Five priorities we see across the law sector, and how UNRVLD helps our legal clients to act on them

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Law firms don't successfully expand without strong branding and reputations. But once they've gone global it is challenging to communicate key messaging online, surfacing the required nuances for each country, industry and client persona. Compounding this are the external pressures of market regulation and evolving artificial intelligence, dictating how law firms can - and should - market themselves to successfully acquire and retain new customers.

With a growing portfolio of global legal clients including Linklaters and Baker McKenzie, we're experts in digital change priorities and learnings for the legal sector. Read on to understand how we're working with our clients to move them along the digital maturity curve through programmes that optimise return on investment and time to value.

1. Differentiate By Design

If every firm talks about “excellence, expertise and global reach”, the only way to cut through is to look, sound and feel different to your peers online.

Creating a single global design system for your website(s) means every page feels like your firm, wherever your audience encounters your business online. This means setting clear rules for local teams, so they can adapt content without breaking brand guidelines. Strong visual storytelling makes your strengths obvious at a glance, not hidden in long copy.

2. Shift from Inside-out to Outside-in

Most visitors to your site arrive with a problem to solve, not a desire to browse your org chart.

Online user journeys should be designed to match the likely intent of your target audiences. It is essential to create simple routes to the next step: signposting a site visitor to the right contact, insight, or action in one or two clicks. This should be matched with more direct client-intent language, so site visitors feel like you are talking directly to them and your site content also performs well for SEO and appearance in AI search results.

3. Publish with purpose

Law firms' content only works if it’s easy to find, easy to understand and has a clear point of view. Content that lacks this won’t just underperform - it will be invisible to its intended audience.

A clear content strategy and framework gives purpose to everything published on your website. This should cover:

• What you publish including content types, channels and messaging pillars;
• Who it’s for;
• Your desired outcomes.

Mastering web publishing hygiene factor elements is also crucial to consistently show up at the point where your content can add value to your audience. Rules for content structure, metadata, and internal linking ensure priority content is surfaced, not buried.

To further build on this, ongoing web and content optimisation is required. Test headlines, layouts and calls to action so thought leadership is converted from traffic to enquiries and onwards to conversations with potential clients.

4. Prepare for the search apocalypse

Search is shifting from “10 blue links” to direct answers provided by AI engines, often without the user ever hitting your website. If your content isn’t structured for that world, your expertise may never be discoverable in a world of ChatGPT responses, Google AI Overviews and no-click searches.

Our SEO team have seen that professional services and legal sector organic search appearances have already been particularly impacted by changes in search and user behaviour. They are providing clear guidance to our legal clients that covers search and generative AI engine optimisation (SEO and GEO). Read more on that here.

The advice is that great SEO will also enhance your appearance in AI search results (for now). Focus on:

• Clear, concise summaries at the top of key landing pages;
• Utilise FAQs, schema and tagging so AI engines can understand and trust your content;
• Be consistent in your use of jurisdictions, sectors and topics: so answers are accurate and safe from a risk perspective.

5. Build an intelligent knowledge engine, not a library

The next generation of legal website must behave more like an intelligent platform than a brochure.

Achieving this requires:

• A single, scalable system for design, components, taxonomy and workflows;
• Personalised journeys by role, intent and location, so the right expertise is obvious.
• User behaviour measurement and analysis tools plus dashboards to surface insights;
• A web experimentation programme that show what’s working and where to invest next.

Read more on our ongoing work with Taylor Wessing to build and operate its web experimentation programme, supporting the law firm's global growth ambitions.

Where to start

1. Executive alignment session

Bring Marketing, Digital and key partners together to agree what good looks like and where to focus first, align on goals, and capture a simple action plan.  UNRVLD can facilitate this session ensuring it is structured in a way that sets up all stakeholders to be on board as part of your digital transformation journey.

2. Model the outcomes

A short, focused review of the current experience across the top journeys and markets, where we’ll look at UX and content basics, accessibility, SEO & GEO, and come up with a “fix-first” backlog of actions. This prioritises quick wins that will almost immediately generate an ROI by removing friction in your digital user experience.

3. Get started

Kick off accelerated efforts to bring this to life quickly. We take a pragmatic approach to realise value quickly while laying foundations to move your business along the digital maturity curve, building your capability at the same time as a digital strategy and platform fit for the next phase of digital change.

Your next step

Complete the form if you'd like to discuss your current digital maturity and ambitions, plus how we support our legal clients to move from a project focus to a continuous improvement mindset for their web presence.