Philip  Thomas’ blog started with a simple goal: a way to raise his profile without going to the networking events. A self-described “introvert,” Thomas knows that networking lunches and receptions aren’t the key for him, but he needed to connect to the legal community.

photo-of-PWT-08-11-111-240x300“I’m a solo practitioner who works on large value litigation cases,” said Thomas. “So I have a low-volume practice, and I’m not necessarily coming in contact with that many other lawyers. So I was thinking about my profile within the legal community, and wanted to raise and maintain that profile…I started reading legal blog, and they looked like something that I could do and would enjoy doing.”

And the rest, as they say, is history. Six years later, Thomas is consistently getting positive feedback on his blog the Mississippi Litigation Review. Most lawyers and judges he knows in Mississippi have told him they read his blog, which he counts as a positive.

“It’s probably helpful to me, when I go in a judge’s courtroom, and I appear before them, they know, sort of, who I am and that I’m thoughtful, write well, and have a good reputation,” said Thomas. “It’s really helped my practice, but sort of in intangible ways.”

The blog gets some non-lawyers reading as well, but through the years he’s worked to keep the focus on writing for lawyers. He looks for issues that would be interesting in the legal community: big cases, important decisions, public matters that may cause a big splash. There have been times when he’s found himself in hot water with an attorney on the “losing side” of the case he’s reported on who doesn’t want the case publicized, but he’s learned to not let that dictate how he frames his writing.

Instead he focuses on what he can bring to the story that others can’t: perspective, both as a lawyer and someone who appreciates humor.

“I love to [insert humor into pieces], it’s something that’s fun to do, and that you can do on a blog,” said Thomas, who believes blogs can give insight in a way news stories can’t. “A newspaper reporter can’t really do that in an article, but it’s my blog and I can’t tackle issues however I want to.”

That doesn’t mean he’s counted out news stories all together. Thomas delights in using the blog as a forum for him to express his opinions and gain insight into a case, and if he can use it to further his “pet projects,” then all the better.

“If it’s something I’ve written about repeatedly in the past–law school, tort reform, Mississippi public retirement system–anytime I see something in the mainstream I use it as a way to reintroduce the topic and give my two cents,” said Thomas.

While Thomas is a frequent poster–he’s had to cut down to two or three times a week, to the dismay of his readers–he knows he didn’t get there overnight. It took time to establish that following; he thinks it’s important to remember that you have to be updating regularly to get people in the habit of reading it. He remembers the early years, when fellow lawyers he was talking to didn’t even know he had a blog. A year after that they’re avid readers.

“You really need to build up a volume of content, and then update it regularly so you get people in the habit of reading,” said Thomas, who says it’s also important to know who you’re writing to. “If I was just going to write for the general population to generate the most page hits, I would need to do it differently than I am. I would need to write about different topics, and appeal more to the mainstream. But that’s not what I set out to do.”

For Thomas, blogging is the perfect answer to the legal arena. It provides him a way to write his opinion about important legal developments and share that knowledge within the legal community. That passion is exactly what makes his blog a destination page for people who are trying to keep up with what’s going on in the legal community in Mississippi.