A Rebuild Goes Better When the Hard Choices Come First
Most firms start a website project by looking at designs. That feels productive, but it puts the easy part first. The harder questions are about who the site serves, what it must do and what it already earns from search. If those stay open, a new design can quietly erase years of work.
Good law firm website planning settles those questions before anyone opens a design file. Firm owners can start with a decision sheet to fill out first. It covers audiences, account access, site goals, existing search traffic and the pages that must survive a rebuild.
If you are still deciding whether your current site needs repairs or a full change, start with our guide to law firm website problems. The steps assume you have already decided a substantial update is coming.
One note on method. We have not reviewed your site or tested any firm’s analytics. The steps below are ones your team can repeat, and where we rely on a published standard, we link to it.
Key Takeaways
- Write the decision sheet before you review designs or sign a build contract.
- Name your audiences in order, because a site cannot put everyone first.
- Confirm that the firm can sign in to every account before work begins.
- Pick two or three measurable goals, not a list of twelve.
- Export your search data and list your top landing pages before anything changes.
- Mark the pages that must survive, and map every old URL to a new one.
- Review advertising rules and confidentiality risks as part of the plan, not after launch.
What Is a Website Decision Sheet?
A decision sheet is a short document, often two or three pages. It records the choices that shape the project. Every vendor, partner and staff member works from the same copy.
It is not a creative brief or a sitemap. Instead, it sits above both. A designer can propose layouts later, but those layouts should answer the sheet, not replace it.
Who Should Fill It Out
At a solo practice, the attorney fills it out, ideally with whoever answers the phone. At a firm with several partners, assign one owner for the sheet. Other partners can comment, but one person collects answers and breaks ties.
For example, a three-partner family law firm might give the sheet to the managing partner. The intake coordinator adds notes on what callers ask. The partners then sign off in one meeting rather than over weeks of email.
When to Write It
Write it before you request proposals. Vendors quote more accurately when they see your answers. In addition, you avoid paying for discovery work you could have done yourself.
Who Is the Website Really For?
Every firm says the site is for clients. However, “clients” usually means several groups with different needs. Listing them in order is the first real decision in law firm website planning.
Ranking Your Audiences
Start with a list, then rank it. A typical list for a small firm looks like this:
- Prospective clients searching for help with a specific problem.
- Current clients looking for a phone number, portal or office hours.
- Referring attorneys checking your experience before sending a matter.
- Job candidates reading about the firm’s culture.
- Opposing counsel or reporters looking up a lawyer by name.
An estate planning firm might rank adult children of aging parents first. Their visitors often arrive worried and short on time. In contrast, a business litigation boutique might rank referring attorneys first, because most of its matters come from other lawyers.
What Each Audience Needs to Find
Next to each audience, write the one thing they must find in under a minute. For a prospective client, that might be “Do they handle my type of case in my county?” For a current client, it might simply be the fax number or the secure upload link.
These notes become your navigation later. If a referring attorney must find bar admissions and practice focus, the bio pages need that information near the top.
Audiences You Will Not Serve
Write down who the site is not for. A personal injury firm may decide it will not try to attract general legal questions. A criminal defense firm may decide not to write for people seeking civil remedies. This keeps the content plan focused and saves money.
Which Accounts Does the Firm Need to Control?
Before any change, confirm that the firm can sign in to the domain registrar, hosting, website platform and analytics accounts. Each login should belong to a firm email address, not to a former employee or vendor.
That is the entire decision for this sheet: yes or no, and who will fix any gaps. Ownership questions can be detailed, so we cover registrars, DNS and vendor logins in a separate guide. For now, add one line to the sheet. It should read “All accounts confirmed in firm control” with a date, or list what is missing.
What Should the New Site Actually Accomplish?
A goal such as “look more modern” is hard to measure. On the other hand, “increase consultation requests for estate planning” can be tracked. Pick two or three goals and write how you will measure each one.
Choosing Measurable Goals
Here are examples that firms commonly use:
- More consultation requests from one or two practice areas.
- Fewer calls asking for basic information, such as directions or document lists.
- Better-qualified inquiries, for instance fewer requests for practice areas you don’t handle.
- A faster path for referring attorneys to reach the right partner.
Notice that each goal points to a page or a process. For example, fewer “what should I bring?” calls might lead to a clear first-meeting checklist page.
