Legal Bloging for a Job

So the holiday season is over and it’s back to work.  Let’s get started, shall we?

I came across a story the other day about Mark Herrmann, co-author of “Drug and Device Law”, a blog he co-wrote for the past several years.  Mr. Herrmann credits his blog with the new job offer he recently received.  He also states that though the blog took up most of his Sudays, or at least Sunday mornings, he has a hard time figuring the financial benefits.

He says that the blog definitely raised his own profile and that of the firm’s, going so far as to say that one idea suggested on his blog was later made into a law by the FDA.  On the other hand, he didn’t know how much business he could attribute to the blog.   He did receive some business from it, but he doesn’t think he got a return on his investment.

Probably not. If his firm is charging $350 an hour (we have no idea if that’s right) and he’s spending several hours every week blogging.  Forget it.  That’s a lot of work for a very highly trained attorney to do, and justifying that much of an expense will always be hard.

Of course, had they hired someone else to do their blog for them.  Say, a company that charges 1/10th of the amount spent on his blog…

(Photo courtesy rcade’s flickr page.)

Facebook Ethics

For judges in Florida, it looks like Facebook may not be a safe place.

Florida’s Judicial Ethics Advisory Committee ruled that judges can’t friend (That’s a verb now too.  Thanks, Facebook.)  attorneys that appear before them as it might imply favoritism or otherwise improper familiarity.

Ok, that makes sense.  Attorneys probably don’t want to go on Facebook, post their pics from the Halloween party where they are dressed up as a naughty nurse/vampire/X-man, only to appear in the judge’s courtroom the next morning to hear “Nice costume, counselor.”  Oposing counsel might not like that.

Come to think of that, I’m pretty sure no one would like that.

Updates.

We’ve been doing a lot of SEO work recently and are configuring, coding, seo-ing.  (What?)  So please forgive us if our stuff is out of whack for a while.  We’ll still be posting, but stuff can be coming and going as it pleases.

Lawyers Feel the Need, The Need to Blog

We came across this article recently, detailing the increased pressure on attorneys feelings compelled to blog.  To put it simply, most lawyers don’t have enough time in the day to blog and practice law.  It’s a growing problem, especially as more and more attorneys and law firms realize the need to keep up to date content on their websites.  Though the importance is recognized, that doesn’t do anything about the time constraints.

Because we offer legal blogging services, we too see the value in blogging.  And not just for our income, but because it is a very cheap way to get your message across.  Even if you don’t hire a blogging services company like Redactic, you should understand how effective and efficient blogging can be for lawyers.  (And any other profession.)

Let’s take a hypothetical situation:  A medical malpractice attorney St. Louis starts a blog.  She writes about her day to day experiences two to three times a week.  Sometimes she writes about winning a case, sometimes she talks about her frustration with a personal injury settlement.

Unbeknowst to her (yet knowst to others) she has been marketing herself with every post.  And not just marketing, but indelibly leaving a record of herself to scatter to the internet winds, traveling all over the world.  Some of words she used in her writing are subsequently picked up by search engines.  They drive traffic to her blog.  A client might search the internet for “St. Louis medical malpractice lawyer” and bingo, her blog posts pops up.   That potential client reads it, like it, and clicks on the “contact me” button on her blog.

And that’s about it.  One post, one new client.  And that one post isn’t like a radio add that only airs for a certain amount of time.  It isn’t like a ad in the yellow pages you have to keep paying for every  month or year.  It’s there.  Out in the ether.  Floating around until someone finds it and follows it to your firm.

Nifty, isn’t it?

The Ethics of Legal Blogging

Ghostwriting and the legal profession are nothing new.  But as more and more law firms and attorneys start taking advantage of the opportunities presented by social media, blogs and other emerging techmologies.  (Yes, we said techMologies.  Because we like it.)

But the ethical considerations lawyers need to consider when ghostwriting, or hiring ghostwriters, are not inconsequential.  But ghostwriting a pleading for a pro se litigant who wants to trim costs is one thing.  Having a writer create content for your website or your blog is another thing.

Does a person reading your blog expect that it is written by you, the attorney?  If it isn’t written by you, do you need to make that clear?  If you don’t, does that make it unethical?  What ethics rule are you violating?

We’re going to keep up with this as time goes on.  There have been ethics rulings on ghostwriting and blogging, but we’re not aware of any on ghostwritten blogs.  We’ll keep looking.

(Photo courtesy Padraic’s Flickr page.)

Google Scholar and the Future of Legal Research

We’ve used it a few times before, but Google Scholar (currently in Beta) allows lawyers and researchers a new way to get case law without having to go to the stacks or pay for Lexis.

Which makes us wonder, what does the future hold for legal research?  The needs to search in-house documents aside, what will the growth of the internet bring to the world of small firms or solo practitioners?  Will you one day be able to search, Shephardize and cross reference every opinion, holding, administrative regulation or pending peice of legislation with everything else you need to know about?  How about current cases, or recently filed cases, or news articles or personal dossiers of each attorney arguing a case?

We don’t know, but if the growth of the internet has taught us anything, it is that this information will be easier to find as time goes on.  Not only easier, but faster and cheaper as well.

(Photo courtesy umjanedone’s Flickr page.)

Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin and Legal Marketing

If you’ve been alive recently, you know that social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and linkedin are the end all be all of existence.  Everyone who is anyone is using them at all hours of the day and becoming fully realized human beings capable of super-human feats.

Well, perhaps that’s a bit of an exaggeration.  But the emergence of these tools has brought up a lot of questions when it comes to attorneys and law firms.   Ethical considerations aside, are there practical benefits for attorneys who use these sites to find new clients or business?

Some attorneys don’t think so.   Many believe the short messages and updates posted on sites like these don’t attract clients.  The thought is that people aren’t going to Twitter to find a lawyer or any other kind of professional.   Is someone going to log onto Facebook and try to find a good plastic surgeon?

They have a point.  These sights may be great for socialization, but for finding the attorney that’s going to help you with your DUI?

Then again, we’re not so sure that using these sites is a lost cause.  Since a lot of (if not most) new clients find their attorney through recommendations from a friend, and these sites make it easier to contact friends, why wouldn’t they use it?  Is it difficult to update your Facebook status and say “I’m looking for a lawyer.  Can anyone recommend one?”  It’s not unreasonable to assume this has, and is, happening now.  (We know from personal experience that many of our Facebook friends often send us questions about legal situations they’re in.)

It’s also not unreasonable to believe that social media friends could then direct the potential new client to the lawyer’s Facebook page.  (Or Myspace, or Twitter, etc.)

We once read that attorneys are much more likely to be pessimists than any other profession.  (Yes, shocking, we know.)  This attitude may serve them in their work, but when it comes to taking advantage of new opportunities, they may be on the tail end of things.   As far as social media goes, like the internet, we don’t think it’s going away anytime soon.  It has potential, and though still in its early stages, we think it is at least worth looking at.

(Photo courtesy Damien Basile via Flickr.)

Law Firm Online Marketing and…THE FUTURE!

On Fridays, we like to take a step back from day-to-day drudgery and focus on the philosophical, the romantic, even the luminous.  (Or maybe we’re just over-caffeinated.)

Because our company focuses on blogs for attorneys, we often come across some law firm websites that are, say, less than well made.

Granted, the most common way for new clients to come to most firms is by word of mouth.  You know someone who recommends their lawyer, they know someone who worked with this law firm, etc.  But the internet isn’t going anywhere, and its integration into our daily lives continues unabated.  (Just ask yourself how different it was 10 years ago, even 5 years ago.)

We know lawyers have a full plate, and solo-practitioners and small law firms may not have the resources or time to devote to optimizing their websites, but we are still amazed at how often these firms do the very least.   (Read this recent article about online marketing basics for a good idea of what we are talking about.)

The promises of the internet, in all its over-hyped, world-changing, brave-new-world exuberance so often read about but so infrequently confronted, is changing every day.  In 10 years, you won’t be able to do anything without it.  It will be everywhere, it will be a part of every moment of our lives.  Paying bills and making web-calls is just the beginning.   (Take a look at Oxford Professor Nick Bostrom’s work at the Future of Humanity Institute to get an idea of what we’re talking about.  Amazing stuff.)

So embrace it, lawyers of America.  The internet is a part of your world, and that part is going to get bigger and bigger every day, for a lot of days to come.

(Photo courtesy tellumo’s Flickr page.)

ABA Top 100 Legal Blogs (or Blawgs)

Just a quick catch up on a news story we missed a week or so ago. The ABA Journal has published its list of top 100 legal blogs, which you can find here.

No, we’re not on it.

Yet.

Tiger Woods, Divorce, Prenuptials and Re-Nuptials

Tiger Woods

How many women does it take to break up a marriage, assuming of course one isn’t named Jolene.  How many does it take to keep a marriage together but for Tiger Woods’s wife Elin Nordegren to get a modification of the prenuptial agreement?  We don’t know, but whatever the number is, it was apparently enough.

Prenuptial agreements are nothing new, but the recent troubles in the Woods-Nordegren marriage highlight a little talked about fact of family and divorce law, namely that these agreements are contracts.  Like the marriage contract itself, or any other contractual document parties enter into, it can be changed, modified, updated, breached, dissolved, etc.

If two parties (in this case the married couple) decide to enter into a contract, they can.  Assuming the contact doesn’t contain any illegal provisions that would make it void as a matter of law, they can come to an agreement on whatever they want, and place whatever terms or limits in the contract they see fit.  Weight gain conditions?  Sure.  Specifics about what they will or won’t watch on television?  Why not? Who gets the convertible on Saturday?  Ok.

And if they decide to change their prenuptial agreement (sometimes called a premarital agreement) they can do that as well.

There’s a lot of stuff that people have included in these contracts that might seem odd.  The Chicago Sun-Times once published a story about some of the more interesting clauses they’d found;

• The right to random drug testing and a fine for positive results.  (Married to the Olympic Committee?)
• The husband does not have to go on vacation with his mother-in-law.  (Ok.  We get this one.)
• For each time a spouse is unfaithful: $100,000.  (Let’s hope this is a deterrent and not an incentive.  “Honey, I want a new boat.  Would you mind going out to get a hooker?”)

Ah, love.  Isn’t it grand?

(Photo courtesy Keith Allison’s Flickr page.)