In the world of Big Law, Avvo is all but irrelevant. The general counsel of a Fortune 500 company is not going to consult the lawyer rating site to decide, for example, who to hire for a billion-dollar deal.

But for regular people—ones who are getting divorced or were injured or got a DUI—hiring a lawyer is not easy. A few years ago, my husband and I needed one for a real estate-related dispute, and it was a frustrating and thoroughly unsatisfactory experience.