Latest / Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast, Helping you create a profitable, sustainable law firm you love / Episode 290 Mastering Law Firm Marketing with Karin Conroy

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Episode 290 Mastering Law Firm Marketing with Karin Conroy · Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast, Helping you create a profitable, sustainable law firm you love

• 0:01
  Intro: Welcome to the wealthy woman lawyer podcast. What if you could hang out with successful women lawyers? Ask them about growing their firms, managing resources like time, team, and systems, mastering money issues, and more. Then take an insight or two to help you build a wealth generating law firm. Each week, your host, Davina Frederick, takes an in-depth look at how to think like a CEO, attract clients who you love to serve and will pay you on time, and create a profitable, sustainable firm you love.
• 0:31
  Davina is founder and CEO of Wealthy Woman Lawyer, and her goal is to give you the information you need to scale your law firm business from 6 to 7 figures in gross annual revenue so you can fully fund and still have time to enjoy the lifestyle of your dreams. Now, here's Davina.
• 0:50
  Davina: Hi, everyone, and welcome to the wealthy woman lawyer podcast. I'm your host, Davina Frederick. And my guest today is Karen Conroy. Karen is the founder and creative director of Conroy Creative Council, an award winning recognized leader that has cracked the code of smart, sophisticated, and strategic websites for law firms that results in more reach and more revenue through strategic branding and positioning. Her clients are proud of the way they look online, and their firm reputation is improved because their online presence beautifully displays their experience and expertise.
• 1:24
  Karen and her team's goal is to enhance the success of the client she works with through a proven online marketing process. She doesn't lead the success of her projects up to creative chance, but uses measurable systems that result in more of the reach and revenue through strategic branding and positioning. Marketing co counsel is the agency's signature flat rate program that provides a unified marketing approach and next level results. Please join me in welcoming Karen to the Wealthy Woman Lawyer podcast. Hi, Karen.
• 1:57
  Welcome.
• 1:58
  Karin: Hi. I see you in a few minutes. Yeah. I always love chatting with you. It's it's always good stuff.
• 2:03
  Davina: I know. We always have so much fun when we talk because we talk about our favorite subjects, which are business and marketing. So
• 2:08
  Karin: Work nerds.
• 2:10
  Davina: We're work nerds. Totally. So I have, read a little intro with you to sort of, talk about it was a great well written intro, by the way. Thank you. A lots of alliteration.
• 2:23
  So I had to speak carefully to be able to
• 2:26
  Karin: A lot of c's.
• 2:28
  Davina: I mean, I appreciate that, though. Yeah. So you were on the podcast. What was it back in 2021?
• 2:35
  Karin: Wow. That's a good question. It's been a couple years. Yeah.
• 2:37
  Davina: It's been a minute. Yeah. Yeah. The and, we were talking then about this as you had started your podcast. I had started my podcast.
• 2:45
  Yeah. And if anybody's not listening to your wonderful podcast, they need to. It's Council of
• 2:50
  Karin: Cast. Yeah. And Well, I had this amazing guest, you. That's basically me. And I think that's what's you know, I I I think you do this too.
• 2:59
  You get these experts on and it's, the conversation just ends up being so full of quality. So, you know, it's not always me. It's like finding people who really have something great to say about whatever we're talking about.
• 3:12
  Davina: Yeah. Yeah. And and marketing and law firms is a huge topic that because it's changed so much over Yes. In ten years, in a decade with all the things that are going on. Yeah.
• 3:25
  So I wanna talk I wanna delve into that and talk about that. Could you just before we go there, just, explain the services that your business provides and what sort of makes you different because you have this little, CMO piece. And I wonder if will you explain why that came about how that came about?
• 3:47
  Karin: Well, it's true that, I feel like both of us have been have seen all of it. You know, we've seen the whole history of how marketing has changed. And I started back in the day, I started at this tiny little internet cafe in a beach town here in California and where literally, people would walk in to check their emails and they would kind of come off the streets. And, you know, so way back in the day when it was like the beginning of the internet, but I've seen a lot of these changes and including and then we have to roll with
• 4:18
  Davina: it. Right?
