Small Law Firms, Solo Practitioners

Will New Rules Of Content Marketing Kill Ghostwritten Legal Blogs Once And For All?

Blogging isn't what it used to be.

By  
on

writing typing blogging keyboardEvery six years or so, the question of the ethics of ghostwritten legal blogs rears its head around the blogosphere. And while most bonafide bloggers stubbornly maintain that ghostwriting is either plainly unethical, not to mention unwise for other reasons, a full sixty percent of lawyers surveyed by the ABA Journal did not perceive any problem with outsourcing blogging to others since lawyers have long relied on marketing experts for advertising copy.

Of course, in 2010, when the ABA polled its readership on ghostwriting, blogging — and the blogosphere — were both much different than they are today. Back then, conventional wisdom among most legal marketers was that penning frequent, short blog posts — would maximize SEO. But the ideal length for a blog post is much different in 2016 than it was in 2008 or even 2012. For starters, as I observed back in 2009, social media sites like Twitter or Tumblr offer better platforms for short form writing than a blog.

More significantly, the Internet today is awash in a tsunami of content. A recent report, Build a Better Blog released by Track Maven found that over the last five years, the average number of blog posts published per brand per month increased by a whopping 800 percent, while social shares of blog content declined by 80 percent. To oversimplify, there’s more noise than ever before, and readers are simply tuning it out.

Though not entirely. Readers are also more discerning about what they’ll share. Most significantly, longer posts are more shareable than short ones, with a target between 1200-1400 words. Moreover, longer posts also have a more favorable impact on SEO.

But here’s the thing. In spite of data showing that long posts perform better than short on nearly every level, many legal content marketers persist in recommending short posts of 450-660 words, 500 words (another vote for 500 words), or 350 words. So why are so many legal content marketers hopelessly out of step when it comes to the optimal blog post length? My guess is that it’s self-interest: while it’s easy enough for a decent writer to gin up a few hundred words on basic topics like “What is probate?” or “The pros and cons of using a mediator in divorce,” it’s much more difficult to fake a 1200 word post. Which is why ghostwritten legal blogs, whether ethical or not, are utterly ineffective as law firm marketing tools.

Granted, many lawyers may not have the time to churn out 1200-word blog posts three times a week. For that reason, I’ve often recommended newsletters as an alternative to blogging, because you can get by with a single long piece once or twice a month, and then circulate the newsletter via social media channels. Alternatively, you can hire a team of law students or recent grads to affordably power your blog, so long as you pay them and give them a byline.

But if you’re approached by a legal content marketer who wants to sell you two or three canned posts weekly for a couple hundred dollars a month, here, the most effective response is also the shortest: no, thanks.

Sponsored

Carolyn ElefantCarolyn Elefant has been blogging about solo and small firm practice at MyShingle.comsince 2002 and operated her firm, the Law Offices of Carolyn Elefant PLLC, even longer than that. She’s also authored a bunch of books on topics like starting a law practice, social media, and 21st century lawyer representation agreements (affiliate links). If you’re really that interested in learning more about Carolyn, just Google her. The Internet never lies, right? You can contact Carolyn by email at [email protected]or follow her on Twitter at @carolynelefant.

Sponsored

Topics

,