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THE TOP MISTAKES LAWYERS MAKE IN THEIR WEB SITES

Why lawyer sites fail.

Many law office web sites are clearly built to impress other lawyers.

Lawyers are not your clients.

 

YOUR WEB SITE MUST TALK TO YOUR POTENTIAL CLIENTS.

Tell them what you will do to solve their problem.

Tell them why you are better.

Post your areas of practice at the top of your home page

Post your phone number on every page

Do you offer free half hour consultations? Say so.

Free parking? Say so. Special hours? Say so.

CanLaw will build you a basic web site in about a week based on decades of copywriting and advertising experience

The only thing more expensive than an expert, is an amateur

MOST COMMON MISTAKE?

Wasted home page screen by putting meaningless big pictures of office towers or landscapes scrolling across the top of your web site home page.

 

Those sites are wasting the most important spot on their web site. Instead, put useful information that clients need to know about your law practice at the top of your page "above the fold."

 

 

IF YOUR SITE IS NOT MOBILEIF YOUR SITE IS NOT MOBILE  FRIENDLY GOOGLE WILL PENALIZE IT SEVERELY. FRIENDLY GOOGLE WILL PENALIZE IT SEVERELY.

 

OVER LONG ONE PAGE

 WEB SITES

There is a fad to produce a long scrolling one page web site. Don't do it.

Treat your site as a type of magazine, and put different topics on different pages.

Easier on readers, and far, far better for your search engine ranking.

 

COMMON MISTAKES AND BAD DESIGN ERRORS MADE BY AMATEURS

HERE ARE THE TOP WEB SITE DESIGN MISTAKES LAWYERS MAKE.

Many lawyer web sites are built to impress other lawyers. They don't pay your bills. Clients do.

Avoid Gimmicks and Special Effects

 

A web site is closer to a magazine in its function than to the latest crash and burn, special effects movie.

Just because something can be done, does not mean it should be shovelled into a web site.

Programmers do not know or understand design or copy writing, let alone advertising. Use an advertising expert to design your web sites.

Keep your site simple, gimmick free and it will always be viewable and usable by the widest cross section of viewers.

Music or Sound Effects

DO NOT USE SOUND on web sites unless you want to alienate most of your viewers. The one exception of course is videos but only where the visitor controls the playback.

Why blast sounds at someone who may be in an open office, on the phone, surfing late at night or in a library?

You have probably heard that some cities are playing classical music in parks to drive away teen age gangs. Inappropriate or unwanted music on your web site has the same effect.

Forcing your choice of music on some innocent viewer is nothing short of idiotic. What sheer stupidity makes someone impose their "taste" in music on a stranger?

If people want music, they will choose their own.

Pop Ups

Anything that pops up is a nuisance. If it is important, put it where it belongs, right on your web page.

Links to another page or section may be an exception, Sometimes you want to show the reader more information but keep the current page open.  Opening a second page is a good way to do this.

Long Scrolling Pages

 

If the page is more then two or three screens long, it is too long. Break it up.

Ignoring Search Engines

First do not fall for those SEO scams promising first page position on Google. They are lying.

Getting position on the search engines is not simple. In Canada there are some 75,000 lawyers and 10,000 paralegals wanting top ranking. Even your surname is probably shared by several other lawyers as well as the general population.

You must include properly done meta tags, keywords and titles, tags on pictures and so on to tell the search engine what is important about your site.

Just submit your finished site to Google and let nature take its; course. Update and change your sites often. "NEW" counts. Stale sites slide down the rankings into oblivion.

GOOGLE IS CONSTANTLY CHANGING THEIR SITE SUBMISSION PROCESS

You now need to submit a sitemap to Google. RELAX.

You probably have one called www.yourdomain.com/sitemap.xml.

Try submitting that and see what happens. It should work perfectly. Simply upload it to your web host server where your web site resides. Google will find it.

Spelling & Grammar

 

Double check your spelling and grammar. Mistakes prove you are an amateur and make your site and company look ignorant. Do not rely on your spell checker.

Nothing worse than using "your" instead of "you're". It screams ignorant and illiterate.

CanLaw can scan your site for spelling errors and broken links and provide you with a list. (enormous fee applies)

Clients do not care about your clubs, your schools or your family Leave that useless information at the bottom of a profile page.

 

Outdated Information

Review your site monthly for outdated information and either update it or dump it. If in doubt, dump it. Bad information, broken links, overlapping text, inter alia, will undermine the credibility of your entire site.

Poor Navigational Support

 

Make it easy for people to find the information on all your pages. Include an on site search engine, table of contents or site map and good navigation bars or aids.

Orphan Pages

Make certain all your pages are clearly identified as being part of your site. Include a link to your home page, email contact and a basic navigation bar on every page.  Post your phone number at the top of every page and make it click able (swipe-able?) on phone pages.

Broken Links 404 Errors

 

Check your site for broken or moved links regularly. Repair or remove them.

If you need help CanLaw offers a service to automatically check your web site and report all broken links on a regular basis.

Excessive Download Times

Pages can be optimized for download speed.

You only have about three seconds to capture or lose your viewer.

Disabling Right Click

 

How dare you interfere with your viewer's operation of his/her system?

Removing or restricting the users' controls mis-using Java Script or other features to eliminate tool-bars, back and forward buttons and various other features is both inconsiderate and rude. Never force your gimmicks on your visitors, particularly when your preferences override the user's chosen settings.

Isn't a lawyer building a website a lot like a consumer self- representing in court?  You know how well that works

Keep your law practice web site language simple and error free. No jargon, no gimmicks and it will always produce results and new clients

THE TOP MISTAKES LAWYERS MAKE

IN THEIR WEB SITE DESIGN

The Top Mistakes Lawyers Make In Their Web Sites. Why lawyer sites fail.

HERE ARE THE TOP WEB SITE DESIGN MISTAKES LAWYERS MAKE. Many lawyer web sites are built to impress other lawyers. They don't pay your bills. Clients do.

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