In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Ashley Robinson discuss:
- Authentic marketing and becoming the expert in your niche.
- How video can play a role in law marketing.
- Videos as a long term investment, not as a quick, results-now marketing tool.
- Creating regular content and reusing it in other ways.
Key Takeaways:
- Video is still a newer technology in the legal field. It can help lawyers gain trust and show expertise and credibility with their clients and potential clients.
- A high-end video effects more than just one-for-one marketing. It also can be used for years to come and can influence clients as well as strategic partners.
- Video adds a personal touch and a story that just showing numbers or images don’t do.
- Social media is not supposed to be high-end professional. It is supposed to be spontaneous and authentic.
“Marketing is casting as many nets as we can to hook people in, in whatever way we can hook them in. But it is not the 80s, it is 2022. People have to make impressions to gain trust and authority.” — Ashley Robinson
Connect with Ashley Robinson:
Website: https://greencardiganmarketing.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashleyrobinsongcm/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/GreenCardiganMarketing
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/green_cardigan_marketing/
Thank you to our Sponsors!
Legalese Marketing: https://legaleasemarketing.com/
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Connect with Steve Fretzin:
LinkedIn: Steve Fretzin
Twitter: @stevefretzin
Facebook: Fretzin, Inc.
Website: Fretzin.com
Email: Steve@Fretzin.com
Book: The Ambitious Attorney: Your Guide to Doubling or Even Tripling Your Book of Business and more!
YouTube: Steve Fretzin
Call Steve directly at 847-602-6911
Show notes by Podcastologist Chelsea Taylor-Sturkie
Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You’re the expert. Your podcast will prove it.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
lawyers, work, marketing, authentic, clients, video, people, website, attorney, absolutely, golf, logo, ashley, helping, steve, adding, apps, firm, life, paying
SPEAKERS
Ashley Robinson, Narrator, Steve Fretzin, Jordan Ostroff
Ashley Robinson [00:00]
Marketing is casting as many nets as we can cast, right and, and we’re trying to hook people in in whatever way we can hook them in. And again, it is it is not the 80s. It is doesn’t 22. And so making impressions people have to, again going back to they have to gain trust authority.
Narrator [00:23]
You’re listening to be that lawyer, life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice. Each episode, your host, author and lawyer coach, Steve Fretzin, will take a deeper dive, helping you grow your law practice in less time with greater results. Now, here’s your host, Steve Fretzin.
Steve Fretzin [00:45]
Hey, everybody, welcome to be that lawyer, I hope you’re having a lovely day, a fabulous day, a wonderful day. But it is all about making every day count. You don’t have to survive something like a plane crash, or a car accident or a terrible experience in the hospital with COVID. To know that every day is precious, and you have the ability to make changes in your life in your career, that could really make the difference between living the best life and making your mark or just kind of eking your way along and not really doing things that aren’t meant to make that involve improvements as you go. And I’m a big proponent of the first so part of what this show attempts to do is to give you ideas, tips, tricks, you know, just just ways of being that lawyer, someone who’s competent, organized and skilled Rainmaker and and today’s no different. I’ve got a terrific guest in Ashley Robinson, who I’m going to introduce in a moment. I want to take a second though, to just thank our sponsors, legalese, marketing, and money, Penny, who helped assist me in various ways. So thank you very much for being sponsors and for helping me with my business. And I want to just bring up the quote that Ashley and I are going to talk about, it’s a Peter Drucker quote, the aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well, the product or service fits him and sells itself. So Ashley, welcome to the show. Hi, thanks
Ashley Robinson [02:03]
for having me.
Steve Fretzin [02:04]
Happy to be here. Yeah, absolutely. And so thinking about that, quote,
Ashley Robinson [02:08]
how does that resonate with you? Yeah, I mean, we’re here at my office. So there’s a sign over my shoulder that, that your audience might can see if they if they check out your page, it says Stay weird. So Stay weird is absolutely my kind of my life mantra, if you will, I’ve always been a little quirky, a little different. It took me many years to just welcome that and, and absorb that. And that’s absolutely what we try to do with our clients. You know, going back to your quote, that’s such a great quote of it. And I think it really it does pertain to marketing. If you’ve got to understand who you are, what is your product, what are you trying to sell, who is your target audience and be authentic to that there’s, there’s far too much technology out in the world for us to be in authentic, we’re we are no longer living in the 90s where everyone can act like a newscaster and have your fake voice. You know, you look at you, you’re you’ve got an authentic background, you’re at home, but it’s very casual, and it fits the vibe and it comes across far more authentic. So that’s absolutely, I believe that wholeheartedly in terms of marketing and what we try to do with our clients.
