THE BEST SOCIAL NETWORK FOR LAWYERS, OR ANYONE, IS…..

Great article and I like Gerry's comment. We are all trying to learn the ins and outs of social media to generate new business. In my experience, it can take a minimum of 2 years to see any real results from social media so long term is the mentality to have when looking at Sm as a tool to bring in new clients. I just got an email today for this new service that launched. It seems like an easy way to generate new business now while other things develop. The site is www.simplyprospects.com, I just signed up today so don't have any real feedback yet but I like it so far.

Hi Nancy, I just came across your blog post today. The question shouldn't be what is the best social network for you as an attorney. Instead the question should be what is the best social media available to market yourself?

That's the goal, isn't it? That's why we spend so much time blogging and tweeting and being on Facebook? We all know that social media is King online. It used to be that plain old text and content was King online. Now it's all social media. Well, guess what is king of all social media?

The answer is video. Video allows the viewer to see you, hear you, and a viewer can begin to trust you before they ever walk into your door.

I know there were comments above that talked about off-line social networking as well as online networking. The key is to use all of them to improve the chances that the people in your network will recognize you as an expert and contact you to help them solve their legal problems.

If an attorney is deciding among many different social networks, and you pose your question, the answer, in my opinion should be: video; although I suppose that does not technically fall within a "social network."

Best regards,

Gerry

Nancy, you hit the nail on the head with one exception - you're presupposing that the only social networks available are online. That's a reductionist view because "social" means more than online. If you want to be social, you need to actually ... well, be social in the old-school sense of the word. Make a phone call to a client for absolutely no reason. Say hi, see how things are going, and leave it at that. Making the connection are the core ideas behind "social media," (yes, I'm using quotation marks on purpose there) and those core ideas run through our entire lives.

Your clients and colleagues are your greatest mouthpieces, and maintaining a connection - be it online or offline - is critical to long-term success. Twitter may disappear tomorrow, and Facebook may go the way of MySpace (who?). The platform is just that - a platform and nothing more. The tools we use to manage our participation in those platforms are inconsequential, and a matter of taste and affinity.

The goal, of course, is to connect with people with whom you have a shared interest and/or common goal. Maintain those connections in any way you see fit, but it is critical to maintain them.

Before I get to "it depends," I give the lawyers I counsel an initial assessment based on potential ROI. It is a tactical assessment of each site measured by global objectives and it gets you past the touchy feely part that lawyers don't respond well to in my experience. (Thanks to @heathermilligan for the inspiration behind this strategy.) Here's what I do.

I lay out a grid. I put potential sites and services that have proven some effectiveness down the left side, i.e. Twitter, FB, LI and YouTube, Open Forum, Connected, Legal OnRamp, JDSupra. I also add more geeky sites like Delicious, Yahoo buzz, reddit, Slideshare, and maybe digg or even flickr. (Which seem to drop below the radar for most legal marketing consultants and in-house folks, but can definitely add value. With the right analytics in place those sites can give you some numbers that may be meaningful.) I put global objectives across the top. The global objectives must have some general degree of ROI in the social media space. They include stuff like brand exposure, client communication, SEO, driving traffic to the firm website, or thought leadership. Then I assess each site or service's strength or weakness in relation to the objective. Then assign a ranking -- good, decent, marginal. poor, or don't waste your time -- in regard to how that site or service meets the particular objective. Volia! You have an objective, tactical road map from which you can build a working plan. Of course at that point, "it depends."

My forthcoming book, social.lawyer, will be published by West Publishing in mid-summer 2010 and I will go into this strategy with more detail. Meanwhile, if you like the idea and use it and it works for you, let me know!
Jayne

Nancy your paragraph beginning with "It Depends...." is brilliant. Legal folks really do need to think about strategy rather than jumping on the latest fads. Don't get me wrong, SM has to be incorporated in business development....but, its the old story of making a carrot cake some us will like a lot more sugar, preferably organic, others will prefer a ton of icing on it. Bottom-line it all works as long the message fits the market and the right vehicles of delivery are utilized. Cheers, P

I recommend Hootsuite over Tweetdeck. It has a much better interface and its easier to use, plus it has stats on your tweets and accounts, like a mini Google Analytics for tweets. Also, it's great for people with multiple Tweeter accounts (like a personal one plus one for your blog). The search feature is much better for finding people than the one Tweetdeck uses and its a lot easier to keep track of who's following your tweets and who you're following.

Great post Nancy, you are absolutely right that it always depends.

For example, if you are a corporate lawyer, than a site like LinkedIN is a great fit. If you practice something more cutting edge like IP/Trademark Law, Entertainment Law, or Employment law- than a platform like Twitter makes a ton of sense.

While many lawyers shy away from Facebook for business development, if you are practicing retail law: family law, personal injury law, employment law etc - than Facebook is a great place to engage with individuals talking about what you do.

These are all just different communities and different tools, so you need to make sure you find the right tool for the job.

My recommendation? Get a facebook page and a twitter address, and then use an app called "Tweetdeck" - this enables you to monitor "tweets" and facebook comments. I use it and love it. But I also have a LinkedIn page...so I would have to concur with the author...it depends! LOL

Thanks,
Mike