Attorney Adwords Advertising

About the Attorney & the Adwords Account

In February 2009, Donnelly Law*, a Personal Liability Injury Attorney located in Memphis*, appointed Denver PPC to manage its Attorney Adwords Advertising, based on a PPC Quote which we had provided the previous month.  At that time, the Attorney was spending $13,000 per month on Adwords and earning new customers at an average cost of $360 per online conversion.  

The Attorney featured in our Case Study offers and advertises a variety of services, including representing clients for cases involving Personal Injury, Accident Injury, Nursing Home Abuse, Workers Compensation, Social Security Disability, Traumatic Brain Injury, Dogbites and Wrongful Death.  Prior to taking over the attorney Adwords advertising, it was being managed by a Junior Partner in the Firm.  The advertising Attorney estimates that the website generates leads by phone as compared to online form at a rate of 3:1, which means that for this specific Advertiser, the actual cost per lead is estimated to be 1/4 of the amount captured by conversion tracking.

Initial Findings – Waste & Inefficiencies

In our initial study of the Attorney’s Adwords account, we determined that much of the advertising budget was being wasted on a handful of keywords which were far too general.  The Adwords account had only 66 keywords which were organized in just 3 ad groups; each ad group had just one ad.  The Adwords account had a standard list of 100 generic negative keywords cloned from somewhere, it seems, which were not customized for industry or geography.  Overall, such an account structure violates the most basic best practices for Adwords Advertising.

Restructuring Attorney Adwords Ad Account

By mid-February, we completed our Adwords account restructuring for the Attorney.  The improved Adwords account was reorganized into about 15 ad groups.  We performed a thorough keyword search, supported by our experience with other Liability Attorneys. This resulted in a revised Adwords advertising account structure which today has over 600 keywords, organized in 16 ad groups, with almost 100 live ads and a custom tailored list of over 300 negative keywords.

Results of Initial Adwords Restructuring

As you can see in the Sample PPC Report for an Attorney , the advertising results for February are mixed, as the Adwords account refactoring took effect during the middle of the month.  Comparing March to January, the account performance improved significantly, showing a decrease in cost per conversion from Advertiser’s previous $360, to Ad Manager’s improved rate of $221.  Adwords ad spending decreased from $13K to $11K per month, while the number of online leads increased from 36 to 51 per month.   Since only 1/4 of the leads are captured via the online form, taking into account estimated phone leads, the estimated cost per lead for March was about $55 per lead.

Continuous Optimization of Adwords Account

Throughout March and April,  in our intense ongoing analysis of the Attorney’s Adwords and Google Analytics data, we continued to refine and improve the Adwords account by identifying which particular elements of the Adwords account were performing best, improving those elements which were under-performing and eliminating elements which had historically proven costly and unproductive.  This process involved analyzing day of week, landing pages, bounce rates, cost per conversion, quality scores and time of day.  Our analysis is clearly demonstrated in the Sample PPC Report for a Law Firm.

Continuously Improving Ad Text

Throughout this period, Denver PPC also continuously analyzed the results of competing ads and began identifying which ad elements were performing relatively better and which were performing worse, and began refining ads for each ad group across the Adwords account.  The results and scope of our ad split testing is clearly demonstrated in the Sample PPC Report for an Attorney.

Ongoing Optimization Improves CPA by 50%

By April, the cost per online conversion had fallen from the original cost of $360 per conversion to $178 per online conversion, as can be seen in the Sample PPC Report for Lawyers.  Adjusted to take into account the estimated leads by phone, this cost was actually closer to $45 per lead.

To learn more about this Case Study, read the Sample PPC Report for Attorneys.  If you want to know more about managing Adwords Advertising for Attorneys, Please read our Adwords Tips for Attorneys.  If you don’t presently have a local listing on Google maps, and are not using local business ads, then please read:  Local Ads for Attorneys.

To request a PPC Quote for your own Attorney Adwords account, call Hanna at 303 975 2810.  Ask her about our PPC Performance Guarantee for Attorneys.

* We have changed the law firm name and metro area name as a condition precedent to using the client’s results in our Case Study.