The Law Firm Marketing Minute
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The Law Firm Marketing Minute
Blockbuster-Level Marketing That Captivates Your Audience
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The Hollywood Formula for Marketing That Hooks Clients
🎬 What do blockbuster movies and great marketing have in common? They both know how to hook an audience and keep them engaged! Smike and Eddie break down the storytelling techniques that make legal marketing more compelling, so you can turn prospects into clients—without losing their attention.
📌 Key Takeaways:
- The secret formula blockbuster movies use to keep audiences engaged
- Why great marketing follows the same storytelling principles as hit TV shows
- How to structure your content to capture attention and hold it
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So if you're a family law attorney, your person, the person, your prospect is someone who had a life, a family, assets. They have a snap moment in their life or they have a divorce. Now they're in a different trajectory, they're in conflict. What they're going for you for is resolution.
Speaker 2:You're part of their movie now Welcome to the Law Firm Marketing Minute, the go-to podcast for solo and small law firms who want to level up. I'm your host, smike, and I'm excited for you to join me this episode. All right, without further ado, let's dive in. Hello everyone, welcome back to the Law Firm Marketing Minute. As always, I'm your host, smike, and we have I'm Eddie.
Speaker 1:I think I'm going to be here more often, so I'm going to say this a couple of times, so get used to it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely it's going to. These podcast episodes are going to end up being like episodes of Mad Men or something like that, where I feel like, gradually, over time, it just becomes like the room starts filling with smoke.
Speaker 1:It is so bad. I always wanted to be Donald Draper and I think on the episode you're supposed to watch it and not want to be Donald Draper. I think they did everything they could to make you not and I was like I still like him.
Speaker 2:Well, it's like the Wolf of Wall Street.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Like after the Wolf of Wall Street movie came out, so many people were like, oh my gosh, I want to do pump and dump stocks and penny stocks? And.
Speaker 1:I was like I want to be Tony Soprano. Who didn't love Tony Soprano? He was not a nice person.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. Or Breaking Bad's another great example. Like Walt, like you're not supposed to like Walt.
Speaker 1:No, I don't like you either, but it's all right. Yeah, you're up there with Walt, oh you know what I take that.
Speaker 2:Somewhere that has yet to be revealed At the end.
Speaker 1:I can't know. Let's not do Breaking Bad spoilers. Even though it came out like 10, got to be at least 10, 15 years ago now Can't get Breaking Bad spoilers out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and if you haven't seen Breaking Bad by now and you watch TV.
Speaker 1:Get after it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you got to do it. But one of the things that I think is super important that has helped these TV shows kind of excel or exceed in their, in their runs?
Speaker 1:was they formatted them perfectly? I mean we talk about Breaking Bad. There's a science by me. When I was in grad school they went down the science of screenwriting. I mean it is it's so. There's so much of a formula there that it's it's. It's almost like like plug and play. It's like a little bit of creativity and a lot of plug and play, it can be done well it's.
Speaker 1:It's comes down to the psychology yeah, I mean, it comes down to action reaction. Action reaction end up in a different spot than when he began. Have you ever heard people say I'm so addicted to this show? The only thing they're addicted to is conflict resolution, like there's so much conflict.
Speaker 1:Like the TV show 24, I know I'm 40 years old, but the TV show 24, I mean at the end of the episode you're like man, like I am addicted because there's like 19 different plot lines and they're all like devastating. Like I'm addicted because it's conflict resolution.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, and then you have the people that. Have you ever seen the movie Prisoners? Oh, with Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal? Yeah, yeah love it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, wait, was it the Denny guy? Oh yeah, Paul Dano, no, the director. Oh yeah, yeah. From the movie Dunn.
Speaker 2:Dune, what Dune?
Speaker 1:Dunn.
