Lawyer firm marketing: comparing five named suppliers
Of the 40 legal-marketing suppliers we read in full on 3 August 2026, 12 published a price and 1 offered work with no minimum term. That is the whole difficulty of choosing one. Below are five named suppliers, what each type of supplier suits, and three situations where we are the wrong answer.
Last updated: 4 August 2026
What are you actually buying when you hire a marketing firm?
One of four different things, sold under one name, which is why proposals are so hard to compare.
| What is being sold | What it looks like | Who it suits |
|---|---|---|
| A website build | A fixed project, delivered and finished | A firm whose site is the bottleneck |
| A retainer | Ongoing content, links and reporting | A firm competing on contested searches |
| Media buying | Ad management, paid by fee or share of spend | A firm that needs instructions this quarter |
| A directory listing | Placement where buyers compile shortlists | A firm with no presence at all |
A proposal that does not say which of these four it is cannot be compared with one that does. That is the first question to ask, and it eliminates roughly half the shortlist in a single email.
A damaging admission before the comparison: we sell the first two. If what a firm needs is the third, we are not the supplier, and the section below says so plainly.
Which suppliers publish a price?
Five named, from the 40 we read in full on 3 August 2026.
| Supplier | Published a price on the site |
|---|---|
| onthemap.com | Yes |
| paperstreet.com | Yes |
| consultwebs.com | No |
| themodernfirm.com | No |
| exults.com | No |
⚠ We are recording whether a price appeared, not what it was. The figures our tooling collected from these pages mixed genuine fees with case values and half-sentences, and attributing a number to a named business on that basis would be publishing something unverified. Two of these five will tell you a price before a call. The other three will not.
Across the full 40:
| Count | Share | |
|---|---|---|
| Published any price | 12 / 40 | 30% |
| Published only a "from" range | 5 / 40 | 13% |
| Claimed a guarantee | 8 / 40 | 20% |
| Offered work with no minimum term | 1 / 40 | 3% |
15 of the 62 questions buyers ask on these searches are price questions. The most-asked question in this market is the one 70% of suppliers decline to answer.
How much should a law firm spend on marketing?
Work backwards from what the searches cost to buy, not forwards from a percentage of revenue.
In New York, 14,800 people a month search for personal injury representation and Google charges around $73.14 for a click, measured 3 August 2026. A hundred clicks is roughly $7,314 and is emphatically not a hundred instructions.
That figure sets a ceiling on what any supplier can reasonably charge for organic work on the same terms. If ranking for a search costs less over a year than buying a quarter of its clicks, the work justifies itself. If a supplier's annual fee exceeds what the entire search would cost to buy outright, ask why.
Our Practice Sprint is $1,450 and the build tier is $2,900. Both are fixed and published, and there is no minimum term.
Where is another supplier the better choice?
Three situations, and they are not hypothetical.
When the firm needs instructions this quarter. Organic work does not produce anything measurable in month one and is not fairly judged before month six. A firm with a cash-flow problem now needs media buying, and a specialist agency running paid campaigns daily will beat us at it. We do not manage ad spend.
When the firm wants one supplier for everything, including television and print. Full-service agencies of that shape exist in this market and coordinate media we do not touch. If the requirement is one throat to choke across every channel, that is a real reason to choose someone else.
When the constraint is fee-earner capacity rather than instructions. If the diary is full, better rankings produce declined work and a longer waiting list. No supplier on any shortlist fixes that, and one who takes the engagement anyway is selling something the firm does not need.
A comparison page that always concludes "us" is an advert. Those three are the honest boundaries of what we do.
What should a proposal contain before you sign it?
Six things. A proposal missing more than two of them is not comparable with one that has them all.
- The price, as a figure rather than a range.
- The term, and what happens at the end of it.
- Which of the four things above is actually being sold.
- What arrives, by name — pages, reports, fixes — rather than "ongoing optimization".
- Who owns the accounts and the work if the relationship ends.
- What the supplier will not do. A proposal with no boundaries has not been thought about.
Number six is the most revealing and the least often present.
Why do you refuse to charge per lead?
Because the model is restricted in parts of this profession and inadvisable in the rest.
Referral fees are prohibited in prescribed legal business, and the prohibition binds the firm paying as well as the party being paid. In the United States, lawyer advertising runs through ABA Model Rule 7.2(b), adopted differently state by state, so an arrangement that is ordinary in one jurisdiction is a problem in the next.
We charge for the work, by scope and time. Never by outcome, never by volume, never per inquiry. Most suppliers pitching law firms do not know the rule exists, and that is worth establishing about anyone on a shortlist.
Before you shortlist anyone
We read 40 legal-marketing suppliers in full in August 2026 — including several on this page. Twelve published a price. One offered work with no minimum term.
The free report gives you the full count, named, so you can repeat it rather than take ours. It also shows how many people search for your practice areas in your town, and what those clicks cost to buy at Google's own prices.
Get the report — five questions, about two minutes →
No call required. Our own prices are on that page.
Where should I read next?
Best law firm SEO company is the shortlist version of this page, using a different supplier set. Law firm SEO services covers what the search work actually contains.
By city, where the click prices differ sharply: law firm marketing Los Angeles and Los Angeles law firm SEO.
If the question is who to hire internally rather than externally, law firm marketing positions covers the roles firms build in-house and when that is cheaper.
Frequently asked questions
How do I compare law firm marketing suppliers?
Establish which of four things each is selling — a website build, a retainer, media buying, or a directory listing. Proposals for different things cannot be compared, and asking that single question usually eliminates half a shortlist immediately.
Do marketing suppliers publish their prices?
Mostly not. Of 40 suppliers read in full on 3 August 2026, twelve published any price and five of those gave only a range. Of the five named on this page, onthemap and paperstreet published a price; consultwebs, themodernfirm and exults did not.
How much should a law firm spend on marketing?
Work backwards from what the searches cost to buy. A New York personal injury click was around $73.14 against 14,800 monthly searches on 3 August 2026, so a hundred clicks is roughly $7,314. If an annual fee exceeds what the whole search costs to buy outright, ask why.
When is another supplier a better choice than you?
When the firm needs instructions this quarter and therefore needs media buying, which we do not do. When it wants a single supplier across television and print as well. And when the real constraint is fee-earner capacity, in which case no supplier helps.
What should a marketing proposal include?
A price as a figure rather than a range, the term and what follows it, which of the four services is being sold, what arrives by name, who owns the accounts if it ends, and what the supplier will not do. The last is the most revealing and the least common.
Should I trust a supplier that guarantees rankings?
No. Nobody controls the ranking. Eight of the 40 suppliers we read claim a guarantee, which in practice means a promise about terms nobody searches or a refund clause that is hard to invoke.
Do you charge per lead or per case?
No. Referral fees are restricted in prescribed legal business and the restriction binds the paying firm as well as the recipient. US lawyer advertising runs through ABA Model Rule 7.2(b) state by state. We charge for the work by scope and time.