This playbook is for trial users at family law firms configuring GavelGrow for the first time. By the end of the 90-day cycle below you'll have an intake form that asks whether the matter is divorce, custody, child support or a prenup; missed-call text-back turned on (texts go out once US carriers approve your number); and a referral question on every lead record. The goal is to close the gap between leads who arrive in distress and your attorneys. Track your own contact rate before and after to measure the lift for your firm.
Marketing context: /solutions/family-lawIf a family law prospect does not get a live answer within minutes of reaching out, most move to the next firm on their list and do not call back. Your setup priority is missed-call text-back (texts go out once US carriers approve your number) and a calm, confidentiality-aware tone in every automated touch.
Divorce intake is not custody intake is not prenup intake. Generic forms either ask too much or too little, and either way leads feel unheard. GavelGrow runs one intake form per firm, so ask the matter type first, keep the shared questions short, and save the matter-specific detail for the first call.
Referrals from financial advisors, therapists, and prior clients drive a disproportionate share of family law revenue. Capture who referred each lead on every intake so the name sits on the lead record, and compare signed cases from referrals against your other channels.
Stand up case-type intake, missed-call recovery, and private lead alerts.
Tune the intake by case type, review referral results, and shorten time-to-consult for emotional leads.
Use modelled practice-area benchmarks, formalize referral cultivation, and lock in repeatable reporting.
Bracketed tokens like [city] are placeholders — replace with your firm’s service area before launching campaigns.
40-50% of paid budget — typically the highest-volume and highest-value family law category
25-30% — emotional intent, often higher conversion but lower retainer than complex divorce
10-15% — narrower volume but signals informed buyers and often referral-driven
5-10% — cheap clicks; protects against competitor bidding on your name
10-15% — soft intent; route to educational nurture rather than immediate consult
Put it first. Divorce, custody, child support, prenup, and modification each need different follow-up questions, and the answer tells the attorney which ones to ask on the callback.
Family law is highly venue-specific. Captures whether the matter is in your firm's practice area; mark out-of-area leads 'Not a fit' with the reason 'Outside our service area' so they stay on record.
For divorce, drives complexity assessment (short marriage vs long marriage). For custody, distinguishes married parents vs unmarried.
Custody and child support questions depend on this. Even in pure divorce intake, presence of minor children changes the case scope.
Y/N + name if known. Tells the attorney whether this is already a contested matter and lets your firm run a quick conflict check before the consult.
Domestic violence, emergency custody, or a pending court date raise priority. A yes here shows on the lead record so your team can call those leads back the same day.
Make it required. Choices can include a referring attorney, financial advisor, therapist, prior client, Google, Yelp or social, and the answer stays on the lead record. GavelGrow does not total signed cases by referrer, so review these answers yourself each quarter.
A checkbox your staff can tick on high-profile or interfamily matters so everyone handles them with care. It does not hide the lead, since every team member can open every lead, so also set new-lead alerts to 'Link only' to keep names and contact details out of alert emails.
Family law leads often cannot speak freely from home. Capturing preferred call windows prevents missed connections during awkward hours.
All sequences are consent-first by default — STOP / HELP keywords honored automatically, consent events captured to an append-only audit log.
Confirm receipt with a calm, confidentiality-aware tone: ‘We received your message — an attorney will reach you within 5 minutes at the contact method you preferred.’ Sets expectation and prevents the lead from calling competitors.
Offer same-day callback slots through your booking link, worded so it reads naturally even if someone has already called. The 5-minute window is decisive in family law; beyond it, contact rate collapses.
Gentle re-engagement: ‘Just making sure you got our earlier note. Reply at your convenience.’ Tone matters more than urgency in family law follow-up.
Educational soft touch — link to a brief, jurisdiction-specific overview (custody basics, divorce timeline). Builds trust without selling.
For non-responsive leads, one final low-pressure check-in: 'Whenever you're ready, we're here.' A week is as far out as a sequence step can go, so any longer-term newsletter runs from your own email tool.
Targets are anchored to GavelGrow modelled practice-area benchmarks. If a metric is off-target, the notes column points at the most likely root cause.
$72 mid-market average; $36 top 10% (per our modelled practice-area benchmarks)
If off-targetIf your CPL is above $90, audit case-type segmentation — divorce, custody, and prenup should each have their own campaign so you can pause underperformers.
Aim for full coverage via live answer + missed-call SMS recovery combined; track your firm baseline before and after this playbook
If off-targetIf contact rate is not approaching full coverage, missed-call recovery is misconfigured or the front desk is dropping calls. Check where each tracking number forwards first.
Track your consultation rate on the Reports page and benchmark against your firm's own historical baseline
If off-targetIf conversion is trending down, intake is usually failing on tone or speed. The missed-call SMS template tends to be the culprit — re-read it as a lead in distress.
Track your close rate on the Reports page and compare signed cases by channel on the Performance page; this is mostly a sales metric, not a marketing one
If off-targetIf attorneys see this trending down, the lead quality from a specific source may be the issue; compare signed cases by channel on the Performance page.
Aim for full coverage; leads without a captured referral source break downstream attribution analysis
If off-targetPhone and LSA leads never see the form, so ask the referral question on the first call and fill it in on the lead record. If form leads are missing it, make the field required.
Review quarterly; work out which referrers sent the most signed cases for your firm
If off-targetGavelGrow does not rank referrers for you. Each quarter, open your signed leads, note the 'Referred by' answer on each, list your top senders and schedule appreciation outreach. Underweighted referrers often respond strongly to a quarterly thank-you.
GavelGrow cannot hide a lead from other members of your firm today: every team member can open every lead, and roles only limit what each person can change. For sensitive matters, set new-lead alerts to 'Link only' so names and contact details stay behind login. On the Optimize plan, the audit log records lead and case status changes, deletions and full data exports, though not who viewed a lead.
Add a 'practice fit' question early in the intake form. Mark out-of-scope leads 'Not a fit' with the reason 'Not a type of case we take', so they stay on record and you can count them. GavelGrow does not record which firm you referred them to, so add that to the lead's notes.
Use case type as the primary intake question and add a 'related matters' multi-select on the same form, so the lead record holds both. Every family law visitor sees the same questions, so keep them to what you need before the first call and let the attorney cover the rest, then quote a unified retainer rather than two siloed engagements.
Avoid sending sensitive matter detail by text. Consent-based messaging is for confirmations and scheduling, not case substance, and texts only go out once US carriers approve your number. GavelGrow's Messages page shows your texts and automated emails, but you cannot write or reply from it yet, so send anything substantive from your firm's own secure email. Data in GavelGrow is encrypted in transit and at rest. Train intake staff on this distinction during onboarding.
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