(Chart via Bob Ambrogi’s Law Sites Blog.)
Recent data from the American Bar Association suggests that fewer lawyers are blogging than have in the past. What this means … well, it could mean a few things.
Many folks—myself included—have advocated for the power of a blog to alter an attorney’s work life. Will a blog transform your law practice and rake in the clients? Probably not. Just like any tool at your disposal, this one can serve your particular needs—but you still have to identify what those needs are.
The hard work of determining your blog’s goals may have resulted in disappointment in the results—which were never clearly aimed for in the first place.
A very good roundup of the ABA’s new data is written by Bob Ambrogi. Among his mentions:
“Blogging was down among lawyers in all firm sizes except those in firms of 10-49 attorneys, where the percentage of lawyers who blog rose a point from 5% in 2013 to 6% this year. Among solos, the percentage who blog dropped from 12% to 10%; among those in firms of 2-9 attorneys, the percentage dropped from 11% to 8%; and in firms of 100 or more attorneys, the percentage went from 10% in 2013 to 9% this year.”
One interesting element of the ABA’s queries relates to its asking lawyers whether they “personally” maintain a blog (see chart above). Well, what else would they do?
As I have mentioned before, a debate exists over whether a lawyer’s blog is just another marketing tool, which no one (let alone potential clients) expects is penned by the lawyer herself.
Others (like me, for instance) see the blog as an opportunity to share your own thinking. It is not just like a lawyer bio, which we know a PR pro wrote. Neither is it like a brief, which everyone understands was drafted with the assistance of partners, associates and clerks.
As long as lawyers believe they can “farm out” the drafting of their own insights and legal perambulations, I’d wager that the decline in blogging may not be a bad thing.
What do you think?
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AZ Attorney 
September 9, 2014 at 1:43 pm
I agree. I think it was in the comments section of Ambrogiâs blog where someone was offering as a âsolutionâ the outsourcing of the writing of your blog. Yecch.
I agree with you â the decline of blogs is, hopefully, the shaking out of those practicing the black arts of SEO in writing blogs fit only for robots.
Dan Wise dwise@nhbar.org
Communications Director & Bar News Editor
New Hampshire Bar Association
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September 9, 2014 at 3:22 pm
Agreed. Don’t let the door hit ya in the ass, bad blogs.