Blawg bleakness : ‘Blog’ generates 25 times more Google searches than ‘Blawg’

Many lawyers seem hell bent on calling their ‘legal blog’ or ‘law blog’ a ‘blawg.’

That’s okay if your blog is being used as an academic experience, but not if your blog is being used to generate business, part of which is generated through search engines.

I just did a quick check of blog versus blawg in the number of Google searches for the month of August. 12,285 searches for ‘blog’. 474 for ‘blawg.’ If you care about click through rates on sponsored links on those terms, it’s also bleak for ‘blawg.’ Blog gets a 1.6% click through rate. ‘Blawg’ does a .21%.

What does this tell us? Well, admittedly more people search for the term ‘blog’ than ‘blawg’ by a 25 to 1 margin. Sure there are other types of blogs than law blogs so that number is going to be skewed higher. And more people find law blogs by just searching for a lawyer or doing research on a relevant subject than when searching for ‘blog’ or ‘blawg.’

But these findings ought to concern any lawyer thinking about following the crowd that think it’s cute to use legaleze to call their blog a ‘blawg.’ Do you really think the public knows what a ‘blawg’ is?

I know if people ask what your ‘blawg’ is, you can just tell them. Confusion cleared up in a second. You can use the phrase ‘pro tempre’ too. Just tell folks who ask it means temporary. Confusion cleared up in a second.

This great ‘blawg debate’ brings out the best in all of us. It’s kind like arguing over religion. But I’ll not be advising lawyers anytime soon to call their blog a ‘blawg.’