Why Social Media Can Help Lawyers Survive Shrinking Law Firm Numbers
The recent’The future of legal services‘ held in Birmingham, UK highlighted the challenges many lawyers face when trying to survive or grow. Many of these have been mentioned in various blogs and articles such as Jordan Furlong’s ‘Goodbye to all that’.
There were a couple of statements made at the conference that really stood out:
- As institutional operators and larger practices move onto their turf, some traditional High Street businesses will find it difficult to compete unless they adapt;
- Law firms that use technology in the right way will have an advantage in the future.
The business model used by many law firms will not help them survive the competitive forces they face.
Jordan Furlong says that lawyers should “…study the means by which you do the work you sell to clients and determine if and to what extent you can adopt new technologies and processes to be not only more efficient, but also more effective at terms of quality, relevance and responsiveness”.
This brings me to social media and what lawyers should do about it.
As law firms begin to use social media to gain awareness, provide better services, and build relationships with potential clients or clients, it becomes increasingly important for most law firms to consider how they use this media platform. within your marketing communications.
Differentiating yourself from the competition and improving the ability to interact with prospects or customers are benefits that come from having well thought out social media strategies.
The key question lawyers need to ask themselves is “what channels should I use to differentiate myself and become the lawyer of choice for potential clients, and this includes social media?”
Basically, lawyers need to figure out what their strategic business goals are and how they can use social media or technology to help me achieve those goals.
Many attorneys who simply choose a social media tactic without integrating it into their lead generation or client nurturing programs will get frustrated pretty quickly. It’s not enough to set up a Facebook page (which looks like your company website), a corporate Twitter handle and LinkedIn profile, or attract 5,000 followers. Anyone can do this!
Lawyers must make social media support overall business goals, which means tightly integrating it into measurable lead generation and conversion strategies. If social media doesn’t make it easy for prospects to find you, stick with you because you direct them to the content they’re actively searching for, and ultimately select you because you’ve articulated the benefits that come from working with you, then there’s no point! !
And, if social media isn’t making it easier for lawyers to engage with clients more effectively, leaving them with more time to focus on delivering high-quality services to targeted niches, then it’s time to rethink.
Social media technology platforms can have a very positive impact on bottom lines and, more importantly, help law firms build positions of authority in an increasingly competitive legal services marketplace.
However, it should support overall business goals and be measured in terms of new leads generated, sales made, increased referrals made, and better customer retention rates. It should also result in a noticeable improvement in how attorneys handle negative feedback about the services they provide and the speed with which they resolve client issues.