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Good lawyers understand blog’s potential to enhance reputation

September 21, 2004

I regularly speak with and meet excellent lawyers looking to learn about blogs. Many of the lawyers have little, if any, understanding of Internet marketing. Most have not a clue what a blog is nor have any computer coding or tech experience

But after just a half hour of my explaining the concept of professional blog, answering their questions and walking them through the back-end of the publishing platform, these lawyers not only get it, they are excited to get started as soon as possible. Un-lawyer like responses such as “Cool” and “This is really neat” are routine.

Happened with two more top notch lawyers in the last week. One in the Silicon Valley I met over her cell phone as as she was driving back to the office. The second was a lawyer in an excellent Portland law firm I met with today.


What do these lawyers see? They see the same opportunity that writing and speaking provides to further establish themselves as a reliable and trusted authority in their area of expertise. But they see it on steroids:

  • Content indexed at Google overnight
  • Content appearing near the top of search engine rankings
  • Content updated regularly because it’s so easy for the lawyer to personally post content
  • Target audience subscribing to their blog receiving updates via RSS and email

These are lawyers who would never use television, yellow pages or other advertising. These lawyers pride themselves on establishing their brand by demonstrating their expertise to their targeted audience, whether they be consumers, business people, in-house counsel or referring lawyers.

I understand most lawyers are never going to blog. Most lawyers do not write articles or speak at seminars as a way to market themselves. In addition an awful lot of lawyers just want to pay to market their legal services and not play an active role in marketing. Blogging is not a passive sport.

But the number of lawyers who understand professional blogs and who are willing to put in a little time marketing themselves through a blog is starting to grow. We may just have a grassroots uprising on our hands.

Imagine a nation of the best lawyers publishing practical legal information on the Internet. Sounds a like a winner for the legal profession and the American public.

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