By Emmett Berg

Once considered the best web- site for oddball videos, YouTube is developing into a place where California lawyers can attract attention—and even new business.

"I used to think YouTube was something for teenagers to watch, but I have definitely changed my opinion on that," says Carl Shusterman of Irvine, who has posted more than 20 videos about the basics of immigration law on YouTube. Shusterman—a former Immigration and Naturalization Service attorney who now runs the Law Office of Carl Shusterman—has created videos that couldn't be simpler: In them he sits behind a desk and talks. Yet the clips have drawn thousands of viewers—and high ratings—since their debut a year ago. Success is "in the content," Shusterman says—not in the "trappings" of a dramatic background or a fancy camera cut.

Christopher C. Dolan, a partner at the San Francisco–based Dolan Law Firm, agrees. "Most people [visiting YouTube] aren't interested in seeing how great you think you are," he says. "They are interested in finding out if you can help them."

Viewers of Dolan's videos—which typically run less than a minute and focus on employment and personal injury law—can click on a browser link that takes them to his firm's site. And because those visitors' point of origin is tracked, it's easy for Dolan to notice when one of his videos attracts potential business.

"We see a great number of people start off on YouTube and go to our website," Dolan says, adding that a few even become paying customers. "I got my first client [through You Tube] more than two years ago, and by now it's in the dozens."

On the downside, Los Angeles–based divorce attorney Kelly Chang Rickert notes that "having a presence on the Internet can get you a lot of freeloader calls." But she does credit her YouTube clips with boosting her public profile and landing her some media interviews.

Gerry Oginski, who tracks attorney videos on his YouLaw blog, is not surprised that the number of law—related videos on YouTube has increased by the thousands since October. "It's the best marketing strategy an attorney can use in this day and age," says Oginski, a lawyer from Long Island. "[A video] costs almost nothing to make, and someone watching it once costs the same as someone watching it 10,000 times."