Let’s call it “The Bob Dylan Analytic.”

It’s one way of understanding how, due to Social Media use, the old ways of online law firm marketing are rapidly fading.

Dylan, the voice of the Sixties folk movement, now has his own Facebook page – one with nearly 5 million “likes.” The site is regularly used to promote his latest releases and tour dates.

If that’s not a sign that Social Media is now being used by consumers across all age groups – not just Millennials but an increasing number of Baby Boomers, too, as our Marketing Administrator Victoria Wilson will discuss this week – then consider these numbers:

• An estimated 72 percent of adult Internet users regularly access Social Media, or social networking, sites like Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn and Tumblr, according to an August 2013 Pew Internet Project report. The growth is explosive. As recently as 2005, only 8 percent used Social Media.

• According to Experian, roughly a quarter of the total U.S. Internet time – 27 percent – is devoted to using Social Media.

• It should be no shock that the Pew report found that adults in the 18-29 age group have the highest percentage of Social Media users (89 percent).

• However, what may come as a surprise is that Pew also found that 60 percent of those ages 50-64 and 43 percent of those ages 65 and older are using Social Media as well. Back in 2005: Those numbers were at just 7 and 1 percent, respectively.

• Based on a 2012 Nielsen report, you can expect the proliferation of mobile devices to increasingly fuel Social Media use. Nielsen reports that 46 percent of Social Media users access those sites using a smartphone, while 16 percent get to them by tablet. Experian finds that 15 percent of total U.S. mobile Internet time goes to Social Media site use.

• People aren’t just using Social Media – they’re using it non-stop. Nielsen found that 41 percent of tablet owners and 38 percent of smartphone owners use their devices while watching TV. Among those in the 25-34 age group, 51 percent use Social Media in their office – and 32 percent of those ages 18-24 access Social Media in their bathroom!

Why Isn’t Your Law Firm Using Social Media?

Still, as blogger Robert Ambrogi discusses, Social Media use by lawyers has only grown “modestly” – from 17 percent maintaining a social networking presence in 2010 to 59 percent today, according to the American Bar Association’s 2013 legal technology survey.

Nearly a quarter of respondents in the ABA survey – 23 percent – said they had no Social Media presence, Ambrogi notes, while 18 percent didn’t even know if their firm did social networking.

All of which begs the question: Why is your law firm not making efforts to join the growing march to Social Media sites?

It’s Social Influence Marketing

Look at it this way: Social Media marketing is really social influence marketing.

Today, people turn to Facebook, Google+, Twitter, LinkedIn and other social networking sites to learn more about products, services and companies – and, yes, law firms. As Nielsen reports, 70 percent of these Social Media users simply want to “hear others’ experiences.”

Now, in terms of legal marketing, you can imagine that Social Media users will want to know if someone found your law firm to be helpful and professional. And they will want to know if your firm’s attorneys are people they can like and trust. Those experiences influence decisions.

For example, if a person’s Facebook “friend” reports a positive experience, then it may influence that person to contact your firm if they have a legal problem. If hundreds of “friends” report the same, of course, the influence is exponentially heavier. Keep in mind: It can work the other way as well if “friends” report a negative experience.

But if your firm lacks any social networking presence, you’ll have no influential reach at all.

“Better swim now,” Dylan once sang, “or you’ll sink like a stone.”

When it comes to law firm Web marketing, the times, they aren’t just a-changing.

They’re a-changed.