Steve Fretzin [03:15]
I think that word authenticity is what we’re we and others are really searching for as a relates to how we become memorable. I think if you’re just another sheep in the herd, it’s very difficult. So you’re a lawyer, a labor and employment attorney, and there’s, you know, 1000 like you in your community. Well, how are you standing out and that’s what marketing is all about how you stand out from the crowd, how you’re seeing differently and how you’re then you know, being found. And I think if you’re if you’re not able to be found, because your name isn’t being passed around, your marketing is non existent. That’s really where trouble is. For people that want to make their mark. I completely
Ashley Robinson [03:51]
agree. It’s, you’ve got to do something. And why not be authentic? Be who you are not, don’t try to create something elsewhere. If you’ve got a big bombastic personality, let’s play on. You know, that’s what’s gonna set you apart. If you are the more serious educational toned down version or if you’re community oriented. Play on that know who your target audiences that be you are, it’s easier. It’s much easier to remember who you are and stick to that in terms of your branding.
Steve Fretzin [04:19]
Yeah, absolutely. And for those of you listening, this is Ashley Robinson. She’s the founder of green cardigan marketing. And I was introduced to Ashley through a very successful client of mine who was on the show recently Jennifer Bullock down in Fort Lauderdale. And so I was just so thrilled to hear you know that get that introduction and then to meet you and have a conversation and bring you on the show. And give a little bit of background because you know, you’ve got an interesting background I was just reading it from from playing collegiate golf, you know, in sort of getting into the law firm space give give give a little Reader’s Digest on that.
Ashley Robinson [04:53]
Yeah, I grew up in Alabama. I know it’s hard to tell with this accent.
Steve Fretzin [04:58]
I thought for sure England I Yes, I’m off on my
Ashley Robinson [05:01]
upstate New York. Yeah. So I grew up in Alabama, smaller town, played golf in that community was so fortunate to get a both golf scholarship to a smaller D one college in northeast Alabama supplied by golf all four years there. And then actually after college went on to play, attempt to play professionally for a few years. Meanwhile, I’ve gotten my degree in communications. And I always knew, I wanted to do my own thing where I come from a family of entrepreneurs. And so it just never dawned on me to work in the corporate world. That was just not my thing. After I played professional golf, it was time to go to work when you realize you can’t make money playing golf. And I did go work in a corporate gig at a wonderful marketing and advertising agency. And that really opened my eyes up to I don’t want to work for someone else. But I loved the concept of having a specific niche. Let me go back and say the advertising interesting, I worked out, only did automotive advertising. And I thought what a great business model, because your clients are going to look at you and say you’re the expert in this field. And you are the expert. That’s all you do. And so these things are going on in my head, I want to mom business plan is a great business model, simultaneously how life works. So unexpectedly, my sister marries an attorney. And I start doing his marketing on the side just because he’s now my future brother in law. What else do you do? Right? Yeah. So I started helping him and he tells a friend, he’s in Atlanta, and he’s got a great network there in Atlanta. And he tells a friend, he tells a friend and next thing I know, I’m like, five or six lawyers deep. And I’m like, Okay, this is, this is it, like it was just, it was so organic is such an overused word, but it was very organic, and how I just landed in that. I’m an Enneagram, type two, if you’re into the Enneagram. So I love helping people. I’m a strong type A personality. So it just, I mean, I came alive, I felt myself come alive. It felt very much like Monday’s of golf. When I started my business up, ah, I love this. I love that I’m able to help these lawyers. I just found that so many lawyers, the more I dug into it, we’re getting taken advantage of a call I had with a client yesterday, said the same thing I hear over and over Yeah, I’m paying someone to do my SEO, I’m paying them 1000 bucks a month. That’s not too much money considering but look, what are you okay, what are you getting for it? Oh, nothing. They’re not writing any content for them. But the lawyers don’t know. And they shouldn’t know. They’re, they’re so busy. You know, they’re so busy doing their other things. And so, as I dug into this, I’m like, Man, this is really unfortunate. You could really help these guys and ladies. So yeah, it just it really organically happened. And next thing I know, I’m dropping down from fold apart. Part of do this thing, I launched this thing go full time. So we’re with about 25 Different lawyers now across the country, all over the country, all types of practice areas. Yeah,
