4 Steps To Get More Personal Injury Cases with SEO

As a personal injury lawyer, you know how competitive the online landscape is.

The average personal injury settlement is $76,000, so competing law firms are willing to do whatever it takes to capture leads.

This creates a competitive (and expensive) landscape for injury law firms – how can you compete against the firms who are willing to spend millions just to drown others out?

Smaller firms can keep pace (and beat) large firms by making the right investments into marketing. You don’t need to spend millions to generate leads.

Our agency has helped hundreds of personal injury law firms generate leads, and we’ve tested every marketing channel there is.

• Search engines
• Social media
• Billboards
• Podcasts
• Digital ads

Search engine optimization is by far the most effective way for injury lawyers to get more leads.

The challenge with SEO for PI firms is it’s time-consuming, forcing you into a contract with overpriced agencies that always seem to over promise and under deliver.

In this guide, we’ll explore how targeted SEO strategies tailored for the personal injury space can help your firm stand apart.

You’ll learn how to:

• Unearth hyper-specific keywords demonstrating clear intent
• Create content that provides emotional value, not hollow hype
• Establish authority through robust localization and community engagement
• Continually optimize through data-driven insights for better conversions

Let’s dig into these strategies for resonating with potential clients and growing your personal injury firm.

Check out our videos for deeper insights, or tune in to our Podcast for legal marketing insights on the go.

Is SEO really worth it for Personal Injury lawyers?

As we’ve established, search engines like Google are where people turn to when they have a problem they need to solve. For personal injury, the searches may look like:

• personal injury attorney near me
• car accident lawyer Miami
• best personal injury law firms

These high-intent keywords represent folks who are ready to find representation for their case today. No other marketing channel attracts such qualified prospects.

Research also shows that 53% of prospects for attorneys come from organic search. When you combine high intent keywords with high conversion rates, it makes SEO an essential growth strategy for personal injury firms.

Plus, SEO results in “free” traffic that continues building over time. Once the rankings are secured, the firm keeps benefiting from the ongoing exposure and leads.

Compare this to other paid options like…

• PPC ads – expensive and results stop when you pause ads
• Social media – weak conversion rates
• Billboards – high cost, low accountability

As you can see, no other platform checks off all the boxes like search engine optimization.

So to answer our own question, yes, SEO is worth it for personal injury law firms. However, you’re well aware it’s not that simple – SEO is complex and takes the right strategy to succeed.

Let’s get into the best SEO strategy for personal injury lawyers.

1. Research the Best Keywords for Personal Injury Law Firms

Keyword research is crucial for any successful SEO campaign. You need to find keywords that attract high-intent searchers who are ready to take action.

For personal injury lawyers specifically, focus on these types of keywords:

1. Local Keywords – Examples include “personal injury attorney Miami” and “car accident lawyer Los Angeles”. Targeting location-based keywords helps you rank for local searches in your geographic backyard.
2. Practice Area Keywords – Examples are “dog bite lawyer” and “medical malpractice attorneys”. Optimizing for your specific practice areas captures folks actively seeking help for that type of injury.
3. Buying Stage Keywords – Examples are “how much is my injury claim worth?” and “why hire a personal injury attorney?”. Create content tailored for each stage of the buyer’s journey.
4. Long-Tail Keywords – Examples include “average slip and fall settlement amounts” and “what to do after a truck accident injury?”. Very specific long-tail terms indicate high user intent.

Avoid generic keywords like “personal injury attorney” that have crazy competition. The more precise the keyword, the better chance you have of ranking high and capturing quality leads.

Conduct thorough research to build a comprehensive target keyword list. This ensures your content targets searches with qualified traffic ready to take action.

2. Optimize Your Website for Maximum Visibility

Let’s discuss how to actually optimize your personal injury firm’s website for higher rankings and visibility.

There are four core components we focus on when optimizing your website:

1. Local SEO
2. Website optimization
3. Content
4. Backlinks

Let’s break these down in more detail.

Step 1: Optimizing for Local Search

Over half of all searches are localized with geography terms like “near me” or city names. So naturally, you want to go after these high-intent keywords.

For example:

• personal injury lawyer Miami
• car accident attorney Jacksonville
• best workers comp lawyer Tampa

The best way to rank locally is optimizing your Google My Business profile. This powers the Maps pack, one of the most prominent placements:

Your website needs to reflect your local presence by creating location pages on your website targeting key areas. For instance:

• legalcompany.com/miami
• legalcompany.com/broward-county

And service pages for specific practice areas:

• legalcompany.com/miami/medical-malpractice-attorneys
• legalcompany.com/jacksonville/workers-comp-lawyers

This shows Google your firm is the go-to authority on these topics in that locale.

