SOCIAL MEDIA AND ATTORNEY ADVERTISING:
STILL TRYING TO GET IT RIGHT
by John Browning of Lewis Brisbois
Bisgaard & Smith LLP
Social Media
and Attorney
Advertising:
Still Trying To Get It Right
Social networking platforms such as Facebook,
Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube have caused a
paradigm shift in how people communicate and
share information. Facebook reaches over 1.2
billion users worldwide, and 72 percent of all
adult Americans online have at least one social
networking profile. The business world in general
has welcomed social media with the equivalent of
a bear hug, and the legal profession's adoption of
advertising via social networking — while lagging
— is no mere perfunctory embrace. How do you
and your firm compare?
SURVEY SAYS
According to an American Lawyer Media's Legal
Intelligence 2012 survey, nearly 85 percent of
U.S. law firms are employing social media for
marketing purposes. Another study, the 2012 ABA
Legal Technology survey, found 88 percent of
the responding firms reported having a LinkedIn
presence, while 58 percent use Facebook and
another 13 percent are on Twitter. In addition,
22 percent of the firms surveyed indicated they
maintain one or more blogs.
Not surprisingly, the heaviest reliance on social
networking tools comes from the ranks of the
profession's younger members; Law Technology