• 4:18
  Karin: Like we, we continue to offer HTML sites and, you know, tell the people to be on, you know, Netscape. Like, these things don't exist. Yes. So we started by offering website. And that you know, I was originally back in the day when blogs were a thing.
• 4:38
  And there, there was, this website lawyerist where it was at the time at the that has also changed, really. But at the time it was kind of a group blog where they had a lot of contributors and I was talking about marketing. And, at the time I was advertising websites and that was what we sold. And it was really almost like a product, even though, you know, it's kind of a combination of product service. And it was price based and, you know, everything that I did then, which we're talking like 2010.
• 5:10
  So, you know, fifteen years ago, everything I did then and the way I marketed myself and the way I marketed law firms is different from how we're doing it now. So I was price based. I was focused on websites and it was, you know, slap up a website and, and then cross your fingers, basically. Like let's hope that the business just rolls in. And back then Google was a lot less sophisticated as users are, were a lot less sophisticated.
• 5:38
  And so it kind of worked, you know, like people just sort of put up what they con considered a brochure on, Google and Google would sort of find them. And, that just doesn't work anymore. So if you think that you're gonna go out and start a law firm, and you're gonna start with a website, and then that checks the box of your marketing plan, that's gonna be you're gonna have a sad reality. That's just not gonna work. And that's not, what we have found that we're not doing any of one a service by solely focusing on websites anymore.
• 6:13
  So that is important. Your website is critical. This is your first impression. And so I don't mean to downplay the importance of a website. I just mean to make sure that you're thinking of it in terms of a broader system and and strategy and plan.
• 6:30
  And you will, once you have that website, then what? So now what we do that's different is we start with a broader scale strategy and we plan out and we think about a marketing plan in terms of a year at a minimum. So we start with thinking about a year at a minimum and everything that's gonna be needed in that year. And sometimes that's not a website. Sometimes we look at the website and it's fine.
• 6:56
  And or maybe it's 90% fine and we need to make some adjustments. But it's not like throw the baby out the bathwater website. We're gonna make some adjustments and then we're also gonna do the following 12 things. And, you know, so, so that's why we kind of, have pulled back and taken a broader scale look at the kinds of things we offer now. It's not just, a tactic.
• 7:21
  It's a broader plan and system and, strategy.
• 7:26
  Davina: For the long effort. And I I mean, that's great for that's great to sum that up because I remember back when I started this business, I started out as as Deep Frederick Media Marketing is my company name. Everybody knows me as Wealthy Woman Lawyer now. But Yeah. I started out kind of thinking I was gonna go the agency model from a marketing perspective because I had done marketing for law firms.
• 7:48
  And I I remember this business that I have evolved out of people coming to me with, I want to do this marketing tactic. And then I would start asking them a lot of questions and finding out they didn't know why they were doing it. I wanted how it fit into the larger picture and all of that. And I wound up going down the coaching branch as opposed to the agency branch. Yeah.
• 8:13
  And you've really developed a full service sort of marketing agency for that specializes in working with law firms. Correct?
• 8:19
  Karin: Correct. That's it. Exactly. And I heard someone describe it really well recently where it's like, if you went to the gym and decided to hire a trainer and then just said, I just wanna show up once. And like, how can I, you know, get a six pack and look like the way I wanna look?
• 8:39
  But I just wanna be here, you know, really just a day. Like, no.
• 8:45
  Davina: It doesn't work that way, Rex.
• 8:47
  Karin: Yeah. Exactly. And it seems so obvious and we laugh, but at the same time, by just doing a website or just coming to you and asking, hey, how can I, achieve these things? But I just wanna do it on Instagram. And it's like, no, that's just not gonna be your plan and your path.
• 9:05
  And I can take this broad scale view and make that plan. But if you haven't even kind of got to the mental thought that there's a lot more to it, then we gotta take a step back and and start there.
• 9:18
  Davina: Yeah. Yeah. One dangers I think I've always seen even back before I became a lawyer and and I was working in the agency world and I was working in house in marketing is this this, a lot of lawyers and law firms at that time, and this is back in the nineties, so I'm really dating myself here, but really didn't look at marketing professionals as a whole separate profession. They always thought, well, if I just had a little extra time, I could write a blog. Totally.
• 9:46
  Matter that their blogs were, like, you know, legal briefs that nobody wanna Yes.
