A little while ago Carolyn railed against Huffington Post for taking AOL‘s money without letting their writers share in the spoils.  Her article Just Say No To Free Use of Your User-Generated Content bemoans the plight of the guest blogger who is uncompensated for his or her efforts.

She just doesn’t get it.

Creating content on someone else’s platform is richly compensated if done correctly.  Just because money doesn’t change hands doesn’t mean compensation doesn’t flow freely.

In fact, I’m a huge fan of guest blogging as a way of promoting your online legal marketing efforts.  In fact, I’m willing to provide content to just about any legal blog that will give me the opportunity to do so.  I ask for no money – now or in the future.  In fact, the ability to create content on another platform is, in many ways, compensation enough for me.

Why?  Because it’s not the money that provides the compensation.

Content For Exposure. If I had the chance to create content for a highly-regarded online publication, I’d be doing so for the exposure I would receive to that publication’s readership.  My words would reach eyes that would otherwise never hear of me, and my thoughts would be exposed to a new audience.  If my writing was good, some of those people would check out my blog and stick around.  That audience growth is a tremendous boon to anyone engaging in a content-marketing strategy.

Content For SEO. When I post on someone else’s blog I get a byline.  That byline typically includes a link back to my site.  Those inbound links are the most honored cornerstones to search engine optimization, that race to the top of the search engines we all crave.  In our link economy we need to recognize the value of those links and how they play a part in our own online success.

The Platform Is The Value. Huffington Post built itself on quality writing, most of which was uncompensated.  But as a news site, most of the content disappears from the public’s eye fairly quickly.  In fact, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that most of the content older than 48 hours gets pretty much no traffic – once it’s gone from the front page, it’s history.

The value of HuffPo isn’t an individual article, it’s the sum of all of the content plus the platform itself.  Surely the’re value provided to the writer who is presented with the opportunity to work in a maintenance-free environment, gain access to millions of readers, and in turn grow his or her own fan base off the back of an established platform.

Carolyn says that one of the reasons she doesn’t take guest bloggers that often is because she doesn’t pay them to contribute.  Speaking as someone who did a guest post on MyShingle a bit of time ago, I can tell you it was an honor and a privilege to do so.  Carolyn’s got an audience who had never heard of me, a well-established site with terrific credibility, and I got a link out of the deal.

Sounds like I got paid more than the value of my 500 words of content.  My hope is that Carolyn will realize the true value provided by and to guest bloggers.

Oh, and by the way – if anyone feels like writing something awesome for this site then by all means, let me know.

Related posts:

1. Carolyn Elefant a Mac using Attorney (Guest Post)
2. Faculty Announcement – Carolyn Elefant
3. Should Lawyers Blog? 3 Reasons To Start Blogging.

We assume that when presented with enough information on a topic, you become an expert.  Read enough of this blog, for example, and you can become an ace at content creation, search engine optimization, and connecting with clients.

That’s true to some extent, but completely false overall.  In fact, it’s the big secret that most of the big bloggers use every single day.

When you publish something on your law firm blog you’re putting information online – not knowledge.  And that’s the difference that keeps your readers from forming an army of pro se litigants.

Information Is Easy – Knowledge Is Difficult

Let’s say you’re a consumer protection lawyer concentrating in the defense of civil lawsuits brought by debt buyers against consumers.  You decide to start a law firm blog on this topic, and publish a post on the issue of standing.  In the post you discuss how a debt buyer needs to establish a proper chain of ownership of the debt in order to have standing to bring an action.

That’s information.  Standing equals right of action.  But it is not knowledge.

Knowledge is practical understanding of a subject that enables you to use that understanding.  In other words, you can read about driving all day long but you’ll never be able to drive unless you sit your ass behind the wheel.

Knowledge isn’t something you can read in a law firm blog, it’s something that needs to be synthesized over time.  It’s the same reason why I can talk all day about content creation but you’re never going to truly grok it unless you practice on your own for awhile.

You Can’t Teach Knowledge

You can talk about standing all day and night, but if the reader doesn’t have context and experience into which he or she can fit those discussions then it’s all academic.  There are all of these little pieces of the puzzle that you, as a practicing lawyer, don’t even think about when you go about your routine.  Little things such as form of pleadings, time and methods of service, where to file documents, and the insider’s lingo that helps get your point across.

