Law firms struggle to find the right social media marketing strategy to help them expand their reach online and hit their business goals.
With so many social platforms and so little time, it can be tough to know where to start. To further complicate things, social media marketing is a rapidly evolving digital landscape, and it takes time to grow.
At OppGen, we understand that social media marketing needs to be an integral part of every law firm’s marketing strategy.
Continue reading to learn how to engage your target audience, build your social presence, grow your firm’s business, and how to put your strategic social media marketing campaign on autopilot…
Why Should Lawyers Embrace Social Media Marketing?
- Over 4.62 billion people across the world use social media (HootSuite)
- 81% of lawyers have a presence on at least 1 social media platform (ABA)
- 85% of lawyers say social is part of their overall marketing strategy (Attorney at Work)
- 71% of lawyers feel that social media is very responsible for bringing in new clients (Attorney at Work)
- LinkedIn is the most popular social media platform among attorneys (ABA)
- *Stats on how social media impacts consumer behavior and conversions.
- Consumers are 71% more likely to purchase products or services based on social media referrals (Search Engine Watch)
So Many Channels, So Little Time
With so many social channels, how do you choose? Take the following considerations into account when choosing which social channels are best for your law firm:
Find Where Your Target Audience is At
You need to meet your target audience where they are at. Do some research on what social media platforms your audience spends most of their time on.
Focus on posting content, engaging, and building your visibility on those platforms.
Need assistance deciding on the social platforms you should incorporate into your digital strategy? Contact our marketing team at OppGen today to learn more.
Check Out Your Competitors’ Social Media Accounts
Another good way to decide which social media channels to choose is to see where competing law firms are most active.
Look at their account for ideas on what to post. Pay close attention to which of their posts with the most likes, comments, and shares.
Ask yourself, “Why are potential clients engaging with this post?”
It also may be a good idea to check out some of the profiles of commenters and followers. Some social media accounts buy fake followers. If you find that more than a few of your competitors’ followers have questionable profiles (i.e., not located in the same area where the law firm is, vague or made-up information), that may be a red flag that they’re short-cutting and short-changing their social media strategy.
Also, take note of how many total followers they have vs. how much engagement their posts are getting. If you see that a competitor has a ton of followers and very little engagement, there’s a good chance that those followers could either be bought (through social ads) or fake accounts.
Social media marketing experts say a good engagement rate is between 1% to 5% of a page or business’s total followers.
Consider the Goals of Your Law Firm Marketing Strategy
Ask yourself, “What am I trying to achieve with my social marketing strategy?”
Your answer can help inform which platforms are better suited for your law firm’s needs. Some platforms are better at building awareness than they are at converting leads.
If you need help with building your brand and visibility on social media, contact our marketing team at OppGen to learn more about the power of social media advertising.
Review Your Available Resources
Some social media platforms, such as YouTube, require familiarity with and access to video editing software. If you do not have the knowledge or experience to create quality content and upload them to those platforms, then you may want to consider outsourcing to a company that does or learning the basics. Our video marketing for lawyers guide is a good place to get started.
If your law firm’s budget doesn’t have room for outsourcing, then reconsider if those platforms are worth including.
Drop Platforms That Aren’t Working
Don’t waste your valuable time trying to make every single platform succeed. Even if it seems like your competitors have figured out the secrets of how to go viral on TikTok or Instagram, that doesn’t mean it’s a good fit for you or your law firm.
Instead, invest more resources into social media channels that are working for you.
What Are the Best Social Media Platforms for Lawyers?
Some of the top social media platforms for lawyers are:
- YouTube
- TikTok
Social media helps your firm create helpful backlinks, which boosts your SEO credibility and can improve your website’s ranking on search engines — much like how adding your firm to relevant directories can.
Our team has years of experience running successful social media advertising campaigns for our clients. Contact our digital advertising experts today to learn more about leveraging social media for your business.
How to Create a Content Synthesis Strategy
The great news is that you don’t have to create one unique piece of content for each channel. That can get very exhausting and time-consuming.
This is why we recommend a content synthesis (or repurposing) strategy: You take one piece of long-form content (blog or video) and turn it into multiple other pieces of mixed-media content that you can share on your website and social media.
Example: Synthesizing and Repurposing Content
Here’s what a content synthesis plus social media marketing strategy looks like in action:
- You write one long-form blog of 1,500-2,000 words.
- You take 3 main topics from that large blog and write three smaller blogs (400-600 words) that go into deeper detail about each of those main topics.
- You write a script and create a video for the long-form blog (4-8 minutes), and each of those 3 smaller blogs (2-3 minutes) that you post to YouTube and share on social media.