• 9:51
  Karin: Feed. Right.
• 9:51
  Davina: It just thought, well, I if I just had time, I could do it all myself. I could learn how to build a website over a weekend and Yeah. And that. And we know when we've seen over the last couple of decades, the evolution of marketing. And now there are so many platforms and ways that we can market.
• 10:10
  There are all the traditional ways we can market. And now there's this whole online world Yeah. That anywhere from online speaking and webinars to various social media platforms, each having their own, personality and way that you have to create content doesn't cross over well to others. Yeah. You know, because I'm going through this myself right now.
• 10:31
  Yeah. And, it can be very confusing
• 10:34
  Karin: for It's overwhelming. Yes.
• 10:36
  Davina: They don't realize, like, this is a whole separate profession. There are people who actually study marketing, and then and then there are some people who are experts in Instagram and some who are experts in something else, and everybody's calling themselves a marketer. Right. You're you are really cutting through all of that and saying, let's back out of all of the tactics and say, patiently based on your law firm, your clients, your goals, where do we need to be, and what do we need to be doing. Is that accurate?
• 11:08
  Karin: I it is. And, you know, I also like to say so before I started doing this with law firms, I worked for Century twenty one. And, they have this they have this whole approach where, don't do, FSBO, which is a for sale by owner, which is kind of the DIY version. And, for the same reason that realtors say, you know, you need my expertise to sell your house because you don't know what you don't know. The same reason lawyers say you need my expertise to hire me because you don't know what you don't know, and it could potentially get you in a lot of hot water.
• 11:45
  It's the same thing with marketing. You don't know what I have spent years learning and the mistakes that I see and the things that I know that I can cut through and get you to those answers that I know are working, that are also changing. I mean, if you're doing anything with Google or search or anything, that stuff changes daily. Not just the technology of it, but what your competitors are doing, where you're gonna rank, how you're gonna address that. And, it, you should not be caught in the daily function of looking where your search rankings are in the same way that your stock broker is gonna say, do not watch your investments on a daily basis.
• 12:30
  That is a path to failure because you're gonna get so caught up in, oh my gosh, I just lost, you know, whatever. And then it, you know, you have to ride the market. So, you know, we know this from so many different ways of trying to find success. And it's just the same with marketing. There is a, little piece of investment.
• 12:53
  There's a piece of strategy. There's a piece of, you know, finding the right expert for what you need, which is gonna be different than what the law firm down the street needs. And, you know, all of these pieces come together to make it work.
• 13:09
  Davina: Let's let's talk about what a fractional CMO's chief marketing officer does. We'll talk about a chief marketing officer does and then talk about the fractional part. Yeah. Because I think, and because you guys not only do the sort of vision and the planning and all that, but you actually help with the implementation. But that doesn't mean you were sitting there
• 13:29
  Karin: Right.
• 13:29
  Davina: Making their Google Ads for them or making their Facebook Ads for them. So tell me kind of how your business works in terms of serving your clients.
• 13:38
  Karin: Yeah. And this is a very trending topic, you know, and I can see this based on our search results for all the things we write about this. And it is different. So if this is something that you're looking into, be very careful about what you need and then finding the right kind of agency for what that, what that, you know, fulfills your need. Because there are people who are basically like, you know, a lawyer who is on retainer and they have a set number of hours and then they just sort of are there kind of like a part time marketing person in your firm.
• 14:12
  That is not what we do. Then there are people who are, you know, there's a lot of different ways of, of doing this. So to make it clear, the way that we do it is we start by planning out a year. And then we look at it quarterly and set goals. And part of our job is to make sure that we focus on those goals and we set aside the distractions.
• 14:36
  Because this is this distractions are a huge part of marketing failure. There's so much waste and this is where a lot of people come in really frustrated because they've tried a lot of things and they're wasting their time and their money. And they've tried it without any plan or strategy. So it's gonna look different for every firm we work with. And it should because every firm is different and that the goals for every firm is different.
