Our approach
Most law firm "SEO" misses the point. High-value clients don't search for "best commercial lawyer." They search for the name they've been given. Our job is to make sure what they find confirms the referral.
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It starts with the name, not the keyword
A referrer gives a prospect a name. The prospect Googles the name. What comes up has to be findable, accurate, and credible: the firm site, a polished profile, recent thought leadership, consistent listings, good reviews in the right places. If the search result is a mess, the referral wobbles. If it's clean, the referral lands.
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Reputation has two parts, and we work both
Visibility — being known by the people who matter, in the places they look. Credibility — what they find when they look, and whether it stands up. A partner with high credibility but low visibility has a small practice. A partner with high visibility but weak credibility gets noticed and dismissed. The work is to build both.
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We don't sell you SEO that isn't worth selling
Ranking for "commercial lawyer Sydney" against the firms with seven-figure ad budgets is a losing game for a relationship-driven firm, and the clients you'd win that way aren't the clients you want anyway. We do the SEO, AEO and GEO work that actually pays off: getting found cleanly for your firm name, your partners' names, the topics you write about, and the specific questions referrers and prospects actually ask.
What we do
The work that makes the firm and its partners easy to find, accurate across the web, and credible when someone checks.
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Search and discoverability
- Getting the firm and partners found cleanly for their own names.
- SEO foundations on the website: meta tags, structured data, page titles, internal linking.
- GEO (generative engine optimisation) work: making sure AI assistants surface accurate, current information when someone asks about the firm or a partner.
- Topic-specific findability for the practice areas, services, and questions that matter to your referrers and prospects.
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Google Business Profile and reviews
- Setting up and managing the firm's Google Business Profile (and the profiles of individual offices where relevant).
- Review acquisition systems: making it easy and consistent for happy clients to leave reviews, without it feeling forced.
- Monitoring reviews across Google and other platforms, and helping the firm respond well.
- Crisis response when something negative appears, online or in the media.
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Web presence and consistency
- Auditing the firm's presence across the web: directories, listings, profile sites, legal industry platforms.
- Making sure the firm and partner information is accurate and consistent everywhere it appears.
- Selective directory and ranking listings work where it pays off (we'll tell you which ones are worth the effort and which aren't).
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Thought leadership for visibility
- Articles, comment pieces, and thought leadership that does double duty: positioning the partner as an expert and surfacing in search and AI results when referrers and prospects look.
- Coordination with our content team where the writing happens.
How we deliver it
Online reputation work happens inside an engagement model. Most firms come to us through one of these.
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Fractional CMO & team
Ongoing reputation work as part of the firm's marketing function. Search, GBP, reviews, listings, and thought leadership coordination, all running consistently. Best for firms that need this happening week to week without thinking about it.
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Projects, campaigns & tasks
Discrete pieces of reputation work on a fixed-fee or hourly basis. A profile clean-up, a GBP setup, a review acquisition campaign, a directory submission. Best for firms with their own marketing function who need specific work delivered.
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Strategy & advisory
When reputation needs strategic thinking before execution. Repositioning a partner after a move, planning visibility for a junior partner being built up, or crisis-response strategy. Best for firms with a specific reputation question that needs to be answered before the work begins.
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How does our law firm get started with improving our online reputation?
Most firms come in one of three ways. If you want it run consistently, search, Google Business Profile, reviews, listings, and the content coordination behind them, that sits inside a fractional engagement, with the work happening week to week without you thinking about it. If it's a defined piece, a profile clean-up, a GBP setup, a review acquisition campaign, that's a project or task on a fixed fee. And if there's a question to work through first, repositioning a partner after a move, or building up a junior partner's visibility, that's a strategy engagement before any work begins. Not sure which fits? Start with a conversation and we'll point you to the right one.
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Is this SEO?
Partly. We do SEO foundations on websites and the search work that helps a firm get found for its name and the topics it covers. What we don't do is chase rankings for transactional keywords like "commercial lawyer Melbourne", that's the wrong game for a relationship-driven firm, and it's not what high-value clients are searching for anyway. If you're being pitched SEO that promises to rank you for those terms, push back hard on the assumptions behind it.
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Can you help us get found by AI assistants?
Yes, that's GEO, generative engine optimisation. When a referrer or prospect asks ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or Perplexity about your firm, your partners, or a topic you cover, GEO is what makes sure the answer is accurate, current, and well-framed. It's worth doing, and a few of your prospects are already searching this way, but it sits alongside the rest of the reputation work rather than replacing any of it. One part of being found cleanly, not the whole game.
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Do we need our own podcast or articles for this to work?
Not necessarily. The basics of being findable, accurate, and credible are worth doing regardless, and they stand on their own. But thought leadership amplifies the work, because it gives search engines and AI tools something credible to surface when someone looks. Most firms get more out of reputation work when there's content alongside it, though it isn't a precondition for starting.
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Can you fix a bad review or negative search result?
Sometimes, partly, and we'll be straight about which. Genuinely defamatory content can occasionally be removed, but it's slow and not guaranteed. A legitimate negative review is better addressed through how you respond and how you build review volume around it. Negative media coverage is the hardest: we can sometimes get newer, positive content to rank above it, but we don't promise to make things disappear. We'll tell you honestly what's achievable before you spend on it.