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Facebook for Lawyers Tip #3: Create a Law Firm Facebook Page

While you may enjoy using Facebook to connect with family and friends, and may even post some business-related posts on your personal Facebook page occasionally, simply using Facebook Friend Lists to segregate your personal from your professional Facebook presence may not be enough for you. In that case, it may be time to create a professional Facebook Business Page for your firm (if you have the authority to do so).

Facebook wants you to use Pages for your business presence, and it has been enhancing features and tools for businesses recently. If you want a Facebook presence for your law firm or solo practice, Business Pages provide many benefits.

Creating Your Firm's Facebook Business Page

It's easy to create a Facebook Page for your firm. Click on the gear icon to the far right of the Facebook navigation bar and select Advertising. Click on "Create a Page" and follow the steps to build your firm's Facebook Page. Choose an appropriate name for your page, add a Profile photo (your firm logo is a good choice, or if you're a solo, you may want to use a photo of you) and a cover photo.

Choose a Cover Photo

There are special rules for cover photos for Facebook Pages, but those have been relaxed a bit recently; Pages are no longer prohibited from including a call to action in their cover photo, or limiting text to less than 20%. But these rules aside, you should use good sense, don't overcrowd your cover photo, and remember that images can have a big impact.

Choose something interesting, but make sure the cover photo represents your firm well. You might want to choose a photo of your firm's partners, or duplicate the header from your firm website. Or choose an image that uniquely represents what your firm does for its clients.

Designate Page Administrators

You can create a Page without having your own personal Profile, if you designate a Page Administrator with a Facebook Profile to create the Page instead, your Page will be much more functional and you'll be able to interact with other Pages, view others’ content, send or receive Friend requests, be found in search, and more - options not available if you simply set up a Page without a personal account.

You would be wise to add more than one Administrator to your Page so that one person doesn't have complete control of the firm's Page. And don't forget that your Page will need to abide by the ethical rules of your jurisdiction.

It is also important to note that Business Pages are public spaces - which means anyone can see what you post on your Page. You'll also want to watch carefully what others post on your page. This moderation of others' posts and comments is one of the main reasons to use care when choosing Page Administrators.

I recommend that law firms not show posts by others on your Page's timeline until you review them. Although you could choose to not allow others to post on your Page at all, removing the ability to engage with you will reduce the usefulness of your Page. You can change these settings by going to Edit Page>Edit Settings and changing your Post Visibility settings.

Add Some Detail

You'll want to complete the "About" section of your firm's page and include contact information so potential clients and referral sources can easily find you. You can also add 'milestones' (similar to Life Events on a personal Facebook Page) to help tell the story of your firm.

Promote Your Page

Once you've created your Page, you'll want to invite others to "Like" your Page so that they'll receive your firm's Updates in their News Feed, and you'll want to include links to your Facebook Page on your website, in emails, newsletters, blog posts, etc.

Participate Regularly

Finally, to make your Law Firm Facebook page work for you, post engaging content and interact with others as your Page. But don't make it all about you - make sure that what you post keeps your audience (clients, potential clients and referral sources) in mind.

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New on Facebook

Hashtags Arrive on Facebook

Facebook announced this week that it is going to be rolling out support for hashtags (#), made popular on Twitter and used in many other social media platforms.

Although some users already were employing hashtags in Facebook posts (possibly because they were cross-posting from other networks that do use and support them, including Twitter, Instagram and Google+), Facebook had no support for hashtags - until now. In other words, you could see the hashtags in a Facebook post, but you couldn't search for hashtags or find posts talking about the same topic.

Now Facebook has announced that hashtags will be both searchable and clickable - if you search for a hashtag using Facebook's search bar or click on a hashtag in a Facebook post, you'll see a list of posts that include that hashtag, grouped by what Facebook thinks are the most relevant posts to that particular user. This will allow Facebook users to see what other people are talking about and to participate in public conversations.

Hashtags are often used by social media users when commenting on events in real time, such as when watching a particular television program, watching or attending a sporting event, attending a concert, etc. A recent study, "Talking Social TV" conducted by the Council for Research Excellence, revealed that half of the respondents reported watching TV at the same time they were using social media.

