Can Social Media Actually Develop Business

Facebook. Twitter. LinkedIn. We all use them. But the question is: can they really help you develop business? Or better yet, is that how you want to get business? I suppose on one level, we all may take business wherever we can get it. Given the challenges of the legal market today, quality clients should not be ignored simply because they originated from a social media connection.

For exemple, I’ve been writing this blog for a few months now, and thanks to a few easy mouse clicks, every post I publish also shows up on my Twitter feed (for the reading pleasure of all 25 of my followers) and my LinkedIn page, where it is available for many more potential readers. I haven’t taken the plunge to auto-posting the blog on Facebook yet because that just seems like a little too much. Hey, look at me old high school classmates that I haven’t seen in 20 years– I have a blog. My friends on Facebook may already know that I’m a lawyer, but would they ever actually call me for legal work? (Now that I think about it, yes, they have.)

But really, if I’m not going to go all out, is this really doing me any good? Maybe. But I could do better, and I suspect most of us could.

I have been making a concerted effort to use Twitter more and more. From retweeting interesting ideas, to the aforementioned WordPress postings, I am trying to expand my Twitter “footprint.” Will it help show the world what I do for a living and invite new clients to line up at my door? Or am I just falling in to the conventional wisdom that social media helps build business? Maybe both.

Most lawyers would agree that word of mouth marketing has been and probably still is the best form of business development. In today’s environment, the challenge is to get that word of mouth message started. “Chatter” on social media sites may be the spark that gets the word of mouth movement actually moving in your direction if done correctly.

My hope is really twofold. One, I think I might just have something valuable for other lawyers to see. I am really loving playing with the technology I have, from the iPad, to trying out keyboards and apps, to putting my experience out there in this blog. Before I dive into the murky waters of search engine optimization, I have to figure out how to get people to actually see this blog. (If you’re reading this, feel free to share it with anyone and everyone). And the best way to reach people right now may just be through Twitter and LinkedIn. My focus now is on Twitter, admittedly because it is more fun for me than LinkedIn.

Second, and the real point of this post, is that expanding my Twitter presence might just help me develop some business. Shameless? Maybe. But for now, it’s the fastest way I can see to reach the most people and let them know that I have something to offer, and that I just might be able to help them solve a problem or two. For example, as a local government lawyer, it is sometimes hard to explain to people exactly what I do. Sometimes the easiest thing to do is show them an example. That’s what I did recently by tweeting about an economic development deal that I worked on for one of my municipal clients. People may have seen that article, but they would have had no idea that I had anything to do with it. By tweeting it as something I was part of, I may have let other people know this is something I can do for them.

In the meantime, I will continue tweeting and retweeting. But don’t be surprised if a picture of my kids pops up every now and then. They are pretty cute.