Here’s the case study from Contigo Law LLC, headed by Kelvin Ong. He mentioned that the legal industry has traditionally relied on warm referrals. However, he said he is always looking to build pipelines five years ahead of time, and we worked together on a subsection of civil litigation: his debt recovery practice area.
If you asked me, as a civil litigation lawyer in Singapore, if you’re doing some form of lead generation online, you’re missing out on a large pool of potential clients.
The paid online marketing strategy we undertook for this particular practice area isn’t complex.
Step 1) Choosing The Key Practice Area to Focus On
Firstly, from a cold audience marketing standpoint (this means you are marketing your messaging to people who don’t already know like or trust you)… you can’t be everything to everyone. The moment you try to market “we are a full-service law firm that handles disputes, divorces, criminal matters, corporate work, and probate” right from the start, your message becomes diluted and weak. The generic ad you run loses impact.
I remember walking into Contigo Law’s office. After twenty minutes of back-and-forth conversation with Kelvin, I identified a key pillar and major revenue driver of his firm. It was a practice area where he has multiple case studies and extensive experience: debt recovery for both individuals and businesses.
That became the foundation for our first paid marketing campaign.
This is based on helping his firm get a return on investment for the advertising dollars invested. Every business owner doesn’t want to throw marketing dollars down the drain. Hence, it’s important to strategize ahead of time and understand the unit economics of how much a debt recovery client is worth to his firm before spending even a dollar on ads.
Step 2) Positioning Ideas for Debt Recovery
The big law (big four/ big five) legal industry leans on authority and brand. However, if you asked me, smaller firms can take a different positioning: you can differentiate through education and relatability.
Today, there are many law firms out there driving clicks to their law firm websites through Google ads. Yet, it is no longer enough to get clicks from users searching for terms like “civil case Singapore” or “filing a civil suit.” Consumers need to be further educated in a relatable manner after they click through the ad onto your website.
That’s why CONTENT with a tinge of positioning is important!
I once found myself in the middle of a legal dispute and needed help from lawyers. Yet I found legal information difficult to access, and most law firm websites did not really explain or guide me with respect to my case. They all required me to book a “free call” with their legal secretary, which was really just a sales pitch. Those calls never helped me understand my options, how much my case might be worth, or whether it was even worth litigating at all. (In the end, the solution presented to me by a government intermediary didn’t involve any lawyers, and I achieved a favourable outcome!)
Once you identify your customer’s goals, fears and objections, you craft content that is a) unique to your experience, and b) positioned across every ad, every landing page, and every piece of content.
HENCE! Here are some ideas for the legal industry: address common legal questions and make them easy for someone without legal training to understand, especially in key practice areas such as employment, civil litigation, family law, and so on.
Craft FAQs or videos that explain complex legal issues in simple terms. Use videos, infographics, or simply laymen explanation to turn legal jargon into easily digestible content.
Thirdly, we included client testimonials taken from Google Reviews. Instead of faceless reviews, we used the profile pictures that clients themselves had uploaded to their Google profiles when leaving reviews for his firm. We were also very selective about the testimonials we used; we wanted them to be directly relevant to his core practice area on the civil litigation page.
Positioning Ideas We Used as a Boutique Law Firm
For Contigo Law LLC’s debt recovery campaign, we positioned legal recourse against other alternative methods like private debt collection.
We explained that legal recourse carries real weight. That going through the courts establishes formal and documented obligations for the claimant’s opponent. This means there are real consequences if the debtor does not comply. This explanation directly addresses the creditor’s goal (and answers a common objection) when trying to recover money.
Secondly, we explained the three-stage process of debt recovery through the legal system: sending a letter of demand first, obtaining judgment second, and then having enforcement options that is available within a 12-year window. This helps clients understand the process and paints a clear picture of a future in which they will be far better positioned to recover their debts through the legal system.
Instead of outright telling people that they should engage your legal services now and sue to get their money back, we combined consumer psychology and legal knowledge.
You don’t outrightly sell the service. You sell the method.
That is where good and ethical direct-response marketing comes in. We took this framework and iterated on it from his ad all the way to the landing page.
Lastly, our team organized his past experience from his curriculum vitae, created a table, and included it on his practice-area landing page. The table clearly shows his portfolio of handling cases in both B2B and B2C civil claims and debt recovery.
Making an Offer Consumers Can’t Refuse
Now that you have made the potential customer feel understood, it is time to nudge him over the finish line and secure a well-qualified lead. So how do we do that? We make an offer they cannot refuse, in The Godfather’s terms.
