Recently, we’ve been looking more in-depth at the ILN Marketing Specialty Group roundtable, which focuses on what mid-sized firms are doing in social media.  Today, we look at question four, which asks "How do you and your firm connect with your firm’s top clients and top prospects via social media?"

Do Kim Dung: Leadco, as a firm, does not have connection to our firm’s top clients and top prospects via social media. Certain partners and associates within the firm do use Facebook and LinkedIn in their professional capacities to connect and communicate with clients and colleagues.

Simone Fell: As with Leadco, lawyers connect with clients and prospects individually through LinkedIn and their personal Twitter accounts. We have not done much to advertise our social media presence. This will likely only change once we have a policy in place and have determined a better way to generate timely and interesting information that top clients (who already get our newsletters) will want to read. 

 

John Buchanan: Similar to the other respondents, the firm itself doesn’t use social media to actively connect with clients. Our attorneys do (mainly through LinkedIn). I think, though, as we begin to promote our Twitter page more, we might end up having some clients follow us on Twitter. Given that social media is really relationship-based, it’s hard for clients to have a “relationship” with a firm. Clients are more likely to have relationships with specific attorneys, so it makes sense that social media tools are going to be more widely used by individuals.

Jeffrey Hild: Arnstein & Lehr also does not have a specific firm-level initiative to connect using social media tools. We have secured a firm Facebook page, but merely in an attempt to ward off use of the firm name by disgruntled former employees and turning it into a forum for discrediting the firm. We do provide LinkedIn training for individual attorneys and several have created profiles on the site. No attorneys that I am aware of have personal Twitter accounts.

Miriam Hackmey & Kobie Rafaeli: We do not use social media to communicate with our clients, although, on an individual basis some of the attorneys are connected to various clients. We do use social media, mainly LinkedIn, as a tool to connect with potential clients. This tool enables us to overcome ethical restrictions related to soliciting. 

McDonald Hopkins: We do not use social media to contact our clients directly. We predominantly use email to disseminate our timely client alerts and roundtable/webcast invitations to our clients and contacts. On all of our email campaigns, we include the links to our social media pages so they can choose to follow or friend us.