10 reasons lawyers need social media today.

• Author: Dayton, Adrian

In the classic play "The Crucible," by Arthur Miller, Giles Corey is accused I of witchcraft. He has two options: Suffer the penalty of death, or admit to the false claim he is a witch and have his life spared. It seems like a simple choice, but not to Giles. His name is everything to him, and lying at the expense of his good name isn't worth any price. "How may I live without my name?" he asks.

Lawyers should ask a similar question. To a lawyer, reputation is everything. Having a gold-plated reputation, however, isn't as straightforward as it once was. Not only do lawyers need to have a good reputation in their community, but it has become just as important to have a strong reputation online. That means that today's legal marketing teams need a new set of skills in their kits to help guide the lawyers with whom they work. They need to know social media and the online world well enough to serve as a trusted adviser to their firms. That's a critical and challenging new fundamental, and with many lawyers at many firms, it begins at the most basic level: convincing a sometimes skeptical audience that this indeed matters.

HERE ARE 10 REASONS WHY:

1. Lawyers need to own their online presence. The single easiest way to do this is by creating strong profiles on LinkedIn, Twitter and, depending on your industry, Google+ and Facebook. These profiles will be on the top of search engine rankings when people search for your name.

2. Lawyers need to maintain better contact with existing relationships. The single largest missed opportunity by lawyers today is an inability to maintain relationships over time and stay top-of-mind with their contacts. Needs for legal work are cyclical, but tools like LinkedIn make it easy to maintain contact on a regular basis with dozens or even hundreds of high-value relationships.

3. Lawyers need to escape the confines of the four walls of their office. Rainmakers reach outside of their walls and connect with high-value contacts on a daily basis. Lunches, drinks or coffee are best, but using LinkedIn or Twitter to share an article or show a top client you are thinking about them when things are busy means a lot. This isn't about online versus offline. Social media works when time is short to augment your offline business development efforts.

4. Lawyers need to track what marketing efforts are working and what falls flat. Never before in the history of legal marketing has there been more data to show what works and what...