A fictional business. The figures are a modelled scenario, not a client result.
SEO case study · Local SEO
Rilska Legal
Corporate & property law firm · Sofia · Sofia, Bulgaria
+138%
consultation requestsover 10 months · modelled scenario
Book IThe brief
Rilska was well respected but invisible online, losing English-speaking investors and local clients to directory listings and larger firms.
Twelve lawyers, two practice groups and decades of referrals from notaries and banks — but online, the firm was a single “Services” page and a map pin with nine reviews. Foreign buyers searching in English for a property lawyer in Sofia found directory listings and three large firms; Bulgarian founders registering an EOOD found aggregators.
The brief was narrow and local: become the obvious choice in the map pack for property and company law, in both languages, without the firm behaving like anything other than a careful law firm.
Book IIDiagnosis
Title I
Unverified duplicate profile
An old listing at a previous address on Vitosha Blvd split reviews and confused the map pin.
Generic primary category
“Lawyer” only, competing with 900+ Sofia listings; no services, no practice-area attributes.
NAP drift across 14 directories
Three spellings of the firm’s name and two phone numbers across legal and business directories.
Title II
One page for every practice
Property, corporate, M&A and litigation sat on a single “Services” page targeting nothing.
Machine-translated English
A client-side translation widget: no crawlable English URLs, no hreflang, no English titles.
No LegalService schema
Lawyers, languages spoken and areas served were invisible to search engines.
Title III
Nine reviews in eleven years
Well-regarded by referrers, but the map pack only saw a handful of 2019-era reviews.
Lawyer bios without credentials
No bar registration, languages or matter types on profile pages — weak E-E-A-T for YMYL queries.
Book IIIThe strategy
Built on our Local plan — local seo for businesses whose clients choose from the map. Each tactic became a chapter with its own owner at the firm.
IChapter
One verified listing, rebuilt as a storefront.
IIChapter
Eight pages, one per matter a client actually searches for.
IIIChapter
A quiet, compliant habit at the close of every matter.
IVChapter
A real English edition, not a translation widget.
Book IVMonth by month
The gilt bar beside each entry is modelled consultation requests that month, out of a peak of 50.
Month I
Discovery
Audit of listing, site and citations; 40-term bilingual tracking set and 25-point map grid.
Month II
Listing
Duplicate merged, categories and services rebuilt, NAP corrected across 14 directories.
Month III
Architecture
Practice-area structure signed off; property and company-formation pages launched.
Month IV
English edition
/en/ section live with hreflang; widget removed; first three foreign-buyer guides.
Month V
Reviews
Post-matter review email rolled out to all twelve lawyers; response standard agreed.
Month VI
Depth
Remaining six practice pages, lawyer bios with credentials, LegalService schema.
Month VII
Local proof
Neighbourhood landing copy for Lozenets, Center and Mladost; legal-directory profiles.
Month VIII
Guides
EOOD registration and title-deed guides in both languages; internal linking pass.
Month IX
Refinement
Titles rewritten on pages ranking 4–10; GBP posts tied to new guides.
Month X
Handover
Playbook, review cadence and reporting handed to the firm’s office manager.
Book VResults
Pull a volume from the shelf to open it. Arrow keys move along the shelf.
Ex libris · Vol. I
+138%
Consultation requests
Rilska Legal
Findings · Folio I
Modelled scenario for a fictional business — not a client result. Rankings and traffic are never guaranteed; see our Terms.
Selected terms from the 40-term bilingual set, Google.bg, central Sofia grid point. Modelled positions.
| Search term | Lang | Before | After | Map pack |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| адвокат недвижими имоти София | BG | #14 | #1 | Top 3 |
| property lawyer Sofia | EN | — | #1 | Top 3 |
| регистрация на ЕООД адвокат | BG | #22 | #2 | Top 3 |
| company formation lawyer Bulgaria | EN | #41 | #3 | Organic |
| English speaking lawyer Sofia | EN | #18 | #2 | Top 3 |
| проверка на имот преди покупка | BG | #31 | #4 | Organic |
| corporate lawyer Sofia | EN | #27 | #3 | Top 3 |
| адвокат търговско право Лозенец | BG | #9 | #1 | Top 3 |
| buying property in Bulgaria as a foreigner | EN | — | #5 | Organic |
Colophon
A 10-month Local engagement: your listing, your practice pages, your reviews and — where your clients need it — a second language, bound into one plan.