In order to move the prospect from information to knowledge, you’ve got a lot of work to do.  Your law firm blog needs to have not only information on standing, but sample pleadings, tutorials and video segments showing exactly how and where pleadings get filed.

That’s going to take a lot of time, and months – if not years – of work on your part.

Nobody Wants Knowledge

This is all pretty intimidating to your readers, people who have likely never been in this situation before.  They don’t know how the legal system works on a day-to-day basis, and they don’t have the time to research this thing to within an inch of sanity.  Even if you’ve got years worth of information your law firm blog, nobody’s got that kind of time on their hands.  This is to say nothing of the fact that your readers and prospective clients aren’t visiting for knowledge.

For the most part, people just want to get a little bit of information so they have a better sense of what they’re dealing with.  And they want to know that you’re in a position to help with a solution.

Take A Lesson From Home Depot And Bob Villa

Go into your local Home Depot or Lowe’s.  Take a look at those do-it-yourself books and ask yourself why contractors, plumbers and electricians still have professions.    Those books fly off the shelves, but the only ones who actually use the information are those who are prone to the DIY lifestyle as is.

These are people who never would have hired an electrician in the first place.  They are DIY people anyway, and the book just gave them the information they needed to fill in their own knowledge gaps.

As a member of the bar, would you rather have a courthouse filled with pro se litigants who have a fighting chance or an army of bumblers?

Image credit:  Wikipedia

Related posts:

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2. Why Your Law Firm Blog Doesn’t Need A Professional Design (Until It Does)
3. Blogging For Your Law Firm? There Is No Middle Ground.

The lawyer who is new to blogging is told that a professionally-designed law firm blog is critical to ensuring long-term success in marketing a law firm online.  That’s true, but it’s only part of the story.

Starting a law firm blog is a daunting task, isn’t it?  You’ve got to think about platforms, how to write content, search engine optimization, and finding the time to get it all done without sacrificing your practice.

Not only that, but statistically there’s a good chance that your first blogging effort won’t be the successful one.  I’m not the only lawyer who started a few blogs before finding my groove.

In spite of the uphill battle you’re facing, there are a bunch of well-meaning designers and blogging companies who are going to tell you that you must – MUST, I tell you – have a professionally designed blog for your law firm.

They’ve got a point.  A professionally-designed law firm blog will be a source of pride that may spur you to create content more often.  People coming to your site will instantly ascribe a level of gravitas to your pearls of wisdom than might otherwise be the case.  The angels will sing.

Good luck with that.

There’s nothing sadder than the image of a kid dressed up for a party and nobody attends.  Streamers and bowls of food everywhere, a huge Pin The Tail On The Donkey tacked to the wall and dance music through the entire living room.  Yet nobody’s there, and Junior just wants to go upstairs and cry.

Same with your law firm blog.  You can put on a terrific design but if there’s nobody coming to read it – and at the beginning, there won’t be – then it’s a waste.  And if this is the blog that you end up scrapping then you’ve wasted valuable money.

I’m not saying you should go forego the services of a kick-ass designer for your blog.  I am, however, saying that you may want to wait until you’ve got a few posts under your belt.

Get a hosting account, install WordPress (or have me do it for you) and start learning how to create content.  Get comfortable with the medium, make sure it’s a good fit for you.  Then, once you’re pretty sure this is going to stick around for awhile, hire a kick-ass designer.  Not just some company that does law firm blogs and websites, but a truly world-class operation that can handle design as well as user experience issues to make your content sing.

Know what?  If you know that creating content on a law firm blog is something you’re interested in doing then spending the money will be pretty easy.  You will already know the value of a stellar design, and you’ll also know more about what you want.

Image credit:   Some rights reserved by eszter

Related posts:

1. A Law Firm Blog With Paid Ads? Really?
2. 6 Non-Sleazy Ways To Promote Your Law Firm Blog
3. The Fastest Way To Grow Traffic To Your Law Firm Website Or Blog

When lawyers think about content marketing the default ideal is a blog.  And when most lawyers think about blogging, they begin to get heart palpitations and sweat profusely.  Blogging, after all, conjures up that overwhelming fear of technology we just talked about.  But if you’re not interested in blogging that doesn’t mean you’re shut out of the content marketing game.

