by Lisa Arrington
In a competitive market like Raleigh-Durham where well-established law firms are in abundance, local attorneys must utilize all the tools in their online marketing toolbox whenever possible. One of the best ways for an attorney or firm to get their name out there is to consider pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, like Google AdWords.
Google AdWords can be set up as complex or simply as needed and, for an attorney or law office, it’s vital for the campaigns to be set up and implemented in the most efficient way possible.
Here are three helpful tips to keep in mind when using PPC to promote your practice:
1. Campaign Structure: Practice Areas & Legal Issues
With AdWords, you want to be as specific as possible – the more relevant to the search query, the higher the ad quality, the more likely you’ll reach top ad placement.
Break each campaign out by practice area, and each AdGroup by the specific legal issues (common terms people will search by). The best campaigns will have landing pages for each AdGroup category.
Sample AdWords structure:
| Campaign | AdGroups | Ad Landing Pages |
| Wills & Estates | Estate Planning | example.com/wills-estates/estate-planning |
| Estate Administration | example.com/wills-estates/estate-administration | |
| Living Trust | example.com/wills-estates/living-trust | |
| Last Will & Testament | example.com/wills-estates/last-will-and-testament |
2. Keywords: Do Your Homework
Do your homework to make sure you’re not running a $2.00 bid structure in a subject where most keywords require $5.00 for the minimum bid. Use Google’s Keyword Planner to help brainstorm ideas and get a feel for which keywords are right for your AdWords strategy (and don’t forget about negative keywords!).
3. CPC: Be Smart About Costs
Using a campaign structure like the example above can help keep your cost-per-click (CPC) costs down. For instance, “raleigh nc divorce attorneys” is estimated at $26.88 CPC. But the keyword for a more specific legal issue is much lower, like “separation attorney” estimated at only $6.84.
This tactic will help get the most out of your marketing dollar and compete with the bigger guys who are bidding on the much more expensive keywords.
Related: “How Much Does it Cost Law Firms to Run Google PPC Ads?”
Pro-Tip: PPC Is Not a ‘DIY’ Thing
In such a competitive space with other firms with much larger budgets also using AdWords to gain brand recognition and drive new business, there’s no room for error. This is where PPC professionals – like the digital marketing specialists at TheeDigital – can add tremendous value to your marketing strategy.