Digital Marketing: 8 SEO key performance indicators every law firm should track

By Kevin Vermeulen

Tracking key performance indicators is essential to the success of any digital marketing strategy, and search engine optimization is no exception.

But how can legal marketers be sure they’re tracking the right KPIs?

The truth is, there’s no “right” answer; KPIs are highly situational and choosing which to track depends on each law firm’s circumstances and marketing goals.

That being said, however, most firms will find the following eight KPIs to be among the most valuable, especially if they want to improve their SEO strategy.

Client lifetime value

Client lifetime value measures the earnings each client generates throughout their relationship with a firm and is a powerful metric for measuring performance across the entire marketing and sales function. From an SEO perspective, tracking this KPI can help firms identify the activities that drive the most value and adjust their strategy accordingly.

Content efficiency

Measuring content efficiency requires marketers to establish specific goals for their firm’s content and then determine what percentage of goals each piece of content is meeting, taking into account the cost of producing those assets. Firms armed with that information are better positioned to optimize content for the search engines and ensure their content strategy aligns with their overall business development goals.

Average engagement time

The more time a visitor spends on a website, the more likely they are to proceed along the client’s journey and eventually convert. Google Analytics 4 allows marketers to track the length of time their site has focused in a user’s browser (i.e., how long they were likely viewing its pages), providing legal marketers with crucial insights for improving everything from SEO and UX to the content marketing strategy.

Accurate search visibility

Accurate search visibility indicates a website’s position in SERPs (search engine results pages) and allows marketers to determine how visible their pages are to legal consumers exploring the types of services offered by their firm. Google Analytics 4 enables marketers to view some of this information. Other useful tools include MobileMoxie, which compares traditional rank with actual rank and counts everything in the SERPs that can hurt organic rankings.

New and returning user information

Analyzing information on new and returning users allows legal marketers to gain valuable insight into these very different segments of their target audience. Fortunately, Google Analytics makes it relatively easy to separate visitor information by new and returning users. While most law firms will find that new users outpace returning visitors, it’s essential to understand that returnees are more likely to engage and convert to leads.

Bounce rate

Bounce rate measures how many visitors land on a website page and immediately click away. A high rate is never a good sign, as it suggests a page fails to maintain users’ interest. By paying attention to this metric, legal marketers can get a good read on their pages’ relevance for the keywords they’re ranking for.

Revenue per thousand/average position 

Revenue per thousand measures how valuable a website’s traffic is, while average position is a keyword ranking metric provided by Google Search Console. When leveraged in tandem, these two KPIs can help legal marketers identify keywords and web pages that need improvement. As they tweak their pages, marketers should observe whether revenue per thousand shifts as their average position changes.

ROI

Return on investment measures how much revenue a law firm generates from its SEO efforts, and every legal marketer understandably wants to see a positive number. However, measuring ROI for SEO is notoriously tricky, as even the best optimization strategy can take months to produce results. Nevertheless, it’s worth tracking ROI, as it will eventually provide meaningful insight into whether or not an SEO strategy is on the right track.

Because marketing and business development goals are unique to every law firm, no single set of KPIs will meet the mark when it comes to gauging SEO success.

However, by using this list as a starting point and leveraging tools like Google Analytics, legal marketers can gain valuable insight into the effectiveness of their SEO efforts and cultivate new ideas for driving meaningful improvements.

Kevin J. Vermeulen is a partner in Good2BSocial LLC, a digital marketing agency that focuses on law firms and companies in the legal industry. He can be reached at [email protected]