Speaker 2:No, the movie was called Dune. We're going to disagree, anyways, people done. No, the movie was called dune. Uh, agree to disagree anyways. Uh, people there. There are some. I mean I love prisoners, but there's awesome the the. There's people that did not like how it ended because, so no spoilers here, but it doesn't end in like a very conflict resolution kind of way yeah right and people hate and not hate.
Speaker 2:But like people very much dislike that. The movie I I like the ending. I think the ending. The ending is justified. But the entire movie is great and people agree on that and they just just don't like the end of these sopranos when it goes I mean, I, I think it's very obvious as to what happens at the end.
Speaker 1:But I mean what if you don't have a clear, definitive? It's like, um, like you tell a story, it's like, yeah, I, a guy knocked on my door. He opened up and he threatened me. Yeah, okay, what happened? Yeah, no, that's it like what. Why did he threaten you? What did you do when he threatened him? I mean there's two people angry each other at your door right now. How did this end? I mean, our brains are wired for this. I mean, this is a great book called wired for story. Our brains are wired for this. I mean, there's a great book called Wired for Story. Our brains are wired for these three-act structures and their formatting and content and the way we and the funny thing is, whether you're doing a blog or whether you're doing a video or whether you're creating Breaking Bad, like the principles are just universal- yeah.
Speaker 1:And they have been. I mean, since we, since the dawn of time, yeah, since human beings became human beings. We're wired for story yeah, I mean people telling stories, I mean constellations were built. We're just naturally drawn to stories and creating stories. Well, what's?
Speaker 2:what's the that formula that the creators of south park have?
Speaker 1:oh uh, you know that. That is see, when I told you said every action in there and as an equal it has an opposite right, equal reaction. That's Newton.
Speaker 2:So when you're telling a story, it's action, reaction, action, reaction action reaction.
Speaker 1:So when the creators of South Park were saying it's like, okay, person A walks in the door, therefore something else happens and people get lost in that. So they say person A, that's what you're supposed to do. What people don't do or people do do which is wrong is, and also person B moves over there. There has to be a connection between point A and point B. Person A walks in the door and has an influence or an impact on person B and that creates a neck. Now we have like a chemical reaction between person A and person B, and what is going to happen? They can't have two independent functions. They have to be combined with one another. So it's like that's how we get drawn into stories, when, when one action checkoff's gun, you know, checkoff's gun is uh, I'm very familiar with the name.
Speaker 1:If there is a gun in act one, it has to go off in act two, so everything has a place like. You cannot just randomly insert things into a story unless they have a functionality within the story or a functionality within content.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I feel like when we can get into this and you know a whole another episode. But I feel like that's what a lot of movies nowadays are missing. That's very lazy screen writing because they're missing. That they there's.
Speaker 1:There's more of a just introduce random people at random times, just to fill a space I mean I just saw the paddington bear movie with my daughter on my saturday and I was telling her I mean she's nine years old. I was telling her, I mean she's nine years old, I was telling her about Chekhov's gun. Like every piece of that, that, that screenplay or dialogue came into action later in the story, Like, even like these small actions with his umbrella became elements of him getting out of scenarios later on. But the way he used the umbrella in London, I mean it's just like these very small pieces. Everything has its place and you, just you can't forget that.
Speaker 2:So how does this affect marketing what you want to take on blogs, like the format of blogs?
Speaker 1:Yeah, is anyone going to read a legal blog and compare it to Family Guy or the Simpsons? Absolutely not. But I mean the principles are there. I had a great writing teacher who told me that writing is not binary. I mean there's no such thing as like well, this because it works in a screenplay doesn't mean it can't work in a blog or it can't work in a video. I mean these are all very. I mean, these are, these are universal principles. So I mean, like when you, when you sit down to write a blog or something you have to, you have to think that every sentence is a reason for the your, your prospect. So many amateur blogs and AI is great at this. In the realm of business law, there's so much difficulty and triumph and trial.
