The Power of a Good Domain Name
URLs and domain names – these aren’t terms you typically run into during the daily operation of your legal practice, but they are important in terms of branding and marketing for your firm to generate new client leads and help your existing and potential clients find you more easily on the web.
A domain name, or simply “domain,” is, in a sense, your online identity. It is the main part of your website’s URL (uniform resource locator – the links that people follow to arrive at your site’s pages) and appears like this in browsers: http://www.yourpractice.com.
Branding with Your Domain
If you want to build your practice’s name as a brand, use that as your domain name. The fictitious law firm of Smith & Doe might choose the domain “www.smithanddoe.com,” for example. You can then focus your marketing efforts on your firm’s name as a brand, and clients will be able to find you by searching for “Smith and Doe” or simply typing “smithanddoe.com” into their browser’s address bar.
More clients and web users in general than ever before are navigating directly to the sites they want to visit by typing a brand name into their address bar rather than searching for a company or name in a search engine, so this is a very good practice to incorporate.
SEO and Domain Names
Some practices choose to utilize SEO keywords in their domain. This involves choosing your target keyword and working it into your domain name. Suppose the Smith & Doe firm is the premier personal injury firm in Dallas; they may choose a domain name like “www.dallaspersonalinjurylawyers.com.”
You can combine both of the above approaches as well, by taking keywords into consideration when naming individual page files. In the Smith & Doe law firm example, they do want to target Dallas area clients looking for personal injury lawyers, but also want to claim their firm’s name online and use it for branding purposes. They could name their Area of Practice page like so: “http://www.smithanddoe.com/dallas-personal-injury-lawyers.” This ensures that both their keywords and their brand name will show up in organic search results via their URL and give them the dual visibility they’re looking for.
Vanity URLs
Another way to incorporate the concept of branding into your online marketing efforts is to utilize the concept of vanity URLs and social networking URLs. These URLs are easier for potential clients to remember and can be provided with other marketing materials to help drive traffic to your site for specific promotions or target offers. The Smith and Doe firm could use a vanity URL as part of an “Ask a Dallas Lawyer” mailing, instructing clients to visit “askadallaslawyer.com.”
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Techgal,
This is a great piece of information which can be useful in any IM as well as legal marketing. A domain name is like a first impression! If you are a specialty law firm (focusing on one specific area of practice such as DUI) then a domain name with those SEO keywords would be perfect (i.e. arizonaduiattorneys.com). However, if your firm practices in various areas, maybe marketing your practice’s name is better. This way you are getting your firm name out there as well as leaving room for your firm to grow into other areas of practice. It would look weird if ‘arizonaduiattorneys.com’ were describing & marketing themselves as a business law firm. Great article!
Great article.
Agreed with the prior reviewer, in that Domain names are like first introductions – they either can be a benefit or a detriment. They need to show what you’re all about.
Many limit themselves with Domain Names, as they may think SEO keywords may be “non-professional” – this is why you need to have multiple domain names that can be used in different situations.
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Great blog post! This topic isn’t as covered as much as it should be. I think the problem has been that many vanity URLs (if not all) are already taken, primarily by domain squatters. My company is in the business of solving this precise problem.
Our technology geo-splits domains so a different law firm in every city can operate the same vanity URL, which is not only beneficial for SEO purposes, but also lowers search engine CPC by up to 40%. Anyway, sorry to get sales-y but it’s so relevant to your spot on blog post!
Cheers,
Camilo
I’ve checked out RootOrange before this – cool model! I hadn’t thought about it in terms of being a vanity URL but that’s a good way to put it. Another would be to describe it as “whole site”, IP-targeted content delivery… It’s always exciting to see what new approaches companies come up with to monetize web traffic.