It’s true. 99% of attorney video truly stinks. It’s boring. It’s unimaginative. It lacks useful information. It’s stuffy. It continues to personify lawyers as inaccessible and unapproachable. Many lawyer videos do nothing but talk about themselves.
Guess what? In case you haven’t noticed, viewers don’t care about you. They only care about themselves. Until lawyers and their video producers recognize this, lawyers will continue to make video that stinks.
My watch needed a new battery the other day. It’s a Seiko diving chronograph. Steel bracelet, multi-function display, with day/date/time/stopwatch/ alarm and count-down timer. Oh yes, did I mention it tells time both analog and digitally? It’s really cool.
Well, I decided to take it into a little jeweler’s shop on the same street as my office. I dropped the watch off, told them I needed a new battery, and I’d be back in 10 minutes.
Sure you do. Will it? Unlikely.
Why?
Most lawyer videos are BORING.
Most lawyer videos talk about themselves.
Why would anyone want to watch a video of a lawyer talking about themselves? I sure wouldn’t.
Want to jump onto video but don’t know where to start?
You need to read this book, written by my good friend Tom Foster of Fosterwebmarketing.com and myself, to get you motivated. You’ll learn tons of useful information about why video is so important to market your practice and why it’s the future of the internet.
Here’s are the top 10 posts of 2009. Enjoy your reading!
1. 10 Reasons Why Every Lawyer Needs To Be On Video
2. An Interview w/ Gerry on the Legal Broadcast Network
Fa [Ben Glass] irfax Virginia Personal Injury Lawyer, Ben Glass says “Gerry Oginski is the master of online video. If you have not seen his videos, you should. He’s done more videos than any lawyer out there. The big edge that Gerry has over his competition is that his videos allow consumers to get to ‘know’ him before they even pick up the phone. His use of video on his website and his video blog is amazing.”
Why is creating lawyer video to market your practice so complicated? Can’t you simply press the ‘record’ button upload your video to YouTube? You could, but you don’t want to.
Watch the video to learn why you have two choices as an attorney if you are interested in creating video. You can either learn how to do it yourself, or you need to hire an experienced video production company to get you onto video with a turn-Key system.
That’s how a guy who wanted my business, approached me in an e-mail. After spouting the great benefits of using him and his company he then proceeded to rag about some of my videos and their production quality. He even went so far to say he could not imagine that any viewer would not hit the “close” button once they started watching my video.
What do you think of someone who tries to get your business by criticizing something you are actually very proud of?
Here are my rules for attorneys who advertise and market themselves using video; they apply to every lawyer who creates attorney video and they’re mostly common sense, but because we’re attorneys, nothing is ever as it seems.
THE 10 COMMANDMENTS OF LAWYER VIDEO
1. Thou shall not disparage another lawyer in your video
2. Thou shall not puff yourself up
3. Thou shall not criticize another lawyer
The answer: Nothing.
If I am a client, that would not be a very satisfying answer no matter what legal issue or problem I had. Obviously, no lawyer can guarantee a particular outcome even with a good case. But think about how an online viewer searching for an attorney would love to hear about guarantees that you can make to reassure them that you are confident and capable of guiding them through the legal minefield known as litigation.
Lawyers who work in a law firm with 5-20 lawyers may think video should not be part of their marketing plan to gain new clients. They’d be 100% wrong. Lawyers fail to look at marketing from a potential client’s eyes.
Think about why you even have a website: To provide information to online viewers.
How do you distinguish yourself from other mid-size lawfirms? With pictures? With flash animation? With your credentials? With your results? With the articles you and other lawyers in your firm have written?
Most mid-sized law firms have pictures of their office building; a photo of generic, well-dressed people in a waiting room; photos of their law library; a photo of a senior partner standing lawyerly and formal while looking at a law book. Here’s my question: “So what?” What good does any of that do to help you distinguish yourself to your online viewer? The answer is likely nothing.
