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Law blog belongs outside a website, law firm’s brand notwithstanding

February 16, 2009

I am absolutely lost on the argument that when a law firm is concerned about their brand, they may want to put their blog(s) in the law firm website.

We work with hundreds of law firms and thousands of lawyers on blogs. Virtually all of those law firms are concerned about their brand.

Each and everyone of their blogs is outside their website. Not because we tell them they have to do it this way. But because it’s the right way. I’ve blogged about the point here and here.

Key to these firms is first a blog design that compliments their other collateral, website included. Second and even more important is that these firms know that a professional service firm’s brand is built upon a reputation – a reputation for being a thought leader and a reliable trusted authority in niche areas of the law.

Though appearance is important, a brand for a good lawyer is not about design, collars, logo’s and the like. If lawyers known as authorities in a niche leave a firm, where do you think the clients needing work on that niche area are going? Do you think the clients are staying because of a branded color, design, and logo? Hardly.

Blogs outside of websites get cited more often. Why? Because they are viewed more credibly.

And when you have a blog that’s cited more often, you have a blog that’s viewed as an influential blog by the technology that pulls in syndicated blog feeds to mainstream media such as the Wall Street Journal and New York Times. And the number of those publications pulling in syndicated feeds from law blogs is going to explode in the coming year or two.

Look at the Wall Street Journal today for ‘Breaking Law Stories from Around the Web.’ It’s an edited feature in the law section of the online journal each day that begins with a call out and excerpt at this WSJ law page.

While some of the WSJ’s breaking law stories come from the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, or Time Magazine, most of the breaking law stories come from law blogs. Law blogs viewed as influential and whose content is pulled in by syndication.

Today there are 24 law blog posts displayed by virtue of syndication at the Wall Street Journal. Not one comes from a blog inside a website. Coincidence? Hardly.

And one of those blog posts being displayed today by the WSJ is a personal injury blog post written by a plaintiff’s lawyer, not a group the WSJ favors. That being John Day’s ‘Day on Torts.’

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