• 15:00
  And so one firm for an example may be, the two big examples that we use are an existing firm that has kind of plateaued and not, you know, finding the kind of growth they want or people who are going out and starting a new firm. So in an existing firm that has plateaued, we're gonna start in both cases, we're gonna start with a lot of strategy. Sitting down, talking about what's working, having a lot of conversations, feeling like, you know, we're, just kind of having virtual coffee and but with a plan. And we're asking a lot of questions about what they're doing, what they're not doing, what they see works, what their clients say, when they decide to work with them. And in looking at all of the numbers, you know, whatever numbers the firm is coming in with.
• 15:47
  So that would include their Google analytics. If they're doing social media, we're looking at all the data. And then we sit and, you know, make a plan and we say, okay, the most urgent and we have a way of, of ranking and rating the different kinds of tactics that we would apply to that strategy. So we look at the strategy and we say, okay, the goal here is x. We're gonna achieve it by by in measurable ways by, you know, doing the following things.
• 16:19
  And let's look at the list of possible tactics. It could be social media. It could be updating the website. It could be, a PR campaign. It could be an email campaign to, nurture our referral resources.
• 16:34
  It could be a lot of different things. Let's go through each one of these things, and we are going to measurably rank our potential for outcome on each one. And then we have a number and we say, okay, the and we call this an ICE score, I C E. And it measures impact and confidence and how easy ease of of execution. So then we come back and we say, okay, the highest score is this.
• 16:59
  How about we try start with that? So we're not just saying, I don't know, let's throw some spaghetti at the wall and see what works. We have a measurable reason for making all of these decisions. And then we plan out the year that way. And this takes a while and it should.
• 17:15
  And this is one thing we see a lot where people are not spending enough time and effort on that initial planning and thought and whatever. And it's like, let's just throw a bunch of stuff out and see see what sticks.
• 17:27
  Davina: Right. Right. And I I I see this all the time, and I know from a a marketing standpoint, there's no guarantees in marketing. And it Right. Be hard for people to say, well, I put all this money in and it didn't work.
• 17:42
  And a lot of times what happens is we get when that happens a couple of times, we get very vulnerable. And then somebody who's a marketer comes along and says and by marketer, I mean, they have a specific product or service that they're selling, and they come along and they say, but you haven't done this, and what you need is to you need to do this. Right. And then you try that, and then you go, well, that didn't work. And then now you're more more vulnerable than ever, and then somebody else comes along and goes, well, you tried that, but the reason why that didn't work is because this, we need to try this.
• 18:12
  And so they're really you really become sort of prey to different types of services. Yeah. Not that some won't work, but some are perfectly legitimate good services. But what you're talking about is really that 30,000 foot view. Yes.
• 18:28
  Tell me some of the things that you take into I rattled off a few, but tell me some of the things you take into consideration when you're sitting there with a law firm. Let's say a midsize law firm or a law firm that's plateaued Yeah. Or an and then we'll look at the new law firm. Well, let's look at that. What are you looking for in terms of, the opportunities that come into play as to what type of plan you choose for them?
• 18:54
  Karin: Okay. So we're gonna first start with talking about who their ideal client is. And everybody talks about this. And I don't mean to define it in a typical demographic ways. Like a lot of people will say, well, it's a 30 to 32 year old woman who has had a DUI.
• 19:14
  That's not what I mean. What I mean is, we're gonna probably add those elements in as sort of a sub definition, but the main definition is what is their problem? And I don't mean like what's wrong with them.
• 19:27
  Davina: Like, what is your problem?
• 19:28
  Karin: I mean, why are they calling you and why do they hire you? And if you have been what doing what you're doing for longer than five minutes, you know, you know, when you get that call and you're like, this is a good one. This is ideal. They're saying all the right things. And, this is also something that you kind of do have to learn over time because, you know, we've all made these mistakes early on in business where we're desperate to get our business going.
• 19:59
  And we learn all the hard lessons the hard way of what those might find. You take whoever
• 20:04
  Davina: walks through the door and we're happy to get the check. And I'm like, I wish I had taken that check.
• 20:09
  Karin: Exactly. It's like it does not, it's not worth it. Like whatever they paid me, it's not worth it. So, but you, you know, a lot of times you have to learn that the hard way, But some of the things I've learned over time are, you know, how does it feel? And I am not a woo woo person, but typically when I'm on a call with someone who is all red flags, I am trying to get off.
