Hi there - thanks for coming back to visit! While you're here, why not sign up for the Legal Practice Pro Newsletter?
Lawyers are always concerned about liability – and bankruptcy lawyers in particular, given the fact that we’re required (in most places) to provide a slew of disclosures to someone pretty much the second we even think about opening our mouths.
So the knee-jerk reaction we all have is to turn off comments on our blogs. Because we don’t want to run afoul of the authorities. Because we don’t want to get roped into giving out advice.
I did this for a long time on this blog, but for different reasons. Then I got yelled at by Amy Derby. I hate getting yelled at, so I turned on the comments.
OK, Amy didn’t really yell at me – she just set me straight. And she was right.
My friend Liz Strauss asked today about The Value of A Comment. And I’ve been thinking about it in the context of our own little world, the microcosm of bankruptcy lawyers.
The point of a blog is to involve readers, to bring them into your circle of influence and engage them. Get them talking, hear what’s on their minds, and delve ever-deeper into the issues concerning them. By doing so, you create a vibrant community of people who come back again and again.
For bankruptcy lawyers, this is pretty important whether we like to acknowledge it or not. With the proliferation of bankruptcy lawyers coming online now and in the future, you’re going to get lost in the shuffle unless you engage your readers.
And it doesn’t matter how good your content is, how much of it there is, or how smart you are – if you don’t make a connection, you won’t make an impact on your readers. And you’ll lose the client to the lawyer who’s online and doing it right.
Now you’re going to fall back on the argument that accpeting comments opens you up to liability. Not necessarily. If someone posts a comment about his or her personal situation, put up a response telling them to call you in the office to talk about it. Let them know you can’t talk about individual situations online, but that you invite them to continue chatting in generalities. Use it as a platform to let people see you’re a real person, caring and involved.
By the way – the picture is of Dan Press, me (in the middle with the scrawny legs) and Brett Weiss. We are in Savannah, GA during our October 2008 Hilton Head meeting for the National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys. As you can see, both Dan and Brett are very serious, upstanding bankruptcy lawyers with no sense of humor whatsoever. Immediately after taking this picture, we resumed a heated discussion on the avoidance powers of a Chapter 7 trustee. Brett departed our meeting with a completed appellate brief and Dan had dictated his oral argument into a digital recorder.
Related posts:
I am glad Amy got you straightened out! I personally feel a huge piece of the blog experience is missing if there is no ability to leave a comment. The interaction is what makes blogging so dynamic and useful. I’ve seen comment discussions that were so helpful they made me come back to the post over and over again to make sure I hadn’t missed anything!
I agree Laurie. In fact, I have argued that comments should get “dofollow” tags. While this idea is usually met with a chorus of boos (the argument being that opens the flood gates to comment spam), if you monitor your blog comments, comment spam is not a problem. Helpful comments should be rewarded. In any event, without the interactive relationship comments provide, blogs are merely another way for article submission.
Jay -
I think people hear about all the terrible comments that end up on blogs. (Take a look at Above The Law.) The trust is that law blogs are just not that interesting and do not attract the kind of audience that is going leave unwanted comments (other than the spammers).
If you were giving a presentation, you would some questions, arguments and discussions with the audience. I think of my blog as my presentation for the day (or whenever I feel like posting).
Although we like to think we are infallible, us lawyers are not always rights. Plus, there are always other points of view on a topic.
I am not a fan of Gyi’s approach. Comments are for sharing your point of view, not to generate SEO (those are spammers).
Quite frankly, if you don’t allow comments on a blog, it is not a blog. The key benefit and feature of a blog is the communication you can have with your readers. If you don’t allow comments, you are having a one way conversation that for most of us is going to be very boring.
Turn on comments and moderate them. You will be just fine.
Who, me yell?! Ha.
Happy that you turned on the comments.
Also nice to see a photo of you and your very serious bankruptcy lawyer friends.
You have inspired me to turn on the comments section as well! I am almost ashamed of having mine turned off initially, but I guess that is our first reaction as lawyers. BTW, check out my repository of the Michael Vick bankruptcy papers at:
http://www.sanantoniobankruptcyattorneylawyerinformation.com/vick.htm
it is terrible really to share all this in commenting lol
lawyer locator service -Being a representative of a law firm, reading an article and blogging and commenting on legal issues has always proved to be useful. To some extent, information given on such blogs and the comments and articles has benefited the victims facing complexities in term of legal issues and helps us also update our knowledge of what is happening around and what all complexities we should expect from our future cases.. It provides a great platform to discuss experiences and share knowledge.
lawyer locator service -
I love to read such informative articles. It is good to know what went wrong in which part of the world.. even in distant places, where we do not ever plan to physically visit, we visit there virtually and analyse the complete scene. Thanks for this piece of information to add to my experience! To share my other experiences too, recently, I have come across an article on how efficiently law firms get you the justice, which otherwise, sometimes, gets next to impossible. While reading, I realized how important it is to contact a lawyer whenever you get stuck with any legal related issues. And a family lawyer does not in any way decreases the importance of keeping an international law firms directory handy.
Its really cool, I came to know this really worth visiting, just bookmarked your site.
http://gisnap.com/
The place where fun never ends
Thanks a lot for that amazing post! I like it very much!
I think of my blog as my presentation for the day (or whenever I feel like posting).
Thanks for sharing the reason
This is the first article I’ve read since finding this site…and what an article!!! I’m hooked.
Personal injury Attorney Temecula