Steve Fretzin [08:01]
that’s awesome. That’s awesome. And again, I don’t do what you do. So it really is nice, because I can help them on the business development side i and I’m not going to really touch their marketing too much, I might come up with a good idea for a book title or, or something fun like that. I help them with a differentiator that, you know, maybe the weird part that you mentioned, but I really you know, they need help with the marketing, they need help to, you know, get their newsletter out to get their social media up to do their search to get their SEO search engine optimization going their website revamped whatever it might be. And that’s not my gig. That’s not my not my jam. So it’s it’s important that there’s someone honest and credible and experienced to help them with that, because that’s really what most attorneys are looking for.
Ashley Robinson [08:43]
Yeah, and the honest is a key component. And again, I’m not trying to be super cheesy, but it’s just, I hear it all the time. Again, it was just yesterday, I heard a lawyer. He’s like, Hey, we’ve been in this community he’s in, in Charleston. He’s like, we’ve been in Charleston for years. And I’ve got this young kid who’s popped up, we’ve got three locations. He’s got one location, and he’s ranking higher than me, but I’ve been paying for SEO for two years. And what well, let’s dig into that. What are you paying for? Nothing is someone’s essentially hosting your website, they’re not writing any content. They’re not. They’re not working on backlinks, you know, so the honesty, part of it. And I don’t oversell that to my lawyers, because if they will work with us, if they’ll give us 3060 days, 99% of them are never going to leave, you’re never going to leave our company and say I had bad customer service, you might could leave and say, Look, I could have gotten better results elsewhere maybe Sure. But you’re never going to leave us and say I did not get superior customer service. That is what we strive to do is to provide really great customer service and just be very honest and authentic and and try our best to use these dollars as if they were our very own.
Steve Fretzin [09:54]
So let’s let’s bring it around a little bit to the topic of the day which is going to be really You’re talking about video and how video plays a role in the law, the law marketing space. And again, I think there’s so many elements of video that can help with that authenticity, that credibility, maybe even help on the search engine optimization side, right? Because a lot of the videos can lead to being found or being, you know, having, you know, links to it or whatever. So, talk a little bit about the history of video in marketing in legal. And let’s talk about that we can get into some some some tips and ideas on on how people can do video in a more effective
Ashley Robinson [10:31]
way. Yeah, so, again, I think, going back to maybe the beginning of our conversation, with all the technology that’s out nowadays, video is still a newer component, especially for the legal field. I know I’m not stepping on anyone’s toes, when I say this, the legal field is slower to technology and slower to progression and change than other industries, rightfully so. Right, that the pandemic has taught the legal industry that hey, you can do it, there’s no need to drive an hour and a half to sit before Judge for three minutes, right and drive an hour and a half back, we can use technology, we can use video. So the great thing that has come out of the pandemic is it has taught lawyers, that very thing. So I would say maybe the history of video lawyers would be your traditional TV advertisement you might have seen years and years ago. But if you look at the progression of where it’s at now, today, it is such a great tool. Because if I’m spending my hard earned money with you, you’re you could be a criminal lawyer and you could be you could be a criminal defense lawyer and you could be saving my life. Or you could be trying to complete my family and help me adopt a child, whatever it is, it’s a big deal in my world. So I want to make sure I can trust you in video is such a great way to do that. Again, we live in in a day where everything is a quick fix, and you can touch everything. So people want to see your face, hear your voice before they buy your book, they want to see your face, hear your voice, and all you’re doing when they come to your podcast page, you’re just adding credibility, I know what I’m talking about. And then they’re gonna go buy your book, right. So it’s the same thing with my lawyers, I’m trying to convince them of, hey, whether we’re doing some big, bold branding package video or if it’s just simply caught up into into a selfie video, you’re not going to do anything. But when that audience develop trust, you know and gain authority with that potential client.
