There’s no escaping it – and with individuals and businesses worldwide investing their time and energy into joining a social networking site, it’s time your law firm did to. Yet given the recent surge in social media flaws that have caused widespread panic and embarrassment to many an online amateur, it’s understandable that the majority of legal professionals are somewhat hesitant about employing the use of social media.

However, failure to join this digital trend could see your business missing out on potential clients; not to mention leaving you trailing behind the rest of your competitors. If used appropriately, social media could boost both your business and your reputation – so get acquainted with these helpful tips to avoid making a social networking faux pas:

1. Acting professional on a personal platform. Whilst it’s your job to promote your business, remember that you need to communicate on a personal level – by ditching your legal terminology and introducing your services in layman’s terms. The more familiar you come across, the more likely your clients will want to connect with you (plus writing in an automated fashion may appear as though you have a spam bot account as opposed to being managed by a friendly human being).

2. Not practising your SEO. Content that can be shared and referenced can be a great way to engage your audience, but without the relevant keywords and topics for people to search for, the less likely you’ll appear at the top of the search engine results page. Increase your SEO, and enjoy increased rankings (as well as an increased customer base).

3. Using legal labels instead of simple solutions. Similar to the first point, whilst your aim is to essentially sell your services, you risk being lost in translation – with customers feeling intimidated due to their lack of legal knowledge. Don’t just list your products, break it down for them by detailing the benefits, fees as well as any unique selling points; as the more familiar you are in your language, the more familiar your customers will be with your brand.

4. Failing to measure your marketing efforts. It’s no good drumming up marketing hype if you can’t measure the effectiveness of your marketing – establish a set of reachable goals then see the outcome of your efforts by assessing your analytics. There’s a host of tools available, such as the ability to measure your Facebook page’s performance or even view analytic data about your business on LinkedIn.

5. Missing out on your target audience. So you’ve crafted your content and now have a variety of helpful resources at your disposal – but who exactly are you hoping to target? It’s all very well hoping to ‘go viral’ but you don’t want to attract the wrong crowds, so do your research to ensure your reach the right demographic.

6. Logging on at irregular intervals. It’s one thing signing up for a social networking account – and it’s another thing maintaining your social media presence. Keep your customers interested by updating your content, and try to interact when possible. If clients see that your last post was more than a month old, they’ll assume you’re no longer active or worse, you don’t care about either your business or your customers.

Social media, if done correctly, can bring you huge success – both online as well as offline. Just make sure you plan ahead by preparing an effective marketing campaign, and remember to leverage your success with quality – and not quantity.