CANO Strategists shy away from the camera
Image [cc] justinmaier

Turns out that some legal bloggers are using a system of mentioning company names in order to boost traffic to their blogs. This strategy, known as Company Alert Name Optimization (CANO), takes advantage of companies like Thomson Reuters, LexisNexis, and BloombergLaw, including subsidiaries like BNA, CCH, Practical Law Company, Matthew Bender, and even smaller companies like Hein Online, Fastcase, Casemaker, and Jones McClure Publishing, all in the hopes that those companies have alerts that will funnel traffic set up by products like Google Alerts, WestClips, Lexis PublisherInfoNgenShiftCentral, Eqentia, Manzama, Ozmosys, FellSoft, Vocus, Aurora WDC, or Digimind. The practice is pretty shameful, yet seems to work very well in drawing traffic from those monitoring their company or competitor brand names.

CANO isn’t just limited to company names. Some legal bloggers go as far as to name law firms by name. The bigger the better. So, AmLaw 100 firms like Baker & McKinzie, DLA Piper, Greenberg Traurig, Hogan Lovells, Jones Day, Kirkland & Ellis, Latham & Watkins, Sidley Austin, Skadden, White & Case are all prime cases for CANO strategists. A larger list of firms that are commonly mentioned are listed below.

CANO strategists are extremely crafty in constantly finding creative ways of bringing traffic to their blogs. Some will even mention other popular legal blogs in the hopes that they are monitoring their brand. The Blawg100 Winners from the previous year are prime candidates for CANO strategists to use. Blogs like Legal As She Is Spoke, The Velvet Hammer, Divorce Discourse, Wills, Trusts & Estates Prof Blog, Lowering the Bar, IPWatchdog, Inside the Law School Scam, The Delaware Employment Law Blog, Koehler Law, Abnormal Use, Groklaw, SCOTUSBlog, California Corporate & Securities Law, and The Legal Writing Prof Blog are all creatively inserted in to blog posts that may or may not have anything specifically related to the topic of the post.

Beware of CANOs. Their name-dropping strategy may lure you onto their site, but once you’re there, you find out that the topics may not cover things like Gay Marriage Supreme Court arguments, or BigLaw Billable Hour Churning at all. It is simply a strategy to artificially increase webstats in order to drive advertising from companies like Google Ads, or Amazon, or Apple, or Bing. They go as far as to republish, or link out their CANO activities on social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, Tumblr and more.

So a word of warning to you on this April 1st, beware of the CANOs and their ability to mention company names that are not relevant to their blog posts. Some of the common names are list below:

Adams and Reese
Akerman Senterfitt
Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld
Alston & Bird
Archer & Greiner
Arnall Golden Gregory
Arnold & Porter
Baker Donelson Bearman Caldwell & Berkowitz
Ballard Spahr
Bancroft
Barnes & Thornburg
Becker & Poliakoff
Berger Singerman
Best Best & Krieger
Bingham McCutchen
Boies, Schiller & Flexner
Bracewell & Giuliani
Braff, Harris & Sukoneck
Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck
Bryan Cave
Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft
Cahill Gordon & Reindel
Carlock Copeland & Stair
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton
Cohen Milstein
Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll
Connell Foley
Connolly Bove Lodge & Hutz
Conrad & Scherer
Cooley
Cooper & Kirk
Cozen O’Connor
Davis Polk & Wardwell
Debevoise & Plimpton
Dechert
Dickie McCamey & Chilcote
Dilworth Paxson
DLA Piper
Doffermyre Shields Canfield & Knowles
Dorsey
Dorsey & Whitney
Drinker Biddle & Reath
Duane Morris
Fish & Richardson
Flaster Greenberg
Fox Rothschild
Freehills
Freshfields
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer
Fulbright & Jaworski
Ganfer & Shore
Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher
Greenberg Traurig
Hangley Aronchick Segal & Pudlin
Herbert Smith
Hoagland Longo Moran Dunst & Doukas
Hogan Lovells
Holland & Knight
Horton, Shields & Knox
Horvitz & Levy
Jenner & Block
Jones Day
K&L Gates
Kabateck Brown Kellner
Kilpatrick Townsend
Kirkland & Ellis
Klehr Harrison Harvey Branzburg & Ellers
Koskoff, Koskoff & Bieder
Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel
Latham & Watkins
Locke Lord
Manatt, Phelps & Phillips
Mandelbaum, Salsburg, Gold, Lazris & Discenza
Marshall, Dennehey, Warner, Coleman & Goggin
McCarter & English
Mintzer Sarowitz Zeris Ledva & Meyers
Montgomery McCracken Walker & Rhoads
Morgan, Lewis & Bockius
Morrison & Foerster
Nixon Peabody
Norris, McLaughlin & Marcus
Nossaman
O’Melveny & Myers
Obermayer Rebmann Maxwell & Hippel
Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe
Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker
Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison
Perkins Coie
Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pitman
Proskauer Rose
Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan
Rawle & Henderson
Reed Smith
Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd
Robinson & Cole
Ropes & Gray
Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler
Saltzman Chetkof & Rosenberg
Seyfarth Shaw
Shaub, Ahmuty, Citrin & Spratt
Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton
Simpson Thacher & Bartlett
Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom
SNR Denton
Sprague & Sprague
Squire, Sanders & Dempsey
Stark & Stark
Sullivan & Cromwell
The Pagan Law Firm
Thompson Hine
Thorp Reed & Armstrong
Weil, Gotshal & Manges
White & Case
Williams & Connolly
Willkie Farr & Gallagher
Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr
Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker
Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati
Winston & Strawn
Wood Smith Henning & Berman
Young, Conaway, Stargatt & Taylor