Top 6 Mistakes Made when Managing a Law Firm Blog

Blog management for law firms can often seem like a chore. You’re busy managing your firm—how can you possibly have time to keep up with a blog as well? Without updates, a law firm blog is as good as dead, and consistently coming up with new article ideas can be a challenge, especially for practice areas that don’t typically receive a lot of public attention.

The good news is that we’ve done a lot of research on law firm blogs. We know what works and what doesn’t. We know how to gain interest of potential legal clients. We also know that there are many law firms out there that don’t take advantage of the incredible opportunities a blog gives them. We’ve noticed a handful of mistakes many firms make in particular.

Here are the 6 of the most common mistakes made when managing a law firm blog:

Not thinking about SEO:

Blogs are terrific communication tools, but they’re also terrific at helping you organically build up your site’s search engine optimization (SEO) potential. With just a couple unique keywords and a bit of creativity, dozens of articles can be written by either your firm or your legal content writers. Never neglect the potential of SEO. Even when you’re writing up a quick news post regarding something that happened in the firm, remember to think about SEO.

Not having a professional writer/marketer produce content for the blog:

Speaking of legal content writers, you do have access to one, right? It’s certainly possible to pass your blog-writing duties down to a legal professional who’s skilled at writing, but unless that person has had extensive experience in writing SEO-rich legal content, you would be better off enlisting the aid of a professional legal content writer or digital marketing specialist with legal experience.

Blogs need to be well-written, rich in SEO, credible, unique, and written by a legal expert. Sure, everyone can write and maintain a blog, but not everyone can do it well. Your potential client base knows the difference between a high quality article and one that’s poorly written or copied and pasted from other sites.

Letting it go obsolete:

A blog that hasn’t been updated for 6 months or a year is effectively useless. When a potential client views your blog, the first thing many will look at is its publication dates. A law firm that doesn’t have enough time to keep their blog updated might not have enough time to properly communicate with its client base. You want to avoid anyone thinking this.

Not taking advantage of local news:

One of your best blog resources also happens to be one that can help you out a great deal when it comes to driving your firm’s local SEO efforts: Your local news. Pay attention to what happens locally, and if anything connects to one of your practice areas, write about the event while tying in your practice. If, for example, there’s a major trucking accident on a nearby highway, you can write about the accident itself or what steps to take if a similar accident should occur.

Not taking advantage of industry/case-related news:

On a similar note, you should also always be paying attention to any major updates that happen within the legal industry—especially those related to your specific practice areas or current cases. Don’t hesitate to post these types of updates on your blog, especially if they’re updates that your current client base or potential new clients might be interested in. This shows you keep up with current events and that you have an interest in keeping clients abreast of updates which may affect their cases.

Not taking creative risks:

Far too often, we see law firm blogs that are well-managed and credible, but just aren’t interesting to read. Also far too often, we see blogs that contain article after article of content that could just as well be posted underneath your site’s navigation bars. A potential client views a law firm’s blog because they’re interested in the firm itself. Don’t hesitate to talk about your firm in your blog. Talk about local events your attorneys are taking part in. Talk about panels you’ve participated in. Talk about cases you personally find interesting.

It’s also perfectly okay to take the “legal speak” and “academia speak” down a notch in your blog. Don’t take it to the realm of “Let’s chillax, dude” casual, but don’t be afraid to speak from a more personal mindset and tone rather than one that’s 100% academic. Remember, your goal is to encourage people—just like you and I—to read your blog and gain interest in your firm. Be personable, and don’t be afraid to take a creative risk from time and time. Afterwards, you can see how it pays off and go from there.

At Legal InSites, we can do more than provide you with articles that can be posted on your blog. We can help you come up with new blog approaches and create a legal content writing plan that will maximize your SEO efforts, increase your chances of receiving new clients, and create a solid content foundation that will keep your blog—and site—looking and reading awesomely. With our help, blog management for law firms can become a whole lot easier.