

(Click here for the 2011 Blogs of the Amlaw 100)
Two weeks ago I was looking online and asking around for a list of the law blogs of the AmLaw 100. The only one I could find was this incomplete list from January of 2010- Social Media Use at the AmLaw 100
That chart is now fairly outdated, so with the help of Gwynne Monahan (@econwriter5 on Twitter) we assembled this list of all the AmLaw 100 law blogs we could find.
(See the list in full page here)
This chart may be missing a few blogs here and there, so please email us the URL’s of any blogs we are missing so that we can update the chart. Email tips to info@adriandayton.com
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Adrian, I am a young Marketing Coordinator working for a mid-size law firm in the Greater-Boston area. One of my responsibilities is to monitor social networking being used for law firm marketing. The firm currently has two lawyers working on blogs. My question is A) How do we make sure our clients are reading the posts and B) What is the best way for our blog to reach prospective clients? I have recently found Legal Updates on LinkedIN and read ATL on a daily basis. Can you please offer some advice?
Great questions Justin.
A) There is no way to guarantee that clients read your posts, but there are a few ways to encourage it. The best way is by creating great content that will be useful to you client. Encourage your clients to sign up for your blog through RSS or email updates. Another great way is to simply email out the blog posts or the link to the posts with a short email.
B) Lexology and LinkedIN are great ways, participating in pertinent LinkedIN groups and sites like Legal Onramp and Martindale Connected are another. I go into further detail in my article How to give your legal writing nine lives
Shoot me an email – info@adriandayton.com if you have further questions.
Adrian, this is an interesting statistic: 50% of law blogs coming from just six firms! Are those six law firms among the top performers? Do you think there’s a correlation between blog writing and success?
Justin, you may be intersted in a conference at which Adrian and other recognized legal social media experts will be speaking on October 21: “The Case for Social Media: Managing Your Online Presence to Build Your Law Practice.” Session details, speaker bios and registration information can be found at http://www.mylegalmedia.com.
Lisa,
Great question RE: how law blogs affect profitability of law firms. This may sound like a cop out, but I think it is too early to tell. Even a pioneer of law blogs like Sheppard Mullin has only been blogging for a couple of years- so I think it is hard to say whether or not a blog along is a substantial enough factor in determining how competitive firms are. Blogs are only as good as their authors.
I think in 3-5 years we will see some long term results, but it is just too early to say at this point.
Justin: One way you can make sure your clients, meaning those who currently employ your law firm for work, are reading your posts is to direct them to those posts. You can email them the relevant links, either as part of another email or as part of a newsletter, and perhaps on other documents as references or “for more information,” or something you know your clients read.
In terms of prospective clients, be sure to include blog links on your marketing materials, your online bio, website, business cards, etc. And, of course, track your rankings in search engines and see how prospective clients are finding your blogs.
Hi Adrian and Justin,
Very interesting conversation here, I couldn’t help but think of a few examples that might help illustrate the valuable points you both raise.
To support Adrian’s suggestion on ways to encourage your audience to read your posts. I’m reminded by an article in Managing Partner Magazine where Jeff Berardi, CMO at K&L Gates referenced the importance of his existing email subscriber list when it came to generating awareness around the firm’s Global Financial Market Watch blog. The firm already had a heavily engaged audience subscribed to their Global Financial Market email newsletters and alerts. This already captivated audience were first to be informed of the blog launch. This was an excellent tactic to tailor to clients ever changing communication / content preferences.
It must be said that 2 key variables in the success of the GFM Watch blog were 1.) the audience and 2.) relevant, valuable content. As Adrian already mentioned.
If you subscribe to Managing Partner online I believe you can access the full article feature on the success of K&L Gates’ blog strategy, a good read.
Another AMLAW 200 firm I know with over 400 attorneys used email marketing as the channel to successfully launch its Liquid Natural Gas blog to their Liquid Natural Gas clients (a very targeted audience) and increased subscribers by 20% in 6 months.
I hope you don’t mind me jumping in here, but hope these examples help.
Follow me at twitter.com/jamesnewcombe for more insights.
Welcome James, glad to hear more examples of affective use of blogs and social media. I really think what we are seeing now is just the beginning. These examples will be followed and replicated eventually by every major law firm. The digital space is just too important to ignore.
Feel free to come again and comment anytime.
AD
We looked at the Law blogs of the AmLaw and recognized that among law firms the use of blogs is still quite small.Thanks, Adrian Dayton!