Our “Active LinkedIn For Lawyers” course is designed to help lawyers and their firms start using LinkedIn to get results.

Here is a collection of comments following a very well received “Active LinkedIn For Lawyers” course delivered by me to Moore BlatchLLP in Southampton.

• I get it now – thank you
• A very useful session to encourage me to get stuck in to LinkedIn
• An interesting insight into the future and an excellent introduction and platform from which to begin a Linked involvement
• A helpful course which provided not only an introduction to the topic, but also explained how to make the most of it
• Interesting and lively
• Excellent presentation which has given me confidence to get stuck in

and this recommendation was also posted through to my LinkedIn account by another partner there, Mark Osgood

“Neil came to our offices to provide training on LinkedIn. We get it now, and Neil’s relaxed and fun presentation style has given us the enthusiasm to really embrace this important resource. January 28, 2011

Top qualities: Great Results, Personable, Creative”

Get in touch now for fun, creative training that gets great results and gets your people using LinkedIn to drive new business.

The first comment posted online was unattractive.

The commentator, who understandably chose to remain anonymous, went on something of a rant.

By messing with vowels and asterisks, he rendered Twitter as a similar sounding word using a derogatory term for female genitalia.  It’s an old joke and a lazy one.  It wasn’t funny when David Cameron told it on live radio and it’s not funny now.

He went on to imply that people using LinkedIn should use a site called SadAssIn instead, presumably because we are all, well, sad asses.

Remember, he was on a lawyer’s professional website and believed that if he could remain anonymous, then he, and his reputation, would remain intact.

In the circumstances, linking back his “Anonymous” name to his law firm’s website was a bad mistake.

Debate online is good and can be constructive, but it can also be overly spontaneous and regrettable, even if we think that we have remained anonymous.

Ask yourself the following questions to protect your reputation online;

1. Why do I sense a need to claim anonymity?
2. If the anonymity fails, or my identity is revealed, am I happy about that?
3. What is the reputational risk if these comments are traced back to me?
4. Would I be comfortable defending these anonymous comments to an employer, colleague or client?
5. Do I need to post at all or should I just walk away?
6. If I do need to argue against a point, how can I do so professionally and without causing unnecessary offence?

Effective use of social media helps us to grow our profile, our following and the referred work we receive as a result.

We need to guard our reputation online by exerting care and control.

Don’t blow it.

If you would like training on social media awareness and conduct issues such as these for your staff or colleagues then please do not hesitate to get in touch now or book a place on the Social Media Training For Lawyers bootcamp, in Bath 22nd November, 2010.

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These were independent practitioners who were interested in using social media to share, network and promote their work.

The workshop was a real joy.  As a trainer, you hope to run such events in a way which enables people to contribute, and even contradict.  The learning process is so much better when we are able to wrestle with the material.

If we do not, then the process becomes very one dimensional.

There is no point in me simply showing delegates how to post a tweet, open a LinkedIn account or explain the difference between Web 1.0 and 2.0.

That needs to be accompanied by a full discussion on where people currently are.  What is their current experience?  What are the worries that they might have?  What myths and presumptions need to be explored and re-aligned?

Only once we have addressed these matters will the social media training itself resonate and make sense.  Without this, then instructions on “How to…” can seem to be completely alien and irrelevant.

One feedback comment I received really amused me.  The course was, said this attendee, “Actually really good.”

That consensus, if not the surprise, was shared by all, who are now convening on a specially designed LinkedIn group to enable the delegates to continue what was a very lively session.

Remember, if you would like to explore social media training for lawyers or for your law firm, then contact me right away.

It was very short but very powerful.

“Thank you” it said “for your YouTube collaborative law video.”

And that was it.

On one level – that of metrics, pounds and pence – it was meaningless. There were no billable units in it, very little chance of a referral down the line.  But that was not the point.

We all like to be recognised for what we do, and here was recognition.  But that was not the point either.

This is the point.

When we create social media content that has value and relevance to people, that meets a need that they have, then people are grateful.  They talk about it and share our contributions into their own circles of online and real life contacts.

When that happens then we grow and develop our personal brand.  We become seen as valued members of that community.  And when that happens, all kinds of new opportunities open up.

Lawyers who use social media effectively are able to position themselves as thought leaders, as authorities in their field, in a similar, but more subversive way to the Legal 500.

We’ll share more on thought leaders later, and at our Social Media Training for Lawyers bootcamp in Bath, 22nd November 2010. Join us there.

Monday 22nd November 2010, 9am for 9.30 start, through to 5.00pm

BRLSI, Queen Square, Bath (www.brlsi.org)

Early Bird Rate £150 up to and including 7th November 2010 then rising to full price £200

ORDER YOUR TICKET HERE

This course is open to all lawyers, law firm staff or partner/directors of law firms.

Delegates will learn the potential that social media offers to individual lawyers, and firms, to develop and communicate their brand and offering and create new lines of work referral.

Delegates will likely have a LinkedIn account but do not know how to use it to build relationships or raise profile.

Delegates may have started using social media and now want to understand how to combine what they are doing with a strategised approach, maybe combining two or more social media activities such as Twitter, Blogging, Facebook and Youtube, to create a basic but effective campaign.

By the end of the course, all delegates will have a collection of social media tools, with the knowledge about how to use them together to present a consistent online image, boost their Google presence and develop new work.

Topics to include:

1. The need for lawyers to use social media, considering ABSs, Susskind’s The End of Lawyers, and GenerationY
2. Keeping it legit – managing the tensions between Social Media and SRA compliance
3. LinkedIn or Missing Out? Maximising the potential in your LinkedIn account
4. Blogging – The essential skill of becoming a “Thought leader” in your field
5. Twitter – Beyond The Inane
6. Youtube, Flickr, Spotify, Etsy, Facebook… Pick a flavour, any flavour
7. Pulling it all together – Designing your social media strategy for growth

Join us at the Social Media Training for Lawyers Bootcamp, 22nd November 2010.

Places strictly limited to only 15 attendees.

Lawyers who use social media can improve the likelihood of lawyer to lawyer referrals.

I have a new client. She’s from out of town. The other person involved in the matter also lives in a different town to me.

I want to be able to influence the choice of lawyer that the other person chooses by giving some possible names to my client to pass on.  I’m thinking that I want my counterpart to share similar values to me, be committed to a certain way of practice and dispute resolution.

Now, I can trawl through websites for lawyers in that town, but what is that really going to tell me?  Too often, our websites have so little differentiation as to be close to meaningless.
So instead I turn to LinkedIn. I get a few names, maybe some recommendations to follow up.

If they are effective within social media and social networking then I can look at how they demonstrate those values and approaches that I am looking for.  I can look at their contributions to discussions online and the creation of other social media materials.

The ones who prove themselves as being committed enough to contribute to discussions and debate, who put out helpful information, are the ones who are going to get the lead.

So, are you using social media to drive lawyer to lawyer referrals? And if not, what is stopping you?

And I am a lawyer.

I have used social media successfully for several years to develop my personal brand, develop referral relationships and bring work into the firm I work for, Mogers, in Bath, UK.

I am increasingly asked if I can share my experiences and knowledge about social media, and specifically how lawyers, mediators and law firm staff can use these free tools.

Lawyers have unique needs in social media training.

You need to know that it is worthwhile in your industry.  It does and I am proof of that.

You need to know that it is professionally ethical.  It is and I can show you how.

You need to know it is safe and I can give you the tools to keep you, your staff and your reputation safe online.

Get in touch to book your Social Media Training For Lawyers, by a lawyer.  Get yourself, your partners and your staff driving your message online responsibly and effectively.

Call now on 07815 727693