America is one of the most litigious countries in the world, but for most people, lawyers and their services are financially out of reach.
LegalZoom set out to change that two decades ago. They were among the first companies to transform how people and small businesses navigate the legal system. Now, they’re synonymous with affordable and easy legal services, having served over 9 million legal milestones.
Other brands were wise to follow LegalZoom’s lead, and now the online legal market is worth around $13.4 billion. Industry revenue is still increasing, but predictions show it may stagnate soon due to rife competition.
To keep its standing in the industry, LegalZoom wanted to up the ante in its marketing — but how can you improve upon a household name?
Ready to Up the Earned Media Ante
LegalZoom had long been a content powerhouse. It already had an extensive knowledge base of articles showing potential new customers how to incorporate and run a business. But like even the most successful companies, getting visitors to their blog to consume the great content they were producing proved challenging.
That’s when LegalZoom turned to Stacker with a clear goal: amplify the reach of their brand publishing efforts. They wanted their stories to appear in trusted third-party publications—a tough feat to scale without an established platform like Stacker.
Partnering with Stacker’s editorial team, LegalZoom followed best practices for optimizing content specifically for newswire distribution. With guidance from Stacker, they crafted stories built for engagement and reach, then distributed them across Stacker’s network of over 4,000 publishers.
The results stood out. “There are hundreds of agencies out there that promise backlinks on thousands of sites,” said LegalZoom’s marketing lead. “But the reality is, you often end up on very niche websites with low reputation and reach. Stacker's network includes thousands of local publications trusted within their communities, and appearing in these publications is very valuable to us.”
Like LegalZoom, Stacker is both powerful and easy to use, helping brands break through the noise and get their stories seen.
Securing Staying Power with Innovative Pieces
Through Connect, LegalZoom distributed engaging, innovative pieces like 7 Tips for Choosing the Best Name for Your Business, which included a fun business name generator from the LegalZoom website. (Who wouldn’t be curious to click and see what it comes up with?)
This creative touch made the story stand out and helped it earn traction with both readers and publications. The piece landed 288 placements across Stacker’s publishing network.
In just six months, LegalZoom carved out a strong presence in new digital territory. They created and distributed 13 stories, which generated 3,265 placements and reached over 480,000 new readers across the U.S.
While readership is one marker of success in earned media, the real impact showed up in LegalZoom’s SEO performance. Their stories brought in 2,900 new referring domains—more than 545 of which were high-authority sites—leading to a five-position increase in average rankings for their top keywords.
The LegalZoom marketing team was thrilled with the results, but the benefits went beyond the metrics. Expanding their reach meant they could serve more American small businesses with their legal expertise, technology, and support.
“We love that Stacker brings in more predictability when it comes to the kind of reach and pickups we should expect from different topics and stories," said their marketing lead. “Thanks to Stacker’s media expertise and insights from thousands of distributed stories, they can accurately forecast content performance. That kind of predictability is something we had never seen before.”
How Stacker’s Distribution Platform Sustainably Scales Quality, Human Editorial
Stacker combines powerful technology with human editorial expertise to deliver a scalable, innovative earned media distribution platform. LegalZoom used Stacker to share its ready-to-publish editorial content with thousands of national and local news outlets via the Stacker Newswire.
- Before any story is syndicated, Stacker’s editorial team ensures it meets high journalistic standards—then fine-tunes each piece for timing and format to maximize reach and engagement.
- After distribution, brands like LegalZoom gain access to real-time performance data through Stacker’s self-serve reporting dashboard, providing transparency and actionable insights.
- With Stacker, LegalZoom expanded its visibility, strengthened its authority, and reinforced its position as the leading online platform for business formation.
And here’s the best part: you don’t have to be a household name to see results like these. Contact us to learn how Stacker can help your brand get the reach it deserves.
Doriane is Stacker’s Director of Marketing. She previously headed marketing departments in various companies, owned a marketing agency for 7 years, and built a startup combining automated marketing workflows with a marketing services marketplace.
Photo Illustration by Stacker // Canva