Law Firm Website Redesigns: Seven Common Pitfalls (and How to Avoid Them)

Redesigning your law firm’s website is exciting, but it can also be overwhelming. Whether you’re looking to modernize your firm’s brand, showcase professional lawyer bios, improve SEO, or better serve your clients, a redesign is a major investment of time and resources. You want to make sure you do everything right.

Yet many website projects encounter the same pitfalls: unclear goals, last-minute scrambles, internal disagreements, and revisions that never seem to end. These pitfalls, however, are avoidable. At Cubicle Fugitive, we’ve helped many law firms successfully manage their website redesigns and we’ve seen the common challenges law firms encounter when redesigning their websites. More importantly, we know how to avoid them. Here are seven things your firm needs to watch out for if you want your website redesign to run smoothly from start to finish.

What is a Website Redesign?

Let’s back up and consider what a website redesign is and why your law firm might consider one. At its most basic, a website redesign is taking your firm’s current website, understanding what works (and what doesn’t), and redesigning it into something that meets your firm’s current needs. A law firm might undertake a website redesign for several reasons, including addressing obsolete features, revising unclear or outdated content, prioritizing new business goals, or updating its visual design to reflect current brand messaging. Whatever the reason, the goal of a website redesign remains the same: to create a better user experience that helps it connect with existing—and potential—clients.

Common Website Redesign Pitfalls (and How to Avoid Them)

A website redesign is a complex project that requires input, management, and sign-off from numerous stakeholders throughout the process. Without clear goals and proper planning, it is easy for your firm’s project to get sidelined by delays and disagreements. Here are the pitfalls we see most often and what your firm needs to do to avoid them.

1. Not Having Content Ready for Migration

Why it’s a problem: Content is often the biggest bottleneck in a redesign. Law firms often underestimate how much needs to be reviewed, rewritten, or retired, causing delays that interfere with anticipated launch dates.

What to do instead: Begin with a content audit by a key partner or stakeholder who knows the firm. Identify your firm’s desired messaging and determine what you need to do to align existing and future content. Flag what’s staying, what’s outdated, and where gaps exist. Identify which pieces of content will take the most time to draft or edit, whether due to complexity, stakeholder input, or length, and prioritize those early in the process. Most often, lawyer bios and practice area web pages take the most time, requiring multiple rounds of reviews and approvals. Having content prepared in advance means fewer surprises later and a faster, smoother launch.

2. Too Many Decision-Makers, Too Late in the Process

Why it’s a problem: When feedback comes from everywhere (and often too late), it leads to endless revisions and unclear direction. This slows momentum and waters down the end result.

What to do instead: Help your firm avoid costly back-and-forth with non-invested parties by identifying key stakeholders and clarifying individual roles at the project’s outset. Designate a lead decision-maker or a small team to have the final say on matters. Ideally, these are persons in firm leadership who are actively engaged with the project, understand your firm’s redesign goals, and can objectively provide direction on questions of functionality, content, and design. Your firm’s marketing manager should also be actively involved in the decision-making process and can apprise firm leadership of project developments, providing important feedback on key milestones. Regardless of who’s in charge, engaging your team at regular intervals is crucial for managing expectations and streamlining the decision-making process.

3. Designing for Internal Preferences, Not the Client Experience

Why it’s a problem: Focusing on internal priorities or preferences is easier—after all, who knows your firm better than your lawyers? But that approach doesn’t always lead to good outcomes for the client, who may have difficulty navigating a website stuffed with legal lingo and industry jargon.

What to do instead: Your law firm’s website should make it easy for clients to find your firm. This means aligning design decisions to client expectations. Put yourself in your client’s shoes and consider what they are looking for. Can a potential client clearly identify how you can solve their problem? Would you show up in a Google search for common terms related to your practice area? What content or features does your client actually want? Understanding your client’s needs and preferences can help you organize your website’s content and determine how to speak their language. Site analytics and user feedback can also provide useful data points for understanding how clients use your firm’s website, helping you to tailor your redesign accordingly.

4. Not Knowing What’s Working on Your Current Site

Why it’s a problem: If you don’t know how people use your current site, you risk breaking what’s working or repeating what isn’t.