Speaker 2:Well, that aspect is very synonymous with movies and what we're talking about here, Because I mean, there's been so many times where I will sit down to watch a movie. I'm a little intrigued, and I will get 10, 15 minutes into it and I'll be like I'm not wasting my time, like I don't think this is good, yes, I'm like I'm not in it.
Speaker 1:I mean, yeah, it's not keeping me hooked. No, you have to. You have there's. There's an element of like man. Every sentence or every line is just someone's reason to get up and walk away. And and on the internet, I mean just every reason is to click off your website, every reason is to scroll through something else or find another attorney. I mean, and it's just, I think so. Even when I was in grad school, I think so many people think that I have your attention because you're reading it, so I have your attention, like it's just, it's not. You have to earn someone's attention and you have to keep earning it Continuously.
Speaker 1:Every line has to be a way to continue. Absolutely Couldn't agree more.
Speaker 2:If you own a small law firm, then you must know how necessary marketing is to the growth of your law firm. Even if you were to just get all of your business, or most of your business, from word of mouth or referrals, that's still a form of marketing, right? You're talking to your audience in some sort of way. It could be indirect or direct. What is not necessary, though, is you having to do everything yourself. Even if you have somebody in the firm who helps you out, you still have to take careful consideration of all those minute, those fine details that could affect the overall marketing plan, whether positively or negatively. So here's what we want to do we have a strategy team who wants to sit down with you. They want to talk about where you are, where you want to be, what you've done, what you have done, what you're doing right now, what you haven't even considered doing, and they want to flesh out everything right. We want to talk about all the solutions that we know have helped small law firms grow, and we want to do it very strategically, very specifically for your law firm.
Speaker 2:So check the podcast description. There's a link there. You can pick the date that works for you. Schedule a call with our strategy team and we'd be happy to help. All right, let's get right back to the episode, so okay. So let's talk very specifically about legal blogs and then formatting what we just spoke about, about re-hooking, or hooking and re-hooking like what. How does that that play?
Speaker 1:I imagine that it's probably slightly different, because legal blogs are really meant to be more informational, um, rather than no I, I would say, slightly different at all at all because I mean like all right, I mean we talked about the snap in Breaking Bad or whatever, excuse me, in whatever episode you're watching or whatever movie, a snap all that means is that you have stasis and there's a problem and now you're off in a different trajectory. So, if you're a family law attorney, your person, the person, your prospect is someone who had a life, a family, assets. They have a snap moment in their life or they have a divorce. Now they're in a different trajectory. They, they're in conflict. What they're going for you for is resolution, like you're part of their movie. Now, think of it that way.
Speaker 1:You're part of their solution.
Speaker 2:We talk about story brand yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely Go ahead. Yeah, Story brand we can go into that too. But story branding all this ties back to is that we're obsessed with story and our brains are wired for story. Yeah, so we're trying to encapsulate or tap into that element. But you have somebody who's like they're in crisis and so I said they're looking for solution. Yeah, they're not addicted to your blog or they're not craving your blog, but they're absolutely craving some sort of resolution. They're craving some sort of direction. What do I do next? I mean, like, what is the next scene in my life?
Speaker 2:and I know we keep tying this back to movies and whatever, but I mean that's the best way to tie it back because you know it's, it's, it's a story.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean I was like, okay, am I gonna lose my house? Like, how much am I going to pay in alimony? I mean, can I afford to live? Like how do I form a budget? Do I need child support? I mean, or, excuse me, how much money am I going to get in child support? Is it going to be enough? These are all questions that people have when they go to a legal blog, so that that you're answering a solution, you're answering a problem. I mean, you are a problem solver, you're in the problem solving business, and that's what I mean on a broad scale, what you should be focusing on.
Speaker 2:That's basically what you're saying. That's basically your part to play in the story.
Speaker 1:That's your part, that's your role. Yeah.
Speaker 2:You're the wizard to little Frodo Baggins.