Jordan Ostroff [12:32]
legalese marketing is not your traditional marketing vendor. Instead, we’re a true fractional cmo that helps you save time and spend your money the right way to build a practice of your dreams. We help through the entire process, from customizing your intake system to driving leads, and even getting more reviews afterwards, schedule your free call at legalese marketing.com.
[12:53]
Hi, I’m Steph from Moneypenny. We’re trusted by leading law firms and attorneys to answer calls virtually professionally and brilliantly. Our high tech receptionist service enables us to route calls to your team’s wherever they’re working. And even recognize and prioritize calls based on whether they’re a repeat caller, a new client or a VIP. Claim your exclusive partner rates and Free Trial by quoting Fretzin today.
Steve Fretzin [13:22]
So let’s get into that because you just that’s a great segue, you’ve got expensive, well produced videos that go on the homepage of a website that really demonstrate you know, with music in the background, it’s a three cameras shoe like you’ve got that full level, all the way down to Hey, it’s me, and I’m walking my dog and look at me, and it’s on Instagram or whatever. And there’s everything in between. So let’s talk about the benefit and maybe the benefit and the negative of all of those as we kind of move from the high end down to the low end and in sort of let’s work from there.
Ashley Robinson [13:57]
Yeah. So let’s start from the high end that works with you. So the high end full on production shoot, you know, we’ve got a crew coming in. We just were doing this two weeks ago for a great all female IP firm in Atlanta. So vivid IP shout out. Yeah, we go to Atlanta. You know, the whole crew. It’s a six person crew. We’re there for two days, and it is movie quality production. I’ve got a wonderful team I work with. So those videos are great for their branding videos right there on your site. We use them on your website, you could use some for any type of paid ad, the owner of this firm does a lot of public speaking. We did another high end video production for another attorney constantly in Atlanta, Molly farmer. Molly is a very well known federal attorney. She is always in the news. And so these are great videos that she uses as promo intro when she does public speaking. And those videos are good. They’re going to last you as long as either you change your physical appearance changes or your press to Syria as the vocabulary changes, so that’s a long time, right? Those, those are going to last vivid IP or Mali farmer or whomever, for five, six years. And it’s a big investment. Right? So then if you take a step down, and
Steve Fretzin [15:13]
maybe I’m going to stop, before we take that step down, I just want to I just want to bring up that people might spend 1020 $30,000 on that kind of production, okay? And they might say, Well, wait a second, I’m not getting, that’s not worth it, I’m not getting a return on investment, because that’s not, you know, bringing in leads, or it’s whatever, like, they’re going to have some objection to spending that kind of money. But they’re not really thinking straight, right?
Ashley Robinson [15:40]
No, no, it’s, it’s so much more complicated than saying, Oh, this video did not directly correlate to a lead, it doesn’t work like that. Marketing doesn’t work like that, it would make my life so much easier if marketing is casting as many nets as we can cast, right, and, and we’re trying to hook people in, in whatever way we can hook them in. And again, it is it is not the 80s, it is 22. And so making impressions, people have to, again, going back to they have to gain trust authority. So they might have to watch you, Steve, on this video channel, once they might have to read your book, they might have to, it might have to do many, many, many different things before they’re going to gain your trust. Now, how can we measure that? In some instances, it’s, it’s almost impossible. There are ways, you know, we have analytics and we have, we have those type of things that can test. So it’s just not as easy as saying, I’m gonna spend $20,000 For this shoot, and I’m gonna get 10 clients, it’s just not that easy,
Steve Fretzin [16:41]
right. And so I think we have to look at it or law firms have to look at it as an investment in their future from a standpoint of how they’re how it’s going to build credibility with their prospective clients, their strategic partners. And think about this, everybody. Also, how are you bringing in laterals? How are you bringing in the new lawyers? That’s the biggest challenge right now with the great resignation? How are you adding credibility and value for the people that go to your website? And see it’s trash? And do they really want to work at a trashy place, or a high end video that really represents you, as professionals? That’s a whole other level of reasoning why they may want to take that interview. So I think we have to look at it as as a part of the overall marketing strategy. But it can affect firms on so many levels, right?
