Updating your law firm’s website is a great way to fix any ongoing issues you might be experiencing. Is your bounce rate too high, or are you trying to increase on-site traffic? Redesigning your website is a great way to tackle these issues.
If It’s Not Broken, Don’t Fix It!
First and foremost, it’s important to think about what’s actually broken when going into your redesign. If something works really well for you, don’t fix it! You should only update the elements that need updating. There’s no reason to try something new if your current strategy works.
If your website converts leads, consistently gains traffic, and works well for users, you may not need to update it at all. However, it’s important to monitor these metrics often to decide when you need to update your site.
Outline Your Goals
Once you’ve decided to update your website, you’ll first want to record your current metrics. You can use any SEO auditing tool to do this. These are the metrics that you should look at and record:
- Organic traffic
- Page load speed
- Bounce rate
- Domain authority
- Leads generated
- Form submissions
- Keyword rankings
- Click-through rate
Once you’ve recorded your current metrics, make a note of the ones that you’d like to see a change to with your update. Once you know what metrics need help, it’ll be easier to start planning.
Update the User Experience
User experience is one of the most important aspects of your website. If it’s hard to use, users will click away fast. They don’t want to deal with a clunky, hard-to-navigate website when thousands of other options are available at their fingertips.
You’ll want to focus on speed and navigation to optimize your website and make it more usable. To lower your page loading times, there are a few things you can do:
- Reduce redirects
- Compress images
- Cache your web pages
- Choose a different hosting option
- Minify CSS, Javascript, and HTML
Regarding navigation, users want a clear visual hierarchy that allows them to find what they’re looking for quickly. If your current navigation isn’t doing the trick, try another approach. A simplified navigation that is easier to use is a much better option than one that’s too clunky.
Create a Backlink Network
Link-building is vital to SEO and should be included in any website redesign. However, creating a network of solid, non-spammy backlinks can take time. To find high-quality backlinks, try reaching out to local news sources, informational websites, and directories. You could even donate to a local charity in exchange for a placement on their site.
Make a Good First Impression
If you’re having trouble with bounce rate, you can do more than just update your speed and improve navigation. User experience is about more than just speed and the ability to navigate. You also need to make sure your site looks good.
Think about it. If you were a regular person looking for a lawyer, you probably wouldn’t want to hire something with a bad, ugly website. The way your website looks says a lot about your brand. If it’s ugly or outdated-looking, people might assume you don’t care. And that’s definitely not something people want to see from a law firm.
So, take a look at your website and really ask yourself: will this design make a good first impression in 2023? If the answer is no, it’s time for a design overhaul. Designing an entirely new website can be a headache, but you don’t have to do it alone. That’s where we come in!
Update Your Content Strategy
If you’re not ranking for the keywords you’d like to be, it may be a sign that you need to update your content strategy. Google has made some updates to its algorithm recently. They’ve stated that they’re focused more on people-first content. That means that instead of writing to rank, you’re writing to help people in one way or another.
With law firms, people-first content is incredibly important. Your content should be actionable, accessible, and informative. To improve your overall content, you’ll want to update your content strategy with new goals. You’ll also want to go through and update pieces of content that might not be performing as well as you’d like.
Always Be Updating with Site Social SEO
Unfortunately, updating your website isn’t a yearly thing. You should be updating and improving as frequently as you can. Always keep an eye on your analytics and make note of anything that isn’t working. When it’s time for a refresh, you know what to do.
We know that sounds like a lot, so we’ll take care of it for you! To learn more about our team and how we can help you update your law firm’s website, contact us at 407-712-0494 or hello@sitesocialseo.com.
