How to Build an Online Audience

Attracting loyal followers is a challenge for law firms that are active Internet marketers and bloggers. Some ideas in today's Wall Street Journal offer insights as to how new consumer-oriented web shows and consumer marketers build a following, with useful analogies that can be applied to the legal marketing.

Social media marketing suggestions to grow your base of followers includes:

• Identify prominent social media users (in this case in the legal market) and try to make a connection with them in a way that will drive traffic to your website or blog. Perhaps an interview or a shared column might attract new visitors.
• Set a regular schedule for your online blog posts or website updates, so that followers can anticipate and watch for your news.
• Get the word out using your star players, in this case attorneys and staff members who know how to conduct online promotions professionally and in a manner compliant with attorney advertising guidelines. (Be careful not to run afoul of anti-solicitation rules.)

Email is increasingly being viewed as an old "push" technnology, and is being replaced by social media techniques that naturally attract interested viewers to your material.

Read the full Wall Street Journal article, "Building Loyalty on Web."