Who Should Write a Law Firm's Website Content?

A law firm website is not simply a digital brochure

A prospective client arrives on a law firm's website.

They may know the firm's name already.

They may have been referred by somebody.

They may have found the firm through Google.

Or they may simply be comparing several firms before deciding whom to contact.

Within a few minutes, they are trying to understand:

• What does this firm actually do?

• Does it handle my kind of issue?

• Which lawyer should I speak to?

• Does the firm understand my industry?

• Has it dealt with problems like mine before?

• Does this sound like a firm I would trust?

The answers depend heavily on the content.

Design can make a website look impressive.

But the words explain the firm's expertise.

That makes the question “Who should write the website?” much more important than simply deciding who has time to fill the pages.

Lawyers know the subject better than anyone

There is an obvious argument for asking lawyers to write the website themselves.

They understand the practice.

They know the terminology.

They know what clients ask.

They understand what the firm can and cannot say.

And they are less likely to make basic legal errors.

For highly technical practices, that knowledge can be particularly important.

The problem is that subject knowledge and website writing are not exactly the same skill.

A lawyer may know everything about commercial litigation and still produce a practice area page that begins:

“Our experienced team provides comprehensive, strategic and commercially focused dispute resolution services across a wide range of complex matters.”

Nothing in that sentence is technically wrong.

But almost every disputes practice could say the same thing.

The lawyer knows the substance.

The challenge is turning it into content that actually helps a prospective client understand why this particular firm is relevant.

Lawyers often write for lawyers

Legal training affects how lawyers communicate.

That is useful when preparing legal advice, pleadings, contracts or opinions.

It can be less useful when somebody outside the profession is trying to understand a website.

Lawyers may naturally include:

• technical terminology;

• long descriptions of legislation;

• detailed legal distinctions;

• extensive lists of services;

• qualifications and exceptions; and

• language that assumes the reader already understands the subject.

A prospective client may be approaching the issue differently.

They may simply want to know:

Can you help with this problem?

Have you handled something like this before?

What happens next?

A good law firm website needs to bridge those two perspectives.

It must remain legally accurate without reading like a legal memorandum.

What about the marketing team?

An internal marketing team may understand the firm's brand better than an external writer.

They may know:

• which practices the firm wants to grow;

• which industries it wants to target;

• how different partners prefer to communicate;

• what competitors are saying;

• what tone the firm normally uses; and

• how the website fits within a wider marketing strategy.

That makes marketing input extremely valuable.

The difficulty arises when the marketing team is expected to independently create technical legal content without enough involvement from the lawyers.

The result can go too far in the opposite direction.

The writing becomes polished and attractive but too general.

Terms such as:

commercially minded

client-focused

innovative

practical

forward-thinking

and

trusted adviser

begin appearing everywhere.

Again, none of those descriptions is necessarily wrong.

But they do very little to explain what the lawyers actually know.

Can a general copywriter write a law firm website?

Yes, but the quality will depend heavily on the subject and the process.

A strong copywriter can bring valuable skills.

They understand:

• readability;

• structure;

• headlines;

• calls to action;

• how people scan websites;

• how to remove unnecessary language; and

• how to make a page easier to follow.

Those skills matter.

But legal websites create an additional problem.

The writer may need to understand the difference between:

• litigation and arbitration;

• a trademark and copyright;

• an acquisition and restructuring;

• regulatory advice and compliance;

• contentious and non-contentious work;

• different court or tribunal processes; and

• legal services that sound similar but serve very different needs.

Without enough legal understanding, a writer may simplify something until it is no longer quite correct.

Or they may rely so heavily on the firm's existing wording that very little improves.

A specialist legal content writer sits somewhere in between

A legal content writer is useful because the role combines two different requirements:

understanding legal subject matter and writing for people outside the immediate legal context.

That does not mean the writer replaces the lawyer.

It means they can ask better questions.

Instead of receiving a list saying:

• commercial disputes;

• shareholder disputes;

• contractual claims;

• arbitration;

• mediation; and

• enforcement,

and turning it into a slightly longer list, they can ask:

• What kinds of disputes does the firm handle most often?

• Who usually instructs the team?

• At what stage do clients typically come to the firm?

• Are there particular industries where the team has experience?

• What tends to make these matters difficult?

• Does the team usually act before proceedings begin as well?

• Which capabilities genuinely distinguish this practice?

Those answers create a much better practice page.

The strongest approach is usually collaborative

The question therefore should not necessarily be:

“Should the lawyer or the writer create the page?”

A stronger process uses both.

Not every firm needs five different people working on every page.

But the principle matters.

A good law firm website sits at the intersection of law, communication, search and user experience.

Expecting one person to naturally master every part can create weak content.

Practice area pages need more than a service list

This is especially important for practice area pages.

Many law firm websites follow the same structure:

Corporate

We provide comprehensive corporate advice.

Employment

We advise employers and employees on all aspects of employment law.

