Case Study: Analyzing 1,000 Law Firm Websites for Average Backlinks, Organic Search Traffic and Keyword Positions

Updated October 2, 2026 · Originally published May 31, 2020

Historical case study — data collected in 2020.
The averages below came from an Ahrefs pull across 1,000 personal-injury / medical-malpractice firm sites in 24 U.S. cities in 2020. Search competition, tool estimates, and link graphs have moved since then. Treat these numbers as a dated snapshot for context — not current benchmarks or a promise of “how many links you need” in 2026.

By Justin Davis, Link Builders (founded 2015). As of 2026, I’ve been building links for 11 years; this write-up preserves the 2020 study rather than rewriting the math as if it were new.

A common question from prospective SEO clients about backlinks is some variation of “how much progress can you make, and in how long?” The answer depends on the current authority of their website and the level of competition in organic search. I built this article so I could steer that conversation toward data and away from speculation — with the important caveat (added on refresh) that this particular dataset is from 2020.

What you will learn from this SEO analysis (2020 snapshot)

• The average amount of organic search traffic that came to these personal injury websites each month (2020 Ahrefs estimates)
• The average number of referring domains in the backlink profile (2020)
• The average number of keywords those P.I. sites ranked for organically in Google’s top 10 pages / top 100 results (2020)

Case Study (2020)

Objective: Examine 1,000 personal injury law firm websites. Estimate how the average personal injury attorney website performed on three SEO-related metrics at the time of the study: organic traffic, keywords in the top 100 results, and referring domains.

It took thousands of clicks, but one-by-one I compiled 1,000 attorney websites from 24 major U.S. cities. All were law firms specializing in medical malpractice and/or personal injury. I used Ahrefs for three metrics: estimated monthly organic search traffic, keywords ranked in Google’s top 10 pages (top 100 results), and referring domains (unique linking websites).

Snapshot averages from that 2020 pull

One summary block from the study framed the footprint roughly as:

• ~398 monthly visitors from non-paid (organic) search
• ~953 keywords in the top 100 Google results
• 79 referring domains

In the narrative detail of the same write-up, the averages were also stated as about 404 organic visits/month, 972 keywords in the top 100, and 79 referring domains. Minor rounding / pull differences aside: the directional story was the same — a wide spread, with many thin sites and a smaller set of stronger ones.

Spread mattered more than the average

Out of 1,000 sites analyzed in 2020:

• Organic traffic ranged from 0 to about 17,400 estimated monthly visits (Ahrefs). Roughly 98 sites (~10%) showed 0 estimated organic traffic. The lower half of the list (by traffic) sat at about 55 or fewer estimated organic visits per month. The top 10% by traffic ranged from roughly 931 to 17,377.
• Keyword breadth: the site with the most keywords in the top 100 in that pull was The Carlson Law Firm (on the order of 3,845 English keywords in the top 100, with estimated traffic around 6,400/month at the time).
• Referring domains ranged from 0 to 2,037. The lower half sat around 0–36 referring domains. The top 10% had at least ~200 referring domains (often landing in the mid-hundreds). Sites with 4 or fewer referring domains averaged only about 7 estimated organic visits per month in that dataset.

Again: these are 2020 figures. Do not use “79 referring domains” or “~400 organic visits” as a 2026 target. Competition and baselines differ by city, practice niche, and year. For planning today, pull fresh competitor and client metrics, then decide how much outreach time is realistic — not a fixed link quota.

Why these KPIs still matter (even when the averages age)

Organic search traffic, keyword footprint, and referring-domain quality are still useful for measuring SEO work. They can show growth and they correlate with sustained optimization — when you compare like-to-like over time on the same property, not when you treat a six-year-old industry average as a goalpost.

• Organic traffic — visitors from non-paid search (validate in GA4 + Search Console; treat third-party estimates as estimates).
• Keywords in the top results — useful for opportunity and share-of-voice style views; your marketing lead should be able to show positions for priority terms over date ranges vs competitors.
• Backlinks / referring domains — volume alone is a weak north star. Relevance, placement quality, and neighborhood matter more than chasing a historical average RD count.

Many CTR-by-position studies still illustrate why moving a few spots on page one can matter commercially — but those studies also age. Use current SERP behavior for the client’s queries rather than any single classic stat.

How I’d use this piece in a 2026 sales or strategy conversation

• Show that PI SEO is uneven — plenty of sites had almost no organic footprint in 2020; averages hide that.
• Separate vanity averages from this client’s competitors.
• Price and scope hours and process (vetting, outreach, approvals), not “we’ll get you to 79 referring domains.”

Link Builders (as of 2026) sells white-hat outreach time at $160/hr, with Justin’s Machine at 30 hours prepaid ($4,800) and Buy the Machine at $9,600 (includes onboarding and an 8-hour prospecting cycle). Publisher fees pass through at cost. No guaranteed link counts or rankings.

Details: link-building process · backlink pricing.