Setting a Baseline Before Launch
A goal needs a starting number. Pull three to six months of current figures before the old site changes. Useful measures include form submissions, tracked calls and visits to key pages.
If the firm has no tracking at all, note that honestly. In that case, the first goal may be to set up reliable measurement. That is still a valid outcome for a rebuild.
Goals That Conflict
Sometimes goals pull against each other. A partner may want long, detailed practice pages, while another wants a short, simple site. Resolve the conflict on the sheet, not during design review. One workable answer is short overview pages with links to deeper articles.
How Much Search Traffic Does the Current Site Already Earn?
This is the step firms skip most often. Yet an older site may hold years of search visibility. A rebuild that changes URLs, removes pages or rewrites content can lose much of it if no one plans ahead.
Exporting Search Console Data
If the firm has Google Search Console set up, open the Performance report. Set the widest date range available, then export queries and pages. Save the files with today’s date in the name.
Look at the Pages tab first. Sort by clicks, and note which URLs bring visitors from search. You may find that a five-year-old article on a specific topic draws more visits than your home page.
Exporting GA4 Landing Pages
Next, open Google Analytics 4, if it is installed. Export a landing page report for the past twelve months. Include sessions and any conversion events you track, such as form submissions.
Compare the two exports. Search Console shows what people found in search. GA4 shows what they did after they arrived. Together, they tell you which pages both attract and convert visitors.
Listing Backlinks Worth Protecting
Other websites may link to specific pages on your site. Bar associations, local news stories, nonprofit partners and law school clinics are common sources. Search Console includes a Links report that lists top linked pages.
Write down each page that has outside links. If those pages move without a redirect, the links lead to an error page. As a result, visitors from those sites reach a dead end.
Checking Existing Redirects
Older sites often carry redirects from earlier redesigns. Ask your current host or developer for the list. Otherwise, a new build may drop old rules, and links that worked for years can quietly break.
Which Pages Must Survive a Rebuild?
Now combine your audience notes, goals and traffic data. The result is a list of pages that must carry over. Some will keep their URL, while others move with a redirect.
Pages With Proven Value
Mark any page that meets one of these tests:
- It ranks among your top pages by search clicks or by landing page sessions.
- It has links from other websites.
- It leads to consultation requests at a steady rate.
- Staff regularly send clients the link.
For example, a workers’ compensation firm might find that a page explaining its state’s claim deadlines draws steady search traffic. That page should survive, even if the wording is updated.
Pages Required for Operations
Some pages matter for reasons outside search. Payment pages, secure upload links, client portal logins and court-required notices fall into this group. Losing any of them can disrupt the practice on launch day.
Similarly, check your printed materials. Business cards, engagement letters and email signatures may point to specific URLs. Those URLs need a working destination.
Mapping Old URLs to New Ones
Build a simple spreadsheet with two columns: old URL and new URL. Every page on the current site gets a row. If a page is retired, map it to the closest relevant page, not just the home page.
Google’s guide to site moves with URL changes describes this mapping step. Its page on redirects and Google Search explains permanent redirects. Share both with your developer, and make the redirect map part of the contract.
Content to Retire on Purpose
Some pages should go. Examples include practice areas you no longer handle, outdated news posts and bios of lawyers who left. Retiring them is fine. Still, make the choice on the sheet so nothing is removed by accident.
How Do Advertising Rules Shape the Plan?
A website is attorney advertising in most states. Therefore, the content plan should account for the rules before writing starts.
Reviewing Claims and Credentials
ABA Model Rule 7.1 prohibits false or misleading communications about a lawyer’s services. Many states adopt similar language, though each state’s version controls. Common risk areas include words such as “expert” or “specialist,” past results and client testimonials.
Add a line to the sheet: who will check new content against your state’s rules? A firm in a state with specific disclaimer or filing requirements should note those too. Your state bar’s website is the place to confirm the current rules.
Carrying Over Old Content Safely
Pages that survive a rebuild still need a fresh read. An old page may mention a lawyer’s certification that has lapsed. It may also describe a result in a way your state now restricts. As a result, “keep this page” should mean “keep and review,” not “copy as is.”
Where Do Confidentiality Risks Appear in a New Site?
New sites often add new tools, such as chat widgets, intake forms, scheduling apps and AI assistants. Each tool can collect information from people who are not yet clients.
