Attorneys with a personal injury focus can market in many more ways than just bus benches and billboards. While those have long been leading attention-getting ways to connect with your audience, competition in the legal space today calls for a diversified and strategic marketing plan.
From old-school word of mouth to advanced digital marketing options like PPC and social media ads, personal injury attorneys need to think about the many places they can connect with their target audience.
While it's tempting for PI lawyers to dive in and try all the law firm marketing ideas, it's far better to select one channel and tactic to start with, then grow from there. To choose your first idea, consider where your audience spends the most time and is most likely to connect with you.
1. Optimize Your Website
Over 68% of online experiences start with a search engine, and law firm clients are not different. When someone gets into an accident and needs help from an attorney, your best chance of standing out to them has a functioning, user-friendly, and optimized website.
Personal injury law firms can benefit from two types of website optimizations.
The first is through implementing a search engine optimization plan. On-site SEO can make sure each page on your site communicates with search engines like Google. Content marketing helps you reach your target audience with topics they care about.
It should be clear from the site structure and content on your website who you serve and how. From well-written content to on-page technical SEO, you want it to be clear that you're a leading personal injury firm in your region.
The second way personal injury attorneys can optimize a law firm website is by thinking about what you can do to speak to your prospective clients.
While great content is the cornerstone of a personal injury website, go one step beyond by:
- Focusing on first impressions
- Using people-first copy
- Creating interactive elements such as settlement calculators or quizzes
- Adding clear calls to action and convenient ways to get in touch
Call out your unique value propositions. It can help you stand out to the people you want to help. For example, if you or someone else at the firm speaks another language, call attention to that on your website in a prominent location like Abels & Annes, P.C. do.
2. Get Involved in the Community
Build awareness and trust in your personal injury practice by getting involved in the community. This can happen in many forms. Participating in local events is not about highlighting your legal expertise but cementing your firm as active and engaged people who happen to practice law.
Here are a few ways a personal injury attorney might take an active role in their local community:
- Offer to sponsor a $1,000 high school student scholarship contest about the dangers of drinking and driving
- Speak to area driver's ed classes about the impacts of distracted driving behaviors
- Sponsor a bike safety class at an area bicycle shop or motorcycle dealer
- Start your own charity fundraising event or participate as a firm in an established one
- Host a town hall with the city council about dangerous intersections in your local area
For example, the Hackstaff, Snow, Atkinson, & Grieff attorneys in Denver regularly participate in the Over the Edge fundraiser for cancer research. They rappel off the side of a building and build momentum and excitement in advance. This brings awareness to a good cause and puts their names front and center in Denver.
3. Launch a Short Form Video Series
Plenty of personal injury lawyers answer the same questions over and over in initial consultations. Get ahead of the curve by creating informative and interesting short-form videos for your audience.
You can share these law firm videos on TikTok, Instagram posts and reels, your website, and YouTube to get maximum mileage from each recording.
Personal injury videos on YouTube or other channels don't need to be 20 minutes long. It's better to keep it short and focused on something relevant for your audience, like the overview of personal injury in Florida provided in this video from McQuaid & Douglas.
4. Build Relationships with Local Referral Partners
Who else knows your target audience? There are some obvious options, like chiropractors, but there are some other people who may be able to send personal injury clients your way.
Rather than focusing on what you can get from a referral partner, look to form an authentic and trusting relationship with these other people. Examples could include local yoga studios or rehabs where people may go after a car crash.
Lawyers in other practice areas are great referral partners too. Make sure that you bring some value to the relationship, either in referrals back to them or by providing such a great experience to your own clients that these partners are happy to keep mentioning your name.
These personal injury lawyers built on their referral relationship with a local community event, partnering with a chiropractic care company to raise awareness and funds for a charitable cause.
5. Ask For Reviews from Every Client
It's easy enough to build an automation to ask all your past clients for reviews. Some may even feel comfortable recording a quick video clip in your office after a final settlement conference, but Google reviews are valuable, too.
It's good to tell your current clients why reviews are so important. Word of mouth marketing and ongoing reviews from actual clients are vital for growing your law firm. No matter what you say about yourself and your firm, there's nothing like having all of that confirmed with a client review.
Great reviews add to your Google My Business profile and legal directory listings and help you stand out as a winning choice when someone searches for an injury lawyer in your area.
Notice something in common with the three law firms that show up for a general "Chicago personal injury lawyer" search? They all have dozens of positive reviews from clients.
