Lately, it seems like everyone is raving about social media’s potential as a business tool. But can it really work for lawyers, who provide professional services, as opposed to companies that sell products or consumer-oriented services, like a hair salon?
The short answer: yes, social media can work for lawyers–because its more than just a marketing tool. In fact, it can be used to benefit lawyers and their practices in a number of useful ways.
However, as I’ve oft-repeated, social media is useless without goals. In fact, in our recently released book, “Social Media for Lawyers: The Next Frontier,” my co-author, Carolyn Elefant and I devote an entire section of the book to the various ways that lawyers can use social media.
As we emphasize throughout the book, different lawyers have different types of practices and different goals, and thus should have different social media strategies. It’s not a one-size-fits-all proposition. Instead, you must carefully tailor your social media strategy so that it forwards your chosen goals and makes the most efficient use of the time you spend online.
In future posts, I’ll examine the different goals we discuss in our book and will offer suggestions as to how you might go about achieving the various goals.
As you’ll see in posts over the next few weeks, social media is far more than a marketing tool; instead, it’s a virtual toolbox that can benefit your law practice in more ways than you thought possible. It’s simply a matter of creating an effective social media strategy that forwards your chosen goals.