Technola : Public Interest Law & Technology Updates & Commentary : Matthew Burnett & Kate Bladow : Tech Advice for the Non-Profit Legal Sector

The BlogHer community likes to recognize their favorite blog posts. It started with the Community Keynote, a session at the BlogHer Annual Conference where bloggers are invited to read their posts. But as the community grows, the tradition does, too.

This year, in addition to the Keynote, BlogHer recognized 90 posts as 2010 BlogHer Voices of the Year. In late July, I was notified that my post My Name Is Kate and I Am a Listener was selected as one of the 90 posts. I was thrilled to be included among the likes of Joanne Bamberger, Tracey Gaughran-Perez, and Liz Henry.

But I evidently didn't read the notification email well because it wasn't until recently I found that my post was inspiration for a terrific piece of art by Kalani Cropper, "Listen."

You see, all of the 2010 BlogHer Voices of the Year were used as inspiration for custom works of art and are now being auctioned to support long-term Gulf Coast recovery efforts.

Interested in bidding on this piece? Do it soon. It's only available until September 20. - K

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My second session, Your Blog Is Great, Get People to Know About It, covered enough information to fill an entire track. Since I can't explain the topic well in a short post, I've found good articles that cover the two main points: search engine optimization and social media and network sites.

Search Engine Optimization

• Search Engine Optimization 101 from MarketLeap. A series of articles about the core concepts around search engine optimization (SEO). (Courtesy of the Pro Bono Net SWEB Support site, which has a great section on Search Engines and marketing, but you have to be a member to access it.)
• 5 Quick Steps to Better SEO and 5 More Quick Steps to Better SEO. Two blog posts from Allyson Kapin and Jarrod Seltzer on care2's frogloop blog.

Social Media and Network Sites

• Using Online Social Networks to Build Buzz, Community & Support for Your Cause. Slides from a presentation by Jonathan Colman, Scott Goodstein, and Heather Holdridge.
• How to Show Your Soul and Engage Users on Twitter from TwiTip.

A few resources to try to cover the large amounts of content covered in the this session. Definitely topics that need more attention in the future. - K

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My first BlogHer breakout session, Owning Your Expertise, was an interactive session that fell a little short because of the large number of people that attended. However, I did take away a few key bits.

• Women write only 10 to 20 percent of newspaper opinion pieces, but they are prolific bloggers. The Op-Ed Project works with women, nonprofits, corporations, universities, and others to teach women to submit more op-eds.
• To get attention from media and other influencers, you need to figure out what you are an expert in and let them know.
• Use the sentence "I am an expert in [specific subject] because [reasons] to craft a good statement of why these influencers should listen to you.
• Don't feel like you are bragging. Sharing knowledge is good.

So what does this mean for legal aid/pro bono blogs? Public interest lawyers are smart, well-spoken people. You are experts in many diverse legal issues: divorces, parenting plans, debt collection, public benefits, health care, and so on. The media covers these topics daily. Why shouldn't they be using public interest advocates as their experts? The media gets good information, and your organization gets some publicity and attracts new donors, volunteers, and clients. - K

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Sitting in a hotel ballroom with 1,400 people, most of them amazing women who either blog or want to blog? Attending a conference with sponsors who have brought awesome swag and cater to attendees because they make household financial decisions? Yes, well, welcome to BlogHer 2009. Find me and introduce yourself!

If not, well, I expect to be posting updates on Technola and on Twitter through the day and part of tomorrow. You can also follow the gigantic stream of tweets from the conference by searching Twitter. - K

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On October 13, 2008, I attended BlogHer DC: The Reach Out Tour. During that day, I tried my hand at live blogging and live tweeting (i.e. blogging and tweeting while the event happens). It was an interesting experience, and to help those who are considering live blogging or tweeting other events, I thought that I would share a few thoughts.

Live Blogging
Beth Kanter wrote that "live blogging takes a certain chutzpah and fearlessness." She's right. When you are live blogging, you can't stop to be concerned about every detail of grammar and spelling. Your typing and thoughts won't be perfect, but you've just got to get over it. You can always go back and clean your post up after the session. And for me, it's much easier to clean up a rough post than write a post from scratch. When I wait, there's a good chance I'll never write up the post.

I was a little worried that live blogging would be a distraction or that I'd miss parts of the presentation; however, instead of being distracted, I had to pay attention, synthesize the information, and explain it immediately. I was forced to stay engaged, which I hope will mean that I remember the key points better. And if I don't, I have better than normal notes that I can review. (I really wish that I would have taken up live blogging during college! )

Live Tweeting
Live tweeting is much easier than live blogging. It's a lot like taking notes, except that you are sharing them with other people. People can respond and ask you questions, whether they are at the conference or not. For people who are at the conference, this can be an amazing tool. Panelists are able to gauge the audience's interest level as well as take questions, and audience members can have their own backchannel conversations about the topic. (Beth Kanter and Jeremiah Owyang both have posts on how a backchannel can change a session.) Live tweeting is also a great way to include people who aren't at the conference. They are able to eavesdrop on the session and get answers to their questions. Participation and ideas aren't just limited to the select people who were chosen or could afford to attend in person.

I had a good experience live blogging and tweeting at BlogHer. It made me really wish that the legal aid and pro bono communities would integrate these communication streams into their conferences. The first step? Make Internet access available in the conference rooms. - K

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Charlene Prince Birkeland of Yahoo spoke during lunch at BlogHer. She mentioned some great tips for increasing your blog's traffic, which I've summarized here.

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Your readers are going to find your blog in a lot of ways - search engines, social media, statistics reports, and so on. You need to actively make certain that readers are engaged, and not turned off, by your site. You can do this in several ways.

• Make your site usable. You'll be better off with a simple and clean design. Everything should be no more than one click away.
• Target the right audience with fresh and interesting content. Be genuine. They'll know if you are posting just to be posting. If you see a spike in visits, pull those readers in by posting lots of new content.
• Build community. You need to be a part of the conversation. Make connections and remember to comment on other people's blogs. And respond to the comments that are posted on yours.
• Use social media to distribute your content. But select the avenues that will really help you. This area can take up a lot of time.
• Embrace search engine optimization best practices. You'll want to use keywords in your title and text (within reason) and to tag your posts and photos. For keyword research, try WordTracker Keywords suggestion tool.

While each of these areas can take a lot of thought, planning, and time, you can make the process as simple as you want to or have time for.  And don't obsess. Search engine optimization isn't the end goal. It's just one way to make your goal happen. - K

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Today, I'm at the BlogHer DC conference. After a bit of technical trouble, I'm online and will be attempting some live blogging later this afternoon, but if you just want to keep an eye on the real-time highlights, keep an eye on me at Twitter. - K

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