Today, we’re bringing you a special guest post, from one of the ILN’s marketing professionals! Alina Crisu is the PR & Communication Associate with LLPO Law Firm in Cyprus and she’s got a thoughtful post on how to respond to trending topics.
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A topic recently came to my attention that was also brewing in my head: should marketers who work for law firms follow social media topic trends? The answer is simple but the reality is far more complex.
So I am taking the opportunity to bring some clarity to myself and hope it will help those of you who are pondering the same questions…alongside the “Why?” and the “How?”.
As the legal system varies from country to country, social media trends seem to spread like wildfire at an unprecedented rate, posing ethical questions while marketers work tirelessly to adapt and create relevant content for their law firms.
The WHY
Questions
- Does the trend bring any valuable relevance to my audience? Or does it create more noise?
- Is there a valuable spin we could or should add to this trend that aligns with our internal policy and values?
- Do we want to?
The HOW
Identifying the right trend can be tricky, however there are a few tools that help:
- Answer the public
An online platform that generates data from search engines and sorts every useful phrase and question people are asking around your keyword. It’s a goldmine of audience insight you can use to create fresh, ultra-useful content, products, and services.
- Google Trends
Google Trends is a website by Google that analyses the popularity of top search queries on Google Search across various regions and languages. The website uses graphs to compare the search volume of different queries over time.
“Trend + Law Firm’s Profile / Services + Lawyer’s unique expertise = Real world engagement”
Pairing researched data with the services that your law firm provides alongside the unique expertise of your lawyers will solidify your marketing campaign and will set you apart from the noise. The marketing campaigns will have a high success rate because of it and your audience will provide immediate feedback.
Some trends will just come up; you will see them and you will know that you must be a part of them because it makes sense. No tool or algorithm will be necessary…follow your gut.
There are a few key components when creating successful content for social media: Relevance, Relatability and Consistency. Adjusting the marketing strategy and creating content with these three in mind will surely make your law firm become part of the online conversation and implicitly trending.
It is crucial to focus on Relatability.
Let’s face it legal terms aren’t relatable, they can be heavy and sometimes confusing for the untrained eye.
Your audience or potential client might not be trained as a lawyer or CEO and doesn’t have the necessary background to understand the legal terms used in the legislative process, therefore it is imperative to use common terms which are “user friendly” when writing articles and creating posts. Using “keywords” will assist in creating long-term content that your audience will want to engage with and provide an approachable presence.
Consistency. We have all seen a “one-hit wonder” and we think that they came out of nowhere, however, they have been consistently doing the work, over and over until they “made it”. Keep tweaking your marketing campaigns, creating relevant, relatable, and consistent content that undoubtedly will bring the desired results.
Thank you for taking the time to read this article. Let me know your thoughts on this topic. What are some of the challenges you have faced?