- Let’s say each of those 3 smaller blogs each have 3 main discussion points. Create 9 short subtopic videos (30-60 seconds) to share on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
Voila! You just created 3 additional blogs, 4 informative long videos, and 9 actionable bite-sized videos to share on social media, all from one long-form blog post.
If you’re still not sure where to start, check out our 27+ ideas for personal injury lawyers blog.
Content marketing is a critical component of social media marketing and SEO. Call our digital marketing experts at OppGen today to learn more about what our award-winning SEO and content marketing team can do for your business.
Tips and Guidelines for Posting Content to Each Channel
Once again, these are guidelines to start with. The most important thing is that you find a posting schedule that you can stick to consistently.
Below, we’ve posted some recommendations for types of posts, frequency, and optimal days and times.
- Post Frequency: 1 post per day
- Type and Length of Content: Articles
- Time of Day: 10 a.m. to noon on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays
- Post Frequency: 5 posts per week
- Type and Length of Content: Video, photo, and text
- Time of Day: 1 p.m.-4 p.m. on weekdays
- Post Frequency: 3-7 posts per week
- Type and Length of Content: Photos and videos with some text
- Time of Day: 6 a.m.-9 a.m., 12 p.m.-2 p.m., and 5 p.m.-6 p.m. on weekdays
YouTube
- Post Frequency: 1 video per week (but if you’re starting out and want to build an audience, start with 3 videos a week, then bring it down to 1 per week)
- Type and Length of Content: videos between 6 and 8 minutes long
- Time of Day: 12 p.m.-9 p.m. on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays.
- Post Frequency: 3-5 tweets per day
- Type and Length of Content: 120-character tweets
- Time of Day: 9 a.m.-3 p.m. on weekdays
TikTok
- Post Frequency: 1 TikTok per day
- Type and Length of Content: Video, 15 seconds long (can create longer videos with videos recorded on the app as 15-second segments, up to a maximum of 60 seconds)
- Time of Day: 6 a.m.-10 a.m. and 7 p.m.-11 p.m.
Note: Sticking to a posting schedule and frequency that’s sustainable for your firm is more important than targeting the above recommendations.
Can I Reshare Previously Posted Content?
Yes, and you should. Often.
Do you think 100% of your audience or target local audience will see your video, blog, or link the first time you post it? Not likely.
Also, you may have a lot of people in your audience see your post at a time it isn’t relevant to them.
“What do you mean?”
Say you’re a personal injury attorney, and you post content to Facebook and Instagram to help your audience navigate the legal process for their car accident injury. There’s a good chance a certain percentage of your audience at any given time won’t have been in a recent car accident.
However, that doesn’t mean that they couldn’t be in the future.
How to Automate Social Media Marketing for Law Firms
If you’re worried about how much time it’s going to take to keep posting and reposting content, don’t be.
There are some incredible social media tools like Hootsuite, Buffer, SproutSocial, and hundreds of other options on sites like AppSumo that can help you automate your social media marketing.
Step-By-Step Guide: Social Media Marketing for Law Firms
1. Invest in a Social Media Automation Platform
To make things easy to post and repost content, invest in a social media automation platform like Hootsuite, SproutSocial, and several others.
AI writing software is also a good investment. It can help you write quick, quippy little social media posts and even rewrite existing ones, so even recycled posts aren’t entirely the same.
2. Plan Out Your Content Strategy
By now, you should know which social channels you want to use for your marketing campaign. The type of content these channels use should inform each content piece you create.
For example, LinkedIn is a great platform to post articles because that’s the primary type of content that’s shared there.
Instagram, on the other hand, is mostly photos and videos with some text. So, your content strategy for each channel should reflect that. Have relevant content prepared for each channel as part of your content strategy.
3. Synthesize Your Content
Follow the example as shown in the above How to Create a Content Synthesis Strategy section.
Start by writing a single long-form blog, take 3 main ideas and/or topics from that blog, and divide those topics into smaller 400- to 600-word blogs that go more in-depth. You can then post those blogs to your social media accounts.
Find some smaller discussion points from those mini-blogs and use them to create short 30-second videos to share on TikTok and Instagram.
You can return to the original long-form blog and write a script to create videos for YouTube and share those videos to your other social media accounts, too.
One long-form blog can easily help you create 10-12 additional social content pieces.
4. Make a Posting Schedule You Can Stick To
Once you’ve created all of the content pieces, it’s time to use the social media automation software to schedule posts.
Some social media automation platforms and software have limits on how far you can schedule posts out or on the number of posts you can have published at once, so make sure you check back in before you reach those limits.
Need More Help with Your Social Media Strategy? Contact OppGen Today
Running a social media marketing campaign isn’t for everyone. OppGen Marketing can help you learn more about digital marketing options for your law firm and more. Contact us today for more information.
