In our last blog post, we went over why your law firm needs a mobile-friendly website. However, while it is important to make an effort to make your firm’s site accessible on a mobile phone, it probably isn’t that important.
Why You Need to Make Your Firm’s Site Mobile-Friendly
Your law firm’s site does need to be mobile-friendly if you want to avoid getting hit with a painful Google penalty. Focusing exclusively on web traffic that comes from computers with wide screen resolutions can lead to your site getting penalized and sliding down in the rankings below other, comparable sites.
Why You Shouldn’t Worry Too Much
Avoiding a Google penalty by having a website that’s responsive to the type of device that’s being used is important. However, going to great lengths to make your website look pristine on a smartphone is likely not a good use of your time, energy, or money.
Yes, more people use a mobile device to search the web than use a desktop, now. However, much of that mobile searching is limited to checking email and using social media, like Twitter and Facebook. Serious web searches, like buying a car, looking for an apartment, or finding the right attorney, are still done at home, on the computer.
What This Means for Your Firm
So, you’re faced with two competing forces: Search engines want your site to be mobile-friendly, but users are probably still only using their home computers to search for attorneys.
If your firm’s marketing budget is limited, then your optimal investment is likely to be to make your website responsive enough to mobile devices to avoid the penalty, while not going very much further. Hosting different websites on your domain – one for desktop traffic and one for mobile – is probably going to be a high investment that does not reap significant dividends down the road, because nearly all of your potential clients aren’t looking for you on a smartphone.
Myers Freelance Legal Blogging
Of course, the mobile-friendliness of your website will not improve its rankings – it will only prevent a painful penalty that hurts where it comes in against its competition. Hosting quality content – particularly in the form of a legal blog – is still the best way to make your website rank well in the long-term. Contact the legal blogging professionals at Myers Freelance to get started.