5 Major Challenges of Google Search Ads for Personal Injury Law Firms
Have you seen ads pop up when searching for “injury lawyers” and wondered how you can get your firm noticed the same way? Or perhaps you’ve heard success stories from colleagues about getting great quality leads through Google Search Ads.
Google Search Ads are a fantastic way to showcase your business to people looking for a lawyer. If done right, your ads can appear at the top of search results, providing an opportunity for people to visit your website and contact you for a consultation.
Google Search Ads can be challenging. There are many obstacles to consider, especially for personal injury law firms. You face common challenges that other industries encounter and unique hurdles specific to your field. Understanding these challenges beforehand can help you decide if this is the right marketing strategy for your firm.
Spoiler alert! You don’t need to worry about these challenges if you have a marketing agency. If you want to proceed with advertising on Google Search, contact us today. We can help you set up and manage your ads to get leads quickly.
Here are the top major challenges you need to consider before starting with Google Search Ads for your personal injury law firm:
Major Challenges
Setting up an Account
Setting up a Google Search Ads account involves a lot of details. Even if you find a YouTube video on how to do it, completing it correctly can make a huge difference.
First, you need to know the right campaign type to use. Some users may create their own Google Ads while using a campaign type that merely uses up the budget. It might not be set up to prioritize traffic to the website, target the right people, or increase leads.
Second, you must set up a measure of success or conversion tracking. As a personal injury law business, your main goal is to get leads. Without proper conversion tracking, you won’t know how many clicks to your website converted into leads. You wouldn’t even know if the calls or form submissions came from Google Ads.
Targeting
There are different types of targeting you need to know. One important type is location targeting. You want to focus on the area within your target market. For example, you don’t want to receive calls from someone who lives five hours away from your office.
Next, there’s ad scheduling. Do you want to show your ads during prime hours? Or only when someone is available to answer emails and calls during business hours? Maybe you want to be available 24/7 because you have an automated phone system to take messages. We’ve seen ad accounts where businesses didn’t realize they were advertising on weekends when the company was closed and had no messaging system. Read our blog about managing your leads!
Additionally, there is keyword targeting. Over the years, Google Ads has made keyword targeting more complicated. If your setup is wrong, you could be wasting money on searches for your competitors’ names or generic terms like “sports injury” or “can you sue an injury lawyer?” While these terms are related to your practice, they might not lead to immediate clients. You don’t want to spend money on searches where people may not be looking for a lawyer.
Competitive Industry
Personal injury law is one of the most competitive niches in Google Search. Many lawyers and law firms advertise for the same keywords. For instance, if you search for “personal injury lawyer” on Google, you’ll often see 3-4 sponsored links at the top, whereas the average search usually has 1-2.
You need to set up your account strategically to appear in front of potential clients. This also means being prepared for a higher ad spend (more on that later).
If your ad account isn’t set up correctly and isn’t competitive enough, your ads might only show up in the middle of the night, appear at the bottom of the results, or not show up at all.
Cost
Google Ads uses a bid system where each account bids in the background, and whoever has the highest bid wins the top position in the rankings. This means the more bidders there are, the higher the cost per click (CPC) becomes.
This is particularly true for personal injury law. With many companies bidding for the same keywords, the cost per click can get very high. In Edmonton, an injury lawyer keyword can cost as much as $145.61 per click. On average, we recommend a budget that allows for at least 10 clicks per day. This means you need a budget of $1,450 per day or $43,500 per month.
There are many ways to lower that cost through optimization. However, without experience in managing Google Ads, you could pay these high costs for years.
Click Fraud
In a competitive space, protecting yourself against fraud is vital to success.
It’s a known issue for injury law firms that a competitor can outsource people to click on their competitor’s ads to try and click them out of the auction. Google doesn’t charge for the number of leads or the number of times your ad is shown – you are charged for clicks. Every click is precious, especially when it can cost $145 each time!
Second spoiler alert! This can be prevented or fixed. Addressing this with a sustainable and reliable solution can and will ensure that no matter how hard your competitors try, you will still be the #1 result on Google, especially during prime business hours.
Hiring an Agency or Do-It-Yourself
You might consider setting up or managing your own Google Ads, but are you ready to spend thousands of dollars on trial and error until you learn how to manage it effectively?
Even if you have an in-house marketing manager, they may not have the time or expertise to keep up with all the changes in Google Ads’ algorithms, updates, and new interfaces. What worked a few years ago might not work today.
A marketing agency like Adster Creative has years of experience in setting up Google Ads accounts based on your budget, priorities, and goals. We don’t just set it up to waste your money; we set it up to maximize your budget.
We also ensure we target the right people. With how competitive your industry is, we can set it up to show your ads to the right audience at the right place and time.
We continually optimize your ads to improve over time. This means lowering the cost per click, improving your Quality Score, and refining your targeting. We also leverage Google’s machine learning to target users more likely to contact you.
Additionally, we have the experience to handle click fraud. We have systems and tools in place to protect your ad spend from fraudsters.
All of this takes years of experience to master. Let Adster Creative help you navigate the complicated world of Google Ads.