The ABA is asking you to vote for your favorite law-related blog in this year’s annual “blawg 100“.

There are some interesting inclusions on this year’s list, and some interesting omissions. Of course any list will have a bias that reflects the ethos of the organization and it’s readership and the ABA is no exception. But even though The Attorney Marketing Center’s blog isn’t on the list (maybe next year), the list has value to me. It does for you, too.

It’s important to know which blogs in your niche are the “most popular”. Why? So you can study them, learn from them, and “steal” their best ideas.

The ABA lists 3,500 blawgs in it’s directory, ranked by the number of readers’ clicks on their profiles. Justia has at least that many with a similar ranking mechanism (and I am one of the top blawgs on their list in the legal marketing category).

Go find the blawgs in these or other directories that are the most popular in your niche and bookmark them. Study them. Learn from them. While they may not have the most traffic overall, or the most clicks, or come up first in search engines, reader popularity is an important metric, even if those readers are other lawyers and not your prospective clients.

If more lawyers were reading your blog, do you think you might get more of their referrals?

Find the top blawgs and “brief” them. What are they writing about? How long are their posts? How frequent? Study their titles (headlines), layout, and graphics. Ask yourself, “why is this blog so popular?” and then see if you can answer that question.

But don’t stop there. Reach out to the top bloggers in your niche and build a relationship with them. Add comments on their posts, link to them on your blog, and share their posts through social media.

Let them know who you are and that you appreciate their good work. Ask to interview them. Offer them a guest post on your blog. Offer to write one for theirs.

Make friends with the top guys and gals in your niche and soon, you might be one of them.