In the fiercely competitive legal industry, standing out online is no longer optional; it’s essential. Law firms investing in strategies like link building and digital PR see substantial growth in their online presence, organic lead generation, and overall brand authority. But what does this look like in practice?
Link building is the process of acquiring links from other websites that direct users to your site. It is an essential SEO ranking factor for law firms, as Google and other search engines use links to determine a site’s relevance and authority.
Digital PR involves creating compelling, newsworthy content and pitching it to journalists and media outlets to earn top-tier coverage, with links back to your website.
Combined, these strategies form a powerful law firm SEO duo: digital PR generates the kind of content that earns trust and attention. At the same time, link building ensures that content translates into tangible SEO value through authoritative backlinks. Together, they help law firms build a strong recipe for success.
Understanding the importance of organically growing your online presence is crucial. At Hennessey Digital, we take pride in delivering measurable results.
In the real-world examples below, we’ll show how link outreach, digital PR, and high-quality backlinks have driven impressive outcomes for our clients, including enhanced visibility, boosted rankings, and improved long-term SEO performance.
If there’s one key takeaway from this, it’s that in SEO, success comes gradually, and that’s the beauty of it!
Gradual Progress
Over the years, Hennessey Digital has created high-quality backlinks for more than 100 clients, helping them drive traffic to their websites.
In this example, we take a look at one of the first clients who came to us wanting to build a more visible online presence. The quality backlinks we built, with time, played a crucial role in improving our clients’ visibility on search engines and strengthening their digital profile, one link at a time.
The impact of our efforts became obvious. The clients’ domain rating (DR) has increased significantly, currently at 59, indicating a strong online presence.
The firm now has an impressive number of valuable backlinks, which not only increase its credibility online but also contribute to a higher ranking across search engines.
These links are part of a larger strategy that has shown gradual, consistent growth.
Client DR before working with Hennessey Digital
Client DR after working with Hennessey Digital
Another link-building and digital PR success story is that of a successful law firm that came to Hennessey Digital nearly a decade ago with a strong desire to grow and a website that had a low domain rating of 15. Throughout his journey, with a well-designed link-building strategy, our client achieved the positive outcome he was looking for and currently has a domain rating of 51.
Client DR before working with Hennessey Digital
Client DR after working with Hennessey Digital
Fixing the Broken & Finding the Lost
Broken and lost backlinks can affect a website negatively and impact its SEO performance. This was the case for several of our clients, who, sadly, faced challenges due to redirects and missing links.
For a little context, a backlink becomes lost whenever websites that previously linked to our client’s domains remove the links or delete the page entirely where the links were placed. On the other hand, a backlink becomes broken when links to your website redirect to nonexistent or broken pages, which often happens due to URL changes or the deletion of content. In both scenarios, the search engine rankings decrease.
Our link development department resolved these issues as soon as possible. Through comprehensive lost link analysis and targeted outreach efforts, the team was able to recover valuable links and restore online visibility for our clients. This not only maintained their SEO rankings but also helped their long-term digital performance. Solving these problems highlights the importance of proactive link monitoring and showcases the expertise at Hennessey Digital in identifying and navigating SEO challenges.
The Art and Influence of Digital PR
Hennessey Digital has developed and implemented numerous successful digital PR campaigns. For one campaign, our primary goal was to create a data-driven resource page that would serve as an authoritative guide to the safest states to live in the U.S. for 2024. The results were terrific, with the campaign earning 40 backlinks from high-value sites and significantly boosted our client’s domain authority.
The campaign page on the client’s website also quickly became the most visited page, driving considerable organic traffic. In addition to the strong backlink profile, the page also saw impressive keyword rankings. It ranked for 1,114 keywords in the U.S. and saw over 2,000 visitors.
Keyword rankings after a digital PR campaign
The visibility of the page also positioned our client as a trusted source for safety-related content, bringing brand credibility while driving continuous engagement.
Even more noteworthy was that the campaign continued to gain organic links six months after its launch. The digital PR campaign has become a key piece of content on the client’s website, which generates leads organically.
Another example of a successful law firm digital PR campaign created here at Hennessey Digital is one focusing on the best time to hit the road in December 2024. Our main goal was to establish the client as a leading authority in the personal injury space. Following the campaign’s launch, we introduced a reactive PR strategy, aligning it with Inauguration Day to enhance its newsworthiness. This strategic approach secured 14 high-quality backlinks from publications such as USA Today, MSN, and Yahoo News. The campaign showcased our team’s ability to elevate clients within the news cycle by transforming an original concept into a timely, attention-grabbing narrative. As a result of the campaign, our client’s domain rating increased from 39 to 41.
Client DR before digital PR campaign
Client DR after digital PR campaign
Turning Links into Long-Term Success
With so much activity happening online, law firms need more than traditional marketing to make a significant impact in their profession: they must build authority, trust, and credibility across the internet.
Through the strategic magic of link building and digital PR, firms not only strengthen their online presence but also enhance their reputation, attract high-quality leads, and establish themselves as professionals in various practice areas. These efforts contribute to long-term growth by improving search visibility, driving referral traffic, and creating valuable industry relationships that can lead to media coverage and client trust. These success stories demonstrate that strategic link building, digital PR, and high-quality backlinks are essential for achieving long-term SEO growth and visibility.
Whether improving domain ratings, recovering lost links, or leveraging timely PR campaigns, the results speak for themselves: gradual, measurable progress that directly impacts business success. At Hennessey Digital, we’re committed to helping law firms navigate the complexities of digital marketing with proven traditional and emerging strategies that drive real, sustainable results.