Legal CPCs can hit $50–$200+ per click. A single month of unchecked search terms in a personal injury campaign can waste several thousand dollars on law students, free legal advice seekers, and job hunters. This page covers the negative keywords that matter most for law firm campaigns, organized by match type, with guidance specific to PI, criminal defense, family law, and estate planning.
Last updated: May 2026
These are the judgment calls that come up constantly in legal campaigns. Not every decision is obvious. Context and practice area matter.
| Search Term | Intent Type | Decision | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| free personal injury lawyer | Free-seeking | Negative | No-fee-unless-you-win firms offer something, but "free lawyer" intent is cost-aversion, not urgency to hire |
| personal injury settlement calculator | Pre-qualification research | Caution | Someone estimating their case value is often preparing to call. Check conversion data before negating. |
| best car accident attorney near me | High purchase intent | Keep | "Best" + "near me" = ready to hire, not browsing |
| how to sue someone in small claims | DIY/Self-represent | Negative | Self-represent intent; not a client |
| law school GPA requirements | Student/Education | Negative | Law school applicant, not a legal client |
| average DUI settlement amount | Research | Caution | Could be a defendant researching outcomes before deciding to hire counsel |
| paralegal jobs chicago | Job seeker | Negative | Career search, not a legal services buyer |
| free consultation attorney near me | Ambiguous | Caution | Many converting clients search this; decide based on whether your firm offers free consults |
| what is negligence in personal injury | Informational | Negative | Legal definition research; not hiring intent |
| Morgan & Morgan reviews | Competitor branded | Caution | Either block and run a competitor campaign, or accept the wasted impression |
Add these as phrase match to block any search query containing the pattern. Copied in Google Ads quote format: "keyword".
Exact match blocks specific standalone queries. Use these when the term is wrong intent by itself but may appear legitimately in longer phrases you want to keep. Copied in Google Ads bracket format: [keyword].
Some of the most tempting negatives in legal campaigns are actually your best leads. Check conversion data before blocking these.
The majority of law firms offer free consultations as their standard intake. Someone searching "free consultation attorney" is not necessarily a freeloader. They're using the standard industry term for the initial call. Block it as exact match [free consultation] if you want to filter pure price-sensitive searches, or write ad copy that addresses it directly. Phrase match negative is usually too aggressive here.
"[Firm name] reviews" and "best personal injury attorney reviews" are pre-hire research behavior. Someone vetting a lawyer before calling is high-intent. Phrase match negative on "reviews" in legal campaigns is a consistent conversion killer. Use exact match [reviews] for the standalone query at most.
People estimating their case value before calling a lawyer are pre-qualifying themselves. In PI campaigns especially, "average settlement for rear end collision" searchers often convert into phone calls within the same session. Treat these as mid-funnel, not waste.
Almost always transactional in legal. "DUI attorney near me" or "divorce lawyer near me" are immediate-hire queries. Never add "near me" as a negative unless you've verified it genuinely doesn't convert in your market.
Sounds like a comparison search; it usually isn't. In legal, "best DUI attorney" = "I'm searching for the right attorney to hire." Strong commercial intent. Adding "best" as a phrase match negative is a common mistake in legal accounts.
Low-quality lead signal in PI and criminal defense where fee structures are complex. More likely to convert in family law and estate planning where clients are cost-sensitive but genuinely purchasing. Segment before negating.
The same negative keyword list doesn't work across all legal practice areas. PI campaigns have different waste patterns than estate planning or family law.
[free] as exact match blocks only someone searching the single word "free." It does nothing for "free personal injury attorney near me," "free DUI consultation," or "free legal advice for car accidents." In legal where CPCs are $50–$150, missing these variants is expensive. Add "free" as phrase match at account level.
"[Firm name] reviews" is how 60–70% of legal service buyers verify a firm before calling. Phrase match negative on "reviews" consistently cuts conversion-path traffic. In legal search campaigns, "reviews" in a query is often a positive purchase-intent signal, not a research signal.
PI and family law use different keywords, different landing pages, and different negative keyword strategies. Running them together means your PI negatives suppress family law traffic and vice versa. Separate campaigns with practice-area-specific negative lists are the right architecture.
When a prospect searches "[Competitor Firm] reviews" or "[Competitor] vs [your firm]," they're actively comparing. Either block competitor names as exact match negatives (if you don't want competitor traffic at all) or build a dedicated competitor campaign with separate ad copy. Never leave this unaddressed.
"Near me" in legal is almost universally a hire-intent modifier. "Emergency DUI attorney near me" or "estate planning lawyer near me" are ready-to-engage searches. If "near me" is blowing budget, the problem is geo-targeting or bid caps, not the query pattern.
The highest-priority negatives for any legal campaign are: "free" as phrase match (blocks all free legal advice searches), "law school" and "bar exam" (blocks students), "pro se" and "self represent" (blocks DIY searchers), and job-related terms. Implement these at account level before launch, not campaign by campaign.
Don't add it as phrase match. Most converting legal clients use "free consultation" as the industry-standard term for an initial call. Add it as exact match [free consultation] only if you've verified it's genuinely low-quality in your campaign data. Write ad copy that addresses your consultation model instead.
Both. Account-level shared list for universal terms (education, jobs, free, DIY). Campaign-level negatives for practice-area-specific terms (criminal defense terms in PI campaign, PI-specific injuries in a family law campaign). This two-tier approach prevents both gaps and accidental cross-suppression.
Decide once per account: either add all competitor names as exact match negatives across all campaigns, or build a dedicated competitor campaign with separate messaging. Never leave competitor name traffic in your main campaigns without a defined strategy. Conversion rates on competitor terms are typically different from non-branded traffic.