Summer’s officially over, the pumpkin spice is flowing, and Q4 is breathing down our necks. Welcome to the September edition of The Legal Marketing Pulse—your fast-track guide from Consultwebs to finishing 2026 strong.
While competing firms are still shaking off their summer vacation haze, high-growth practices are using September to quietly steal market share. Grab your morning coffee and let’s turn these autumn leads into end-of-year revenue. Let’s dive in to the updates👇
🔎SEO
Google’s August 2026 spam update is complete. It took 2.5 days to complete. Google did say this is a “normal spam” update and that there is nothing specifically new with this update, outside of Google running it again.
🤖AI
OpenAI is building a new ad format. It would lead users to a business-specific ChatGPT conversation equipped to answer questions, surface products, and capture leads. OpenAI has already started this process with select advertisers. This feature will allow potential customers to immediately join a conversation and more closely mimic the workflow of consulting a chatbot natively.
🌐Digital Advertising
GeoSurge ran a test on AI chatbots to compare how often brands that the chatbots are familiar with are cited compared to others. They found that chatbots cite the brands they are familiar with 3.2 times more than other brands, highlighting the importance of branded marketing efforts.
Each year, advertisers everywhere breathe a sigh of frustration during election season. Political advertisements tend to drive up the cost of ads, meaning if you don’t change your budget, your results may dip. Temporarily increasing your budget will help sustain momentum in your campaigns. It’s projected that the spending for this year’s election will reach an all-time high of $10.8 billion. Prepare for the upcoming influx by speaking with your team to talk about options. “Election windows drive 5–15% CPM increases nationwide, with 40–50% increases in battleground markets. Meta is most affected, while TikTok tends to experience less political pressure. Flexibility in budgets and targeting is essential.”
📱Social Media
LinkedIn is now offering the option to report AI slop. They are using this as a way to combat AI comments and restrict feedback in posts to real humans. This will also help LinkedIn improve their models to create better feeds for users with more human interaction.
New research reveals that 75% of LinkedIn AI citations come from individual profiles instead of company pages. AI systems are favoring individual voices because individual profiles share specific content with expertise, practical advice, and more. In particular, LinkedIn articles coming from individual pages are driving a large portion of those citations.
Stay LAWsome–We’ll See You Again Next Month!
That’s a wrap for the September updates! Remember, the moves you make right now are what give way to a momentous Q4. You don’t have to tackle it alone. Stay tuned each month for our updates packed with unmissable strategies, news, and takeaways to keep your law firm prepared. Catch you in October!