Intellectual Property

Our experienced IP lawyers assist clients with a broad range of intellectual property matters.

Technically, these statements explain what the firm does.

But they do not give the reader much reason to keep reading.

A useful practice area page should normally help answer questions such as:

• Who does this team work with?

• What problems does it solve?

• Which services are actually provided?

• Which industries does the team understand?

• What experience sits behind the practice?

• What kinds of matters usually bring clients to the firm?

• Who are the relevant lawyers?

• What related insights has the firm published?

The page should help someone understand the practice, not simply confirm that it exists.

Lawyer bios need writing too

Another page law firms often underestimate is the lawyer biography.

Many bios read like shortened CVs.

They include:

• title;

• qualifications;

• admissions;

• education;

• memberships;

• awards; and

• a long list of representative matters.

All of that can be useful.

But somebody reading a partner's biography is usually trying to answer something much simpler:

“Is this the right lawyer for my problem?”

The bio should therefore help explain:

• what the lawyer actually focuses on;

• who they tend to advise;

• which industries they know;

• which types of matters they regularly handle;

• what kind of experience they have; and

• where someone can read more of their thinking.

A specialist writer can often help turn professional credentials into a clearer professional identity.

The homepage has a different job again

The homepage should not attempt to explain every service in detail.

Its job is usually to help visitors quickly understand:

who the firm is, what it does and where they should go next.

That sounds simple.

It often is not.

A homepage becomes difficult when too many people are involved.

Every practice wants to be prominent.

Every office wants space.

Every award matters.

Every value needs to appear.

The result can become a collection of statements that say everything about the firm without clearly saying what the firm should be known for.

Whoever writes the homepage therefore needs to understand positioning as well as language.

Search engines also need to understand the website

Website content is not only read by prospective clients.

Search engines need enough information to understand what each page is about and how different pages relate to one another.

That does not mean inserting the same keyword repeatedly.

It means making the subject of the page clear.

For example, a strong intellectual property practice page may naturally discuss:

• trademark registration;

• trademark disputes;

• copyright;

• licensing;

• brand protection;

• portfolio management;

• IP transactions; and

• relevant industries.

Related articles can then link back to that practice page.

Lawyer bios can link to the practice.

The practice page can link to relevant lawyers and insights.

Together, those pages create a much clearer picture of the firm's expertise.

This is another reason website writing should not be treated as simply filling blank sections in a design template.

Writing first and SEO later can create unnecessary work

Another common approach is:

1. write the website;

2. approve everything;

3. send it to someone for SEO;

4. ask them to “add keywords”.

That can lead to awkward content.

Search considerations are more useful when they are included earlier.

For example, understanding what prospective clients search for may influence:

• which practice pages should exist;

• how services should be grouped;

• what headings should be used;

• which questions deserve FAQs;

• what supporting articles should be created; and

• how pages should link to each other.

SEO should therefore influence the structure of the content without controlling every sentence.

Existing website content should not automatically be preserved

When redesigning a law firm website, firms sometimes focus heavily on the new design while transferring almost all of the old text into it.

That can be a missed opportunity.

If the existing website contains:

• vague practice descriptions;

• outdated lawyer profiles;

• duplicated language;

• excessively long pages;

• old terminology;

• services the firm no longer prioritises; or

• content that does not reflect how the practice has evolved,

a new design will not solve those problems.

A website redesign is often a good time to ask whether the content still represents the firm accurately.

Different pages may need different writers

There is no rule saying one person must write the entire website.

A specialist legal writer may handle:

• practice area pages;

• lawyer biographies;

• industry pages;

• legal guides; and

• substantive website content.

A marketing copywriter may work on:

• brand messaging;

• campaign pages; and

• shorter promotional sections.

Partners may contribute directly to:

• specialist technical material;

• personal profiles; and

• thought leadership.

The internal marketing team may coordinate the overall voice.

The important thing is that the final website feels consistent even if several people contributed to it.

Who should have final approval?

Regardless of who drafts the content, legal accuracy should remain with the firm.

Before publication, the relevant lawyers should review:

• descriptions of legal services;

• statements about experience;

• legal explanations;

• representative matters;

• industry claims;

• jurisdictions;

• lawyer credentials; and

• anything that could create a misleading impression.

The writer's job is to improve communication.

The firm's job is to make sure what is being communicated is correct.

So, who should write a law firm's website content?

For most firms, the strongest answer is not one person.

Lawyers should provide the expertise.

Marketing should provide the wider positioning.

A specialist legal content writer can turn that material into clear, structured and client-facing copy.

And search considerations should help determine how the information is organised and connected.

The weakest model is often asking a busy partner to “write something for the website” with no brief, no structure and no support.

The partner usually knows exactly what the firm does.

They simply should not have to become a website copywriter to explain it.

A good law firm website should sound like the firm understands the law.

But it should also sound like the firm understands the person reading it.