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Law Firm Analytics: Measuring Your Digital Marketing Efforts

by Guy Alvarez • February 16th, 2018 • Measurement and Analytics | Blog

Law Firm AnalyticsThe only way to know if your marketing efforts are meeting your goals is, of course, to measure results. Otherwise, there is no way to tell if your campaign is on the right track or running off the rails.

With so many different channels available for advertising and marketing in the digital world, it can be difficult to determine exactly how to put all the numbers together and decide if the result is good or bad.

Whether your law firm is just getting started with digital marketing, or looking to revamp current marketing campaigns, there are several key metrics you should be monitoring:

Total Visits

Since the main goal of online marketing is to get people back to your law firm’s web site, the most obvious and easiest statistic to track is the total number of visits your site is receiving.

If total visits are going down, or suddenly drop from one week or month to the next, you’ll want to look at your overall campaign and see if something is not functioning the way it should. At the very least, you’ll want your site visits to stay about the same, but ideally this number should be going steadily up, even if only by a small amount.

A slow decline could mean your marketing message needs to be changed to something more relevant to your audience. A sudden drop could indicate a technical malfunction like a page not working properly or a broken social media scheduler.

New Sessions

You’ll find this statistic in Google Analytics. (You are using Google Analytics, right?)

New sessions show the number of visitors who’ve never been to your site before. By comparing new sessions with total sessions, you’ll get an idea of how many people are returning to your site, and how many are there for the first time.

The optimal numbers here are going to depend on what your overall goals are. If you’ve been working on site content and nurturing leads, you might expect to see higher return visit numbers. If you just launched a social media blitz to attract new clients, you’ll want to see the new sessions number increasing.

Acquisition Channels

You’ll find these statistics in Google Analytics under the Acquisition section. Click on “All Traffic” and then on “Channels”. The four main channels that should interest you are:

Direct – Visitors who went directly to your site by typing the URL in their browser.

Referral – Visitors sent to your site by clicking a link on another web site.

Social – Visitors sent to your site from links on prominent social media sites.

Organic Search – Visitors who clicked a link in search results to reach your site.

The value of these numbers should be fairly self-explanatory. Of course, ideally, you’ll want to see all of these numbers steadily going up, but they will give you a good indication of whether or not specific marketing efforts on different channels are producing results.

Bounce Rate

Bounce rate is the percentage of people that visit your site but leave without any other page. For instance, if Google Analytics shows your bounce rate as 65 percent, it means 65 percent of the visitors to your site leave after viewing only one page. You’ll want to work on lowering the bounce rate by providing internal linking on posts, pages, and the sidebar, if you have one, and provide better navigation.

Cost Per Lead/Client

Calculating your cost per lead and cost per client will help you to decide which marketing channels are giving your firm the best value for its money.

To come up with your cost per lead, simply divide the total amount you spent on a particular marketing channel for a period such as one month by the number of leads or clients generated by that channel over the same period.

For example, if you spent $500 on Google Adwords advertising last month and gained 10 new leads and two new clients during that same period, your cost per lead for Google Adwords would be $50, and your cost per client would be $250.

Client Value

Client value is determined by calculating the average amount of money earned from each client over the life of the firm’s relationship with that client. This number is particularly useful for helping to determine the last item on our list.

Projected Return On Investment (ROI)

In the end, everything comes down to the ROI your law firm gets from its marketing. If the ROI is positive, you’re on the path to consistent profit. If the ROI is negative, there is more work to be done to turn things around.

To calculate the ROI for a given campaign, you just need to compare the money you are spending over time with the expected value for the number of new clients your firm gains during that time.

So, for example, if your firm spends $500 per month to advertise on Google Adwords and gains two new clients, each with an expected client value of $2000, you would have a projected monthly ROI of $3500, or 700%, on Google Adwords advertising.

By checking these law firm analytics regularly, you’ll be able to develop an accurate view of which online marketing strategies are working best, why they work, and how you can refine your tactics for even better results in the future.

Updated and republished February 16, 2018.

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