The recent report of the American Bar Association (ABA) on Legal Profession highlights that the great majority of lawyers (79%) personally use or maintain a presence on social media for professional purposes and that their most popular social network is LinkedIn (82%). It is great to see the level of adoption of LinkedIn by lawyers, and for sure, these numbers will continue to increase as technology continues to play a larger role in our personal lives.

With 740 million members in more than 200 countries and territories worldwide, LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional network and the digital business card of the 21st century that enables lawyers to achieve more. Embracing and actively using LinkedIn provides incredible opportunities for legal professionals to build their brand (and their law firm’s), learn, and develop deeper relationships with others. 

10 tips every lawyer must master to ensure effective presence on LinkedIn 

1- Build a robust profile

The foundation for any impactful LinkedIn presence is your LinkedIn profile. Invest the time and effort to build and continually update your LinkedIn profile. Be sure to have a professional headshot photo, a nice background photo, and a compelling headline—especially since those items will be featured prominently when profiles are viewed via a mobile phone. Complete your profile in its aggregate and gain ideas on how to best construct your profile by viewing LinkedIn power users’ profiles.

2- Build connections with your potential clients

If you deal with corporate business, small business or real estate issues, you can use LinkedIn to network with potential clients—and educate them so they will want to come to you with their problems.

3- Mine LinkedIn Data

LinkedIn is a treasure trove of news, information, and data that helps us learn and embrace a growth mindset. Connect with business professionals and be part of related LinkedIn Groups so that you can have real-time access to the most updated content related to legal topics important to your practice. LinkedIn also enables you to gain valuable insight and background information about other lawyers and business professionals that you may work with as part of your practice.

4- Actively Evangelize

LinkedIn is a terrific medium to showcase your legal expertise and promote your organisation by posting and sharing meaningful content that provides value to others. You can even measure the impact of your posts and shares by monitoring the number of views and likes.

5- Be Current

Make sure that the information you post and share is current and relevant. LinkedIn professionals are less inclined to consider you a thought leader or view/like your posts and shares if they contain dated content.

6- Visual is Key

When you post and share LinkedIn information, consider incorporating pictures and videos since such information is more likely to be viewed and liked by others. Such visuals should be high-quality in nature so others can easily view them.

7- Thoughtful Cadence

Be mindful about how often you post and share content on LinkedIn. If you post and share information with too much frequency, others may ignore you or decide to unfollow you. 

8- Everyone Can Be an Author

Many lawyers are excellent writers, and LinkedIn allows you to publish your articles. Consider writing on subjects that may be top of mind to members of your network and legal organisation. Also, avoid writing legal treatises by keeping your articles concise and clear.

9- Use SlideShare

SlideShare is a great feature underutilised by lawyers as it allows you to share your LinkedIn presentations. Lawyers are constantly delivering presentations via PowerPoint (or other technology), so consider uploading the slides from your next presentation or panel discussion at a legal conference, seminar, event or CLE on SlideShare.

10- Be Smart

When using LinkedIn, be positive, use proper spelling and grammar, comply with your organisation’s social media guidelines, adhere to local legal ethics requirements, embrace reasonable cybersecurity practices, always avoid sharing any confidential information, and be nice and respectful everyone.

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