Technical SEO for law firm sites — schema (Attorney, LegalService, FAQ), Core Web Vitals, mobile UX, hreflang, redirects. The pieces that ranking actually depends on.
Speed and mobile matter; if they're broken, fix them. But once they're at acceptable thresholds, the schema layer is what differentiates the technically-strong law-firm site from the technically-mediocre one.
The technical-SEO label covers a wide territory — site speed, Core Web Vitals, mobile UX, schema, canonical handling, hreflang, redirects, sitemaps, robots.txt — but for the average law firm site, the highest-leverage technical work is schema.
Each practice-area page should carry LegalService schema with the practice name (e.g., "Personal Injury Law"), the provider (the firm), the area served, and the audience. The schema is what tells Google "this page is about a legal service offered by this entity in this area." Without it, the page relies on text inference alone.
Each attorney bio carries Attorney (or Person with knowsAbout) schema. Fields: name, jobTitle, alumniOf (the law school), worksFor (the firm), knowsAbout (the practice areas), award, publication, sameAs (links to LinkedIn, bar profile, Avvo, Martindale). The richer the bio's schema, the stronger the entity signal Google attaches to the attorney.
One LocalBusiness schema per office, on the location page. Fields: name, address, telephone, openingHours, geo coordinates, priceRange, image. Multi-location firms have one LocalBusiness per office, each on its own location page. The schema must match the GBP exactly.
FAQ schema on pages with structured FAQ sections. Eligible for rich results in Google search, which can produce significant CTR gains. Don't fake-stuff a FAQ section just for the schema — Google catches synthetic FAQs. Real FAQ content gets the boost; padded FAQ content doesn't.
On every page, breadcrumb schema mirrors the site's navigation path. Surfaces in search results as the breadcrumb display under the title.
For blog and supporting-article content. Author, publisher, datePublished, dateModified. The dateModified field is particularly important for legal content that gets updated when laws change — Google's freshness signals reward updated dates accurately.
Core Web Vitals (LCP, FID/INP, CLS) are real ranking factors but rarely the binding constraint for a law firm. Most law firm sites have CWV issues caused by oversized images, render-blocking scripts (chat widgets, tracking scripts), and shifting layouts (ads or banners loading late). The fixes are mechanical: compress images, defer non-critical scripts, reserve space for late-loading elements.
The threshold to clear: 75% of page-loads "Good" across LCP, INP, and CLS. Above that, no further investment is needed. Below that, the firm is paying a measurable rank penalty that compounds with every page added.
Google's index is mobile-first. The mobile rendering is what's ranked. Most law firm sites pass Google's basic mobile-friendly test but fail the harder bar: are critical elements (call button, form, attorney bio) usable with one thumb on a 5-inch screen? Click-to-call has to be visible without scrolling. Forms have to fit without horizontal scrolling. Text has to be readable without zooming.
Mostly relevant to immigration practices. If a site has English and Spanish versions, hreflang tags tell Google which version to serve which user. Common mistakes: hreflang only on the homepage and not the practice-area pages; hreflang pointing to a different domain with mismatched content; hreflang missing the x-default. The discipline is unforgiving but mechanical once the rules are followed.
Most law firm sites are 5–15 years old and have accumulated URL changes. A page once at /personal-injury might now be at /personal-injury-lawyer; the old URL might 404 or 302-redirect or chain through three intermediate URLs. Redirect mapping is a recurring task in any law-firm SEO engagement. The rule: every retired URL has a 301 redirect to its closest current equivalent, with the redirect chain length ≤1.
Before a dollar is spent, you see exactly where your site leaks equity and which structural fixes compound.
A technical audit (schema gaps, CWV pass-rate, mobile UX issues, hreflang errors, redirect problems, sitemap completeness, robots.txt issues).
A priority-ordered fix list.
Schema implementation per page type.
CWV optimization to the 75% threshold.
Mobile UX rebuild where needed.
Redirect cleanup.
Quarterly technical re-audit.
See the same 30-point audit we ran on ourselves. Before a dollar is spent, you see exactly where your site leaks equity and which structural fixes compound. No vanity metrics, no obligation.
