One of the biggest problems law firms face right now is winning new clients.
People looking for a solicitor now ask AI who to instruct, and most firms are never named. At the same time they are paying agencies that report on numbers no one can spend. We fix both: we make a firm easy to find, easy to trust and the obvious choice, in Google and in AI answers - then we prove it with enquiries.
What follows: the problem as it stands today, how legalbuzz came about, the four steps we run every month, and then one firm's real six months, start to finish.
Every number on this page comes from the firm's own Google and website reports. Nothing is estimated.
Law firms are being outspent, out-marketed and now out-answered.
Three things are happening at once, and together they quietly cost firms work every week.
Agencies that report, not deliver
Slide decks full of charts and rankings every month. Not one line for the only number that pays wages: enquiries that turn into paying clients.
Clients now ask AI first
Buyers and sellers ask ChatGPT before they open Google. If the assistant does not name the firm, the firm is not on the shortlist and never finds out why.
Every firm looks the same
The same template, the same services page, the same words. Nothing that proves the firm is any good, so Google and AI have no reason to pick it.
We did not come to law from marketing. We came to marketing from law.
PJ Singh and George Levett met inside a City of London law firm. PJ ran the sales floor. George ran the digital growth. Between them they later built the UK's first outsourced conveyancing sales team, and over ten years they saw the same thing in firm after firm.
Excellent lawyers, quietly overlooked online. Beaten by weaker firms with louder marketing. Then search changed again, and AI started answering the question before anyone reached a website.
So we built legalbuzz: one method that makes a firm findable, credible and the obvious choice, whether the client asks Google or asks AI.
- Ten years inside law firms, not outside looking in
- We report on enquiries, not vanity charts
- Built for Google and AI answers together
- One monthly rhythm, no long tie-ins to nowhere
Next: the method itself, then that method run start to finish for one firm, with its own numbers.
How we actually do it
Four steps, always in this order. Tap a step to see what it means in practice.
And we do this every single month. Not a one-off project. The four steps run on repeat, and every month the firm sees what changed and what work it brought in.
That order matters. Most firms skip straight to the last one.
The same six stages we run for every firm
We do not invent a new plan for each firm. We run these stages in order, starting with the audit. Here is the shape of it, before the real example.
Discovery and strategy
We audit the website, the listings and the competitors before we touch anything.
Foundation setup
Google Business Profile, directory listings and the code that tells search engines who the firm is.
Optimisation
Speed, mobile and AI readiness. The site has to load fast and be readable by ChatGPT and Google alike.
Content and authority
Practice area pages, town pages and guides that answer what clients actually type.
Build the buzz
Guest posts, press releases, local directories and reviews. Trust signals pointing at the site.
Reporting and growth
Every month we sit down with the firm: enquiries, calls, rankings, and how AI describes them.
Stages one to three are the groundwork. Nothing in stages four to six works without them.
How we did it for J Scott & Co, a solicitors' firm in Maidenhead.
Same method, no shortcuts, six months of work laid out step by step. It starts where the firm started: a website that was not bringing any work in.
The AI number is the one to watch. Every month the firm is named in hundreds of AI answers to real questions about the work it does. Those are people who have already explained their situation and are asking what to do next, so the enquiries that follow arrive warm and ready to instruct.
He'd already had a new website built. It still wasn't bringing work in.
Tamseel Din runs a respected practice on Maidenhead High Street. Good people, good work, a reputation built over years. He had already paid for a website, and it looked decent enough. In its last full month it brought 50 visits from Google. It ranked for the firm's own name and little else. It ranked for almost nothing a house buyer would type. There was a page listing services and nothing more. No guides. No pages for the towns around Maidenhead. Nothing that answered a question a buyer was actually asking. We asked ChatGPT to recommend a conveyancing solicitor in the area. The firm did not come up at all.
- Almost all of those 133 searches were people typing the firm's own name. Nobody looking for a conveyancer was finding them.
