Autofeed is not a personality

Social media by definition includes being social. You get out there and engage people. Follow what others are saying in your niche and share information and insight on blogs, Twitter, and the like.

Sounds a lot like networking for client development as a lawyer in the ‘real world.’ Get out and engage your target audience. Be yourself. Listen to what people are saying. Offer value to conversations.

In either case, if you have the personality of a doorknob you’re unlikely to succeed.

I’d hate to guess how many times in the last month I’ve heard from a law firm that we’re going to really use social media in 2011. We’re going to distribute our email newsletters and alerts through blogs. We’ve got a social media consultant who’s going to set up an ‘autofeed’ so that our blogs, articles, and every other piece of content we produce are automatically fed onto Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook.

Wow. That’s wonderful. Rather than exhibit any social skills you’re going to go out and push things at people that they don’t want. Rather than exhibit personality that allows people to warm up to you and allows you to build trust, you’re cold and standoffish.

Excusing yourself from having personality because you’re a law firm or lawyer is a total crock.

“We’re highly regulated. We can’t say anything that could be used against us or put a partner in an awkward position with one of their clients. We can’t give insight on the law without forming an attorney client relationship.” Wakeup. You think that held the rainmakers in your firm back in their personable style of networking while at a conference, lunch, or golf outing?

“Our firm isn’t ready to exhibit any personality in social media. We’re new to this. We’re a really conservative and traditional firm. General counsel and firm management won’t let us do anything more than distribute vetted content.” Educate the decision makers as to what social media is all about. That, or don’t participate. Putting the fact you have zero personality on display is not going to do you or the firm any good.

Social media does work for professional and client development. But you need to be social. You need to exhibit some personality. Autofeed won’t cut it.