Reasons Your Law Firm Should Leverage Online Reviews

Everything is at our fingertips with the advances of the Internet, including the ability to instantly evaluate a business. Online reviews are essential for a business, including law firms, and will only become more valuable over time. In fact, 97% of consumers regularly read reviews before choosing to work with a business.

Online reviews can help your business grow, and embracing reviews is the first step. This shift means asking your clients to leave reviews, monitoring your reviews, and taking the time to respond to reviews. If your firm is hesitant to push online reviews, here are five practical reasons why reviews are critical for a business.

1. Improve Your Online Visibility

Your online presence amplifies the success of a law firm. Most potential clients will search for businesses that align with meeting their legal needs on search engines like Google or Bing. Each search engine has a unique way of indexing and cataloging content for a search, but they all value original and new content. Online reviews play a role when a search engine indexes the review content and leads to a higher ranking in a search engine result, ultimately increasing your firm’s online visibility.

2. Build Trust and Credibility

As a lawyer, trust and credibility are significant pillars of your relationship with your clients. A law firm can demonstrate trustworthiness by aligning with client expectations and showcasing your credibility in needed practice areas. When trust and credibility are established, it will most likely be shared by your clients. Whether your client shared a review independently or you ask for a review, your next client pays attention to the reviews to see if your firm is the right fit for their legal needs. It’s valuable for your law firm to have an online review presence because you could miss out on a new client if not.

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3. Provide Valuable Feedback to Fix Problems

Not all online reviews are positive. Even if your firm takes great care to create an exceptional experience, you will sometimes have negative reviews. However, not all negative online reviews are bad. This type of review is an opportunity to know about problems with your law firm and fix them. Your firm can also respond to a negative review and tell your client that the issue is being resolved. On many online platforms, including Google, the reviewer can change their original review post. If your firm makes an effort to improve on the issues presented by an unhappy client, there is a possibility to turn a negative review into a positive one.

4. Boost Word-of-Mouth Marketing and Referrals

Positive word-of-mouth can exponentially impact your business when leveraged through online reviews. It’s a well-known fact that a wide variety of industries believe positive word-of-mouth is the lowest cost and most effective way to generate brand awareness, new leads, and sales. People that have learned about your business from their peers typically have a favorable opinion of your business because a friend or family member has referred them. These referral leads are more likely in the market for your firm’s services because they have expressed interest in similar services to their peers, as well.

5. Gain New Customers

Gaining new customers can be an expensive challenge for any business, but online reviews are essential for bringing in your next client. If a lead is in the decision-making process, your law firm’s online reviews can be a huge reason why a lead chooses your law firm to help with their legal matters.

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Online reviews are essential for a law firm for several reasons. That being said, gathering online reviews should not be left to chance. Your law firm can start gaining more reviews by simply asking your clients.

If you’re ready to take the next step for increasing your law firm’s online reviews, Law As a Business (LAB) Services can help. We work with elder law and estate planning firms on all aspects of marketing, including online review strategies to help your firm grow.

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During the free recording, we’ll break down how to ensure your firm’s website is performing optimally and is getting a strong return on investment (ROI) from web marketing. From the hub of your marketing to the foundation of your lead management, your website is a critical part of your success.