Have you read these?

A smattering of posts you should be reading from the blawgosphere and beyond

• “Listen to Your Clients, Stupid” from to Lawjobs.com Career Center. This piece is great. It starts with the central premise of “talk to your clients” (you know what I think from this and this), but it doesn’t stop there. A dialogue with your client is only valuable if you ask your client for an evaluation. Simple? Yes. Easy? No way. But you can’t hide your heads in the sand much longer. Lawyers: you must engage your clients head-on in the tough conversations if you’re going to get out of this recession on top.
  
  
• “Why Old School Marketing Won’t Work For Your Law Blog” from Law Firm Blogger & Consultant. One of the challenges for lawyers moving into blogging is overcoming the unknown: a blog isn’t a white paper or a brochure or a website. It’s a conversation, and creating engaging conversations requires different tactics than lawyers and firms have traditionally used for written communication. Here’s some ideas on how to do it right.
  
  
• “Eye Opening Alternative Fee Theory...” from The Legal Hokey-Pokey. The billable hour v alternative billing debate is always exciting (that seems a lot geekier written down than in my mind). The issue regularly dominates the blawgosphere charts. I’ve written about it here and here.  We need more conversations like this that don’t beat up on the billable hour because it’s an easy target. Read it and then add to the discussion.
  
  
• “How to Develop a Niche Blog Content Plan” from Problogger. I generally try to avoid back to back recommendations of a blog, but Problogger makes that hard to do. This post is really about managing your blog, and everyone who blogs will benefit from reading it. I did, and I know you will too.
  
  
• “A Lawyer and His Pen” from Simple Justice. If you don’t subscribe to Scott Greenfield’s blog or follow him on Twitter, you’re doing yourself a huge disservice. Don’t be fooled by the title: I’ve learned more about marketing, social media, networking, and other essential skills from Greenfield than I can even remember. This post is no exception.