Marketing for Attorneys and Twitter Coverage of the Debate

For the September 26, 2008 debate between Barack Obama and John McCain, Twitter set up a feed of continuous user-generated updates commenting on the proceedings.  The feed is located at election.twitter.com.  Thus, with 140 characters or less, would-be political pundits were able to use Twitter's micro-blogging site to comment on the debate and the presidential election.

According to a FOXNews article on September 26, Twitter has anticipated a record number of tweets during both the McCain/Obama debate and the upcoming debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin.  The same article noted that while bloggers played a key role in commenting on the 2004 elections, the 2008 election has been defined by social networking sites.  The article also noted that as opposed to YouTube and Facebook, Twitter is an ideal forum for political ideas.  In part, this is because of the speedy and concise nature of tweets.

The FOXNews article further noted that political twitterers include FOXNews itself, the Barack Obama campaign and the John McCain campaign.  Also noted was a Twitter partnership with Current TV (a network and Web site connected to Al Gore) to encourage Twittering about politics.

I personally took the opportunity to post a tweet following the debate on election.twitter.com.  Immediately following the post, I could see my comment and picture move along the feed with comments from other Twitterers.  Of course, among those I already follow on Twitter, there was plenty of political debate occurring.

The emphasis on Twitter in connection with the debate and the election underscores the possibilities for using Twitter in marketing for attorneys and Internet marketing for lawyers.  The legal Twittering community is growing, and Twitter is an excellent forum for lawyers and law firms to participate in a dialogue.  When it comes to Internet marketing for attorneys, those who ignore Twitter do so at their own peril.