How to Choose the Best Law Firm Domain Name

Nine ways to choose the best law firm domain name

1. Easy to Spell

If your average clients cannot spell your URL, then you could see a drop in direct traffic. Direct traffic comes from visitors who type your domain into the browser. These are great prospects because they already know your firm.

Even the most diligent prospects have limits. If they cannot spell your name, then you need to change the domain name.

For example, if one partner has a confusing name you might not want to spell out the partner’s name for the site. Instead, you can abbreviate the partners along with a brief description of the firm.

2. Easy to Type

Along with easy to spell, you should also have easy to type domain names. Therefore, if your firm is Smith, Johnson, and Jones, then you don’t want to use a hyphen or comma between each attorney’s name in the URL.

Either make it SmithJohnsonJones.Com or SMJlaw.Com, so clients can remember your website without having to look it up.

The best way to keep it easy is to avoid dashes, hyphens, and symbols on your domain name. Users typing in your website on a mobile device have trouble entering them on the touchscreen.

3. Description

If you have a generic practice name like Smith Law, then add more information to separate yourself from the other Smith Law firms.

You can use common descriptions such as the full firm name, geography, or practice area. Therefore, Smith Law could be either SmithLawOfficeChicago.Com or SmithMedicalMalpractice.Com.

Think about what works best for your firm based on your location and practice.

4. Long-term

Also, consider the long-term implications of your domain name. For example, if your law firm has multiple partners, then you might not want to use the names of the partner for your website.

Otherwise, every time a new partner enters the firm you might have to replace your website domain. The constant shuffling of domain names can hurt your search rankings and confuse current prospects.

In the same light, do not use a street address. If your law firm moves to a bigger office, you run into the same challenge. You don’t want to tell your prospects your website is SecondStreetAttorneys.Com, and your office is on Main Street.

5. Check availability

With over 333.8 billion registered URLs around the world, it takes time to find an available domain name to purchase.

Two free tools to check your domain name availability are:

• SmallSeoTools.Com
• InstantDomainSearch.Com

6. .Com versus .Law

As the Internet continues to grow, many law firms have taken advantage of the new domain name extensions. While it is cool to have a .law extension, there is little value in choosing a .law domain name over a .com or .net.

You do not get more search traffic for having a .law domain name. Additionally, these extensions cost more money over the long run.

7. Short Domain Names

We talked earlier in this article how to make it easier to type a domain name. The best strategy to achieve this goal is to keep your domain name to less than 15 characters.

How long is that?

SmithLawyer.Com is exactly 15 characters. Can you keep your domain name that short?

8. Do not use adjectives

You might be the best law firm in your area. You still should not include that in your website name. Going way back to English class, we recommend you do not use any superlative or comparative adjectives for your domain name.

That means avoiding words like premier or super that add little value to your site. An adjective takes up valuable real estate (Remember 15 characters) on your URL.

Let your website sell your services, not your domain name.

9. Avoid abbreviations

Finally, do not abbreviate words in your domain name. It goes to keeping your domain name simple.

Do not use something like SmithAttys.Com. The entire point of the domain name is to make it easier for people to find information. If visitors have to remember how to spell your name, then they will go somewhere else.

The two exceptions to this would be common geography terms and long partner names, which we discussed earlier.

For example, you can use SmithLawUSA.Com or SmithLawIL.Com for the United States or Illinois.

Also, can you imagine how the firm of Tchaikovsky and Dostoyevsky would do as a law firm? Instead, you might want to use TDAttorneys.Com

Final Thoughts

As you can see, what you put into a domain name matters! Do you want to make sure your law firms domain name builds your firms traffic? If so, schedule a free consultation with our team today.