Your firm’s website should be a reflection of the quality work you provide. Out-of-date content and clunky designs from the last decade do a disservice to your reputation. A legal marketing agency can help.
Your website serves as the digital face of your business, and it’s often the first point of contact potential clients have with your firm. Just as you wouldn’t rent office space in a stained stucco strip mall for your polished professional services, you also should not tolerate a website that looks like a cut-and-paste project.
An outdated website can not only deter potential clients, but can also harm your search engine rankings and credibility. That’s why it is essential to ensure that your website is up-to-date and reflects the current industry standards.
Read on to learn about the top 5 signs that indicate your law firm’s website needs an upgrade. By recognizing these signs, you can take steps to improve your website and ensure that it continues to attract and retain potential clients. Contact Obu Interactive at (800) 619-5944 for a consultation on what our boutique services could improve about your online presence.
Top 5 Signs of an Outdated Law Firm Website
Here are the top signs that your firm’s website needs an overhaul:
1. Old Content
A lack of up-to-date content on a law firm’s website can lead to several problems, including:
- Inaccurate information in content that communicates cases are open or ongoing when they have already settled. This can lead to confusion among potential clients and may even result in lost business.
- Poor search engine rankings (SEO) due to a lack of fresh, relevant content. If your website hasn’t been updated in a while, it may be ranked lower in search engine results, making it harder for potential clients to find you.
- Compliance issues with the laws and regulations governing marketing in the legal industry. These standards are constantly evolving, and outdated statements may fail to comply with the latest laws and regulations, exposing your firm to potential legal issues.
Collectively, these issues can lead to a negative user experience. Old content can make your website look old and unprofessional, harming the impression of credibility your site should be conveying. This can negatively impact a user’s opinion, leading potential clients to look elsewhere for legal services.
2. Dated Design
Often more obvious than old content, dated designs, images, and layouts on a law firm’s website can create several issues, including:
- Inconsistent branding between your website and more regularly update social media platforms like Twitter, or Meta/Facebook. Inconsistencies here can be confusing for potential clients and harm your brand’s reputation.
- Embarrassing elements that look unprofessional as styles evolve, such as stiff stock images in a realm increasingly dominated by dynamic AI images.
- Increased bounce rates, which is when users “land” on your page, see its ancient appearance, and quickly “bounce” by closing the page or clicking away.
An outdated design and layout on a law firm’s website can harm the user experience. Old visuals create a negative perception of the firm, create branding inconsistencies, limit functionality, and harm mobile responsiveness.
To avoid these issues, it’s crucial to update your website’s design and layout regularly. This task can be delegated to a legal marketing firm like Obu Interactive. Call us at (800) 619-5944 for a site evaluation and consultation — we keep up with the latest trends and technologies to create a positive impression on your potential clients.
3. Slow Load Times
Slow load times can harm law firm websites in several ways:
- User page abandonment, which is when a potential client leaves before engaging with the content at all (reading, viewing images, clicking anything). This happens when people become impatient waiting for complex images or bulky content to appear.
- Lowered search rankings as search engines recognize your page isn’t as optimized for speed and convenience, and deprioritize it to keep their users happy.
- Decreased conversion rates on users who might have been ready to submit their contact information, but become so frustrated waiting for the page to load that they leave before taking action.
Slow load times can drastically harm law firm websites by losing conversions you could have captured with a streamlined design. To avoid these issues, it’s crucial to optimize the website’s load times regularly by using techniques such as image compression, browser caching, and minimizing HTTP requests. These are all tasks that Obu Interactive’s website design team can handle.
4. Poor Mobile Presentation
Your website will likely be accessed by both desktop and mobile devices like phones and tablets. Poor mobile presentation can harm a law firm’s website in several ways, such as:
- Missed opportunities by not engaging the potential clients that are primarily or exclusively mobile users.
- Lost conversions when the “Contact Us” buttons or chat features that work fantastically on desktop are impractical or impossible to use on mobile.
- User harm that may be far greater than an inconvenience because the people who are searching for a personal injury lawyer may be holding on by their last thread. Your website working may mean the difference between a sigh of relief or an emotional breakdown.
Nearly 5 billion people worldwide access the internet on their mobile devices. Leaving out consideration for their user experience is like leaving money on the table at a negotiation — don’t do it. Instead, learn how to implement responsive design and provide easy-to-navigate mobile menus, or better yet: hire Obu’s marketing team to do it for you.
5. Low/No Social Media Tie-Ins
Last on the list but not least, low social media activity can hurt law firms in several ways. By leaving content on your website and not sharing it or repackaging it for social media could lead to:
- Reduced brand awareness in digital areas where your potential clients frequently search for advice and recommendations.
- Decreased traffic conversion from your active social media pages to the website you’ve spent time creating and populating with important information. These are individuals whose attention you’ve captured once, keep them engaged by linking to your website or fresh, topical blogs.
- Less thought leadership in your industry by neglecting the conversation being held in the digital town square that is platforms like Instagram and LinkedIn.
Don’t miss engagement opportunities by thinking your website is separate from your social media accounts. Avoid these issues by ensuring that your content is shared far and wide.
It’s vital to keep your website content up-to-date and versatile enough to be useful for mobile users and through social media platforms. By not doing so, you lose out on important opportunities to engage clients and colleagues, plus risk consigning all the work you’ve put into your website over the years to the inadequacy pile.
Obu Interactive can scrub your website of content or elements that drag it down, plus generate new, fresh content fully optimized for search engines, social media sharing, and super speeds. Call us at (800) 619-5944 or reach out to us online for a consultation.
3 Ways to Update and Modernize Your Firm’s Website
Here are three proven ways to get your website back on the right track:
- Hire a legal marketing agency: A marketing agency like Obu Interactive that focuses exclusively on legal content can keep your content fresh, your designs modern, and your search rankings high. Delegating this work out to a dedicated team leaves you and your office free to focus on the highly-skilled work only you can accomplish — writing briefs and representing your clients in court.
- Platform upgrades: Transitioning your website from stiff, buggy, and increasingly obsolete websites like WordPress and moving to lightweight, modern platforms like Webflow increases your website’s speed. This upgrade can also be the catalyst for the need to drop ancient pages that no longer serve your needs.
- Repurpose material across multiple platforms: A beautiful new website needs people to come see it, and promoting an upgrade and other new material on social media can help advertise your firm. Additionally, every new page or post on your website can also be used for new social media content. Good material that no longer serves as a full page can still be repurposed as an infographic so that effort is never wasted, just transformed.
If you know your website needs a refresh but you simply don’t have the time, skills, or interest in doing it yourself, Obu Interactive has got you covered.
Contact Obu Interactive for a Digital Update
In today’s digital age, it’s crucial that your law firm’s website is up-to-date and optimized for the best user experience.
At Obu Interactive’s legal marketing agency, we specialize in helping law firms upgrade their websites to better reflect their brand and attract potential clients. From optimizing website design and layout, to improving load times, to creating informative social media shareables and original content — we have the experience you need to achieve your marketing goals online.
If you’re interested in upgrading your law firm’s website, contact Obu today at (800) 619-5944. Our team is ready to help you optimize the old and embrace the new.