When running a solicitors firm, one thing that you are going to realise is that you need a website. Gone are the days when you could solely rely on being a physical place to visit. Now, you have to ensure that you have a virtual base too.  

The website that firms create reflects who they are. It is your chance to showcase your branding and ensure that everyone out there is going to know more about you and your solicitors firms ethos.

Whilst having a website for your firm is excellent, you need to think about the design (and the content) too. A well-designed and put together website will provide a truly positive experience for visitors. So, you are always in a great light with those potential clients. You may be an expert in law, but there is a good chance that you won’t know much about website design. 

To help you make sure that your website looks great and performs in the best way possible. Here’s my guide to the main website design tips to keep in mind.   

Always ensure that you are mobile-friendly  

Mobile users make up for more than half of all website traffic. So, mobile users should find your website easy to read and navigate like they would on a desktop computer or laptop. Although you can have a separate website for your mobile and desktop users, this means that you will have double the website to update.

A much better approach is to create what is known as a “responsive website”. This is a website designed to work on both a desktop and mobile version. Although, fundamentally, it is one website that will only require one lot of work to create and update.   

Keep it clean and simple  

Your website needs to be as clean and straightforward as possible. Especially your homepage, which is often the page shown first. This part of your website needs to instantly convey what you have to say and what the rest of the website can offer. Visitors should not worry about too much reading or searching around.   

As people, we seem to have developed relatively short attention spans. Which means that we want to see whatever it is that we are looking for instantly. If we can’t find it, then we tend to move on.   

Some of the key things to focus on when it comes to designing a website for your firm includes:  

• Keeping all of the content that you want to be seen instantly above the scroll point of the page  
• Not being afraid to use space between specific key points of your website  
• Using the power of infographics, videos and photographs  
• Including a call-to-action for your visitors to then follow   

Create the best solicitors firms website content

When I say the best website content, I mean content that is easy to read. When someone understands what you have created, they are more likely to want to know more about what you can do. Not only this, but readability is a key part of how Google judges your website. The higher your website is rated for readability, the higher it will score on Google’s ratings.  

If you want to ensure that you score the very best in readability and create the best content for your website, here are some key things that you need to keep in mind.   

• There should be a contrast between the colour of your text and also the colour of your background  
• You should use a larger font size (anything over a 16 is best)  
• The fonts that you use should be simple and straightforward rather than decorative and intricate  
• You shouldn’t use more than three different typefaces on the website   

If you take all of these things on board, you will see the very best response to the content on your website.   

Make certain things your visual priority  

When it comes to website pages, there will always be certain aspects that you want to be noticed over others. This will usually contain key parts of information you feel is more significant than others. The information you want to highlight is your name and logo. These are the key things that your potential clients remember and take away with them. The Call-to-action is the next stage of the process that you want them to take so highlight that too.   

Once you have thought about what you want to make a priority on your website. It’s time to think about how you can make sure that it is noticed. To do this, think about placement and size. Another way that you can highlight is by thinking about the spacing. Spacing will accentuate key parts of the content. You can also use colour and contrast, which helps the eye of the reader to move in the way that you want them too.   

Your solicitors firms website needs to be easy to navigate  

The main focus of making your website easy to navigate is so visitors will find it as easy as possible to gather all the information they need. However, this isn’t the only reason.   

When your website is easy to move around, this sends positive signals to Google and other search engines. They see that you are thinking about what is best for your clients and that you are the type of solicitors firm that should be recommended.   

To make your website easy to navigate, you want to avoid things such as scrolling. Instead, use an anchor menu that will be easy to click through and find the essential links that you want your clients to click through. Some examples of this include contact information, social media icons and any other relevant links that you may want to follow.

As a solicitors firm, you want to appeal to as many clients as possible. Of course, the best way to do this is to provide a service that is high quality, and delivers what it needs to deliver. However, it is also essential to have a place for your potential and existing clients to go when they need to find out more about what you offer. This place is your website. And if you want it to work the best that it can, you need to design it in a way that will be right for them and also Google and other search engines.   

Take a look at some of my other blogs you may be interested in:

How can you make your professional service firm’s website trustworthy?

The ups and downs of website visitors

Need help?

If you would like help with your marketing then bringing on a marketing consultant with a fresh pair of eyes can make all the difference. I work with B2B businesses and professional service firms in London, Kent, UK and Europe as well as specialising as a Legal Marketing Consultant. Please get in touch or book a free 30-minute consultation.