Speaker 1:And think about how you read a blog yourself. I mean you scan it, you go to the bottom. You read a blog yourself. I mean you scan it, you go to the bottom, you read something, go back to the top.
Speaker 2:You're not, you're not, okay. So to that point, real quick, let's talk about that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, how, like, how to format in terms of like this. I mean we, normally, when I write I, it's four to 600 words. For us it's usually, I mean it's mostly like 500, five, 600, sometimes longer, but that's usually it's very intentional in the sense that you have someone's attention for only so long, like it's like there's a great ad. It was just a massive chunk of text. It was like two pages long and the top was this is why nobody reads long-form copy. Nice, because you look at the like ugh.
Speaker 2:Like I don't want to read this. I feel like ads used to be like that in the 60s.
Speaker 1:They used to. They used to have large chunks of copy, and if you look at an email marketing campaign a good one, I dare you to find one that's more. Each paragraph is maybe a sentence, usually two, and there's going to be lists involved. They're very short sentences. The sentences are usually no more than 14 words, 14 to 16 words max. Then you're talking paragraphs that are probably one or two sentences long, and then you also want to have lists. I call them listicles. I mean, it's just like. They're just kind of dangling like an icicle.
Speaker 1:Goodness gracious Listicles. It's an icicle.
Speaker 2:It's a list icicle, all right, all right, I got to keep my mind out. I was thinking of something else, but let's continue.
Speaker 1:No listicles, I mean.
Speaker 2:You set me up. You know exactly what. I have no idea what you're talking about. Continue continue.
Speaker 1:No, but I do have a copywriting book that took that word, so I did not come up with that. Okay, but in the middle of the blog you have lists. I mean so, like if someone sees a list, they're going to be drawn to the list itself. They're going to read the list and that's going to be intriguing. So when I said every line is important, I mean that list is important. I mean if you got someone's attention for that list, can you make them enticed enough to read the paragraphs which, again, are only going to be a couple of sentences? You're at short, shortish sentences, shortish paragraph paragraphs, with plenty of lists involved in the same time. So it's just like it's just how you read, is how someone else reads like you're not. You're scanning blogs. You're not. You're not reading them like a book. I think so many people think that a blog is like a book and I want.
Speaker 1:I want that, I want to tell a narrative.
Speaker 2:I want I want to in canvas, like I want to tell a three-act structure, like that's not what's happening here, but we are trying to entice people yeah, and there's also something to like you know being totally aware of who your audience is right, because, for example, you, there's a reason why you don't bring kids to, uh, our rated movie, right like my parents did, oh no, a lot but, um, because you know there's, there's, obviously it's rated R for a reason, right.
Speaker 2:And so the movie, knowing its audience, because it's got that rating R, well, I guess the rating after the fact, but even so, knowing its audience, it's not gonna tailor, or at least shouldn't tailor to little kids right, no. So, in terms of knowing your audience as a lawyer, a law firm, you shouldn't be writing it for other law firms.
Speaker 1:No, great point. Yeah right, who is your audience? I mean and again, that seems like an obvious point when people say, oh no, obviously I'm not right, but I mean so many people get caught up, it's like no, this isn't sophisticated enough, like another lawyer is going to read this and they're going to judge me, and it's like I've gotten that a lot too, and a lot too. And I, yeah, I understand that, like I, it's a very valid concern, but it's not a valid concern in the sense it's going to impact your marketing and it's certainly not going to impact your client. I mean, like, if you're a family law attorney, I mean you're talking, I mean hypothetically, anyone from 18 to 80.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean so you're talking about a very wide range here. I mean in terms of educational background, depending on who your target audience is. I mean income level. You're talking to a very broad and you want to appeal to both people, I mean, depending on who you're targeting. So, yeah, you're not going to sit. I mean you have to know your audience, you have to know what the thing is, and it's like you're not writing for other attorneys, you're writing for a prospect and you're trying to get the one step closer to trusting you to be able to say, yeah, I want to work with that person. Yeah, or after reading this, I'm more inclined to book a consultation now that I've read this. Yeah, or just now, I want to watch videos about this person.
