HHM’s social media effort relies on photos that show lawyers involved in causes and activities throughout the Mahoning Valley.

A Mahoning Valley law firm is using social media to build engagement around its wide-ranging community involvement tradition.

Since late 2015, Harrington, Hoppe & Mitchell has used Facebook and LinkedIn to spotlight its lawyers’ participation in the Panerathon, Mad About the Arts, Streetscape, local road races, charity golf outings and dozens of other cultural, civic and athletic events.

“The firm has always been deeply involved in the community, going back 184 years, and social media makes for an easy way to shine some light on that,” said Denise Glinatsis Bayer, an HHM lawyer and co-chair of its business development committee.

The initiative provides other advantages, too. By showing HHM lawyers not only in business attire but in running gear, or planting flowers, or smiling with their spouses and children, the region’s oldest law firm conveys its personality – and its youth.

Building relationships through involvement

To encourage community engagement, HHM encourages individual attorneys to invest in organizations or causes that help build relationships. Lawyers report their spending decisions to a management committee.

A social media calendar is used to track the firm’s diverse community involvement activities across Mahoning, Trumbull and Columbiana counties and facilitate a steady flow of posts. Lawyers are encouraged to take pictures and capture shareworthy information.

When events overlap, the firm holds content for a few days to maintain a consistent pace. Some larger events warrant content in advance and afterward.

HHM’s Facebook and LinkedIn feeds also include blogs by lawyers, news items and information curated from others. But support of local organizations and events comprises the bulk of what followers see.

“Community involvement has always been part of who we are, and one of the newer benefits of that is generating a lot of opportunities to capture pictures for social media,” said Bayer. “With nearly 20 lawyers doing good things all year long, the impact adds up, and so do the likes and shares.”

Advantages of spotlighting good deeds

Dan Pecchia of Pecchia Communications, which has supported HHM since 2006, points out several other advantages of this type of social media strategy.

It’s natural. HHM doesn’t need to develop new activities to generate social media exposure, he said. The firm simply spotlights what it does and has been doing.

“Part of the stress often associated with social media – or any form of public relations – is trying to be something that you’re not,” Pecchia said. “The best communications are based on real activities that don’t need to be manufactured.”

Done right, it’s humble. A good tone for social content based on community involvement is that the publisher is glad to be part of the community, he said.

“If the tone becomes ‘Look at me, I’m a great philanthropist’ that wouldn’t be good,” Pecchia said.

It lowers the bar for “news value.” When organizations relied on news organizations to publicize their philanthropic efforts, the high standards of those gatekeepers applied and only the most dramatic donations were newsworthy.

But in the age of social media and other vehicles that essentially allow any organization to be a content publisher, and on platforms where many good deeds can be appreciated, information is not as limited.

“The traditional gatekeepers are gone,” Pecchia said. “However, because organizations still want followers and engagement, they still need to think strategically about what content makes sense and what volume makes sense.”