Facebook - not for the faint-hearted

Person A comes to your website and looks at some info.
Person A goes to Facebook and sees your advert directing them
back to the subject they researched on your website.

Person A thinks, "Wow, this law firm does have some interesting
stuff after all and I think I will call/email them"

That's called remarketing and is possible today.

Person B is getting married. You know because their status is
"engaged" on Facebook. (You can search personal statuses along
with a whole variety of things).

Person B lives within 20 minutes drive of your firm. (You know that).

Person B sees your advert for "7 Legal Mistakes You Must Avoid
Before You Get Married" which goes to your Facebook page,
which has the guide on it, (but they have to Like the guide before they
can access it (Facebook gating).

Person B reads it, and decides to call you for a pre-nuptial agreement
consultation.

Facebook can be tested very cheaply and quickly like this.

Sure, focus on existing clients, upsells, downsells, and referrals but don't ignore the possibilities of other channels.

Hampson Hughes are doing stuff in PI social media marketing that is attracting
potential clients. I know because I used their infographics to send to a potential claimant myself (my uncle).

The key is to find ways to test things without breaking the bank, track it and if it works ramp it up quickly and profitably.

JAM: Hi, I have read your post with interest and its a good topic for debate.. I have looked at responding to your comments underneath your post so do excuse me if this post seems somewhat long-winded.. I have highlighted JAM's Comments with the word JAM:

The subject of Facebook has cropped up quite a lot recently in enquiries I’ve had from law firms.

I don’t know why, Facebook has been running for many years so it’s hardly new. Maybe Spring is in the air and firms feel they need to do more on their marketing, especially on the social media side.

JAM: Many of the law firms don't have any Social Media strategy at all and there are lots of areas to promote their business successfully but as you point out there are many difficulties, but that are easily resolved as we have proven since ,May 2011

The question is: should Facebook be part of their marketing mix and how do they go about it? This is an awkward question for me because my instinctive response is to say, unless you’re really committed, don’t bother. Facebook isn’t like Twitter, or LinkedIn... or even Pinterest.

JAM: You should always be committed to cost effective marketing, that's why many firms and businesses fail due to lack of successful marketing.. What are you comments based in relation to Twitter or Linked In? We are talking about "BtoC" which would mean that Linked In would not be an area for Lead Generation...

For marketing purposes, Facebook is difficult... it’s time-consuming, involves lots of work yet the rewards are very uncertain. To make matters worse, you can’t be sure that Facebook won’t cut the ground from under you just as you’re on the verge of success.

JAM: No one knows the future but charging people for Facebook Pages but if they did decide to charge you then this would be potentially catastrophic for its users so i don't see this being an issue but if they did charge then how would it be any different to another other advertising option? They all charge and advertising is essentially about coverage and the correct audience seen the content or adverts- Please give details of the alternatives for advertising that hold more potential than Facebook right now? At this current moment in time it is free (Facebook) and more effective!! In terms of time involved then i have to say this! "Why would you not spend time engaging with a customised audience that has questions about the services a firm can provide especially if its profitable"?

I should point out that I’m not talking about Facebook advertising... the stuff you pay for. I have my doubts about that but that isn’t the subject of this article. I’m talking about the organic social interaction side of Facebook; the kind of marketing that’s free in theory but which in practice may turn out to be very expensive.

JAM: So far LAW firms using FB correctly are enjoying a CPA of well below what they were paying for in any other marketing route of referrer arrangement and with the response being direct from the claimant to the firm then the issues of compliance are surely above board? Hampson Hughes (mentioned in this thread) have benefited directly from our Advice on how to market themselves correctly through FB

Let me explain. The basic premise of Facebook is that you set up a page and put interesting posts about your firm and its services, legal developments, news stories... anything that will catch the attention of the public so you can build up an army of followers.

So far, so good... but there are problems.

Facebook is far from straightforward. Its system is set up so that your posts are only seen by a small proportion of your followers, currently about 10%. This means that if you have 1,000 followers, only about 100 will see any particular post.

JAM: By understanding more about the audience such as who they are, when they go on Facebook and who shares the content etc is how you get the traction.. It no good just getting likes if you don't know who they are and what they will do for you.. You first build a customised audience then understand how to work that audience.. We use advanced software that is approved by Facebook and plugs into their API and helps us see clearly who is doing what, why and when.. Yes you are correct in saying that if you used Facebook's own software tool (ad manager) then this process would be far more difficult and the results less impacting

You then hope that some of those 100 will find your post interesting enough to share with their friends or followers. This way you will reach a bigger audience. If one post goes down very well and gets lots of shares, Facebook may slightly increase the number of people who see your next post. If that gets lots of shares, you may get a virtuous circle going.

