Content Marketing, Content Writing, Digital Marketing, SEO
Written By: Lauren Sears
Legal Marketing Pros Need to Know… Earlier this year, Google quietly updated its Search Quality Rater Guidelines. QRGs are the internal playbook used by human evaluators to assess whether web pages are helpful, high-quality, and worth ranking. The update didn’t get much attention then, but Aleyda Solis, founder of SEOFOMO, brought several critical changes to light last week at Search Central Madrid. Among them is one that should catch the attention of anyone managing marketing for law firms.
Deep in Section 4.6.6 of the QRGs is this new language:
“The Lowest rating applies if all or almost all of the MC [Main Content] on the page (including text, images, audio, videos, etc.) is copied, paraphrased, embedded, auto or AI generated, or reposted from other sources with little to no effort, little to no originality, and little to no added value for visitors to the website.”
In plain English, Google draws a clear, somewhat hypocritical line in the sand. If your firm’s content, written, visual, or otherwise, is being generated with minimal effort or originality, including relying too heavily on AI content in the judgment of Quality Raters, it could be flagged as low quality and devalued in search results.
This update presents both a short-term challenge and an opportunity for legal marketing professionals under pressure to scale content and prove ROI.
Understanding Quality Rater Guidelines — and Why They Matter
The QRGs don’t directly influence search rankings. Instead, they’re used by thousands of real people around the world who evaluate websites manually. Quality Raters then provide structured feedback to Google’s engineers regarding the success of various algorithm updates and tests. The Quality Rater Guidelines are a tool intended to provide uniformity, standardize criteria, and limit subjectivity on topics such as “helpfulness” within the reporting. Essentially, the Quality Raters are judging if the output of the algorithm is acceptable to human users.
These ratings help shape how future updates are designed, meaning the guidelines often preview what the algorithm will soon reward or penalize at scale.
For those of us managing marketing for law firms looking to grow, the QRGs aren’t just technical documentation. They’re a north star (admittedly, one of several) for building strategies that endure, even as the algorithm and search engine result pages (SERPs) evolve.
Why This Update Matters for Legal Marketing Teams
The section in question doesn’t just take aim at AI-generated text. It specifically lists all types of content — “text, images, audio, video, etc” — and flags them as problematic if created with minimal originality or value, including and explicitly when relying on AI.
This is especially relevant for firms or digital agencies that are:
- Publishing blogs or otherwise “scaling” content with pages entirely written by AI tools, with little to no human editing, legal nuance, or unique perspective.
- Generating videos using avatars or “talking head” tools, with templated scripts and little added commentary.
- Embedding infographics or animations created by third-party software without tying them back to the firm’s specific POV or audience needs.
- Building pages programmatically (e.g., practice area pages across multiple cities) with only minor variations.
None of these tactics is inherently “bad,” to be clear. But at the moment, Google is signaling that intent, effort, and originality matter more than ever — and that scaling at speed could come at a cost.
So… Is AI Off the Table for Content Marketing?
Not at all. Google’s position isn’t anti-AI. It’s anti-low-value. There’s still plenty of room to use AI tools to improve content workflows, as long as they’re part of a thoughtful, human-led strategy.
Many marketing teams (ours included) successfully use AI to generate content ideas, outlines, and even early drafts. It’s also proving useful in other channels: developing subject line variations for emails, suggesting hooks for social posts, and helping translate long-form blogs into short-form snippets.
The key is in how you use it. AI should support and accelerate the process — not replace it. You still need people who understand the firm’s ideal prospective client, the legal specifics of each practice area, the nuances unique to your local area(s), and what clients actually want to read. Without that, your content, at best, won’t create any new leads. At worst, it gets flagged as thin, repetitive, or untrustworthy and drops from search results altogether.
Don’t Gamble With Lead Generation
The core takeaway here isn’t just about one Google update. It’s about the pace of change. Search is changing fast. AI tools are evolving even faster. However, what hasn’t changed regarding attorney content marketing is Google’s long-standing preference for helpful, original, experience-driven content.
If your agency or internal team is publishing content indistinguishable from every other law firm in your market — or leaning heavily on automation to “keep up” — this is your cue to reassess.
The stakes are too high to gamble your firm’s visibility, pipeline, and growth on unknown factors. That doesn’t mean avoiding new tools. It means using them wisely, testing their limits, and ensuring that the strategy comes first.
Legal Content Marketing in the Age of AI
It might be time for a gut check if you are unsure whether your content marketing strategy is still aligned with what Google expects, or if you’re concerned that your agency is cutting corners in ways that could hurt rankings.
At Postali, we work closely with in-house legal marketing teams to strike the right balance. We blend proven strategies with smart, scalable tactics that keep pace with the shifting digital landscape.
Let’s discuss how your team can scale content without sacrificing quality, credibility, or long-term results.