Web hosts, domain names, WordPress installations and graphic designers cause confusion and difficulty for lots of lawyers.  But when it comes to content marketing options, the blog is a good but not necessarily critical piece of the puzzle.

Content Marketing Takes Many Forms

Your online legal marketing must involve the creation and promotion of content.  It’s what leads people to your doorstep, enables you to expand your influence, and showcases your expertise.  But it need not occur on your own domain.

Sure, having your own domain and blog is preferred.  You own your content, control the way it’s handled, and can maintain the visitor experience to accomplish all of your law firm marketing goals.  If you can do it, you should.  But if the technology is getting in your way, you should know there are other options.

I’m a huge fan of Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn as a way of connecting with others, promoting my content and getting the conversation going.  That’s a part of content marketing, but not all of it.  You’ve still got to create content as part of your online legal marketing efforts.

The good news is that you’ve got options.  Plenty of them.  Here are some of my favorites.

Article Directories.  A blog is nothing more than an article posted to a website.  Having a blog gives you a platform to publish your own content; from there, you’re going to promote it using whatever techniques suit you best.  But if you don’t have your own blog or domain you may want to look at sites such as Ezinearticles.com.  It’s one of the top 100 websites in the United States in terms of traffic, which means there are a lot of people going there for information.

Open up a free account, post your article, and remember to use the tools provided to link back to your own site (if you’ve got one) so people can learn more.  Newbies can see their content live within a few days, and established writers get their stuff cleared for publication in about 48 hours.

As of right now I’ve got 88 articles up there and they’ve been read over 12,000 times.  Not too shabby considering I’ve never done much promotion of that content.

Other places you can publish articles are out there – I’ve used HubPages, Squidoo, Google Knol, Gather, GoArticles and a few others.  Some give you the ability to make money off the ads shown on your article pages, others don’t.  You’ll pick the one that suits you best, but suffice to say there are lots of options.

There is some indication that Google doesn’t consider links from article directories to your site quite as highly as was previously the case, but there’s no proof that there has been any reduction in pure traffic to these sites.  So for the lawyer looking for traffic, these are still extremely solid choices.

Hit The Forum Sites. Forum sites are old school, but are hugely popular.  Find a topic with a question and answer it intelligently.  That’s a piece of content that’s helpful to the forum community, and you’ll be pleased to see the results of your efforts.

Avvo. Much-maligned (by some) Avvo is rapidly becoming a powerhouse in the field of online legal marketing.  Say what you will, Avvo gives you a really good opportunity to buttress your online legal marketing efforts.  You can answer user questions, create a guide (which is really just a 4-5 part “how to” piece of content) and build up your profile.

JDSupra. I love JDSupra, and I think the team is top-notch.  In case you don’t know what it is, JDSupra is a document sharing site that allows you to post articles, legal pleadings, and the like for distribution to various social networks.  If you post an article to JDSupra it’s going to be placed all over the web.

Free Blogging Platforms. If you’re into the blogging game but don’t want to tinker with the whole “get a domain and keep it going” thing, there’s always WordPress.com, TypePad and Blogger.  I’ve used all of these platforms as trial runs for my blogs and, though I don’t recommend them long-term they are solid ways to start out.

Quick Blogging. You want to create content, you don’t want any hassles, and you want it quickly.  Head on over to Tumblr or Posterous, two services that have sprung up to fill the void between a full-fledged blog and the micro-blogs such as Twitter.  Either of these services allow you to create a place for your content and post by email.  You can supplement the content creation by adding photos and links using a variety of browser plugins and apps for your iPhone and Android devices.

So there you have it – proof that your online legal marketing efforts can begin without anything more than a free account on a system and the contents of your mind.

Questions?

Related posts:

1. 6 Non-Sleazy Ways To Promote Your Law Firm Blog
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3. How Can Someone Else’s Video Help You Market Your Law Firm Online?

You can create a law firm blog with real value, but if you don’t let people know it exists then it’s all wasted.  How can you promote you blog posts without being sleazy?

We’re uncomfortable with sales and promotion; that goes for the attorney marketing a law firm just as much as any other profession, but I think lawyers are hit particularly hard in this respect.  We’ve been trained to behave conservatively, and in our minds the notion of promotion (hey look, I made a rhyme!) is distinctly NOT conservative.  Add in years of being compared to hucksters and you’ve got most lawyers believing that promotion of any sort is unseemly.

