We’re number one…well, almost….

Paralegal Blog TopI received an email today from Charles Sipe http://www.paralegal411.org/.  According to paralegal411.org and the sophisticated metrics they use, The Estrin Report  is ranked number two (in the world? in the country? on the Internet?) in the Top 25 paralegal blogs. 

 I love that and I genuinely appreciate all of your support and thank you for what it took to get there.  This blog has been around since 2005.

But according to the paralegal411 chart, there are 26 blogs.  Does that mean that out of 250,000 paralegals in the U.S., a whole slew of paralegals who don't have the paralegal title but act as paralegals plus legal document processors (not considered paralegals but doing paralegal work directly to the public), paralegals who are called legal assistants, paralegals who have duel titles such as Office Manager/Paralegal, paralegals who have made a horizontal move outwardly or vertical climb up upwardly on some kind of ladder leveraging their careers, along with 500,000 paralegals in the U.K., uncounted licensed paralegals in Canada and countless others in other countries, there are only 26 paralegal blogs?  How do we get enough information in this day and age?

Holy, moly!  We may be underserved!  Come on paralegals!  Start writing.  Open your desktops, glom onto the Internet, go to WordPress, Typepad and other service providers!  Start writing now! Share your experiences!  Shout out to other paralegals!  Let the legal field know how important paralegals are – what paralegals do and how the job has expanded into important and sophisticated roles in the legal community!  Point to where the heroes are!  Who finds the hot docs and smoking guns?  Paralegals, of course!  Push yourselves up an invisible career ladder!  Make TV land do a series about paralegals instead of the same old, same old predictable lawyer shows!  (Paralegals have love lives too, you know.)  Write a mystery novel, be another Scott Turow but for paralegals! If paralegals don't tout their successes, who will?  Attorneys?  Bzzzzz!  Thank you for playing.  Try again. 

This field needs more outward recognition.  Who works alongside attorneys until midnight the night before going to trial but might never publically get asked to lunch?  Who catches mistakes but doesn't get the acknowledgement?  Who comes home to suddenly find out their kids aren't 4 anymore but just turned 14?  Paralegals!  So, stand up, folks!  Get some well-deserved recognition!  Social media is here to stay.  Use it to get acknowledged.  Write, write, write.

Oh, and if you could possibly link The Estrin Report up to your site or follow us on Twitter @estrin or mention us in your blog, we sure would like to make it to Number One………