What to do instead: Before starting, dig into your firm’s website analytics to better understand current traffic patterns, such as top-performing pages, traffic sources, and drop-off points. Understanding how your firm acquires clients can inform your firm’s redesign, helping you prioritize content for practice pages that are driven by online conversions versus practice areas that may be more referral-based. Knowing who at your firm has a stake in your website’s success can help you identify project stakeholders, redesign priorities, and areas for further improvement, such as adding a FAQ for a popular topic. These insights can help you create a website that enhances what’s already working, helping you allocate resources for a better return on investment.

5. Never-ending Revisions

Why it’s a problem: Without clear checkpoints and time limits, law firm website redesigns can stretch into months of back-and-forth tweaks, eating up budget and time.

What to do instead: Prevent scope creep by setting expectations at the outset for approval sign-off and guidelines around how feedback should be communicated. Identify clear goals and milestones at the project's outset and align on visual design preferences and content needs before your team gets started. While some revisions are to be expected, keeping lines of communication clear throughout the process and providing regular updates can keep everyone on the same page, minimize misunderstandings, and keep your project moving forward, reducing the need for rework.

6. Lack of a Clear Visual Direction

Why it’s a problem: Starting a redesign without a clear visual direction or inconsistent branding can lead to misalignment across your website, compromising your firm’s brand identity and confusing potential clients.

What to do instead: The goal of your law firm’s website is to stand out from the competition; you do this by having a consistent visual brand that makes it easy to identify your firm. Think of your favourite brand—you’d likely be able to recognize its logo even if certain aspects were changed. It’s the same with your law firm’s website; the brand guidelines are just the starting point—consistently rolling them out is where your brand takes flight.

If your redesign is hindered by disagreement over visual direction, try finding common points of consensus. Is there a colour that speaks to the firm’s personality? Can everyone agree on the logo design? Does the content’s tone of voice resonate? By nailing down your visual direction and understanding your firm’s brand, you can consistently roll out core thematic elements in your firm’s redesign, helping to establish your firm’s brand recognition.

7. Not Connecting the Redesign to Business Goals

Why it’s a problem: A website isn’t just a design project; it’s a strategic business development tool. When treated as a visual refresh without considering the bigger picture, you miss the opportunity to support your firm’s strategic objectives.

What to do instead: Find a clear connection between your law firm’s redesign and its overall business goals. A good rule of thumb is to start at the end goal and work your way backwards. You can do this by identifying the key components your firm’s website needs to facilitate strategic growth and jettisoning unnecessary features. Whether you’re prioritizing lead generation, strong search engine rankings, or effective brand storytelling, let your firm’s business strategy lead your website’s redesign, not the other way around.

How to Prepare for a Website Redesign: Quick Tips for Success

Now that you have an idea of what not to do, here are a few steps you can take before the redesign begins to set your project up for success:

• Audit your content. Know what you have, what’s outdated, what needs to be rewritten, and what’s missing entirely.
• Set stakeholder roles early. Who gives feedback on designs or content? Who approves and when should they be engaged? Clarify this before the first designs land in your inbox.
• Clarify your website goals. Is it more leads? Better SEO? Improved user experience? Building name and brand recognition? Know what success looks like before you get started.
• Define your audiences. Who are you designing for? What are they looking for in a law firm? What are their pain points and needs?
• Review your analytics. Look at top-performing pages, bounce rates, user flows, and traffic sources. Client usage patterns should guide your design decisions.
• Gather your brand materials. Ensure your visual guidelines, logo files, tone of voice, and messaging are current and accessible.

Plan First, Launch Smarter

A successful website redesign for a law firm isn’t just about a fresh look; it’s about making smart, informed decisions that support your business goals. The more preparation you do upfront, the smoother the process will be. Whether you're just starting to explore a redesign or already planning one, aligning your team, clarifying your goals, and understanding your current site will save time, reduce stress, and lead to better outcomes in the long run.

Redesigns can be complex, but they don’t have to be difficult. At Cubicle Fugitive, we specialize in helping law firms navigate the website redesign process, providing comprehensive support from design to post-launch. Whether your website needs strategic messaging, seamless content migration, or improved SEO capabilities, our team can help you avoid common redesign pitfalls and ensure your website’s redesign meets your firm’s business goals. Contact us to learn how we can help your law firm identify the key elements for a successful redesign process.