CT Biz Blogs

For my case study post (for the 20 blog types marathon) I want to take a look at Andrew Ewalt’s Law Blog. One reason is that he’s a CT lawyer from near my old stomping grounds (he’s in Manchester and Storrs; I lived in that area for many years). For another, he’s a good subject for my experiment — he’s headed in the right direction with his blog, but it could use a few tweaks. For a third, I’m in the process of redesigning this blog, and thinking objectively about someone else’s blog is easier than thinking objectively about my own. This will get my brain going in the right direction. So, I have a few thoughts on Andrew’s blog that I’d like to share. Do with them what you will, Andrew.

I’ll be writing about three parts of Andrew’s blog:

1. The URL
2. The Header
3. The Posts

1. The URL (web address)
   Notice, one and all, that Andrew has his own domain for his URL. This is a very wise and professional way to go. Even though this is a Typepad blog, his address is not somethingorother.typepad.com. That is the sign that a blog is a sub-domain of Typepad — its address is part of Typepad’s URL, and owned by Typepad.

   Typepad is not an evil empire or anything, I have nothing against Typepad. Many bloggers use it for their blogs and it’s fine.

   But, should this hypothetical blog (somethingorother.typepad.com) decide to move elsewhere, it will have to change its URL, because the current address points to a location on Typepad’s domain — in other words, the files that contain and run the blog physically reside on Typepad’s web servers. And changing the URL will result in broken links from the many blogs that have links to that blog, which is not only an inconvenience, but also can hurt your search engine page rank.

   But enough about this hypothetical blog; Andrew doesn’t do that. Smart move, Andrew!

2. The Header
   Under the title of the blog, there’s a paragraph with a line summing up what Andrew offers, “Helping individuals, families, and business control their affairs, protect their families and preserve their assets, through effective, prompt and reasonable legal services…” and then a list of all the different services. I’m sure this was done for two reasons 1) give search engines a list of keywords to use to determine what the blog is about, and 2) to actually list the services for potential clients.

   The problem with item #2 is that, speaking from an info design standpoint, this paragraph is way to long for a reader to grasp. And it’s not an actual list, which makes it more difficult to scan. People coming to this blog from a link want to know, “Does this attorney offer what I need?” or even, out of curiosity, “Do I need any of these things?” What they’ll say when they read the paragraph is “Wow, there’s a lot of stuff here,” but they won’t necessarily pick out anything.

   Instead, I’d suggest a shorter, snappier header line, maybe ending with”assets,” or up to the “legal services” part of the header. Then take the formatted list of services on the “About” page, and put that at the top of the right-hand sidebar, where the “Recent Posts” is now (moving that to the other side.) In fact, the picture could go there, as well, but maybe slightly smaller so that the Areas of Practice would still be “above the fold,” meaning readers wouldn’t have to scroll down to see the list.

   That way, item #1 would still be served, and item #2 would be maximized as well.

3. The Posts
   Recently Andrew posted an entry on what he will be writing about in his blog. He makes his stand, saying that,

   I have never seen this process as a place for me to post endless commentary
   regarding the comings and goings of my practice or personal life. I see
   the blog as a place for people to get up to date factual information regarding
   the law, financial and consumer information.

   Good for him! As I said in my comment there, a blogger can build up search engine page rank over time, as well as by posting every day, or several times a day. And, what I didn’t add but should have, it won’t dilute your message or your “personal brand.” It’s only good marketing to be consistent in how you represent yourself.

   On the other hand, something less impersonal can be good, too. For example, I loved the post, way back in May, about adoptees. It was handled well, referring to an article he read, and then to his personal experience.

   There are other ways to get in more “personalization” without getting personal.

   In the post I mentioned on writing in the blog, he refers to “…the ABA Section of Law Practice Management.” Now, he could explain what that is, and a bit about how he implements that in his own practice. It doesn’t have to be specific; “we send invoices every hour on the hour and expect to be paid promptly,” but he could write on how he feels a practice should be run.

   In other words, you don’t need to do an “All Creatures Great and Small,” kind of story, and write about wacky and eccectric clients. But you can still tell a story. There’s a story behind every action you take and every principle you uphold. And telling those stories will help people find you and know you.

So, that’s my screed for the day. I’d love to hear any comments — does anyone think I’m on-target, off-base, or just plain out-to-lunch? Let me know.