Ashley Robinson [17:27]
Absolutely. That’s a great, that’s a great thing to talk about as your your maybe your associates you’re trying to hire you want to grab the best associate? And how do you do that, besides providing great insurance, you’ve got to prove to them, Look, they’re there, you’ve got a lot of attorneys out there that these associates can go to, and you want to grab the very best. So absolutely, you’re absolutely trying to impress or put your best foot forward with them. And then for your other strategic partners, like you said, you know, if your family law attorney, you need a good referral source. And you want to get the best criminal defense attorney to pass business to? How do you do that, that that criminal defense attorney has got many, many, many family law attorneys to choose from? So let’s make sure that he or she is choosing you, because of your online presence is a plus your online presence is confident it’s high quality, it’s up to date, your website works well. It ranks well. So absolutely. This is just part of that plan.
Steve Fretzin [18:24]
Yep. But it has to be looked at as an investment. It’s not it’s not you’re doing it and we’re just throwing this money in the wind or way. You’re putting money into your your overall branding and your overall marketing strategy of how you’re going to make next year this year, next year better than the year before.
Ashley Robinson [18:42]
Absolutely see the great point there. So it is an investment. It’s not making these videos. This is not a paid ad campaign, a paid ad campaign is here’s my money. Get me results. If you want something that quick. Absolutely. We have tools like that. But that’s not what these videos are for these videos we’re specifically talking about. It is a long term investment. If you come to me and you say I want to see results now. Okay, then we need to we need to do something different some sort of pay per click Pay per lead and immediate response. Right. But there are, there are there’s a time and a place for all of those. So going back to two, I think your original thought if if a lawyer is watching this, and the biggest takeaway with this would be these high end videos is it’s a long term investment. You hit the nail on the head there. Perfect,
Steve Fretzin [19:31]
perfect. And we’re on the same page. Let’s move down a level so so not the big production with the whole crew coming in? What’s the next level of video that lawyers and law firms might want to consider?
Ashley Robinson [19:42]
Yeah, so I can only speak for what we do. I’m sure there’s other marketing companies that have other different levels. For us. Our level, or medium level is something we’re doing now. So it is a recorded zoom call with our clients. We’re writing scripts, we’re working with the client and writing the script. And usually these packages they’re they’re doing one month, maybe two a month. And so these videos, again, a little higher in quality than the selfie. Because what we do is we take these, these zoom videos, or edit it together, we’re going to ask cat at caption on the bottom and their logo, smash logo front and back at the beginning and the end of the video. I cannot remember this statistic, I was just reading this last week 70% of people who watch videos on social media said that they watched them at work, meaning they watched them on mute. So these are things to remember, when you’re making these videos. So that’s why we add on this tear, we’re adding closed caption to think of these videos, these are educational videos, these are I’m talking to you about divorce the things you need to know about divorce, same sex adoption versus heterosexual adoption, here’s what you need to know, here’s the type of attorney you need to look for. If you’re a same sex couple here, you know, you’re going into the weeds on certain topics. So that’s what these videos are for. So we use them for mostly is for educational purposes. And then you can still stick these on your on your website, you know, maybe have a tab what we do for a lot of our lawyers who do these just have a tab of resources or, you know, video, whatever the tab may be. So these are still on your website, and you can use them on social. So we a lot of our clients are starting to use this package for most, they’re much more affordable than the big high end video. And then you’re constantly making them. So if there’s a change of a law in your state that is applicable to you or your firm, we’ve got a video coming up next month, and it’s a one hour session, we record these, again, we’re helping them write the script. So that’s the middle tier, which is a great option because you can use it on both social and your website.