Don't tell your clients what to say, but you can give them some direction on what's most helpful to include in a review, such as:
- Their concerns about hiring a lawyer before they chose your firm
- Some of the general challenges faced in the case and how you handled them
- Anything unique or unexpected about working with you that made the process easier
You can also repurpose these reviews into social media fodder and throughout your website. If you get a ton of reviews, you may need a law firm reputation management tool to keep track of them.
6. Host a Live Event
Interactive workshops that give people clear tips about handling a specific situation are great for personal injury lawyers.
Here are some examples of webinar or live event titles that might get someone's attention:
- What Victims Must Know Before Filing a Car Insurance Claim
- 5 Things to Remember If You Have a Dual Workers' Comp/PI Claim
- How Damages Work in Wrongful Death Claims in Kentucky
Fill these events with value. There's no point in strongly promoting your services, but you can do a lot of good showing your knowledge in the field and how you might approach cases. Since a family member or friend might attend on behalf of someone else, this sets up a possible future consultation.
7. Retarget Your Followers
In the midst of trying to recover from a major accident, your client might need some time before deciding on a law firm. They may come across your website following a Google search for middle of funnel terms like can I get damages for soft tissue pain or proving fault in t-bone accident, but they might also close that tab and forget your firm's name.
This is where retargeting with relevant ads on social media or Google reconnects you with that potential client.
They'll see ads for your firm and may open a conversation with you. This is a strong way to stay top of mind when your prospective client has a lot going on in the aftermath of a wreck.
Know where your audience is at in the advertising funnel and align ad content to that.
For example, imagine someone who’s in the middle of your funnel. They know they have a legal issue but haven’t decided to hire an attorney yet. They’ve been to your site and know your brand. You can retarget them with content that shows you understand their needs or how you've helped other people in similar situations.
8. Collect Conversion-Worthy Data from Your Firm
Even if you can't talk about the specifics of individual cases, your existing and former caseload is a treasure trove of information you can reuse in your marketing.
Don't just collect this data, either. You can use it to highlight your firm's unique value proposition in a way that makes sense to and intrigues your readers. There's a subtle but important difference between being self-aggrandizing and highlighting something valuable about your firm in terms of how you help clients.
Your unique value proposition will direct you toward statements you might make in your own marketing. Here are a few examples:
- Hired by over 200 injured cyclists in NYC
- A leading reputation for resolving insurance disputes out of court
- The complex injury team other lawyers want to partner with
- Over 20 years of experience in truck accident claims
- More than $1 billion recovered on behalf of injured clients
Pines Salomon Injury Lawyers keep it simple but effective. They use phrases like "top-rated" and "nationally recognized" while also making a connection with their local audience in San Diego.
This is a good start for expressing your firm’s value proposition. It makes it clear that the attorneys at the firm have experience and can be trusted. But it might come across as a little stale to some potential clients.
You could try something a little bolder, like the Levin Firm uses. In a few simple words, this firm sets an aspirational tone for any visitors. It puts the ball in the visitors court, implying that you can win if you work with us.
9. Speak at Local Bar Associations
Your local and state bar associations usually need speakers, and these are valuable for connecting with referral partners and for writing up your participation in a blog or email newsletter after the fact.
Make sure to promote the event before it happens and to get pictures on the day of your talk. When others see that you're sought out in your own legal community for expert conversations, it may help future clients decide to work with you.
10. Submit Your Attorneys for Major Awards
Law firm awards vary in terms of the impact they have on new clients, but it's worth making sure that you have some of this social proof on your website from time to time.
Whether it's a pro bono recognition or a national award for personal injury attorneys, clients do like to see some awards on your website. It shows that others recognize your role as an industry leader. Select meaningful and vetted lawyer awards to submit to.
Don't rely on this plan alone for your personal injury marketing, but instead, build in time once or twice a year to review awards opportunities.
Take Your Next Marketing Step Now
All your marketing efforts can make a difference but don't neglect the value of your own website. It's the only place where you own the traffic and data, unlike social media, where you're at the mercy of corporate policies and algorithm changes.
If you haven't yet invested in any marketing efforts as an injury firm, start with SEO. It has a lot of potential for personal injury law firms, especially since your target clients are most likely to search for an attorney immediately after an accident.
Rankings.io has been helping injury lawyers get results with SEO for years. If it's finally time you start earning the traffic and clients you need to get your law firm to the next level, invest in an SEO strategy that pays off again and again with Rankings.io.