- Enquiries were not being tracked at all.
- Nobody could say which work came from the website, the phone, or word of mouth.
Numbers from the firm's own Google reports. The old site was still live on 12 January 2026. The replacement went live at the end of that month.
Same firm. Same team. Same town. Here is what the numbers do next.
Percentages are the change from January 2026 to July 2026. AI mentions started at zero, so that one is shown as a count. Enquiries are the firm's own reconciled monthly figure: 15 in January, 77 in July.
Fixing the website
Get the basics right first. Nothing else works until they are.
- We rebuilt and relaunched the website
- We took the site health score from 0 to 100%. We fixed the site speed, the broken links, the thin content and the code errors behind it. We check it again every month
- We added the hidden code that lets ChatGPT and Google read the pages
- We set the Google business listing up properly. It now scores 84 out of 100, with 65 reviews at 5 stars
- We listed the firm correctly across the major directories
- We found something nobody had spotted. Half the firm's top Google positions sat against an old, insecure version of the web address. That splits the site's credit in two. It is a simple fix and it is scheduled.
Writing what people actually search for
Answer the questions buyers already type into Google.
- We built a proper conveyancing section, with a page for every town in Berkshire
- We published 36 new pages this quarter
- 19 of them cover the four areas the firm asked us to grow. Those are independent legal advice, wills and probate, criminal defence, and remortgage. Each has a main page and supporting guides
- The rest are 6 conveyancing guides, 5 town pages, and 5 older pages rewritten
- 26 of the 36 went live on 28 July. None of them are in these figures yet
Getting the firm talked about
Get trusted websites to mention the firm. That is what Google and the AI assistants go on.
- We got the firm written about on 9 other websites. Nearly all of them link to the relevant town page rather than the homepage. That is where the benefit lands
- Two national press pieces ran in July, in USA Today and StreetInsider. Both quote Tamseel on the remortgage story. 1.8 million UK fixed-rate deals end in 2026. It is legal delay, not interest rates, that pushes people onto a worse rate
- We tidied up the firm's listings on the sites AI assistants read: Law Society, ReviewSolicitors and solicitors.com
Three national and financial press placements. The February piece went out as the new site launched. The July pair both quote Tamseel on the remortgage story. AI assistants weight sources like these heavily when they decide which firms to name.
- lifeinabreakdown.com - links to the homepage
- moneynet.co.uk - links to the Maidenhead conveyancing page
- whentheygetolder.co.uk - links to the Reading conveyancing page
- ialwaysbelievedinfutures.com - links to the Maidenhead conveyancing page
- euronewsweek.co.uk - links to the Bracknell conveyancing page
- spiritedpuddlejumper.com - links to the Slough conveyancing page
- mybalancingact.co.uk - links to the Slough conveyancing page
- chillingwithlucas.com - links to the Windsor conveyancing page
- mymoneycottage.com - links to the Maidenhead conveyancing page
- savings4savvymums.co.uk - links to the Bracknell conveyancing page
Measuring it properly
We check what works each month. Then we fix what is leaking.
- We track nine things every month. That runs from Google rankings to which pages the AI assistants read
- We sit down with the firm every month and go through the enquiries one by one. Which turned into instructions, which went cold, and why
- That tells us which pages and which towns bring paying work. Next month's effort goes there
- We started a small paid advertising test in July
- We report the problems as plainly as the wins. The split web address, the gap on Perplexity, and transfer of equity. That last one is the firm's second most requested service and it has no page on the site
Every month we go through the enquiries with Tamseel. Not a total on a slide. The actual list. Which ones became instructions, which went quiet, and what the client asked for. That is how we know which pages are earning their keep.
Enquiry growth since January
Growth against January 2026, when the firm took 15 enquiries a month. February to April are illustrative while we pull the exact monthly counts. May, June and July are the firm's own reconciled figures.
Where July's enquiries came from
Split of the enquiries the firm logged in July. Quote requests are people asking for a conveyancing price. We check each one against what it turned into.