Steve Fretzin [21:42]
And I don’t know if I’m if I’m moving from the middle tier to the next tier down, I just wanted to add one more. I did this recently. And I have to start publishing the video. But I have like seven or eight clients that said they were willing to do a video sort of montage or testimonial and Jennifer was one of them. And in so what I did was I essentially had like five questions I wanted answered about their law practice their background, what things were like before they worked with me what happened when we work together? What was the end result or return on investment? So the answer all these questions, and it was the video productions, almost nothing because it was all done through zoom. So it was really more of an of a time and then editing. And I think it came out great. I didn’t think that we needed to have a three camera shoot with lighting and everything. I thought people are so used to zoom. Let’s just Let’s just do it that way. And I think it came out great. So
Ashley Robinson [22:36]
you’re pro Steve, you can tell you know, just talking about? That’s exactly right. That’s exactly right. That’s exactly that is the best way to use. Not the best. But I mean, there are many ways, like I said, educational, that is another great way to use these videos. And we’ve done that for one of our clients, we’re in the process of doing it for another he works with, with people from all over the country, we’re not going to have to fly in and go see these people, this is a great way to make a little montage of, of clients giving their shout out to you. Yeah, that just adds credibility, right? It posted on your socials posted on your website, it’s just adding credibility,
Steve Fretzin [23:10]
it can all be chopped up in made into long form short form. And think about this, if you’re a personal injury attorney, and you have five or 10 clients that you’ve gotten really nice rewards for and help win their cases, would they be willing to take you know, 15 minutes and say some nice things? And the answer is yes, of course. But you don’t have that. People go to your website, and they just see your picture with maybe some numbers talking about the awards that whenever you’re able to do, but video is so much better at telling the story. And that’s what you can have them do. So I’m just putting it out there that you know that personal touch was there’s a name for that. The testimonials give the validation. There’s a lot of words, but that those are a couple that I’m thinking that you know, like lawyers are always concerned about working with me, because they kind of don’t know what they’re getting into, or they don’t know exactly what I do. Well, here’s a bunch of lawyers telling you exactly what I do and what I for them. Well, that’s going to help sort of like solve a problem before it happens.
Ashley Robinson [24:12]
Absolutely. And, you know, I’ve done that with prospects before. I’ve said Hey, call call one of my lawyers, please talk to them. Because my best referral source is my, my current clients, my lawyers is exactly the same as you, you know, we’re providing a service as our lawyers. So this, this eliminates that. And it makes it very easy for them to go watch testimonial. This is a real person. And I like that it’s not such a high end production. It seems more authentic to me again, I’m younger, not young, mid 30s. But I’m kind of jaded, right to, I mean, I’ve been around with technology most of my life and so I’m jaded to a lot of things. And so I like the in authentic very cool. actual inauthentic, but not as professional high end, I would kind of
Steve Fretzin [25:03]
like coffee, like off the cuff like it’s okay to make mistakes, right? It doesn’t have to be perfect. Right? My generation is looking for that. Yeah. Yeah, that’s an authentic that makes it off this. So like, you and I are having this podcast, we’re having this chat. And we go off topic and we talk about weird things because that’s what you’re into. And I have some talk weird with anybody. That’s okay. Like, that’s right, that’s gonna be like interesting to someone listening to this versus it just being you know, this monotone, you know, very formal conversation.
Ashley Robinson [25:33]
Again, people are jaded, I go back to your, your background and my background. This is This is my office. It’s kind of weird, like me. It’s different, but I love it. This is my vibe, here’s your home. You know, and same. Same with you. That’s, that’s your vibe, you’re showing that you obviously your sports fan, or I’m showing that I’m court, whatever it is, but it’s authentic. And that is what folks are looking for today. I mean, again, I just think a lot of people are jaded. And you can’t be some stuffy, you know, tie.
Steve Fretzin [26:03]
Well, it’s funny, because I’m looking him up. I have this I haven’t I got this from a client of mine. I haven’t put it up yet. But it’s all the Seinfeld isms. And if you’re nice, all of the, all of the funny like lines, and I have to I’m gonna put that up behind you over here. Yeah, and that’s gonna be another weird authentic thing is like, I’ve watched every Seinfeld, you know, half a dozen times, I know all the funny lines. And I still find it funny, but not for everybody. But
Ashley Robinson [26:30]
that’s you. And that’s me. A good starting point, when somebody gets on a call with you. Let me get to know who Steve is as a person before I spend my hard earned money and time with him. I want to know who you are. You can I trust you. And these are small things. But look, if someone could relate to you, because you like Seinfeld, or sports or, or whatever. So again, as be as authentic as you can.
