Legal communications and marketing people not using social media

I recently ran across a press release in my feeds from a legal marketing company sharing word of work they were doing in the legal technology arena.

I was going to share word of what they were doing on Twitter. Before doing so I went to look up the Twitter handle of the communications person who sent out the release. I wanted to give them a shout out and personal attribute. It also lets them know I spread the word for them — think engagement.

To my surprise the person didn’t have a Twitter account. This was a person working as a communications professional interfacing with the media for a company offering marketing services to law firms and legal services companies.

They’d have to know that media today includes traditional media sources as well as bloggers and people on social networks. They’d have to know reaching the influencers on social media helps get your stories spread and covered in the traditional media.

I didn’t share word of the release and the news. One, social networking and media was part of the subject of the release. If the company’s communication person did not use social media, how credible was the subject of the release?

Two, though I thought positively of the company before the release I thought it was kind of lame to talk up social media when you don’t walk the talk. How can you help companies and firms with social media if your own communications person does not personally use social networks and social media?

Am I being too much of a hard ass here? I expect people talking of offering services on something to actually be good at it — personally.

If you are in legal marketing, communications, and public relations you best be using social media and social networks, and using it well. This is is especially true if you’re selling such services.

I am not talking of the companies using social media as a company, I am talking of their people using social media and social networks personally in their own names.

When I started LexBlog I wasn’t sure how any one was going to find us. Heck, no one even heard of blogging, let alone LexBlog which was headquartered in my garage. I would have to buy some ads. I would have to sponsor events. I’d have to get a booth at a conference.

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. How could I tell people that blogs would work for business development if I wasn’t blogging to get my work? I wouldn’t have any credibility.

So I just started blogging, in some cases a couple times a day. I was no business guru, and though I was scared as heck blogging alone would not get me work I just thought it the right thing to do. I needed to put my money where my mouth was, to be there with my clients, and to get good at the service I was offering.

Doesn’t it make sense that legal marketing and communications professionals offering social media, social networking, and blogging services, solutions and support to be building their own companies by their people personally using social media?

Image courtesy of Flickr by sushiesque