Step 2: Website Optimization

Your website structure itself needs to be optimized so Google can easily crawl and index your pages. Elements like site speed, technical SEO, URL structure and internal linking all impact rankings.

Conduct an SEO audit to identify and fix any issues hindering your performance. Ensure your site loads quickly, is mobile-friendly, allows proper crawling and indexing.

Streamline site navigation and optimize page templates for conversions. The goal is making it easy for visitors to find what they need.

Step 3: Content

Content is the fuel for SEO. You need fresh, relevant content targeting your focus keywords in order to rank.

We develop pages and blog posts optimized around your top keywords. The content provides value for readers while also catering to high-intent searches.

You need a blend of content for each stage of the buyer’s journey:

• Awareness content: “How Long Do You Have to File a Personal Injury Claim in Florida?”
• Discovery content: “5 Mistakes That Can Ruin Your Personal Injury Claim”
• Consideration content: “Why Hire Rosen Injury Lawyers for Your Personal Injury Case?”

This strategy allows you to drive qualified visitors into your sales funnel. Quality content also helps with backlink building.

Step 4: Backlinks

Backlinks from other authoritative websites help boost your site’s ranking in search engines. When reputable external sites link back to your content, it’s a “vote of confidence” that improves your authority.

There are a few smart tactics we use to build quality backlinks:

• Guest posting – Provide value by contributing posts to law blogs and legal resources relevant to your practice. Include a link back to your site.
• HARO links – Contribute expert quotes to news articles from sites like Forbes, Bloomberg, etc.
• Link insertion – Find where other sites are already mentioning your brand and ask them to hyperlink it.
• Resource link outs – Link to authoritative sources from your own content when citing data, statistics, etc. They may link back.
• PR outreach – Pitch stories to legal publications and get featured, including a backlink.

The focus should be on building links naturally from reputable sources. spammy linking schemes can actually hurt your rankings. Slowly build a diverse profile of quality backlinks over time to improve trust and authority.

3. Optimize Local Factors For Faster Visibility

Here’s a telling statistic – nearly half (46%) of all Google searches now have local intent. That means the searcher wants to find something near their physical location.

This presents a huge opportunity for personal injury lawyers to dominate the search results right in their geographic backyard. When potential clients search “personal injury lawyer in Denver,” you want to appear at the top.

As mentioned earlier, optimizing your Google My Business listing is the foundation of strong local SEO. Follow these best practices:

• Fully complete your profile – This includes your full address, phone number, website, hours, services, photos, and more. Missing info hurts visibility.
• Get reviews – Reviews boost credibility and help you stand out in the map pack. Ask past clients to leave an honest review on your GMB listing.
• Post updates regularly – Google favors active profiles, so post relevant news, case results, and updates often.
• Monitor accuracy – Routinely check that your name, address, phone number and other info is correct on GMB. Report any duplicate or inaccurate listings.

Beyond just GMB, build local relationships by getting featured links/mentions on other trusted business sites in your area – law firm directories, doctor’s offices, community pages, etc. The more local signals pointing back to your listing, the better.

Build your presence on various sites where locals are searching for lawyers:

• Avvo
• Lawyers.com
• Justia
• Yelp

The goal is establishing your firm as a known local legal authority. This multi-channel local SEO approach will drive more cases your way.

4. Crafting Content That Ranks

Creating content just to target keywords is useless if it fails to resonate with your readers. When dealing with personal injury clients, you must directly address their fears, questions, and concerns.

What urgent questions and worries weigh on their minds? How can you guide them to make the right legal choices during overwhelming times?
Address critical questions such as:

• How do I provide for my family with this loss of income?
• Will I recover the costs needed for medical bills and ongoing therapies?
• What are my options if the insurance provider gives me the runaround?
• How do I choose the right personal injury lawyer to trust?

Speak directly to those concerns. Use real-world stories and case examples to humanize your firm and showcase clients like them that you’ve helped.
Some elements to include:

• Common questions after an accident
• Challenges you’ve helped clients overcome
• Step-by-step explanations of your legal process
• Infographics or statistics related to settlement amounts
• Testimonials from past clients in their own words

By directly addressing the emotions, fears, and questions of potential clients, your content will truly resonate during their urgent time of need.

Become the Go-To Personal Injury Lawyer in Your Market This Year

With a tailored approach leveraging long-tail keywords, geo-targeted content, and an optimized on-site experience, your firm can dominate the local market this year.

Don’t allow potential clients to struggle to find you. Meet them where they already are – online and urgently searching for your expertise.

Be the lawyer with empathetic, targeted content who shows up at the exact moment prospects need you most.

Let our team at WEBRIS make it happen and schedule a FREE consultation call.

We’ll discuss how our blended organic and paid search solutions can make your firm the go-to personal injury lawyer in your city.

Don’t miss the chance to claim your rightful place at the top of search results when it truly matters.