Speaker 2:I want to keep looking yeah, and people don't trust what they don't understand never, you know so if you're speaking in you know legal jargon and you're not explaining what this legal jargon is, how are they going to even know?
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Oh, I can throw some Latin up on a screen and people are going to trust me very much.
Speaker 1:I joke with lawyers about this because I hate the word legalese, but I mean like law texts are dense. It's a word they use, but they're so dense and like going back to what the purpose is, here is someone saying like I have a problem, yeah, I need to get out, I need resolution. What is the quickest route? So you're giving them a path. You're giving them a path like laced with mines and explosions, like it's too dense, like give them a clear, clear, clear route forward. Yeah, like we don't show off. Yeah help.
Speaker 2:Exactly the other aspect that we wanted to talk about and this actually fits a little bit more into the whole conversation about how movies and tv shows are formatted is social media content. Um, mainly video, yeah, um, I mean, it almost goes kind of word for word. So if you watch any good movie or tv show, I'm saying emphasis on good, because there is a lot of bad stuff, bad movies, out there, but all of it, most of it, nah, I mean, okay, yeah, most of it's probably I'm old and grumpy but yeah, yeah, but for the really good movies, right?
Speaker 2:Like, think about the ones that you enjoy watching, right? Yep? So obviously with a movie it's much different than, say, a social media post, because with a social media post you really only have about three, four, five seconds to reel someone in.
Speaker 1:If you're rounding up, I mean I'd kill for five seconds, right, I mean that's a great scenario.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then once you have them, you want to re-hook them. So now think about, like your favorite movie, right? Yep, how does the movie? Obviously it's more than five seconds, it's probably about like five, 10, 15 minutes how does the movie hook you right? Like, how does it hook you in Action reaction, something like that. Right, there was a point where most movies at least that I saw in theaters they always started off with a very high energy scene.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, it's not so much anymore as it was, but they started off with a very high energy scene. Whether it was like a fantasy movie, it would be like some sort of battle, or if it was a spy movie, there'd be like a chase or something like.
Speaker 1:Remember the first daniel craig james bond movie is like a 15 minute chase where he's like hanging off a crane, he's like he hasn't even said a word yet 15 minutes in.
Speaker 2:But he's hanging off a crane, yeah, so they hook you in and then the process is to re-hook. Now you don't have to get all extravagant as a as a small law firm. You don't have to get law firm, you don't have to hang off a crane or anything like that.
Speaker 1:That'd be awesome if you could.
Speaker 2:If you're a personal injury lawyer, that would be an insane piece of content. Yeah, that is yet to happen, and if you want to do it, I want to be a part of it.
Speaker 1:It's yours if you do it with us. Michael, drive the crane Not licensed.
Speaker 2:But it's kind of like that same scenario where it's like they need to know that they're in the right place and that what they're going to experience is something that's going to benefit them right like I'm watching a movie and the first scene is like a very high energetic movie and I'm digging it right, like it's good, like I'm like okay, I'm going to enjoy this yeah, this is what this movie uh can offer me, like there's.
Speaker 1:Yes, there could be more of this. You're in a little sample size. Yeah, there could be more of this.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, so for a social media post, mainly a video. You want to start off clear cut, like a great way, and a simple way to start off is take whatever question that you're answering and just say that question, yeah, so as if someone was asking you so what are the five things to do after you get into a car accident? Go ahead.
Speaker 1:Problem solving Go ahead.
Speaker 2:Start off with that. What are the five things to do if you get injured in a car accident?
Speaker 1:Right, because now you're thinking it's like okay, now you're envisioning, okay, now I'll know what to do, now I'm prepared, I'm not driving around clueless, et cetera. Yeah, there's a possibility and hope in there that you know what you're going to do afterwards.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, but also the way that that social media post is set up with that hook. It's like okay, I am going to now learn the five things to do after getting to a correction.