Intake Forms and Chat
ABA Model Rule 1.18 describes duties to prospective clients. Information they share can create obligations, even if the firm never takes the matter. For that reason, many firms limit intake forms to basic facts and add a note asking visitors not to send confidential details yet.
On the sheet, list every form and chat tool. Next to each, write where submissions go, who can read them and how long they are stored.
AI Tools and Third-Party Vendors
Some site builders and chat tools now include AI features. These may send visitor messages to an outside service. ABA Formal Opinion 512, issued in 2024, discusses lawyers’ duties when using generative AI tools, including confidentiality. Ask each vendor where data goes and whether it is used to train models.
Model Rule 1.6(c) also asks lawyers to make reasonable efforts to prevent unauthorized disclosure of client information. A short vendor review on the sheet is one practical way to show that effort.
What Does Law Firm Website Planning Look Like in Practice?
Consider a two-lawyer immigration practice planning a new site. The partners first rank audiences: family members sponsoring a relative come first, and employers come second. Next, they confirm every account sits under a firm email address.
Their goal is simple. They want more consultation requests for family petitions and fewer calls asking about document lists. The baseline comes from six months of form submissions.
The search exports hold a surprise. An old article on a common visa delay draws more search clicks than any practice page. A local nonprofit also links to it. So that article goes on the “must survive” list, with a fresh review for outdated facts.
Finally, the partners notice that a proposed chat widget would store messages with an outside vendor. They ask where the data goes before agreeing to it.
A Sample Decision Sheet You Can Copy
Here is a plain outline. Paste it into a document and fill in each line.
- Sheet owner and sign-off date: one name, one date.
- Audiences in order: top three, plus one “not for” line.
- What each audience must find: one sentence each.
- Account access: confirmed yes or no, with gaps listed.
- Goals: two or three, each with a measure and a baseline.
- Search data exports: Search Console queries and pages, GA4 landing pages, links report, existing redirects, all saved with dates.
- Pages that must survive: with reasons.
- Pages to retire: with their redirect targets.
- URL map: link to the spreadsheet.
- Advertising review: who checks, and which state rules apply.
- Confidentiality review: every form, chat and AI tool, with data handling notes.
- Launch checks: forms tested, redirects tested, tracking confirmed.
Most firms can draft this in two working sessions. The search exports take the longest, especially if no one has opened Search Console in a while.
Common Mistakes in Law Firm Website Planning
Even careful firms make a few predictable errors. Watch for these:
- Starting with design. Visual choices made first tend to drive content, rather than the other way around.
- Skipping the exports. Once the old site goes offline, historical page data can be hard to recover.
- Redirecting everything to the home page. Visitors and search engines both lose the context they came for.
- Copying old pages without review. Outdated claims carry into the new site.
- Adding tools without a data review. A new chat widget can collect sensitive details on day one.
- No one owns the sheet. Without a single owner, decisions stall or get revisited.
Common Questions
How long does law firm website planning usually take?
For a small firm, the decision sheet often takes one to three weeks of part-time work. Timing depends on how quickly partners respond and whether analytics are already set up. Larger firms with many practice areas may need longer.
Do we need a new website if our traffic is good?
Not always. Strong traffic is a reason to be careful, not a reason to avoid change. If the site works but looks dated, a redesign that keeps URLs and content structure may carry less risk than a full rebuild.
What if the firm never set up Search Console or GA4?
Set them up now, even if the rebuild is soon. A few weeks of data is better than none. You can also ask your current developer for server logs or any older analytics account.
Should we keep old blog posts?
Keep posts that draw traffic, earn links or still help clients. Update facts that have changed. Retire posts that are outdated or off-topic, and redirect each to the closest relevant page.
Who should check the new site against advertising rules?
Assign one lawyer at the firm to review new and carried-over content. Check your state bar’s current rules, since requirements vary by state. Do this before launch, not after.
Next Steps
A rebuild works best when the firm decides what matters before anyone designs anything. Start the sheet this week, beginning with the search exports, because that data is the easiest to lose. If you would like a second set of eyes on your plan, reach out to the Lawgility team.
References and Review Date
Reviewed October 24, 2026.
- Google Search Central, Site moves with URL changes
- Google Search Central, Redirects and Google Search
- Google Search Console Help, Performance report
- ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct 1.6, 1.18 and 7.1 (model rules; your state’s version controls)
- ABA Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility, Formal Opinion 512 (2024), Generative Artificial Intelligence Tools