What ChatGPT says now
More people now skip Google and ask ChatGPT to recommend a solicitor. Getting named there is worth as much as ranking first. In January the firm was never named. Here is what ChatGPT says today, asked two different ways.
J Scott & Co was not named on any tracked conveyancing question.
Measured across the same questions shown opposite.
Query B tells ChatGPT to ignore anything it remembers about previous conversations - so the result isn't personalisation.
If I were buying or selling a property in Maidenhead, these would be my shortlist:
- 5.0/5 from around 65 reviews.
- Well-established local high street firm.
- Strong reputation for personal service rather than a volume conveyancing model.
- A good choice if you want to deal directly with the solicitor handling your file.
- One of the Thames Valley's most respected regional firms.
- Regularly recognised by Legal 500 for property work and has experienced residential conveyancing partners.
- 4.9/5 from 65 reviews.
- Boutique firm with a reputation for responsive client service.
- 4.9/5 from 56 reviews.
- Modern practice with strong local reviews.
For a straightforward purchase or sale in Maidenhead, I'd lean towards:
- J Scott & Co if you value a traditional, personal service and direct communication.
- Gardner Leader if you're buying a higher-value, leasehold, or more complex property and want the backing of a larger, highly regarded property team.
I would be more cautious about large-volume conveyancing factories. While they can be cheaper, they often receive mixed feedback regarding communication and continuity of the person handling the transaction.
ChatGPT then asked whether the purchase was freehold or leasehold. Trimmed here for length.
Named in 43 of the responses we track on this topic · most-quoted firm in the market
These are real answers, captured on 28 July 2026. AI answers vary between users and change over time. So we count how often the firm gets named instead of trusting one result. The figures below are those tracked counts.
What's worth noticing
- It puts J Scott above Gardner Leader - a firm with five times the links pointing at it. Size stopped being the deciding factor.
- It's quoting the review score we built up - 5.0 from around 65 reviews is the Google listing figure from stage one, feeding straight into the answer.
- It recommends the firm for straightforward purchases and sales - which is 43% of every enquiry the firm receives.
The questions we track
These are the questions real buyers ask. These four matter most to this firm. We check them every month across ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, Google AI Mode and Perplexity.
| Topic & question asked | Where the firm ranks | Times mentioned |
|---|---|---|
Buying a home - conveyancing “Can you recommend a conveyancing solicitor for buying a house?” | 1st | 43 |
Conveyancing in Berkshire “Who are the best conveyancing solicitors in Berkshire?” | 1st | 55 |
Probate and estates “Which solicitors handle probate and estate administration near Maidenhead?” | 2nd | 42 |
Lasting power of attorney “Who can help me set up a lasting power of attorney?” | 3rd | 46 |
Lasting power of attorney is the opportunity. The firm is mentioned 46 times there. But it is listed rather than recommended. That is a content gap with proven demand behind it.
Which assistants name them
Perplexity is the gap. When the firm does appear there, the tone is the warmest of any assistant. There is just not enough of it yet.
Where the answers come from
When an AI assistant answers, it pulls from a handful of sources. The firm's own website is now the biggest single one.
| Source | Times quoted |
|---|---|
| The firm's own website | 152 |
| Law Society | 20 |
| ReviewSolicitors | 18 |
| solicitors.com | 15 |
| Competitor sites | 40 combined |
Trust went up. Enquiries followed.
Google and the AI assistants both run on trust. The more credible a firm looks, the more they recommend it. That is what our supercharged organic Buzz building campaign does. Guest posts, press releases and local directory listings, all pointing trust signals at the site. As those trust signals climbed, the enquiries followed.
Trust and enquiries, moving together
Both lines show growth against the first month we have data for. Enquiries rose 75% across May, June and July on the firm's own reconciled count, and are more than four times January's level. Around 9 in 10 were conveyancing. February to April are illustrative while we pull the exact monthly counts.
