Who it is for
PPC for solicitors: expensive clicks, regulated claims, and a page that has to agree with your price list
Google Ads for a law firm is a different job from Google Ads for a shop, for three reasons. The clicks are among the dearest in UK search, so a wasted one costs more than a wasted afternoon. The SRA Transparency Rules put your price and service information on your website for the listed services, so the ad and the landing page cannot say anything the price page contradicts. And the value of an enquiry depends on the matter, so the account has to be built by practice area, not by firm. We manage Google Ads for solicitors from the Growth tier at £399 a month, a flat fee that does not rise when a click does.
By practice area
One campaign per matter type, because a will and a divorce are not the same customer
The searches, the urgency, the value and the conversion path differ by practice area, so each gets its own campaign, budget and landing page. The table is how we usually shape a firm's account; yours starts from what you actually take.
| Practice area | How people search | What the page must do | What a lead is judged on |
|---|---|---|---|
| Residential conveyancing | A quote, a town, a property type; often on a phone from a viewing | Show the price information the Transparency Rules require, and a quote form that asks the questions a quote needs | A quote request that becomes an instruction; the value is known and the margin is thin |
| Wills and probate | By service and place; probate often by a relative in the first weeks | Explain the process plainly, name the person who handles it, price information for probate where it applies | A booked appointment; a slow, considered decision |
| Family | Urgent, emotional, often out of hours | The number at the top, the first meeting explained, no promises about outcome | A call answered and a first meeting booked |
| Employment | By problem, by both sides: employee and employer | Two pages, one for each side; tribunal claim price information where the rules require it | Which side called, and whether the matter has a claim in it |
| Personal injury | By injury and by claim type; crowded with claims-management companies | Funding explained, no referral-fee arrangements (they are banned in PI), a clear next step | A claim with prospects; the cost per enquiry is high and the value depends on the case |
| Commercial | By transaction or dispute, usually from a desk in office hours | The sector experience, the people, a direct line | A qualified enquiry from a business, often through Microsoft Ads as well |
The Transparency Rules
The ad, the landing page and the price page have to agree
Since 2018 the SRA has required firms to publish price and service information on their websites for a list of services that includes residential conveyancing, probate, motoring offences, certain employment tribunal claims, debt recovery and some immigration work, and to display the SRA digital badge. That is your rule, not ours, but it shapes the ads: a headline that says “fixed fee conveyancing” is a claim the landing page must carry and the price page must match, and a landing page that quotes a figure the price page does not is a complaint waiting to happen.
So the landing page for a listed service carries the same price information as the price page, or links to it in the first screen, and the ad copy is written from that page rather than from what would get the most clicks. The SRA's rule that publicity must not be misleading covers ads as much as brochures, and Google's misrepresentation policy covers the same ground from the other side. Ad copy goes to you for approval before it runs, because the claims are yours.
Intake
A form that qualifies, and a phone that is answered
A legal enquiry is only worth what the matter behind it is worth, and the account cannot know that from a form fill. So the form asks the two or three things your fee earners ask first: the type of matter, roughly when, and where. A conveyancing quote form asks for the property price and whether there is a chain. An employment form asks which side you are on. The answers arrive with the enquiry, the wrong ones are filtered before anyone spends time, and the conversion value can reflect what the matter is likely to be worth.
Most legal enquiries from ads are calls, and a call that rings out is an expensive click wasted. Call reporting counts the calls the ads produce and their length; the ad schedule follows the hours reception is staffed; and where a firm cannot answer out of hours, the ads stop rather than send a family matter to voicemail. Call tracking is set up in the first week and written up in our guide.
Where the money leaks
The four findings we expect in an inherited law firm account
- Practice areas you do not take. A firm that does conveyancing and wills pays for “solicitor” searches from people with a criminal or immigration matter, because the keyword was broad and the negative list was empty.
- Searches for advice, not a solicitor. “Can my employer”, “how long does probate take”, “is it legal to”: questions with no matter behind them yet. They belong to your content pages, not your ads.
- Location set to interest rather than presence. A high street firm showing ads to people abroad who searched for its town.
- One page for every campaign. The homepage, with six practice areas and no price information, receiving every click from every campaign.
Judging it
Cost per matter, not cost per click
The report for a law firm leads with enquiries by practice area, the share that became instructions once you tell us, and the cost per instruction against what an instruction in that area is typically worth to you. A campaign with a high cost per click and a low cost per instruction is a good campaign; the click figure on its own means nothing in this sector.
Where the firm can tell us which enquiries became matters, that is imported back into the account as a conversion with a value, so the bidding learns to buy the searches that produced instructions rather than the ones that produced calls. Firms with a case management system that stores the click ID get this from month two; the mechanism is the same one described on the B2B page.
Related
Where this connects
Landing pages for PPC
The page that carries the price information and the intake form.
PPC for dentists and clinics
The other regulated, appointment-led sector.
Pricing
Growth for most firms; Scale where practice areas need separate offline import.
Get a quote
Your practice areas, your town and what an instruction is worth; the plan in reply.
Questions from law firms
Why are legal clicks so expensive?
Because a case is worth a great deal to the firm that wins it, and every firm in the area knows it, so the auction for a search like a conveyancing quote or an employment solicitor is crowded with firms and with claims-management companies bidding on the same words. The answer is not to bid lower; it is to make sure every expensive click was a search from a person with a matter you take, in a place you serve, and that the page they land on turns more of them into an enquiry.
Can we bid on another firm's name?
Google allows bidding on a competitor's name as a keyword in the UK; using their trade mark in the ad text is restricted. Whether you should is a separate question: the clicks are cheap relative to service terms, the conversion rate is usually poor because the searcher wanted the other firm, and the SRA's requirement that publicity is not misleading applies to the ad. We run it only where the numbers justify it and never with the other firm's name in the copy.
What should the landing page for a legal search contain?
The matter in the first line, the price information the SRA Transparency Rules require for that service where it applies, who will handle it and their qualification, the next step in one sentence, and a form or a number. The SRA digital badge belongs on the page. What it should not contain is a promise of an outcome.
How do you stop the phone ringing with matters we do not take?
Negatives for the areas of law you do not practise, from day one, and a shared list that grows every week from the Search Terms report. Location set to presence for a local practice. And an intake form that asks the two or three questions your fee earners ask first, so the enquiry arrives qualified rather than as a name and a number.
What does PPC for a law firm cost with you?
The flat fee by spend band: £249 a month up to £1,000 of spend, £399 up to £3,000, £599 up to £8,000. Most firms with more than one practice area sit on Growth because each area is its own campaign with its own budget. One firm per practice area and area on the monthly plans.
Tell us your practice areas and your town. The reply has the fee and the campaign shape.
If the account is already running, add the customer ID and the reply also says how much of last quarter's spend went on matters you do not take.