Twitter for lawyers is about creating your own community

As Austin business development expert Thom Singer wrote this morning, Twitter is not all about the numbers. It’s about the community you create.

Don’t worry about how many people are following you and how many people you’re following on Twitter. Focus on the community of like minded people you are personally creating for yourself.

This weekend a healthcare lawyer started following me on Twitter. As I’m apt to do, I skimmed through some of the people she was following. Followers tell me where this persons interests lie and how savvy they are at using Twitter for client development.

She was following an incredible number of doctors, health care providers, hospitals, insurers, and publications reaching the healthcare industry.

This lawyer had put together her own community of people she could learn from and network with. It was a community of people other healthcare lawyers would die to be a part of.

When speaking around the country, I’m always talking of the Rotary Meeting analogy. As a young lawyer I was prodded to go to Rotary Meetings where local business people, including a number of other lawyers, would network among each other.

The idea was to get known and to get new clients. The problem was that the group was a cross section of a city. There was no common interest that brought us together – other than to network in an attempt to get work.

But what if there was a Rotary Meeting of individuals, business owners, bloggers, and reporters with an interest in the area of law you specialize in? You’d go in a heartbeat.

You’d listen to what folks were saying. You’d engage in conversations. You’d offer your intake and commentary. And unless you were a buffoon, you’d pick up some legal work along the way. And the legal work would be from people you’ve come to know and enjoy.

This healthcare lawyer created her own Rotary Meeting of doctors, health care organizations, insurers, bloggers, and reporters – all with an interest in healthcare issues.

By engaging in a conversation with these folks, by sharing ideas, and by learning about other’s professional and personal interests, she is going to grow her reputation and her practice.

As Seth Godin says in his latest book, Tribes, a community, or tribe, is nothing more than people with a common interest and a means to communicate. That’s what Twitter is all about for you as a lawyer.