Many social media users employ hashtags when talking about television programs. This presents huge opportunities for advertising and promotion. (Why do you think you now see hashtags appear on the screen when you're watching TV?) That may be one of the reasons why Facebook has decided to begin supporting them.

According to Facebook, now you can:

• Search for a specific hashtag from your search bar. For example, #NBAFinals.
• Click on hashtags that originate on other services, such as Instagram.
• Compose posts directly from the hashtag feed and search results.

For Facebook users who are concerned that using a hashtag in a Facebook post will make that post searchable - and therefore visible - publicly, Facebook has indicated that posts with hashtags will be treated the same way other posts on Facebook are treated. In other words, you set the audience for your post. If the audience for the post is public, the hashtag will be searchable and viewable publicly. If you set a specific audience for the post, only those individuals will be able to view the post, whether it contains a hashtag or not.

Don't forget that if you have created a Facebook business Page, your posts are always public, and that will include any post that includes a hashtag.

If hashtags aren't working for you on Facebook yet, they will be soon. Do you think this a feature that you'll use on Facebook?

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New on Facebook

If you haven't seen them yet, get ready - changes are coming to Facebook (again).

Facebook's "What are you doing?"

The latest addition? When you click in the status update box to post to Facebook, in addition to options to indicate who you're with, where you are and when your post will appear on your Timeline, Facebook has added a new option: what you're doing. 

The new option is designated by a smiley-face icon at the bottom of the status update box (like the others mentioned above, it only appears once you click inside the box to begin writing your post):

Once you click on the smiley face, you'll see a number of different options to respond to the question, "What are you doing?"

As you can see, each category has an arrow next to it which provides additional options. For example, clicking on the "feeling" section will bring up a menu of icons to choose from that express all different kinds of emotions. Similarly, clicking on "reading" will bring up a list of books. But you can also add your own by simply typing into the space that appears under the dotted line.

If you post in one of the categories such as reading" or "listening to" these items will also be added to your About section that corresponds to that activity.

As of this writing, you are restricted to one feeling or activity per post.

New Guidelines for Facebook Business Page Cover Photos

Facebook has also recently updated its guidelines for cover photos for Facebook Business Pages. Previously, Facebook restricted cover photos for businesses to prevent them from including contact information, pricing information or calls to action (such as "Contact us at: 555-1212" or "Download your free report here") as part of the cover photo. 

The new guidelines simply say that your Business Page cover photo cannot include more than 20% text, and that text cannot be "deceptive, misleading, or infringe on anyone else’s copyright." And you cannot encourage others to upload your cover to their personal Timeline.

See the full text of Facebook business page cover photos here.

Facebook News Feed Changes

Facebook is also rolling out a new, less-cluttered version of News Feed. You'll have more options for filtering what you see in your Feed, and the experience across desktop and mobile applications will be more consistent. You can find out more about the new news feed here.

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Facebook for Lawyers Tip #2: Schedule Posts for Maximum Impact and Engagement

When should lawyers post if they are using Facebook to engage with clients, potential clients and referral sources, whether through a personal Facebook Profile or through a law firm Facebook Page?

As with many questions like these, there is no 'one size fits all' answer. But it is worth taking the time to think about based on each lawyer's individual circumstances.

Know Your Audience

Some lawyers (and clients) think that lawyers shouldn't post too much on Facebook during business hours because those hours should be devoted to client work, and posting during business hours (especially frequent posting during those hours) may signal that the lawyer or firm doesn't have much client work to do or, alternatively, that they aren't paying appropriate attention to clients and are spending time on social media instead. 

Alternatively, lawyers may not be able to post on Facebook during business hours precisely because the lawyer is working and their attention is elsewhere.

Remember that Facebook, like all social networking, is about building relationships, and for relationships to form, there must be engagement.

Any real analysis of post timing should originate with thoughts about the client (or other individuals/businesses with whom the lawyer or firm is seeking to engage). How and when does the client, potential client or referral source use Facebook? What are their expectations? When are they most likely to engage on Facebook?

What you  may find is that your audience doesn't use Facebook during business hours at all - or you might find the opposite, depending upon who you want to reach and what their purpose is for using Facebook.

Experiment with posting at off hours, such as in the early morning periods , late evenings and on weekends. Then track what type of response you get and how much people engage with your posts at different times.