JAM: People will share content and services that are beneficial in the same way they will advise on the best restaurant ... Why would you not want people to share your services directly to a friend if they knew they needed it? If your content is not there then it cant be shared and with the average user have at least 150 friends that gives you a social reach of 150,000 per 1000 fans.. Where can you get that level of potential in other marketing circles?

However, it can go the other way as well. If your post doesn’t create much interest you’ll be back where you started.

JAM: Correct Audience + Good Content = Great Results

This means that how many people you reach on Facebook is determined by how popular your posts are and how many people share them. It’s not enough to have large numbers of followers; you also need to produce lots of interesting posts.

JAM: its not just the numbers, it the quality of the audience

This presents difficulties for law firms. The law is a serious matter yet Facebook is a medium designed to allow friends to interact socially in a light-hearted way. As people put up pictures of their boozy Friday night out, how many of them are going to share your law posts?

JAM: We are currently working with firms where 50% of their audience is sharing and liking their content and we simply amplify the content and asses the data on who is going to like, share and promote that content.. those are the ones we ant to engage with

The question of what material works best on Facebook is another concern. The most popular posts involve pictures, jokes, amusing or inspirational quotes... none of these are all that high on the law agenda.

JAM: We know what works having worked successfully with LAW firms in this area since May 2011.. Yes if you don't know what to do then you will have to spend to find out.. If you know what to do, what works and has been a success already then this is not an issue

The other problem with Facebook involves something we can’t predict: what will Facebook do next?

JAM: We are only control of the here and now and no one knows what any of these big firms are going to do next.. Do we know what Google are going to do next? Will papers go weekly instead of monthly? Is it not really about what marketing works and how much it costs as opposed to trying to see through a crystal ball that none of us have access to? You could argue that did we ever expect Facebook to have 31 million profiles 3 years ago? Did we ever think that The News of the World would hack phones??

Its practices aren’t set in stone. For example, until early last year, Facebook used to automatically show your posts to somewhere between 20% and 30% of your followers. Then its share price fell, so it cut the figure down to something like 10% - presumably to persuade firms to pay for advertising instead of trying to reach people organically.

JAM: Facebook shows both adverts and content.. Its about understanding when to show the content as covered in one of earlier comments

Who’s to say Facebook won’t reduce the percentage even further? It raises the question: who wants to put a lot of time and effort into a marketing platform they don’t control and which may change for the worse at any moment?

Again this is a case of "possibly maybe".. we need to work with facts here and the facts are that Facebook marketing for LAW firms if done correctly is a far more costs effective and compliant way to bring work in and we have proved that beyond any reasonable doubt.. Your point is just not relevant at this moment in time...

So, should your firm get involved in Facebook? Well, maybe... but only if you’ve already got more certain and reliable marketing strategies in place. Facebook should be one of your last marketing platforms, not one of your first. And if you are going to do it, you need to go into it wholeheartedly with a lot of resources behind you.

JAM: Why would firms not get involved? They should all get involved because the alternatives for the most part don't work, are too competitive and offer no hope for organic growth that is needed with many of the changes to funding putting more pressure on firms to cut costs for case acquisition.. You don't need big resource either and compared to the average case being paid for at £500-£750 on the old schemes then the money and time needed to make Facebook work is vastly less than what firms have been paying out for the same work load as our video shows http://www.jambusinessmedia.com/personal-injury-leads-generation...

As we’ve seen, it’s full of challenges and is not for the faint-hearted.

As for that social media platform Twitter, well now that’s a different matter altogether. I’m much more positive about Twitter... but more about that in another post.

JAM: Tell me why?

JAM: We work directly with our development partners who have gained early access to Twitters API (1 of only 4 in the world) but we are a year away from this being looked at a source of lead generation work via adverts.. What are your thoughts on whether Twitter will charge? Do not all Social Platforms have the ability to charge for the usage of their platform? I am interested to know why you don't have the same opinion about Twitter as you do Facebook?

Nick Kehoe is a former television and newspaper journalist. He is now managing director at law marketing firm Media Coverage