Facebook to become more important than Google for lawyers?

Many lawyers are fixated on Google when it comes to business development. Where is my site or blog ranking on search? How can I achieve better search results with SEO?

But as the Mootley Fool’s Chris Neiger (@cdneiger) reports, Americans spend more time on Facebook than Google. At least when it comes to smartphone apps, according to a Forrester Research.

Most lawyers find Facebook a challenge. Many look at the social network as a playground for personal trivia. They wouldn’t feel comfortable sharing professional insight or even a blog post with commentary.

Other lawyers and law firms attempt to set up law firm pages as their presence on Facebook. Most of those pages fail miserably for lack of engagement.

A Facebook personal account used by a lawyer to share those things they are passionate about, whether professional or personal, does work for business development.

Much like the pre-Internet world, lawyers mingle and have discussions with people on Facebook. The result is relationships and a word of mouth reputation. People trust you as a result of your authentic and genuine style.

Unlike Google, lawyers can proactively seek to be-friend those people they’d like to get to know. This includes prospective clients, referral sources and influencers such as bloggers, reporters and association leaders.

Facebook friendship and exchanges with this targeted audience lead to meaningful relationships. Relationships leading to face to face meetings.

Like LinkedIn, sharing your blog posts on Facebook leads to likes, comments and engagement. Much more so than on your blog itself.

Also for bloggers, the Internet is becoming more of discovery vehicle. Rather than searching for information, people we trust share news, information and commentary that we discover and read. That’s why 61% of millennials get news on Facebook.

Do I think Facebook is going to immediately supplant Google as most important for blogging lawyers? No, relevant searches on Google will retrieve items you’ve written over the years.

But Facebook has a place today for those lawyers looking to build relationships and a word of mouth reputation. And in the years ahead Facebook will become indispensable for lawyers — and possibly, even more important for lawyers.

Image courtesy of Flickr by Sam Michel