Where Do I Start?How to Launch Your Firm's Facebook Presence

Kelli S. Burns, Ph.D.

Topics for Today

• Getting on Board– Why have a Facebook page?

• Building your Boat– Setting up your page

• Navigating a Sea of Content– Managing your content and the secrets of the News Feed

• Finding a Treasure Chest of Data– Admin Panel Basics

• Advertising• Joining Groups/Pages

Building your Business

• The legal practice is still very much a word of mouth business built through solid relationships with clients.– But social media help increase the speed of

word of mouth.

Why Have a Facebook Presence?

• Raises brand awareness• Potential clients might be checking Facebook

for more information about your firm• Improves Google’s search engine ranking• Establishes your firm/attorneys as thought

leaders• Allows clients to share experiences through

reviews

Page, Group or Profile?

• Profiles are for individual/personal use. – Can only have one Facebook profile.

• Groups– Better for small organizations/clubs that need to

communicate with members• Pages– Best choice for your law practice– Most customizable and no limits on # of fans

Setting up your Page• Create your page

– https://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php

• Are you a local business/place or a company/org/institution?

• Choose either Lawyer the Legal/Law category

• Continue setup with website URL and page description

• Get a custom URL when your page reaches 25 fans– https://

www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=670888052953• Add a cover image and profile image• The About section permits 155 characters of text

that are visible on your profile.

Buying fans?

• Look at a page’s likes to see where fans live and age group.

• How many will really be “talking about this”?– Your “irrelevant” content will

be shown to fewer people.• Instead:– Promote the page to your

clients (email)– Promote online and offline– Run ads

Recommended video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVfHeWTKjag

Add Social Media Links on the Top of your Website Homepage

Keep Your Content Fresh• Don’t limit your content to ad/marketing

messages.• Think of yourself as a news source for your

clients/fans.– Post links to recent news stories and legal decisions.– Write opinion pieces

• Include content that is visual (photos) and interactive (questions).– Text only posts on Pages will get limited distribution

• Use link share instead of embedding links.• Highlight your community involvement.

The Reality of Facebook

• The average number of pages liked by the typical Facebook user increased 50% in 2013.

• The average user might have 1,500 posts that could appear their feed each day. For others with lots of friends and pages liked, that number could be 15,000.

• Not all of your fans will even be online when you post.

• Even if they are, Facebook curates the news feed for users.

Are your fans seeing your posts?

• Organic reach of pages is diminished.

• Facebook explained decreased organic reach is impacted by increased sharing.

• Many contend that Facebook is selling more exposure in news feeds.

Performance Impacts Reach

• If you publish interesting posts that get likes, comments, and shares, your reach increases.– If not, your reach decreases.

• More competition = more work for you

Reach is more important than fansHere are two pages, one with 1M fans and the other with 500k fans. This screenshot from our Facebook Page Performance Barometer shows the average number of fans reached by each post of the page for the last 50 posts. But, even if the second one reaches half the fans of the first one, it still reaches 8 times more people each time it publishes something. Don’t you think you need to be aware of that?(Emeric Ernoult of AgoraPulse)

Admin Panel Basics

• Build Audience– Invite Email Contacts– Invite Friends– Share Page (on your personal page)– Promote Page ($)

• See Insights– https://

www.facebook.com/business/news/pageinsights– Ads Manager

Promote Your Page

• From Admin Panel, click Build Audience and then Promote Page.

Boost a Post

• Boost a post directly from the post on your news feed or from the admin panel.

• Can select fans/friends of fans or target your audience through demos.

Content Strategy

• Don’t calculate engagement by dividing those who liked, shared, commented by total number of fans.

• Instead divide those who liked, shared, commented AND clicked by reached users.

• What patterns do you see with the most engaging content? Is it a certain type of content? Is it shared on a specific day of the week or time of day?

Posting on Facebook

• Best times: Weekdays 6:00-8:00am and 2:00-5:00pm

• Worst times: Weekends 10:00pm-4:00am

Facebook Ads

• Placement– News Feed– Sidebar– Search results

Ads Manager

Facebook Pages/Groups

• Join a page/group that would contain good prospects for your law firm– Can use Facebook ads to target people who liked or

joined pages/groups that are relevant to your business

• Start your own page– Can use Google keyword advertising to direct people

to Facebook group– Should disclose that your law firm sponsors the page– Create contact form on page

Final Thoughts

• If you can’t keep the page fresh with new content, it’s better for you to delete it.

• Instead of having a Facebook page for your firm, you could use your personal page to promote your brand.

• Be mindful of solicitation rules when using electronic media.