Contribute Articles to Increase Exposure and Leads!

Why You Should Contribute Articles to Nolo

Generates More Business

Thousands of consumers research legal issues through our network of websites every day. Sharing your knowledge builds rapport with clients. And every article you publish links to your LawFirms.com or Nolo.com profile, increasing the opportunity for potential clients to learn about your firm and contact you.

Increases Your Exposure

Contributor's articles and profiles will be displayed on the LawFirms.com home page, directory, and resource center. All articles are also optimized to rank on search engines, giving you another opportunity to reach prospective clients. The more articles you submit, the better your exposure will be through our network and search engines.

It's FREE

And because it's free, you are essentially increasing your lead volume without increasing costs.

Contributor Guidelines

Our goal is to create a network of sites flush with helpful content and well written, practical information that will keep readers coming back for years. With this in mind, we've put together a set of guidelines to which contributed content must adhere.

Length

Articles must be between 400 and 1,000 words (Longer articles can be submitted and will be paginated).

Topics

Submissions must be unique, in that they have not been published elsewhere online. For more on duplicate content, see our Article FAQs.

When you're choosing a topic, keep firmly in mind that Nolo's mission is to provide relevant, practical information to nonlawyers. Review our website to become familiar with Nolo's writing style and the types of issues we cover.

Avoid writing on topics that will quickly become irrelevant. Articles on recent changes to legislation, newly proposed legislation or other timely topics will quickly lose their relevance in the context of our site's legal library. This type of topic is best suited for a blog.

Additionally, we try to provide topic ideas to make contributing the appropriate kind of content easier. You'll see these ideas (tied to your practice area) when you go to the publishing tab of your Nolo inbox.

Style and Content

Here are some practical tips to help you write articles:

• Provide practical, unbiased information. Avoid long narratives, legal history, and sensational language.
• Use plain English. Avoid legalese and flowery language. Remember that most readers are not lawyers.
• Don't submit a law review article. The average nonlawyer should be able to understand the article and find it interesting and informative.
• Limit discussion of personal experiences or cases. Refer to a personal experience or case only if it helps explain a legal concept or provides a good example of what's discussed in the article. Don't discuss the size of monetary judgments or settlements that you helped obtain.
• Don't promote yourself. Consumers trust Nolo's website because it is not filled with self-promotional material. (If you are an advertiser in Nolo's Lawyer Directory, you can tell readers all about yourself in your Lawyer Directory profile.)
• Write a good first paragraph. The first paragraph should state what the article is about and offer a conclusion (when appropriate) so that readers can decide right away if the article will answer their question. Don't start with a case or client story.
• Keep paragraphs short. When possible, use subject headings to break up paragraphs, and use bulleted lists when including a list of items or issues.
• Be willing to revise. The best writing comes from several "eyes" and revisions. Nolo's expert editors will edit your article and may request revisions.

Byline

Your name, image, type of law practice, and city will appear prominently on the article page with a link to your profile page.