Speaker 1:This is what I'm getting. Yeah, my attention. You're giving me five things. I'm giving you my attention. That's the trade.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and, and there might be a thought that you know crosses people's minds that say like, oh well, you know, if I just give away what I'm going to talk about, like, where's the intrigue? Well, that's the intrigue. They don't know what the five things are. Heck, you could get to number four, you still have intrigue because they don't know what the fifth thing is.
Speaker 1:And yeah, and even if they have five things to do on a personal injury after a car accident, they're still going to need help with all five of them.
Speaker 2:Yeah, or they could have an assumption, and then they want to match their assumption to what is reality Confirmation.
Speaker 1:It's like, yeah, I need to take a picture of the scene, I need to contact an attorney and go to the doctor. Where does my list match up to a trained professional's list?
Speaker 2:Exactly, exactly. So I think that there's there's multiple elements to it, but it's really, it's, it's tried and true. But from that psychology that, hey, you, you want to make sure that you are driving home the point, but you are setting it up just as just as well. Like the, the, the ending is just as important as the beginning, and the beginning is just as important as the beginning, and the beginning is just as important as the end.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, the greatest form of content is not necessarily a how-to, it's a done-for-you. So if you have a checklist of things to do after a car accident, that is what you call a done-for-you piece of content, not so much a how-to or an explanation. I mean, those are lower forms of content. But a how-to definitely is lower on the totem pole than a done-for-you piece of content.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So if you're listening to this, I encourage you next time you watch a good movie or good TV show. Sometimes you don't really realize if a TV show or a movie is actually good until you watch it all the way through.
Speaker 1:Movies tend to be way more. I mean mean they're like short stories in the sense that I mean they're all. The pieces are very apparent, like, uh, tv shows go on tangents sure yeah, but harder to see yeah.
Speaker 2:But I encourage you, next time you are viewing one of those, just be mindful about how it's set up, right. If it's, if it's, if that first 5, 10, 15 minutes of the movie hooks you in, just know that. That that's the psychology behind it. It worked. And if, if it re-hooks you like, if, if, if it hooks you in, gives you some context and then it re-hooks you like, that's psychology yeah, every time.
Speaker 1:So yeah, every time I open my mailbox I get a, a piece of mail that's a marketing, and if I open it, I save it. How did you get it? Because I know what you're doing. I'm very well aware of what tricks you're employing. Right now, if you get me to open it, you got me. I'm like, okay, even I know it's the magician who's tricking. He still fools me. I'm like, all right, I have to save this. This is like the magician who's tricking. He still fools me. I'm like, all right, I have to save this. This is good enough to steal.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's good enough to steal here's. Here's a little trick. If you are doing direct mail and this might be time consuming, but I I guarantee you that it's, it's worth it, and then we'll kind of uh, cap off the episode. But one little trick handwrite where it's going yep, because nobody does it, nobody does it. There's no time to no and heck and heck. You could do it if you have 10 people to do it for.
Speaker 1:Great, just do it. It's a disruptor, it catches your attention. It's like okay, you're just about to throw it out in this handwritten. Like okay, this is weird yeah.
Speaker 2:And it tells you or it tells the receiver that you care. Yep, you care enough to actually on something specifically for them. So that's going to do it for this episode. Love it. I had a lot of fun talking about it because I love movies.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we do. Next time we'll talk about how Lord of the Rings left off Harry Potter.
Speaker 2:Whoa, whoa, whoa. Maybe you won't be on the next episode after saying that it's if they had a time machine. Yeah, all right. Well, everyone, thank you for listening. Please leave a review. We greatly appreciate it. Always grow the uh, the podcast.
Speaker 1:Eddie, I'm sure you'll be on the next one actually I hope so, if I'm still allowed to be here all right.
Speaker 2:Everyone have a great weekend we'll see you next week.