Good law firm website design is less about looks and more about answering a worried visitor's questions in the right order. These are the elements we would plan into any solicitor website design.

Design for the moment someone needs a solicitor

Most visitors arrive with a single problem: a house sale, a dismissal, a parent's estate. They are not browsing your firm, they are checking whether you can help with that one thing.

So every page should quickly answer four questions: do you handle my matter, what will it cost, who will I deal with and how do I get in touch? If a visitor has to hunt for any of those answers, the design is getting in the way.

Tone matters too. Most firm websites call themselves "trusted" and "experienced", so a clear position on who you serve best gives the design something real to express. Our branding work starts there, before any colours or fonts.

Plan the structure around matters, not departments

Internal departments rarely match how clients think. A clear structure usually has a page for each matter type, a fees section, a people section, an about page with regulatory details and a simple contact page. Firms with more than one office benefit from a page for each office.

Each matter page should explain who it is for, the key stages, how fees work and who does the work, with a way to get in touch at the end. These pages are also what search engines rank, which we cover in SEO for solicitors.

Build the SRA information into the design

The SRA Transparency Rules set out what an SRA-authorised firm must show on its website. Treat these as design requirements from the start, not footer links added at the end. The SRA also has guidance on publishing your complaints procedure.

The listed services include residential conveyancing, uncontested probate, some immigration work, summary-only motoring offences and dismissal claims at the employment tribunal, plus debt recovery up to £100,000 and premises licensing for businesses. The SRA clickable logo, which the rules call the digital badge, has been mandatory since 25 November 2019 and links visitors to information on the protections regulation brings. It only works on a web address registered to the firm in mySRA, so update mySRA before launching on a new domain and allow at least 24 hours.

Make price pages easy to read

Rule 1 sets out what cost information must include, and the SRA's price and service guidance adds detail and templates. Good design turns that list into something a client can follow.

Worked example. A probate fees page might be laid out as follows, with each item as its own short section.

• The total cost, or an average or range where a single figure is not practical

• The basis for the charge, such as a fixed fee or hourly rates

• What is included, the key stages and likely timescales for each

• Anything a client might expect to be included that is not

• Likely disbursements and their cost, or an average or range where the exact cost is not known

• Whether VAT applies, and how much

• The experience and qualifications of the people doing the work and their supervisors

The guidance also says an online quote calculator must produce a quote without the person having to make further contact first. If you add one, design it to show the figure on screen.

People and proof

Clients hire people, so real photos and plain-English profiles matter more than stock images. For the listed services, the rules also require the experience and qualifications of the people doing the work and their supervisors.

The SRA says this information does not have to sit on the price page, and can live in your existing team biographies. A good profile template covers role, qualification date, the matters each person handles and how to contact them.

Reviews, accreditations and memberships work best on each matter page, close to the enquiry form, rather than on a page nobody visits. Keep every claim accurate and current, because the SRA Code of Conduct requires publicity to be accurate and not misleading.

Make getting in touch effortless

Put a tap-to-call number and a short enquiry form on every matter page. Ask only what you need to route the enquiry, and say when someone will reply.

Route enquiries by matter type so the right team sees them first. Track each enquiry by page so you can see which parts of the site bring in work.

Accessible, fast and safe to relaunch

Many clients are older, anxious or using a small screen. The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (currently WCAG 2.2) set testable criteria at levels A, AA and AAA, and are a sensible standard to design to.

Pages should also load quickly on a phone, as covered in our guide to Core Web Vitals. Choose a platform your team can update without a developer, because people, fees and guides change often.

If you are redesigning, remember that an existing site may already rank for valuable searches. Map every old URL to its new page and set up redirects before launch, as set out in our website redesign checklist.

How The Think helps law firms

We design and build websites in Framer, with copywriting, branding and SEO in the same team. For a law firm, that means a structure built around matter types, price and complaints pages planned in from the start, and a CMS your team can update.

Our websites start from £7,500 with a fixed quote, and our guide to website costs explains what drives the price. See our law firm website design page for how we work.