Social media offers lawyers a wealth of opportunities, from invitations to pay your own way to speak at legal conferences to the promise of a one-day training certificate in Thought Leadership. And, once in every 476,935 posts* to Twitter or Facebook, a lawyer gets a client referral out of the deal.
But how does a non-tech savvy lawyer achieve such near-miracles in a manner that makes for worthwhile Return on Investment (ROI)? Two words: name dropping.
If you want to break through the noise and get noticed, you’ve gotta name drop. The most efficient way is to drop the names of gurus and mavens, as they have the most influenceness. Tag social media celebrities in Facebook photos. #FollowFriday them. Even talk @ them, because they’ll probably notice you and then use a filter to put you in the “yeah, sure” pile. Especially if they have more than 100,000 followers.
Tweet about your phone conversations. For example: “Just had a great convo with @lizstrauss. I went to her conference in 2009 and even saw her house once.”
If no one important wants to have a conversation with you, stick to tweeting web celebrity sightings. For example: “Just saw @kevinokeefe having a convo with @adriandayton in the hall at #ABATechShow.”
Have no important friends and can’t afford to attend a social media conference? Just tweet about things you’ve read that were written by trending quasi-experts. For example: “Reading @nikiblack ‘2011 Tech Trends for Lawyers’ http://bit.ly/gvULIh”
The “real” social media experts like @chrisheuer, @briansolis and @shelisrael have been doing this crap since 2006, and some of the legal marketing gurus are about to catch on. Most of them are still unemployed and clientless, but online namedroppage will nonetheless constitute a paradigm shift for lawyers who discover the internet in 2011.
To make it appear we have researched this concept, we interviewed a few lawyers that we’ve name dropped before. As expected, real practicing lawyers are far behind the tech and legal marketing curve.
Recent ABA 100 blawg award winner @mirriam71, when asked how many referrals she’s obtained by dropping the names of Social Media Rockstars like @kevinokeefe and @chrisbrogan into her tweets, told us “I don’t know who those people are.” She then accused us of making them up.
Real lawyer @btannebaum, when asked about his ROI namedropping strategy, told us “I’m hoping to get more clients hitching my wagon to @mirriam71 and her new ABA award.” He then added, “I came in 5th place in category 9 in the ABA 100. Please retweet.”
We also asked two of the 2.7 billion people on Twitter. Patent lawyer @Pandersonpllc, whose blawg has a picture of a football on it, twittered back, “Since I namedropped conversation w/ dontfileapatent.com, clients r hiring me to not file their patents.” We’re not sure what this means, but we think it sounds promising and is a testament to name dropping power.
@ScottGreenfield, who had no comment at this time but who often posts about pressing social media marketing issues on his infamous Simple Justice blawg, once said, “How can I ever get that three minutes of my life back?”
We think that pretty much sums up this piece and hope you’ll namedrop us (@biglegalbrain) on Twitter. We promise to namedrop you back.
* Since there are no case studies on this, we made up something that sounded plausibly impressive. Please let us know your success rates if you try it out. We’ll put together a Venn diagram or infographic.
Your inclusion of me is far too flattering. I am still learning where the local star bucks is, and I still have conversations with clients about all the work I’m not doing for them … The real gurus don’t even need to talk to clients in order to not get work …
Patrick: Hate to point this out, but Starbucks is one word, just like namedropping. Many clients may not notice it on your business cards, but they will on letterhead. May need to think about reprinting.
I told you, I’m just a fledgling … I still have an office too… maybe there is no hope for me.
I thought Greg fact-checked this and decided name dropping was one word, not two? Did he fuck it up again? I bet @GuyKawasaki wouldn’t make this kind of mistake.
I received a kidney from @GuyKawasaki, and I know he always hyphenates name-dropping.
… the kidney was delicious, by the way.
I feel so left behind. It is true that I routinely drop the name* of @amyderby on da Twitter. But I don’t do math–this is why I am a lawyer–so I can’t ever calculate my ROI.
Signed, Hopeless and Despairing.
*Clever verbification side-steps the hyphen controversy. Yeah, I can write, baby.
David. No worries. We are planning a post on calculating your personal brand using a slide ruler. Hadn’t thought of calculating ROI, but we could easily work that in. Thanks for the suggestion. We’ll drop your name on March 3, as we’re getting backed up with requests.
This was hilarious! I can’t wait to see what you post next.
Less of a parody and closer to the truth. Name dropping does work especially people that retweet…
Tom, our apologies. We try to have a large ratio of parody to truth and obviously Amy went too far toward the truth. It’s an issue she’ll be first to admit to– she struggles with the truth every day. I’ve probably said too much, but please be assured that I’ll talk with her and our staff about excess veracitiness.
This is hilarious! I am sure that @JohnCleese and @JimmyFallon would agree. Thanks to @LizStrauss for tweeting the link to me.
Best … advice … ever. Obviously not written by an Attorney however. The author appears to have a dry sense of humor (that’s actually funny); strictly forbidden by the Model Rules of the American Bar Association.
What a great resource!
Thanks, certificate. Hey! Wait a second, aren’t you employer identification, who posted a comment a few days ago? That’s tricky!