Scheduling Posts in Facebook

Luckily, if your audience is reading and engaging with your posts at 6 a.m. or 11 p.m., that doesn't mean you have to be physically posting at that time. There are many third party tools, such as Hoot Suite (www.hootsuite.com) or Buffer (www.bufferapp.com) which allow you to schedule posts in advance. But even then, some experts say that posting from a third party app can reduce engagement, and that posts from outside sources don't get as much play in the News Feeds of those that follow the Page.

The good news is that you can schedule posts to appear on your Timeline in the future right in Facebook.

If you are posting from your individual Facebook Profile, in order to schedule posts to appear in the future, you'll need to use the status update box on your Timeline, not the one that you see in your News Feed (see below). For some reason, Facebook doesn't provide the scheduling option from the News Feed update box.

News Feed Update Box:

The status update box you see at the top of your News Feed doesn't show the clock icon signaling that the post can be scheduled. 

But if you go to your Timeline and click inside the status update box that appears there, you will see the clock icon. When you click on the icon, Facebook will prompt you to choose a year, then a month, date and time for the post.

Timeline Update Box:

Similar scheduling options are available to Page administrators for your law firm Facebook Page. Again, you will want to use the Update box from the firm's Timeline, rather than the News Feed.

Facebook  Page Timeline Update Box:

You'll see the clock icon on the lower left.

Using the scheduling tool in Facebook means you don't need to be logged in to Facebook at the time you want your post to appear, and you can schedule multiple messages in advance.

Update: Thanks to some readers for pointing out that the scheduing tool on Facebook individual Timelines does not allow for posting to a future date - it only allows you to post to a past date. Hopefully, Facebook will change that. But you can post to a future date on a Facebook (business) Page using the method described above.

Want more tips on how lawyers can use Facebook effectively? Check out Facebook in One Hour for Lawyers either in print or e-book format (also available from iBooks).

Facebook For Lawyers Tip #1: Use Friend Lists to Segregate the Personal from the Professional

Since my Facebook Tips for Lawyers post has been one of the most popular recent posts, I thought I'd start a series of Facebook tips posts, similar to the series of tips posts on Time Management and LinkedIn. Here's #1 in the series.

Think carefully about whether you want to keep your professional life and personal life separate on Facebook. Lawyers tend to use LinkedIn as a professional presence and Facebook for a personal presence. But if you want to use Facebook both personally and professionally, you can do so, and using Facebook's Friend Lists is one way to segregate them.

Friend Lists

There are two types of Friend Lists – automatic lists, called "Smart Lists" that Facebook creates, and manual lists that you can create yourself. Each Friend List can have up to 1,500 members, and your Friends can be on more than one Friend List. 

Friend Lists let you target your posts. When you post to a Friend List, only members of that list will see the post. You can use Friend Lists to reach a specific group of people quickly and easily. For example, you can send an event invitation to your "business connections" list, and it won't be seen by the rest of your Facebook Friends. Your Friends will not be able to see the names of the Friend Lists you create, or which Friends you have added to a List.

You can also use Friend Lists to filter the Updates you see - in other words, when you click on the Friends List in the sidebar on your Home page, you will see only the Updates from Friends who belong to that List. This makes it easy to quickly catch up on what is happening with a particular group of people without having to scroll through your entire News Feed.

Smart Lists

Facebook automatically creates Smart Lists for you, such as Family, Close Friends, Acquaintances, High School, College, and Workplace, depending upon your activity and the activity of your Friends on Facebook. Sometimes Facebook is not always accurate when populating these lists, so you'll want to check them and add or remove members as needed. 

Manual Friend Lists 

You can create your own Friend Lists in addition to Facebook's default Smart Lists. For example, you may want to create lists for clients, colleagues, members of a specific organization or industry, etc. To create your own Friend List, find "FRIENDS" on the left sidebar of your Home Page. When you hover the cursor over FRIENDS, you'll see MORE. Click on that and then on +Create List on the top of the resulting page.

For more on Facebook, look for future posts in this series, or check out Facebook in One Hour for Lawyers, my new book co-authored with Dennis Kennedy and available from the American Bar Association Law Practice Management section.