Criminal Defense: Book consults fast. Sign cases faster.

Criminal defense leads are in crisis. They need to hire someone today, not next week. GavelGrow captures them at the moment of arrest, routes to the right attorney, and keeps your intake running 24/7 for DUI, drug, and assault cases.

Common challenges for criminal defense firms

Leads call at 2am — nobody answers

A DUI arrest happens at 1am. They call 5 firms. The one that answers gets the retainer. Everybody else loses.

Local SEO is a full-time job

"DUI lawyer [city]" has 40 competitors in your market. Ranking is table stakes — and staying ranked requires weekly tuning.

Retainer urgency gets lost in handoffs

Lead comes in at 3am → assigned to intake the next morning → attorney calls back at 2pm. By then they have hired someone else.

What GavelGrow does for criminal defense firms

24/7 automated intake

Every lead gets an SMS + email response in 43 seconds, regardless of what time it hits. Captures case type, arresting jurisdiction, next court date.

After-hours call routing

Night and weekend calls route to the on-call attorney mobile with the client context pre-loaded. No more missed emergency leads.

Retainer-ready lead records

Lead records include jurisdiction, charge, bond status, court date, and prior record. Everything the attorney needs to quote a retainer on the first call.

Local SEO attribution

Every organic lead tracked back to the keyword, page, and search location. Measure which SEO pages actually generate retainers, not just traffic.

Benchmark — Avg. CPL (mid-market criminal defense)

$80 Avg. CPL (mid-market criminal defense). Top 10% of criminal defense firms run at $40 CPL. See exactly where your firm ranks.

Frequently asked questions

Can you route after-hours calls to the on-call attorney?

Yes. Call routing rules can be set by time of day, day of week, or emergency flag. Each tracking number can route to different attorneys based on case type (DUI vs. drug vs. assault).

How does this help with local SEO?

We track every organic search lead back to the exact keyword and landing page. See which "DUI lawyer [neighborhood]" pages generate retainers vs. which just get traffic. Budget tuning becomes obvious.

Do intake sequences ask bail/bond questions?

Yes. Pre-built criminal defense intake templates ask jurisdiction, charge, bond posted (Y/N), bond amount, next court date, and prior convictions. Fully editable.

Can this work for a solo defense attorney?

Yes — the Solo plan ($79/mo) is built for solos: 1 seat included (+$19/seat up to 4 total), 1 tracking number, 250 SMS, 500 leads/mo, and all the automation you need to compete with larger firms. Upgrade to Growth once you add intake staff.

Setting it up?

Once you have started a trial, the Criminal Defense setup playbook walks through the first 90 days — tracking number provisioning, intake field guidance, recommended Google Ads keyword themes, SMS cadence, and KPI targets anchored to the 500-firm benchmark dataset.

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