Last week, I attended the social media for lawyers at New York Law School. Here is the Reader's Digest version: technology is inescapable, the Internet is here to stay, social media is real, law firms and many lawyers are already doing it, and it works.
Meeting Potential Clients
Nicole Black (@nikiblack), and Lisa Solomon (@lisasolomon) started with an introduction to world of social media. Social media is part of Web 2.0, which is generally understood as the increased user interaction with web sites primarily in terms of user generated content. A programmer may tell you that Web 2.0 has to do with advances in programming languages that allow sites to do the things we now expect them to do. But the terms Web 2.0, and the retronym Web 1.0, are not really important, what is important is that it all adds up to one big conversation.
For lawyers, this conversation is a networking opportunity roughly equivalent to a cocktail party- the cocktail party analogy belongs to one of the panelists, anyone remember who that was? Social media thus presents an opportunity to network with huge numbers of lawyers and potential clients anywhere in the country and without leaving the office.
Getting Started with a Web Presence
The complete list of possible social media outlets is rather large, e.g. Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, blogs, Delicious, Digg, Freindfeed etc. Then there are the lawyer specific sites like Avvo and Justia. This proliferation of user driven sites can be daunting and getting a handle on all of them is time consuming.
So what's an easy way to get started?
Ms. Black suggested filling out lawyer profiles on avvo.com, and justia.com, two sites that seem to have gone through the state bar registrations and given a page to every lawyer admitted in every state. A profile on Linkedin.com is also standard.
Filling out these profiles gets you online for free and very easily so when someone Googles you they will be able to find out something. And because these profiles are relatively static so you won't have to worry much about maintenance.
Getting Started with Social Media
When people talk about social media for lawyers Twitter dominates, that's because Twitter is where the professionals are.
To get everything going with all possible speed and ease, I suggest the following:
1. Have a picture ready to go.
You will need it everywhere.
2. Convert your resume into a narrative or crib your website text and also come up with a list of accomplishments, honors, and associations.
You will need this for Avvo, Justia, and Linkedin. Condense your narrative into 160 characters, that's your Twitter bio.
The Twitter bio is different from the others not only because it must be short but also because it often includes something more personal or fun. The bios are frequently a series of nouns. For example; lawyer, writer, chef, fountain pen addict, and string theorist.
3. Download the Firefox web browser.
Really, Internet Explorer is a terrible browser and Firefox has a host of great tools for just about everything that happens online.
4. Fill out Avvo, Justia, and join Linkedin.
5. Get a Twitter account, your username will probably be your name if available or your_name. My Twitter username is EsqTech, so I'm not following this advice but many of the Twitterati so advise.
Twitter Quick Start Tips
Signing Up for the First Time
Profile
Don't follow any of the suggested people, add your contacts, or follow anyone else until you get your picture up, a bio, and a link associated with your account. If you have a site or blog use that link, if not use one of the three pages you just set up. "Profile" on the top set of navigation links is where you''ll find everything related to your profile.
Settings
Click on "Settings" -next to "Profile" in the top nav menu- to choose a color scheme or theme. Just pick one you like.
While you can upload a background image, I wouldn't do it unless you have a single graphic, optimized for web viewing, in the neighborhood of 1600 x 1200 pixels. I think using a small photo looks a bit silly and tiling it often has the same effect. To tile a photo means that it will repeat over and over. The backgrounds you will see on many user pages are just specially designed images.
I wouldn't spend more than 60 seconds in the "Settings" area. And I wouldn't worry about getting a background, if ever, until you get a website or blog and can have the designer do a background to match. Anyway, you don't even know if you'll like Twitter, so don't worry about it.
So far you've got about four minutes into your Twitter adventure and it's time to leave the site to go to bit.ly.
Getting the Short Links
For lawyers, Twitter is mostly series of links to other sites and information. If you know about RSS, you can think of Twitter as an edited RSS feed. When you look at Tweets, you will see links that look like nothing you have ever seen before, they are short links. You must know about URL shortening to participate in Twitter because a Tweet can only be 140 characters.
For example, http://bit.ly/6atPB is link to a article I wrote about SEO. The actual url is: http://offsitelawcenter.com/Blog/tabid/296/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/115/8-Things-Every-Lawyer-Should-Know-About-SEO.aspx - if you don't know what SEO is then it is a good place to start. Both links go to the same place. To go from long to short, you have to run a URL through a shortener. There are several, but bit.ly is a good one and the one I use.
Visiting bit.ly
When you get to bit.ly sign up for a free account and then look at the right side of the screen for the tools. You're using Firefox right? Good, drag the button that says "Shorten with bit.ly." to your bookmarks bar, i.e.,the thin strip just below the address bar and navigation buttons. Just drag it up there and let it go, it'll settle right in. The "bit.ly sidebar" is also convenient.
After about 2 minutes at bit.ly we're almost done. There's a box labeled "options", that's where you can link your Twitter account to your bit.ly account. You want to do this for two reasons.
First, bit.ly will keep track of how many times your links are clicked. Wondering what people want to see? Just check bit.ly.
Second, now you are ready to do the majority of your Tweeting, which is directing your followers to what you are reading.
Tweeting a Link
To start Tweeting, just click "Shorten with bit.ly" when you are looking at something good inside fo Firefox. The link will shorten and bit.ly will even pick up the page title, which is normally the same as the title of the article. Then click the "Post" button to post from bit.ly to your Twitter account. That's it.
After you get some followers, refresh the page and see if anyone clicked on the link in your new Tweet. If so, you just reached someone. If you Tweeted something really good, your followers may retweet (RT) it, which means that person sent your Tweet to their followers. That's a good thing and it's a thrill the first time it happens. My first series of RTs came from my article "Twitter Grader, Web 2.0, and SEO."
Get a Few Followers
Now you'll need followers, go to lextweet.com and follow a bunch of lawyers. Return to Twitter and type #sm4law in the search box and read all about the CLE and probably follow all of those people as well. #sm4law is the hashtag, or unique indetifier for the event.
With this minimal Twitter set up, i.e. bit.ly on the bookmarks bar to Tweet links to answer the question "What are you reading?" You'll be able to see if Twitter is for you and get it done with minimal additional effort.
Of course, there is more to Twitter and to the tools people use to Tweet. But for a few minutes of mild effort you can get in on what can be a very good thing.