Firefighter, roughneck, surveyor, trainee lawyer and nascent networking specialist Steven Latta connects Peter Kay and Victor Hugo without breaking stride.

There is an old adage in business that "people buy people first" and that is why engaging people, who may be potential sources of business, in a social, or at least quasi-social context, has long since been an important tool in any professional's business development strategy.

Colloquially we, of course, refer to this as "networking" and the internet, like just about every other area of our business lives, is changing and developing the way we network.

One of the most significant internet-related phenomenon in recent years has been the rise in social networking sites. A study in the USA showed a 700% growth in the use on the time spent by Americans on Facebook in the year to April 2009. Twitter, still in its infancy during this period demonstrated growth of almost 4000% in the same period and a study by Market Research consultants Neilsen, in March of this year, found that time spent on social networking sites has now eclipsed that spent using e-mail.

To paraphrase Victor Hugo, social networking is "an idea whose time has come".

In trawling the web I came across the Trainees' Facebook pages of Dundas & Wilson and both MacLay Murray & Spens and McGrigors have embraced Twitter to help keep their 'followers' abreast of what these commercial heavyweights are up to too.

On the whole, however, in Scotland there appears to be a fairly low take-up of social-networking technology by the profession (I have come across an interesting link from the US, however: http://www.lawlink.com/).

Up until recently the only social networking site that I was a member of was 'The Firm's' Linkedin site and, as far as I am aware, this is by far the best such site for lawyers in Scotland.

I am keen to retain and develop my existing contacts within both property and the law so I have created my own space on property journal 'Property Week' specifically for surveyors and lawyers, traditionally important sources of business for each other, to engage online.

My rationale is that if you're going to network with an eye to getting 'on the radar' of prospective clients, your networking will be much more efficient if targeted at specific groups.

I am going to 'push' the site through the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors so, if you're a construction, property, conveyancing or planning lawyer, to quote Peter Kay, "get on t'internet".

Here's the link:

http://network.propertyweek.com/group/surveyorsandlawyers

Having managed to quote Victor Hugo and Peter Kay in the same blog, I'm going to sign off.

Until the next time.

Steven