Is your estate planning or elder law firm social? If you are an Essential AttorneyTM, then your answer better be yes! Part of the Essential Solution includes help setting up and formatting several different social media pages as well as training in how to use them. But to really take your marketing system to the next level, we also integrate those social media channels with your website.
We talk a lot about the importance of social media around here. If you are still doubtful of the impact that social media can have in your marketing, check out this post that account manager Dana wrote, debunking some of the most common social media myths or this post by CEO Jennifer explaining some of the stats behind social media use in marketing.
Now that we know that social media is a great tool, how to we tie it in to the rest of your marketing, mainly the website? The way in which we integrate social media into your website depends on your unique firm, the goals we set together for your marketing, and your target audience.
For example, IMS President Kyle Krull has found that he is more successful asking for reviews and recommendations on sites such as Avvo or Martindale-Hubbell rather than on Facebook or Google+. Therefore, while he is still active on social media platforms, they aren’t as prominent in the website design.
On the other hand, an attorney or firm that has a slightly younger target audience or has goals to increase the overall exposure of their firm and increase social connections and reviews would do well to have social media more prominent in their site design. We could do this by using a larger Twitter feed, displaying a separate blog feed, and displaying the social media icons in several places or on every page of the site.
Social media is usually included in the design on the lower half of the home page design. While it is an important part of your marketing, it isn’t as important as a call to action item or the navigation. Avoid distracting your viewers from something that important whenever possible! It does make a great lower-level action item though – a way for viewers to connect with you either after they have converted and filled out a form or found the contact information they were looking for.
Next week: Next week we’ll be talking about “other stuff” on your homepage. These custom sections could include downloadable resources, testimonials, an attorney spotlight, or many other options. What options are available and why might you want to take advantage of them? If you want to catch up on other installments in this series, check out Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, or Part 5.