Done the wrong way, promotion can make you feel dirty.  If you look at most of the marketing online you’ll see scads of yellow highlighter and exclamation points that tell you to BUY! BUY! BUY!!!  Is it any wonder why some fairly prominent legal bloggers think that marketing is a word to be expunged from the next edition of Black’s Law Dictionary?

But there’s another side to this coin, and that’s the realization that marketing need not make you want to take a bath in lye and burn your clothing.  If you’re marketing a law firm you want to be not only ethical, but mindful of your professional standing in the community.

Your law firm blog is a marketing tool, no matter how you slice it.  A law firm blog showcases your capabilities, exposes people to your message, and enhances your standing.  It informs, inspires to act, and serves as your online face.  You need to promote the content in order to gain an audience, and you want to do so without being sleazy.

Send Links to Select People Who May be Interested. If you read an article about the foreclosure crisis and are doing a post about TILA, RESPA or any of the real estate-related “alphabet soup” of statutes, send an email to the author of the other article to let him or her know what you’ve done.  Be polite and offer up an invitation to visit the link.  Three lines should do the trick, and it will help to gain one more viewer.  That viewer may send the link along to others if it’s a good enough post.  One thing you need to know, though – do not spam your email address book.  I’m talking about sending the article out to 1-3 people who you know will be interested in it.  If you spam, you suck.

Post the Article to Facebook. 500 million people are registered on Facebook as of this writing; when you post a link it shows up on the stream of all of your friends.  If something interests you enough to write about then it’s probably interesting to the people you know and connect with on Facebook.

Tweet a Link. Twitter is a hive of activity, with people sharing links to content that interests them.  Though you may choose to post your links automatically (I do this), the secret sauce is to create a compelling question rather than sending out the title of the post (which should be compelling anyway, but I know sometimes you just can’t make it sexy enough.  For example, I recently sent out a tweet to someone else’s blog post.  Her title was, “Is Bankruptcy Right for Me?”  My tweet was, “Is bankruptcy a good idea or best left to others? Ask yourself these 22 questions.”  Which one looks more interesting?

Hit The LinkedIn Group. If you’re a member of a LinkedIn group associated with your field of law then you’re already associated with a bunch of people who are interested in the topics you’re blogging about.  When you’ve got a particularly interesting post (not one of those, “who is the Chapter 7 trustee in my area,” ones) head over to the LinkedIn group and post a link with a description.  Your colleagues may find the content interesting enough to pass along to others.

Comment On Related Blogs. Blog commenting is an excellent traffic generating tactic for your law firm blog because it gives you exposure to the other blog’s audience.  But let’s say you’ve got a meaty post on your site that you’re itching to share.  Chances are pretty good that there is another blog out there talking about the same issue.  In fact, I’m going to go so far as to say that your article may be yin to another blog’s yang.  Go to the other blog and comment appropriately (again, no spamming please); in the area where you enter your URL, paste the URL of your article rather than the main law firm blog URL; in this way, when people click to learn more about you they will be taken directly to your related post.

Ask Your Readers To Share Your Law Firm Blog Content. Using blog plugins such as Sociable, Tweetmeme and the FBLike you’ll make it easier for readers to share and pass along your law firm blog posts to other people.  Good content has a way of traveling fast, so if you’re providing real value to readers you should expect the traffic bump.

Your law firm blog isn’t going to take off into the stratosphere overnight.  It’s a slow build, but when you consistently use these promotional techniques you’ll have a greater chance of reaching more of the people who may find your content interesting.

Image credit:  victoriafee (Flickr)

Related posts:

1. 6 Ways To Market Your Law Firm Online Without A Blog
2. A Law Firm Blog With Paid Ads? Really?
3. Knowledge, Information And Why Your Law Firm Blog Won’t Create A Pro Se Army

You want to blog, but it’s such a pain in the ass to go to WordPress, enter the post, and click “publish.” And though there are some excellent programs to enable you to blog from your desktop (MarsEdit for the Mac, or the ScribeFire extension for Firefox), what if you’re sitting at a public computer and just want to get out some thoughts?

