Referrals still matter in legal services, but they no longer stand alone. A referred client will still search your firm's name and practice areas before calling — and if that search reveals a dated website or no independent visibility, trust erodes before the phone even rings.
Local SEO for law firms centres on practice-area structured content targeting searches like "[practice area] lawyer [city]," alongside Google Business Profile optimisation and consistent citation building.
AEO content — FAQ sections answering real client questions about process, fees, and what to expect — builds the kind of structured trust signal that increasingly feeds both traditional search and AI-generated recommendations.