Get this: Only about 1 in 20 law firms have their websites professionally managed. The other 95% have a site built, then decide they’ll somehow make it searchable but they have no clue what they’re doing, so their big investment starts collecting cyber dust like a box of brochures on a shelf.

I know, I know—your firm doesn’t need site-management help because you’re good with Google, your paralegal made a site for a friend once and your admin likes blogging. Hell, for that matter, why not have your dentist handle depositions and the mailman can take your place in court? Eventually you’ll panic, hire a bunch of piece-meal vendors to try to keep it afloat and then waste time trying to manage them.

If you want high search rankings, you need a proven site-management company with the expertise, dogged mindset and dedicated hours to systematically keep your site in step with Google’s constant algorithm changes. (Admit it—you don’t even know what that means, do you?)

You need the real deal: 24/7 webmasters who live and breathe fully integrated, rigorous and nuanced searchability strategy, from SEO link-building, pay-per-click, Google Places and long-tail key-phrase microsites to social media tactics and YouTube channel finesse. There’s a reason our clients’ sites consistently out-rank the competition and it’s because of relentless Google geek pit bulls  whose sole job is to drive our clients’ sites to the #1 spot (which, in the world of p.i. law firms, we basically own at this point) and keep them there.

If it still isn’t sinking in, try this: Google’s objective is to fight clutter and clutter is exactly what patchwork, multi-vendor or in-house site management typically produces. At best, unintegrated site management is expensive and inefficient but at worst it’ll hurt your bottom line because if you engage in conduct Google considers obnoxious, you’ll be penalized.

It isn’t just about not confusing the consumer; it’s about not confusing—or pissing off—Google. If you do, it’ll shove your site so far down in rankings, nobody will ever find you. The days of gaming Google are over because if it doesn’t protect consumer experience, its own product will tank.

Don’t freak out, though. Even if you’re in that 95% of law firms doing it all wrong, it’s not too late, you’re still early enough to get on board now and screech past the competition. Then you can get back to what you do best—practice law.

I’ve lost count how many lawyers have argued with me that they don’t need help managing their site. They do, they just can’t accept that They Don’t Know Everything. They’re as irritating as the ones who insist they’ve gotta have a flock of microsites. But in that case I tell them the opposite: They don’t. More on that next time.