Comments on Lawyers use of LinkedIn : It's becoming an avalanche | Real Lawyers Have Blogs

gerkmana@gmail.com (AlliG) — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 06:07:04 -0800

Have you seen the new company profile section on LinkedIn? It's not live just yet, but LinkedIn will soon let companies customize their company pages. I have to think that will be even more of a hit to pay-to-play directories.

chuck@chucknewt.net (Chuck Newton) — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 08:10:39 -0800

Is this all just hype? On the one hand I do not disagree that Linkedin is exploding in terms and accounts and people asking me, for example, to join their group, but I fail to see any real use of the system, or at least no real use of the system.

vbalasubramani@yahoo.com (Venkat) — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 10:47:15 -0800

For me the jury's out. I'm a convert and I think there are definite uses to linked in (among other things, you can chuck out your business cards).

(As far as firms using it as a marketing tool I think that's unlikely and will just start diluting the whole network, which is about personal connections.)

As to seriously making connections, I'm not sure. I say that as someone who is pretty gregarious on-line.

To me the utility will depend on whether people really restrict their network to trusted folks and whether the whole "trust" thing tends to get abused. (I've been added by and sought to add people I've met once or twice. This sort of waters down the network.)

I think the grown is also very demographically focused. In a city like Seattle or SF, there are bound to be a ton of users. Less so across other socio-economic-geographic strands. Still, I'm surprised when I see a relative from India on there or someone I've met in a foreign country. Its reach seems impressive.

kevin@lexblog.com (Kevin OKeefe) — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 08:35:19 -0800

>>Have you seen the new company profile section on LinkedIn?

I have blogged about all the major law firms having detailed LinkedIn profiles.

Those profiles detailing demographic info on the firm pulled together from individual lawyer profiles and their networking on LinkedIn are very powerful.

Agree that it will be more of a hit than the pay to play lawyer directories that do not include potential clients in the same directory.

kevin@lexblog.com (Kevin OKeefe) — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 08:38:54 -0800

I'm not sure LinkedIn is hype anymore.

In the last 3 months alone almost 100,000 lawyers added their profiles to LinkedIn. It's possible LinkedIn has more detailed profiles than Martindale-Hubbell.

And each of the LinkedIn profiles is well indexed for Google so that when searching for a lawyer, their LinkedIn profile often comes up high on the first page of Google search results.

Hulienbarrett@gmail.com (David A. Barrett, Esq. ) — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 22:42:02 -0800

Thank you for your post Kevin.

In addition to Oliver Picher's uses, LinkedIn can also be used as a stand alone legal client referral tool.

LinkedIn lawyer networking groups have a variety of uses for law firms and practicing attorneys, often providing a vehicle for lawyers to find and build new relationships with each other.

The relationship nature of LinkedIn allows attorneys to make legal referrals to appropriate counsel in the desired jurisdiction.

One way to quickly locate and refer connected attorneys in response to a consumer LinkedIn question seeking counsel, is to enhance a direct connection with membership in legal networking groups organized by practice area and geographically.

Lawyers may find new LinkedIn legal networking groups here -

http://MyLinkLaw.com

David Barrett
Boston, Massachusetts
http://davidbarrett.mylinkinvitation.com

rosalie@kramm.com (Rosalie Kramm) — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 11:10:13 -0800

I believe attorneys and all business people need to be strategic who they are connecting with. I agree, the network can get watered down and lose some of its authenticity if a person invites everyone they ever met to link with. As a court reporting firm owner, I am interested in connecting to my clients and potential clients. It would seem to me attorneys are in the same position. I believe attorneys should create a network of their business clients, potential referral sources of attorneys who are in a different area of law, and limit their network to whom they want to share info and knowledge with. If attorneys are strategic, I can envision tremendous value using LinkedIn.