Social media marketing for your law firm can be a bit baffling because there are so many options nowadays. The first step to determining what strategy is right for your law firm is to get a better understanding of what your options are. In addition, you must have a clear understanding of who your target market is and how to best reach them online.
Effective social media marketing for your law firm will enable you to engage your audience and build a loyal following that yields referrals down the road. It also allows you to generate qualified leads which will increase the number of cases and revenue for your firm.
Let’s explore some of the types of social media campaigns that you can implement for your law firm:
1. Retargeting Campaign.
In this type of campaign, a potential client who has shown interest in your website or social media ads can be reengaged in seeing your advertising as they surf the Web or social media sites. Retargeting can be set up by putting a “pixel,” which is a piece of code, on your website that allows visitors to your site to by placing a cookie into their browser. As a result, they will see your retargeted ads that will direct them back to your website.
2. Conversion Campaign.
This type of campaign has a distinct focus of getting the user to take some type of action. It may prompt a website visitor to download a PDF or white-paper, join an email list, fill out an online form or case evaluation, or even engage them in a chat conversation.
Now that you have a better understanding of types of campaigns that can be set up, let’s discuss a few of the social media channels. Facebook falls in the top three visited sites on the Web. Let’s break down what types of features are available for you to utilize on Facebook.
Facebook groups are a great way to expand your online reach. You can easily join other people’s groups based on interests, topics, practice area and more. The key to joining groups is to offer value by answering questions and providing useful tips and resources. You can also set up your own group and be the moderator or even appoint additional colleagues as moderators. The best part about Facebook groups is that it does not require a financial commitment. However, it will require a time commitment to grow the group and benefit from it.
Some other useful Facebook tools and features include Facebook Live-Streaming and Facebook advertising campaigns. Facebook Live-Streaming is a feature that is available to all Facebook users and is free to use. It allows you to stream videos to your audience or Facebook group.
To gauge the performance of your marketing on Facebook, you can utilize Facebook Insights and the Facebook Analytics Dashboard. It provides insights about your audiences, such as past purchase behavior/habits, online activity, relevant interests and more. It also shows “likes” and video/live-streaming statistics.
Another social media platform that may be beneficial is Instagram. As of Feb. 4, 2020, Instagram has 1 billion monthly active Instagram users. Another important statistic to note is that 71% of the billion monthly active users on the Instagram app are under the age of 35. So if your target audience tends to be on the younger side, Instagram may be a great way to reach your target audience.
Like Facebook, Instagram also provides insights. Some popular features of Instagram are “stories” which are short clips that only remain on one’s page for 24 hours. Instagram Stories can be used to show bits and pieces of your day, make special announcements, or engage your audience in feedback.
Instagram Videos/IG TV is a great way to expand your audience by creating videos about various legal topics or conducting interviews with other attorneys and then posting them using a title and hashtags. The hashtags you use are keywords that will enable your target audience to find your video. Another advantage of IG TV Videos is that they tend to be get more organic views than a normal post.
Another favorite social media platform that is ideal for attorneys is YouTube. YouTube allows you to showcase your expertise to a broad or niche audience and helps build your credibility and authority in your legal industry niche. When you are determining what your videos should be about, start by evaluating what your potential clients’ and clients’ most commonly asked questions are, and make a video around that. Now YouTube also has a feature to add “Video Cards” to your video which creates a clickable call to action.