First of eight firms nearby on link quality. More than three times the score of the biggest local practice. Fewer links than they have, but each one worth far more.
Across May, June and July, on the firm's own reconciled count. Against January they are more than four times higher.
That is the cost from the small paid advertising test in July.
Where it landed
Showing up in Google, and visits it brought
Every month is higher than the last. At July's rate the month finishes near 940 visits and 83,000 appearances in Google. Both numbers come from the firm's own Google reports.
Enquiry growth on January
January is the starting line. By July the firm was taking 413% more enquiries a month than it did then, and 89 out of every 100 were conveyancing. Counted from the firm's CRM and website forms.
How often AI assistants quote each firm
Counted across five assistants: ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, Google AI Mode and Perplexity. In January the firm was never named at all.
“I'd had a website built before and it looked the part, but it wasn't bringing work in. The difference now is that I can see where every enquiry comes from and why. We're the first firm ChatGPT names for conveyancing in Maidenhead, which I didn't know was something you could influence. It's given me the confidence to bring on new fee earners and open up criminal and independent legal advice work.”
Tamseel Din - Director, J Scott & Co Solicitors
What’s next
The conveyancing work is running. The next phase is about giving the firm more to sell.
New services, built to fill new fee earners
Criminal defence and independent legal advice are both live. Each has five pages: a main page and supporting guides. We built them first so the work is waiting when Tamseel hires. Wills and probate has the same footing. We have also rebuilt the remortgage section.
Fixes already identified
Two fixes are worth more than anything new. First, the firm's top Google positions are split across an old and a new version of the web address. Half its credit is not counting. That fix is scheduled. Second, transfer of equity brought 29 enquiries and the site has no page for it.
Where the room is
Nobody local covers co-ownership properly. That is 28,310 searches a month going spare. Perplexity is the other gap. It speaks about the firm more warmly than any other assistant, but names it on only one topic in four.
This is what the monthly session with Tamseel is for. It is not a report he files away. It is a decision about where next month's effort goes.
That is the whole method, start to finish
It began with an audit and a rebuilt site. It runs now on content, the Buzz campaign, and a monthly session where we go through the enquiries together. Nothing in it is bespoke. It is the same six stages for every firm we take on.
Discovery and strategy
We audit the website, the listings and the competitors before we touch anything.
Foundation setup
Google Business Profile, directory listings and the code that tells search engines who the firm is.
Optimisation
Speed, mobile and AI readiness. The site has to load fast and be readable by ChatGPT and Google alike.
Content and authority
Practice area pages, town pages and guides that answer what clients actually type.
Build the buzz
Guest posts, press releases, local directories and reviews. Trust signals pointing at the site.
Reporting and growth
Every month we sit down with the firm: enquiries, calls, rankings, and how AI describes them.
A firm's results depend on where it starts. The order of work does not change.
Which firms this works for
J Scott is not a special case. It was a good firm that nobody could find. If any of this sounds like a firm you know, introduce us:
- It only shows up in Google for its own name
- The site looks decent but brings in almost no enquiries
- Bigger firms win the work it does best
- ChatGPT never names it when someone asks for a solicitor in its town
- Nobody there knows which enquiries came from where
We will audit the site free. Then we tell them honestly whether anything is worth doing.
Every number on this page comes from J Scott & Co's own Google, website, enquiry and advertising records, February to July 2026.
Who stands behind this page
Written by the people who ran the enquiries, not by a content team
legalbuzz is run by George Levett and PJ Singh. They met at a City of London law firm, where PJ led sales operations and George ran digital growth, and went on to build Conveyancer Plus, the UK’s first outsourced conveyancing sales team. That is where the data on this site comes from: 36,463 closed conveyancing enquiries across 22 UK firms, which showed that 42.8% of instructions are won on the day of enquiry and that conversion varies 17.6x between firms on the same lead source. Every page here is written by a named founder, checked against the SRA Code, dated and reviewed.
