I get requests every day to follow someone I have never heard of on Twitter. I then scroll down to see how many followers they have and how many people they are following. Many of these people have followers ranging from 5000 all the way up to 75,000 followers.

Here’s my question: these people don’t know me, and I certainly don’t know them. When I tweet about attorney video, I am 100% certain that they will never read my Tweet.

The race to accumulate as many followers as possible and compete with the next person to see who can have the most followers, solely to claim the “prize” of saying you have the most followers in any particular field serves absolutely no purpose from an attorney marketing standpoint.

I strongly believe that if you are going to develop a regular following, you need to offer quality content and not seek to compete on quantity. The number of people following you has no bearing on your success.

Want to be popular? Go ahead and click that “follow” button. Just remember most of those people don’t want to know what you have to say nor do they care what you have to say. Focus instead on quality.

I am amazed at the volume of traffic on Twitter about people who market to attorneys, and attorneys who actively market using the same old screaming method and jargon found in 30 second TV commercials that lawyers have always used.

Here are some examples as of 6/24/09
“Lawyer marketing with Twitter”
“Lawyer marketing with Facebook and MySpace”
“Injured? Call me”
“The Little Black Book” of lawyer marketing”
“A Lawyer’s Guide to Creating a Marketing Habit in 21 Days”
“Should Your Firm be Tweeting? Social Media Marketing 101 4 Attorney Marketing Online”
“New York personal injury lawyer marketing (press release)”

I don’t get it. If all these lawyers are busy marketing to potential clients, who is left to practice law and work on cases that are already active?

I also don’t understand why these lawyers who are actively promoting themselves continue to shout the same annoying message that have turned off the public for years. Stop yelling about your services. Instead, tell your viewers how you have helped others. Then, when you’ve done that, put it in a video.

Don’t shoot your video in front of your beautiful office window.

Why not?

Your camera doesn’t know what to focus on. It doesn’t know what’s light or dark. When you have a bright source of light from outside, it makes everything inside look extremely dark. The better practice is to close your window shades and put up a drape or curtain to give you an even, textured background.

Do not use your $20 webcam to create your attorney video. The quality will stink; the video will be poor; and the lighting will be awful.

The worst video I ever made was my first one. My kids still joke about it. “Dad, you look like a bobblehead.”

“Dad, the lighting is terrible.”
“Dad, the sound is awful.”

Looking back now, they’re right. I used my built-in webcam to tape my first-ever internet video. However, I was so eager to get onto video, I felt I had to do something!

Believe it or not, this ‘terrible’ video has actually done well in the search engine rankings. That’s why I’ve kept it up. Quality-wise it stinks.

Calibrate your white balance.

Before even starting to shoot your video, make sure you set this. It takes all of 10 seconds. If you don’t do it, all of your colors will be off and you will look extremely dark.

Get a white posterboard at Staples or Costco. Total cost: $1.49. Put it on the seat where you’ll be shooting your video. Zoom in so only the white posterboard is visible in the viewfinder. Press “White Balance” and then lock that setting (if your camera has a lock setting). Zoom out, and you’re ready to start. What you have done is told your camera what is really white. It adjusts all other colors accordingly.

If you neglect this step, you will waste hours and not realize it till you edit your videos. DO NOT RELY ON THE AUTOMATIC WHITE BALANCE SETTING. It is not reliable.

Calibrate your white balance.

Before even starting to shoot your video, make sure you set this. It takes all of 10 seconds. If you don’t do it, all of your colors will be off and you will look extremely dark.

Get a white posterboard at Staples or Costco. Total cost: $1.49. Put it on the seat where you’ll be shooting your video. Zoom in so only the white posterboard is visible in the viewfinder. Press “White Balance” and then lock that setting (if your camera has a lock setting). Zoom out, and you’re ready to start. What you have done is told your camera what is really white. It adjusts all other colors accordingly.

If you neglect this step, you will waste hours and not realize it till you edit your videos. DO NOT RELY ON THE AUTOMATIC WHITE BALANCE SETTING. It is not reliable.

Get your secretary or paralegal to do a video too.

Transparency on the internet is very important. Show a viewer how your secretary helps get your work done. Show their work space. Have your secretary explain why she likes working at your firm and how she interacts with your clients. Viewers eat this up! They love to see real people working and how those people help others.

Get your secretary or paralegal to do a video too.

Transparency on the internet is very important. Show a viewer how your secretary helps get your work done. Show their work space. Have your secretary explain why she likes working at your firm and how she interacts with your clients. Viewers eat this up! They love to see real people working and how those people help others.

Do not create an attorney video to sell yourself to a potential client. If you come across as a salesman, you will lose all your viewers and you probably will not get any calls. The reason why attorney video works so well is because it is the best way to educate a potential client and at the same time have them get to know you.

Why does that help? Once a viewer gets to know you, they begin to trust you. They will listen to you. They want to hear what you have to say. If you try to make a sale to your viewer from your short video clip, they will click on the next video, never to pick up the phone and call you. Your video should be to teach and educate. Not sell. By teaching, you show that you are an expert. Is a viewer more likely to call an expert who explains things or a slick salesman?

Do not create an attorney video to sell yourself to a potential client. If you come across as a salesman, you will lose all your viewers and you probably will not get any calls. The reason why attorney video works so well is because it is the best way to educate a potential client and at the same time have them get to know you.

Why does that help? Once a viewer gets to know you, they begin to trust you. They will listen to you. They want to hear what you have to say. If you try to make a sale to your viewer from your short video clip, they will click on the next video, never to pick up the phone and call you. Your video should be to teach and educate. Not sell. By teaching, you show that you are an expert. Is a viewer more likely to call an expert who explains things or a slick salesman?