I’ll sidestep the issues of using Posterous or Tumblr to do your mobile blogging, as well as using the WordPress applications for your mobile phone, in favor of something more straight-forward.

That is, just sitting down at a computer, firing up an email client, and typing out an email. Coincidentally, that’s exactly how this blog post is being done – by sending an email. And it’s easier than you think.

You’re going to want to use a WordPress plugin called Postie. I tried to use the plugin some time ago but it didn’t work out for me; maybe I was rushed, wasn’t paying attention, whatever – but I recently gave it another whirl and things worked out well.

Why You May Want To Use Postie

You know that blogging is an important component to your online legal marketing efforts, but the prospect of opening a new browser tab isn’t appealing. Once you get past that, the whole WordPress administrative area is overwhelming. You feel as if you’ve got to learn something new, and you just don’t have time for that.

More likely, you come across an idea from time to time and you think it would make an interesting blog post. Then the phone rings, a client shows up, a staff member pops in … whatever. You end up getting pulled into a million different directions at once, and the potential blog idea gets lost in the shuffle.

And when you lost the inspiration for a blog post, it’s gone forever. That means a loss of traffic, SEO and, ultimately, new clients.

How To Add Postie To Your WordPress (Self-Hosted) Blog

1. Go to your WordPress administrative panel, which is the same URL you use when you’re going to put up a new post (typically www.yourdomain.com/wp-admin)
2. Go to Plugins on the left side of the screen
3. Click “Add New”
4. Search for Postie
5. Install the plugin
6. Activate the plugin

How To Configure Postie

1. Set up a special email account for use with Postie. I believe it works with a Gmail or Yahoo account, but for the love of all that is holy I could not figure out how to make it do what it’s supposed to do. So I spent hours silently cursing the computer, the Interwebs and anything else I could think of (including my cup of coffee, which was getting colder by the minute). Then I realized that even if I could eventually figure it out, this just wasn’t worth the effort. After all, we’re looking for fast solutions, right?
2. Set up a special email account for use with Postie. Yes, I said that twice. Because the first time just resulted in abject frustration. So I went over to GoDaddy, which is where I keep my domain registrations and set up one of those freebie email addresses that come with the registration. Took about 5 minutes to do. One thing you should remember, though – you want to make up a really absurd email address with garbage characters because Postie will grab any messages sent to that address and post it to your blog. If you’re using an address that sounds vaguely real then someone could theoretically get the address and start posting to your blog without your knowledge.
3. Enter your email server settings into Postie. You’ll get your email server settings and enter them into the plugin (which you can get to by going to Settings -> Postie on your WordPress administrative panel). Part of that will include your email address and password.

You could stop there, but there are more options you can configure. You can set up Postie to accept emails only from certain addresses, tell the plugin what to do when it gets the email (publish the post, keep it as draft, etc.) and play around with it quite a bit more. Or, as I said already, you could stop there.

Why Not Use The Built-In Post-By-Email Feature Of WordPress?

WordPress gives you a way to post by email, but it’s bare-bones. Not many features, and I’ve never been happy with how it works. With Postie I can add photos, audio or video to a post. I can limit the email senders so that spammers can’t take over my blog. I pre-set how the email will be handled so that things don’t get published immediately. In other words, I get control and convenience.

Image credit: koka_sexton (Flickr).

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As a lawyer who blogs, much of my legal marketing reading comes to me in the form of other blogs.  Also podcasts, which are really nothing more than blogs for my ears.  Television bores me for the most part, though I’m a treasure trove of Family Guy references (my dog’s name is Griffin because my wife refused to let me name him Brian).

Last year I was listening to a podcast where someone was talking about his goal of reading 52 books in 52 weeks.  Kindle in hand, I set about the same goal.

Today’s purchase was ProBlogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income (that’s an affiliate link), the second edition of the excellent book by Darren Rowse and Chris Garrett.  Both of these guys are successful bloggers in their own right, as well as social media icons.  Darren is heavily involved in Third Tribe Marketing, and Garrett is new media consultant.

First, a confession (well, I guess this is the second) – I never read the first edition of the book.

Second confession (which is really the third) – I am currently zipping through the new version.  I even bought it in (gasp) physical paper form because the Kindle version won’t be out until after I’ve gone to San Francisco for the weekend and was going to read it on the plane there.  At this rate I’ll be done long before then.

