How To Leverage Social Media As An Aspiring Lawyer

Building A Personal & Professional Brand

What does it mean to build a brand? Building a brand for yourself involves creating an identity that others will perceive you by. (It is very similar to your reputation). As an aspiring lawyer, the goal is to create a personal and professional brand for yourself.

For example, your personal brand could be that you are a writer and are ambitious about engaging in the arts. Whilst your professional brand could be that you are an aspiring lawyer, keen to pursue commercial business opportunities in a variety of industries.

As you are an individual, and not a business, these brands will probably overlap. For example, your brand could be that you are passionate about environmental issues and are pursuing opportunities as a commercial lawyer to advise on deals within the environmental industry.

In terms of building a brand via social media, you can achieve this by:

• Creating a ‘mini portfolio’ in the form of a social media profile. Typically, people are first introduced to you online via your profile. Therefore, it is essential that it represents you in the most well-rounded and updated way possible.
• Networking and connecting with people who have the same passions as you are or are in the role you are aspiring to.
• Making posts about your career journey, achievements, and interests. This is a great way to get recognised and attract a stronger network. It can also get you recognised by employers.

One of the best places to start to build your brand is on LinkedIn, which I will expand on later in this guide.

Find out more about how you can build your brand.

Professional Networking

Social media is also valuable for networking with a diverse, wide range of people at the tip of your fingers. It’s a great place to make professional friendships, gain mentors, connect with people you wouldn’t necessarily have the chance to meet in real life.

As you begin to take networking into real life, you will find that you will start to recognise online connections as you meet them. The hope is that overtime, as you attend in-person events, you will see people from your pre-existing network.

Here are some key things to remember when making connections online:

• Start by defining clear networking goals you hope to achieve.
• Focus on the quality of your connections, not the number of connections. So, make sure to be purposeful with your connections and conversations!
• Try to cultivate more long-term relationships with your connections, where your interactions with them are frequent and genuine.
• Keep up to date with the people in your network and what their interests and strengths are.
• If you do want to ask someone to be your mentor, make sure it’s someone you believe will genuinely benefit you and don’t ask just for the sake of it.

Read more about how to ask someone to mentor you.

Work Experience & Events

Almost all graduate or career opportunities will be advertised online, so social media is a great way to keep up to date with these adverts and find a wide range of opportunities.

To keep up to date:

• Follow graduate recruiters, as they will frequently post graduate role openings and other graduate events. If it’s on LinkedIn, for example, you may also be able to ask them questions personally.
• Follow the companies you are interested in.
• Set up notifications for job alerts and follow relevant hashtags.

Commercial Awareness

Social media can also be used to build your commercial awareness. Platforms like LinkedIn and Twitter posts millions of news posts on a daily basis – it’s all about making sure you are following the right accounts and hashtags.

Moreover, on the likes of LinkedIn, companies (including law firms) often post firm updates and deals. They may also post their insight on a topic or summarise insights shared at a talk or conference, for example. Start by following companies and news outlets you are interested in, and your algorithm will bring you more suggestions.

Read more about how to build your commercial awareness.

How To Get Started On Social Media

Set Clear Goals

Start by setting clear goals of what you want to achieve from using social media as an aspiring lawyer. This can be a general brief goal or defined by numeric metrics. For example: “By the end of 2023, I want to be more confident when discussing commercial matters with others or I want to increase my network by 50 people”.

Create Engaging Content

On social media, people will be consuming hundreds of posts a day at a very fast pace and therefore, it is important to create content that is engaging and makes people want to stop and find out more about you. Remember that individuality is so important when it comes to your online presence. Therefore, it is best to create and publish content that is engaging with your intended audience but is also authentic to yourself. Do not post what you think others want to see, but rather what you want people to know about you in the seconds or minutes you have your audience’s attention.

Read more on how to create an engaging post.

Create A LinkedIn Profile

When it comes to all-things-professional on social media, LinkedIn is the best place for this. It is also the best place to start when building your professional presence.

What is LinkedIn? “LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional network on the internet. You can use LinkedIn to find the right job or internship, connect and strengthen professional relationships, and learn the skills you need to succeed in your career”. LinkedIn is also a safer and more standardised way of sharing your personal details and staying connected to others.

Read our guide on how to make an effective LinkedIn profile for aspiring lawyers.

Key Takeaways

• Make sure you are active on your social media, even if it’s at small as liking someone’s post
• Don’t confine your social media activities to one purpose
• Start with a clear goal or idea of what you want to achieve in mind