A will-writing firm near Wrexham now comes up first, second or third across almost the whole middle of its patch when someone searches for a will writer on Google. Wales and North West Legal Services, run out on the Welsh border near Hanmer, sits in the map pack across Wrexham, Whitchurch and the towns in between, and on the broader search "legal services near me" only one other legal firm in the area ranks higher. When we took them on in the spring, Google barely knew their website was there.
Why most professional firms think the map isn't for them
Ask a solicitor, a will writer or an accountant about ranking on Google Maps and most of them assume it is a tradesman's game. They picture a plumber's van and a boiler, not a legal practice. The thinking goes that their clients come from referrals and word of mouth, so why would anyone pick a firm like theirs off a little map.
Here is the thing. People search "will writer near me", "solicitor near me" and "legal services near me" on their phone every single day, and the first thing Google shows them is three businesses on a map, before a single website. Someone typing that is not browsing, they are ready to get it sorted, and the three firms sat on that map are the ones who get the call. If you are not one of the three, you are not in the running, and you will never even know the enquiry existed.
Where they rank now
Here is where Wales and North West Legal land for "will writing services", their main search, on a recent map scan.
Map scan, 17 September 2026, "will writing services", 13x13 grid. Green is a top three position. The firm holds the top three right across the centre of its area, with an average map position of 6.33.
When we started with them in March, on that same search, they were twelfth on average across the map and in the top three in just 7.1% of it. By the end of April, on the same map, that was up to 15.98% and seventh on average, and their share of the local market had gone from 9.16% to 20.62%. On the most recent scan, in the middle of September, they averaged position 6.33 across the map, sitting first, second or third across the heart of their service area. On the broader "legal services near me", they come up second of every legal firm in the area by average map position, with a 44.32% share of the local market. That is a will-writing firm from a village on the border sat above practices many times its size.
How we got a legal firm onto the map
Three things did the heavy lifting here, and each one is still working for them today.
First, we sorted out the Google Business Profile. They had ended up with three separate profiles for the one business, which is the sort of thing that gets a listing suspended, and the main one carried 84 hard-earned reviews. We had Google merge the three into one, so every review sat under a single profile, then set the categories to what they actually do: Will Writing Service as the main one, Legal Services and Estate Planning behind it. We also stripped out the categories that were wrong for them, things like civil and property litigation that the firm does not touch, because a category you do not serve only muddies the signal.
Second, we built the website out. When we picked it up there were only two pages Google had indexed, a homepage and an about page, which gives the search engine almost nothing to go on. We rebuilt the homepage around "will writing services in Wrexham", added proper service pages for wills, powers of attorney and trusts, then a page for each town they cover: Wrexham, Whitchurch, Chester, Shrewsbury and Oswestry. Every one got the right local schema so Google knows exactly what the firm does and where it does it.
Third, we put the reviews and the profile to work. Those 84 reviews were sat invisible on Google and nowhere on the website, so we surfaced them on the homepage where they build trust the moment someone lands, kept the profile posting every week, and ran the citations so the same name, address and phone number show up the same way right across the web.
That is the whole system, and it is the reason they sit where they do. Google is trying to answer a local search with the business that fits it best and sits nearest the person searching. When a firm spells out exactly what it does, says where it does it, and has the reviews and the pages to prove it, that is the one Google puts in the three spots. A big practice in a far off city, however well known, loses that search to the local firm that matched it exactly and sat right where the person was looking.
How to tell whether the map is working for your firm
So how do you know if this is already earning you work, or passing you by. Start with your Google Business Profile. Is there just one, or has a second or third crept in over the years? Is your main category the exact service people search for, or something close enough. Are all of your services listed, or only a couple. Then look at your website. Does it have a page for each service and each town you cover, or is it a homepage and not much else. And are your reviews showing on the site, and still coming in every month, or did they stop a while ago.
If any of those is a no, the top three on your own doorstep is going to the firm that got it right, and you will not spot it on your website stats, because that enquiry never reaches your site. You can see more of these results on our results page.
How we measured this
Every number here comes straight off map scans, read exactly as printed, with nothing rounded or averaged. The headline scan ran on the 17th of September 2026 for "will writing services", across a 13 by 13 grid of 169 points covering the firm's patch, where a green point means the firm was in the top three at that spot. The March and April "will writing services" figures I put side by side are from scans on one and the same grid, so that climb is a true like-for-like, and the "legal services near me" figures are from a scan of the area on the 17th of April 2026.
We will scan your main search right across your area for free, show you where your firm comes up in the top three today and where the calls are going to someone else, and tell you what those missed enquiries are worth to a practice like yours. Start with a free ranking scan.
J
Runs Rank on Google and Nivoro Marketing from Bishopton, Renfrewshire.