Steve Fretzin [26:52]
Yep. All right. So we’ve talked about the high end, we’ve talked about the Zoom middle ground educational videos, and testimonial videos, then what’s the next level down from there that lawyers could do on their own to start getting more video marketing out there for themselves.
Ashley Robinson [27:09]
You’re on your phone all day, record a selfie video, prop your phone up on your computer, when something comes to you, which it does all day because you’re a lawyer. And that’s the way your your mind works. You’ve got things coming in and out of your brain all of the time it record that stop and I tell my my lawyers all the time, you’re walking into a courthouse, stop, record a little video, or what I find this when they leave the courthouse record. Hey, you know what, I just left the courthouse today. This reminds me, blah, blah, blah. Well, I’ve got Shawn Kemp, who’s a great lawyer of ours. We’re so fortunate to work with him. He’s in South Carolina, and he is so good at this. He leaves the courthouse. Hey, just left the courthouse. And I know what lawyers might be thinking here. He’s not giving details. We’re not having to throw up a disclaimer. We’re not having to, you know, cover, make sure he’s not in trouble. He’s not giving details of the case, right? Just said, Hey, love the courthouse. And in dealing with this type of case. This reminds me seven years ago, and Shawn’s a really funny bombastic, big personality. So his are usually funny stories. But it works for Sean. He’s in a small town in South Carolina. And so just stop and film yourself. If you’ve got an idea. If you want to pose a question, social media was not meant to be I in professional. And that is hard for me to get into the minds of some my lawyers of it, I don’t know what I’m going to say I don’t, I don’t want my background. That’s not what this is for. That’s not what social media is for. It’s meant to be extremely spontaneous.
Steve Fretzin [28:46]
That that once we got around to it,
Ashley Robinson [28:50]
in when it comes to you record it, yeah. And so that’s what the majority should do and send it to me, you know, we will slap their logo on it. We’ve also been starting to add caption to those videos as well, because again, people are watching them on mute. So we make it, we make it a little bit we brand it, you know, with their logo. Yeah. But if you don’t have those tools, if you don’t have a marketing company, that’s okay. You don’t have to have your logo on it.
Steve Fretzin [29:14]
And there are apps to write apps because you know about the apps I mean, select us, okay, like a big view or something like that. Or
Ashley Robinson [29:22]
now that you asked me that I would Claudia, management of social media, she’s gonna kill me because I don’t know the name of the platform that she uses. Okay, okay. Let’s see the invoice every month. But it’s a very easy, she actually has the app on her phone. So when a client sends us a video, she imports it into this app. You can manually add the caption to make sure it’s correct. She never does she just she just lets it auto populate the caption. Okay, 99% accurate. Just the logo on the bottom quarter. Good to go.
Steve Fretzin [29:52]
But there’s there’s apps there’s teleprompter apps, there’s ways to if you’re like not good off the cuff and you know, you can write 456 sentences and then read them. And you want to look into the camera and not look like you’re reading or looking down. You know, there’s there’s apps out there. I mentioned big view and are so many. Yeah, I don’t mean that, you know, but you throw your lawyer throws your logo up, it throws the captions in, you read the teleprompter at the right speed that you’re watching. I actually have the APA. And I’ve only done three or four videos, and I haven’t posted any of them. Because I’m just I’m finding it hard to get it done. I’m doing other stuff that I’m getting done like this YouTube apps is Yeah, but I think sometimes we need a marketing agency to to sometimes push us forward or to help to get all that done, because we’re just not doing it. We’re just not able to get it done ourselves. So if that’s your problem, you might want to talk to Ashley about, you know how she can help you with the video and make that a more consistent thing. Either you do it or she does it for you get it done?
