Welcome back and we hope that you had a great summer! Each week we are going to take a look at a different industry and explore how social media is being used. For the first week we dive into law. Here's an interview with Frederic R. Abramson whose practice "encompasses both litigation and transactional law."
1. How do Lawyers use social media?
There is quite a bit of debate about how lawyers should use social media. As you can probably guess, I am a very active user of social media. I consider my blog the most important part of my social media presence. Blogs (lawyers call them Blawgs) serve as a home base and allow for frequently updated content. It is especially helpful for long tail searches of legal issues.
There are thousands of legal blogs out there. The foremost proponent of blogs in the legal industry is probably Kevin O’Keefe. Read through his excellent blog http://kevin.lexblog.com. I maintain a very active presence on Twitter, Facebook and to a lesser extent LinkedIn. I also write a monthly email newsletter. In order of importance: 1. Blog 2. Email newsletter 3. Facebook 4. Posting article to LinkedIn Groups and 5. Twitter. There are also social networking sites that are specifically geared to lawyers, such as Legalonramp.
In my experience, blogs are great for connecting with people who have a specific legal problem. Email newsletters are important because the vast majority of lawyers obtain new business through referrals. Email newsletters serve as a reminder to those who know you that you are out there. Facebook is good with keeping up with friends in the past who may serve as a referral source due to your activity. LinkedIn groups drives tons of traffic to my blog posts. I spend most of my time on Twitter, however it is best used for lawyers as an information source. In my opinion, the power of Twitter is in who you follow. It is rare for lawyers to be retained by followers on Twitter.
2. What problems do you come across?
The biggest problem with social media for lawyers is trust. Clients do not hire lawyers simply because they enjoy your tweets. Most people hire lawyers based on referrals by satisfied clients, accountants etc.
3. Do you know any other lawyers successfully using social media?
There are a few who use social media well. Perhaps the best is @nikiblack (on Twitter).
4. What should people be careful about legally when using social media?
Read my post Legal Problems of Social Networks.
5. How do you expect social media to affect the law industry in the future?
As more people use social media, I believe that it will become increasingly important. I believe lawyers are in a race to put out as much legal information as possible on their blogs. Google now incorporates tweets and blog posts in searches, so your presence on all social media is becoming increasingly important. I think that more lawyers will be using video as a marketing tool.
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