publication of the International Legal Technology Association
Issue link: https://epubs.iltanet.org/i/221442
TWITTER FOR LAWYERS: EMBRACING THE #S, @S AND RTS Twitter is actually not as scary, time-consuming or useless as some might think. While there is a learning curve to mastering the site's unique functionality, employing "Twitter speak" can become second nature. As for posting, there are a variety of third-party applications, such as HootSuite and Buffer, that allow you to time tweet deployments in advance. These applications enable you to prepare and schedule a week's worth of tweets so your feed remains active even when you're busy. •A hashtag makes content easily searchable by topic •A retweet includes another user's tweet on your feed, which promotes that user to your followers and in turn helps you build an online relationship with the user •@mentions include a user's handle preceded by the @ symbol, alerting the user that you have mentioned him in a tweet and promoted him to your followers, which once again helps forge that online relationship While monitoring your feed all day every day is a Herculean task for which no attorney has time, you can still reap value by checking your feed periodically. If you ride mass transit to and from work, spend part of your commute checking your feed via your mobile device or tablet, and pay special attention to interactions (e.g., instances in which a user has @mentioned you or retweeted one of your tweets). You can even set your device to receive push notifications (automatic alerts) for such actions as @mentions and direct messages. As for the social network's utility, there are a variety of uses. Twitter is an excellent relationshipbuilding tool. For example, if you want to conduct your own public relations, search for the handles of reporters, editors and publications that cover your areas of interest and begin interacting with them through @mentions and retweets. Over time, if you demonstrate your knowledge of an area that is important to their readership, you just might get tapped as a go-to source, thus expanding your reputation's reach. Beyond the media, interacting with handles of corporate counsel and other business contacts, particularly those you have met at real-life conferences and luncheons, can help you forge these relationships. Follow their feeds, get to know them better through their tweets and engage with them periodically. By doing this, you'll stay top-of-mind should a need arise. It also can give you and your firm that extra edge should you find yourself in an RFP process. If you're familiar with the concept of RSS feeds, then you'll quickly grasp another one of Twitter's uses. Whether you rely on your main feed or you create "lists" (user-created customizable subfeeds), Twitter is an effective news aggregation tool. Lists are especially useful for this purpose, as you can create feeds on any topic of your choosing, e.g., private equity firms, legal trade magazines, legal technology vendors, etc., that automatically update in real time. Twitter is also an effective distribution tool for attorney and firm content. Client alerts, press releases, blog posts, bylined articles and white papers can all be pushed to your or your firm's Twitter feed as a means to draw maximum exposure. Twitter isn't going anywhere. After all, it's been around since 2006, which for Internet companies is practically an eternity. While the user base skews younger, millennials aren't the only ones on Twitter. According to the Pew Research Center, 17 percent of Internet users ages 30 to 49, 13 percent of Internet users ages 50 to 64 and five percent of users ages 65 and up are on Twitter, while the largest chunk of Twitter users occupy higher income brackets. Lawyers and law firms looking to remain competitive should use the site to engage the media, clients, prospects and cohorts directly and actively because, if wielded with prowess, it can be an extraordinarily effective marketing and relationship-building tool.