will help you maximize your return on investment.