Ashley Robinson [30:50]
Yeah, let me I’ll just throw out some of the some of the different ways we work with our clients. Again, we’re a full service agency. So we try to customize everything for each individual client. It means we’re running ourselves crazy sometimes. But look, that’s what you pay us for. So Jennifer, let’s talk about Jennifer, she’s a great client of yours. She’s recently started working with us. She’s local here to me, I’m in South Florida. So today is the day Jennifer comes in to where we’re at here at my office. And we’ve got an hour with her. And Claudia, my social media director is just following around with a phone and we’re filming these very casual videos. So Jennifer is one that said, Look, I’m not going to I’m not going to be I’m not going to just casually do these videos, make me do this. Yeah, I’m good. I’m good at bossing people. So hey, come here for an hour, and we’re gonna record them. We’re also doing another final half here in software. We’re recording his as well today. So that’s one way we can work with a client. I’ve got another client in Phoenix, Arizona, he said, Look, if you’ll give me the ideas, and I’ll do it. So we have created a shared video ideas, Doc. So we’re going in there, we’re adding video ideas. Hey, we want to do a caption, some sort of caption about this, help us get there make a video. That means that we can make this caption because this is a hot button topic now. And we want to use these hashtags, because we’ve done our research on the hashtags you need in Phoenix, Arizona. So then he’ll make us a video. So we can use that caption. So there’s so many different ways to do it. Again, it does I mean, I’m biased, it makes it easier if you have a team here that’s constantly pushing you. But there are ways to make yourself you know you better than anyone, is it best for you to sit down once a month to pump out 10 or 15 videos of you looking into your MacBook, or is it best for you to do them as they come to you. You know yourself, but stick to it.
Steve Fretzin [32:40]
Right? It’s all about consistency. And I think that’s that’s where we’re going to wrap things up. Actually, if people want to reach out to you to learn more about your agency and how you’re working with law firms and lawyers. What’s the best way for them to get a hold of you?
Ashley Robinson [32:51]
Yeah, so we are our website is green cardigan. marketing.com. You can email me through the website, or we’re very active on social media. What kind of agency would we be if we were not? Yeah, so you can find us on all social medias at Green cardio marketing.
Steve Fretzin [33:08]
Very cool. Very cool. And how do you stay weird?
Ashley Robinson [33:12]
You know, it comes very natural. As my friends and and family, how do I stay weird is tried to now in my life, it doesn’t take as much effort but just be as authentic as I can. I’m indifferent. I’m buying a motorcycle next week. I’ve always ridden motorcycles. That’s kind of weird, you know? And I tell people that they’re like, or, or play golf or whatever it is, yeah, it’s okay. It’s okay to be different. I’ve a nose ring and I have an advertising agency. That’s okay. I’ve been told that’s not normal. I don’t care to be normal, it fits me so I would just say try to be as authentic as you can from the smallest decisions to the biggest decisions.
Steve Fretzin [33:51]
Now. That’s great, great advice and a great way to wrap up I just want to thank you for spending some time on the show and talking about not only your business but but you know video and how it can be used on different levels. So just you know, thank you for sharing your wisdom.
Ashley Robinson [34:06]
Absolutely. Thank you for having me. I really enjoyed it.
Steve Fretzin [34:08]
Yeah awesome. And hey everybody again, you know, an opportunity to learn you know, not only about authenticity, but about you know, some video best practices and ways that you can get your brand out there and get your authenticity out there in a way that’s never been easier. I mean, it’s never a really hasn’t there’s so many different ways to go. You just have to find what’s going to work for you whether it’s being you know, pushed by someone like Ashley or whether it’s something where you can self motivate, and then just learning best practices so that you can put out content you can be proud of, or that you find interesting or most importantly that other people find interesting. So again, it’s all about being that lawyer right that’s what it is. It’s all about being competent, organized and a skilled Rainmaker everybody take care be safe be well, we’ll talk again soon.
Narrator [34:55]
Thanks for listening to be that lawyer. Life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice, visit Steve’s website fretzin.com For additional information, and to stay up to date on the latest legal business development and marketing trends. For more information and important links about today’s episode, check out today’s show notes.