What is a realistic cost per signed client when hiring a marketing company? Roughly $300 to $1,500 for most non-contingency practice areas, and $2,000 to $8,000 in competitive personal injury — with local search typically the cheapest channel and paid search the most expensive.
The same firm can pay $400 per signed case from its Google Business Profile and $2,400 from paid search in the same month. The channel mix drives the number more than the agency does.
- Published pricing — $2,500, $3,500 and $4,500 a month, on the site.
- Month to month. No contract is holding you anywhere.
- A former attorney of 17 years who filed 5,000+ cases works your account.
- You see your rankings move for 14 days before you are billed a dollar.
- Law firms only — no other industries, ever.
| Attorney Pro Marketing | Scorpion | FindLaw | Typical legal agency | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pricing published on the website | Yes — $2,500 / $3,500 / $4,500 per month | Not published | Not published | Rarely published |
| Contract term | Month to month, 30 days’ notice | Not published | Not published | Commonly 12 months |
| Who works on your account | A former attorney of 17 years, in every account | Assigned account team | Assigned account team | Account manager, often across industries |
| Your website is built on | Standard, portable code | Proprietary platform | FirmSite platform | Varies — ask before signing |
| See results before you are billed | Yes — 14 days, then you decide | No | No | No |
| Ad spend billed by Google directly to you | Yes, no markup | Ask | Ask | Often passes through the agency |
“Not published” means the figure does not appear on that company’s own website as of October 2026 — check for yourself before you sign anything, with them or with us.
Ranges by Practice Area
These reflect total marketing cost — agency fee plus advertising plus subscriptions — divided by signed matters attributable to marketing, in a steady-state programme rather than month one.
- Estate planning and business formation: roughly $200 to $600. Lower competition, high organic potential, clients research before calling.
- Immigration: roughly $300 to $900, varying substantially by matter type and language market.
- Family law: roughly $400 to $1,200. Competitive in most metros, high intent, substantial Map Pack share.
- Criminal defence: roughly $500 to $1,500. Urgent, often mobile searches, expensive clicks.
- Employment and business litigation: roughly $800 to $2,500. Lower volume, higher value, longer consideration period.
- Personal injury, competitive metro: roughly $2,000 to $8,000, and higher in the most contested markets. Case values support it.
Use these as a sanity check on your own figure, not as a target. Your market size, your close rate and your channel mix will move you within and sometimes outside these bands legitimately.
Why the Channel Matters More Than the Agency
The same firm, in the same month, routinely pays very different amounts per signed matter depending on where the client came from.
Google Business Profile is usually cheapest. The cost is labour — posts, photographs, review activity, category accuracy — with no media spend. Once the position is held, the marginal cost of the next call is close to zero.
Organic search is cheapest over time and most expensive at the start. The first three months produce little and cost full price; by month twelve the pages written in month one are still producing at no additional cost. The lifetime figure looks very different from the first-quarter figure.
Local Services Ads sit in the middle. Charged per lead by Google, usually at a lower effective cost per case than search ads in the same market.
Paid search is most expensive per case and fastest to produce them. You are buying immediate position in an auction against everyone else who wants it. The right use is speed and testing rather than foundation.
Which means a firm's cost per signed case is substantially a function of its channel mix, and improving the number is often a matter of shifting weight rather than negotiating a fee.
The First Three Months Will Mislead You
Early cost per signed case is always bad, for three structural reasons rather than any failure.
Build costs land in months one to three but the matters they produce arrive later. Paid campaigns are still gathering the search-term data that removes waste. And organic work has produced nothing yet while being paid for in full.
A firm calculating cost per signed case at month two will get a number two to four times worse than its steady state, and firms that cancel on that number have tested only the expensive part of the curve. Calculate it, by all means — but compare month six to month three rather than month two to a benchmark.
Lowering It Without Spending Less
- Raise the close rate. Cost per signed case is cost per contact divided by close rate. Going from 30 to 40 percent lowers your cost per case by a quarter with no change to spend at all.
- Shift weight toward local and organic. The cheapest channels per case, and the ones most firms under-fund relative to paid.
- Narrow targeting. Negative keywords and tighter geography remove spend that was never going to convert.
- Fix the page before buying more traffic. Doubling contact rate halves cost per case, and is usually weeks of work rather than quarters.
- Separate the number by channel. A blended figure hides the one channel that is dragging the average and the one carrying it.
Step 5 is the one that unlocks the rest, which is why call tracking with recordings and lead attribution is part of our engagements from the Growth tier, with advertising billed to your firm directly by Google so the media cost in the numerator is exact rather than bundled. Pricing is published at $2,500, $3,500 and $4,500 a month, which fixes the other half of the numerator before you start. The Google Business Profile work is included on every tier, including the cheapest channel per case rather than treating it as an add-on.
And the structure gives you an early read rather than a six-month wait: rankings recorded on day 0, movement reported on day 14, nothing billed for that period if it has not moved enough to continue. Month to month with 30 days' notice after that.
See it before you pay for it.
We snapshot your rankings on day 0, build and launch your site within three days, and show you the movement on day 14. If it has not moved enough to be worth continuing, you owe nothing for that period and you keep the Google Business Profile work.
Related Questions
In steady state, roughly $200 to $600 for estate planning, $300 to $900 for immigration, $400 to $1,200 for family law, $500 to $1,500 for criminal defence, $800 to $2,500 for employment and business litigation, and $2,000 to $8,000 for personal injury in competitive metros where case values support it.
Usually the Google Business Profile, because the cost is labour rather than media and the marginal cost of the next call is near zero once position is held. Organic search is cheapest over time and most expensive in the first quarter. Competitive paid search is the most expensive per case and the fastest to produce them.
Three structural reasons: build costs land in months one to three while the matters they produce arrive later; paid campaigns are still gathering search-term data that removes waste; and organic work has produced nothing yet while being paid for in full. Expect month two to be two to four times worse than steady state.
Raise your close rate, since a move from 30 to 40 percent cuts cost per case by a quarter with no spend change. Shift weight toward local and organic. Narrow targeting with negative keywords and tighter geography. Improve the page's contact rate. And separate the figure by channel, which reveals what a blended number hides.