I can’t tell you if it’s better or worse than the original, but I can tell you that this is good stuff for anyone who wants to use a blog to make money.

In the book they discuss tools used for blogging, and there are a bunch of screenshots and descriptions to help you along. There’s also an excellent chapter on using social media for your blogging efforts.

The really nice thing for lawyers is the back story Rowse brings to the table. He began blogging out of passion, not as a business. In fact, his Digital Photography School had nothing to do with money when he started it. What he had, however, was knowledge about a core topic and a desire to get his information out to the public.

That sounds a lot like lawyers, doesn’t it? Lawyers have information about a niche subject and can use that knowledge to begin their online legal marketing efforts using content generation.

The title is obviously a huge draw for people who are looking to blogging as a way to build a business, and most lawyers aren’t going to use some of the monetization strategies used by that crowd.  But the underpinnings of social media and content marketing for lawyers is compelling and cuts across industries – right to ours.

Related posts:

1. Law Blog Basics: Get your blog rolling
2. Should Lawyers Blog? 3 Reasons To Start Blogging.
3. Problogger — The Book

Guest posting is important for blogging, search engine optimization, and legal marketing in general.  When you guest post you have the ability to reach a new audience, expand your reach, and spread your message.  You also get the chance to add a quality backlink to your arsenal, which is a major SEO boost.

That having been said, not all guest posts are created equal from a legal marketing standpoint.

Two weeks ago I undertook a familiar legal marketing tactic by doing a guest post on the subject of estate planning as it relates to bankruptcy.  Rather than ask, I did the guest post and sent it off to the firm for which I wanted to see it appear.  This particular firm has a nice blog and I assume it does well for their legal marketing efforts if for no other reason than the fact that it ranks well for a particular search term.

My post was about 450 words of solid content, and well written.  Within 12 hours I got a response from the lawyer that he thought it was very good post and he’d get it up immediately.

About 10 minutes later I got the following email, sent to me by a “Legal Communications” person who apparently didn’t understand the concept of “reply all.”  The email said:

This is how it works. Nice tie in. Now, we can identify some bloggers for <name of lawyer’s paralegal> to write the same kind of email to.

I’m not worried at this point.  It’s good that someone who gets paid for this sort of thing has been taught the “hidden secret” of guest blogging as legal marketing vehicle.

The following day I get an email from the lawyer saying:

It looks like it needs a partial rewrite now that I have reviewed it (since there are some other alternatives) so I will simply borrow most of it, give you attribution and link to your site.

A partial rewrite?  OK, no problem.  A little editorial control in the interests of clarity is a good thing.  After all, I’m not an estate planning lawyer.

Now remember why we guest blog, people – to increase our reach and audience, to provide value, and to get noticed in a field in which that may not otherwise be the case.  Legal marketing in the online world, this is.  Tried and true content marketing.

In hindsight my mistake was clear.

Fast forward to the other day.  I get an email from the “Communications Director” of this law firm (my oh my, they do have a lot of people working in the field of communications) telling me as follows:

Sending you a link to the blog with <lawyer> did based on your recent email.  Please note that you are quoted in the blog and we have provided a link to your website.  Thank you for the suggestion.

The content is noted as having been written by the attorney, and encompasses the content I provided.  Of course, it’s wrapped in pure promotion for this attorney’s firm and not offered as a substantive piece of content written to inform and educate.

I am quoted with a link to one of my sites, but it is not my post.  I did not give this attorney an interview, and I did not agree to ghostwrite a post for him.  I did not offer to feed him ideas, and I certainly did not knowingly give him a “suggestion.”

What this proves, however, is that this attorney does not necessarily control his own content.  His “communications” people are handling that, thank you very much.  And rather than either accept or reject a guest blog post they chose to co-opt the content for their own purposes.

No, I’m not telling you the name of the other lawyer.  It’s not relevant.

What is relevant is this – guest posting is a valid form of legal marketing.  I’ve done it before, and I’ll do it again.  But before you submit a proposed guest post you need to remember that it is your intellectual property.  You need to retain full editorial control or, at the very least, final say on the content being published.

Photo courtesy of chick pea pie.

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3. Home Office Lawyer to Guest Post on Futurelawyer