Firstly, as an SME law firm, your positioning against the big branded firms is that you target the mid-to-lower tier market. Here, individuals and SME owners want affordable, accessible, and good value legal services.
Secondly, we have to remember that you are marketing to people who do not know you, do not like you yet, and do not trust you yet. Therefore, giving value first is the core principle.
Here are the other positioning ideas we included on his landing page. First, transparent pricing. Second, the availability of fixed fees.
From a consumer standpoint, potential clients are always worried that lawyers will charge an arm and a leg for their services. Offering fixed fees and fully transparent pricing directly addresses these concerns and helps alleviate consumer fears.
Step 3) Installing Tracking & Analytics
Some time ago, I also spoke to another lawyer who specializes in family law, and he’s spending around $3000 to $5000 a month on Google advertising. I asked him if he’s tracking his ads from lead to client sign-up intake. He said no.
Ideally, you want to track every lead from ad to lead, to client on boarding. Where did they come from? Did they fill out a form? Did they WhatsApp you? How qualified are they as a lead? Did they become a client? What were their objections or concerns during your consultation calls?
For that to happen, certain digital analytics setups are required, namely Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager, and a Google spreadsheet that updates whenever someone fills out a form or books a call with you on your site.
Here’s a basic Google Tag manager setup, not too difficult once you get the hang of it.
You need to know exactly where every dollar spent on ads turns into revenue, ideally where you spend $1 and generate $2 or more. You must track which specific channel the leads are coming from (organic, direct, referral, paid social) and which practice area ( which landing pages) is generating the highest revenue for your firm.
Until you know track, you’re just guessing.
In Contigo Law’s case, tracking was not 100% optimized because we were only tracking WhatsApp clicks. The website was static (not built on a CMS like WordPress), and I had to coordinate with his part-time developer, who was also his friend, to implement the necessary changes.
We decided on using WhatsApp as an indicator because he had been getting enquiries from WhatsApp, and we were cautious about removing it. Yet, we relied on trust and his own feedback from leads he was getting.
However, ideally, you’ll want to output the leads to a Google Sheet and/or a CRM system for the law firm, so that we truly know the performance of our marketing campaigns.
Step 4) Testing Pay Per Click Advertising and Meta Advertising
I initially started with spending on Google Ads. However, I found that Google Ads for the civil litigation practice area are very crowded. Other competitors were already bidding quite high for clicks.
This search was done in an incognito window.
When you search for “debt recovery lawyer” the top results are packed with sponsored ads from competing firms. Everyone’s bidding on the same keywords.
From a data standpoint your cost per click for targeted keywords such as “civil litigation lawyer” can go up to $9.74. Imagine pay almost $10 for a click! Not that it cannot be done. A good Google Ads strategy does focus on bottom of the funnel keywords where people are ready to hire, but we were looking for a more efficient and cost effective approach.
However, in my professional judgment, Meta Ads is where law firms currently have an advantage. That is because most law firms haven’t figured Meta Ads out yet. The competition is much lighter, there is more creative leeway, and hence more opportunities.
Our Results for the Debt Recovery Practice Area
Our Results for Contigo Law LLC using Meta Ads
From the image above, you can see that we generated him 280 WhatsApp clicks to enquiries for $1.79 per WhatsApp click to enquiry for the entire campaign (that is still ongoing). From those clicks, we generated WhatsApp conversations that led to consults and signed cases.
Kelvin has provided a testimonial that states that he signed clients through our process.
Bonus
Since I was SEO trained, I built the page based on SEO principles and our page ranked on Google.com.sg Page One for “debt recovery lawyer Singapore”. This keyword has high commercial intent for businesses or individuals looking for debt recovery legal services.
It’s a bonus, but I guess if you work with a digital marketing agency or a digital marketer that has a full-stack digital marketing perspective you get free bonuses!
Our team also managed to drive some “free potential leads” through organic SEO through his debt recovery page.
Conclusion
This concludes our civil litigation law firm marketing case study. I understand that disputes are a bread-and-butter practice area for many lawyers and law firms. However, the way you acquire clients can still be highly strategic, relatable, and educational.
For civil litigation lawyers in Singapore, there is clear search competition and strong demand in pay-per-click (PPC) advertising methods.Yet because almost every law firm is buying Google ad space, the Meta platforms present a true blue-ocean opportunity.
Couple that with proper analytics, tracking, and strategic positioning, and you are on your way to creating a highly scalable client acquisition system for this key practice area.