• 20:33
  There's something in my gut that's saying, oh, no. They're, when they ask a question, I I'm immediately, I get kind of defensive and I'm saying, no, no, no, no, no. That is not how it's done or whatever. So instead, just instead of kind of having those things play out, you know, while you're talking to them, I take notes and I make sure, and I start to write down, this is going to be a no. You know?
• 20:57
  And so then what I do is I transition to getting them off my plate and being a good resource for them. And a lot of times they end up coming back six months or, you know, a year and saying, you know what? And I try to tell them very professionally and in a way, you know, about the things that I feel like they're the path that they're on, that's not correct. Usually it's things that are very money focused and it's, things like why, why can't I just do my own website? And so usually my response is, do it.
• 21:33
  You know, go go ahead and you do that. Because if you're coming to me and you don't and you're not value based and you're not seeing the value, I'm not gonna try to convince you because it's something has fallen apart along that path. And I will say the way I've got my system set up, this doesn't happen that much anymore. They've already, you know, usually through my, my process and my system, they naturally drop off because there's some trigger that tells them it's not right. And that's perfect.
• 21:58
  That's what you want. So when I'm sitting with that initial company, it's what are your red flags? You already know what these are. And, you know, I gave you a few of my examples, but, are they, are they not value based and price based? Are they, Is there a certain kind of case here that you're looking to do?
• 22:18
  And they're asking about some other thing. Or when you're talking to them, do you get the feeling that, you know, you want to jump in? Like right away, you want to get going, you're excited about it. This is, this is, you know, a thing and you're going to tell your spouse about it at dinner. And you're like, this is something that you're excited about.
• 22:35
  Maybe it's something that you've been wanting to do and whatever. So how do you feel about it? And then let's talk about all of that and who that is. Let's get some examples. Let's maybe see if you can get some, referrals and references and reviews and all of that.
• 22:50
  But build around who they are. And then let's talk about where they show up so that you can be there. So let's say, so let me use my ex the example of how I do it for myself because it's so different for different law firms. But for me, I show up where lawyers are. So when I first started building my business, I was on lawyers talking about marketing.
• 23:15
  And the audience is specific to lawyers. So I wasn't just going out and writing articles about marketing on any old site that I could find because that's a waste of my time. You want to be where those people are. So that kind of goes back to defining who they are and thinking about, okay, what kind of media are they listening to? Are they listening to podcasts?
• 23:39
  Are they not doing any of that? And I need to do, ads at a bus stop. You know, where are they and what are they consuming where you can be present? That's where we kind of start. And then you kind of build your your, plan around it.
• 23:56
  Davina: Right. Right. I always tell people a lot of times when I'm going through with my coaching, it's comprehensive. So it's not around marketing. It's around, like, kind of your whole big picture, but we talk about who your ideal client is.
• 24:08
  And the way that I what I and this the way you said it, it was very similar to the way that I say it. But I tell them, I said, we're not talking about your existing clients. We're talking about your ideal client. This is the client. You've probably got two or three of them if you've been in a business for a while.
• 24:24
  At that point, you hang up the phone, you're doing your happy dance because Yeah. They've just hired you and agreed to work with you, and you're so excited about it. Right. So ideal client is different. And we're also talking about marketing messaging, which I think a lot of people don't really understand too.
• 24:39
  They think in terms of, well, if I target just this specific client, what if this type of client wants to come and hire me? Yep. And what what am I gonna do? And you could well, you can take that client too. Like, maybe that's your b category.
• 24:53
  Right. You want somebody of your a category hiring you, and you might have some b category come along and they it doesn't mean you can't take their work, but we're talking about in terms of who what who are we creating a message for Right. Out there. So let's talk about the difference in messages Yeah. To have some examples for people to go to.
• 25:12
  So think of a client that you've had recently, maybe one of your case studies where you really crafted a message for a particular demographic, psychographic sort of client. And can you tell us give us tell us that?
• 25:27
  Karin: Yeah. We've worked with a lot of different clients where, like, for example, in family law, we're gonna talk a lot about getting to the other side of this conflict. Potentially, you know, what is it that they care most about? Sometimes it's they care most about not, creating a, a hostile environment that damages their kid. So that when you start working on the feelings around that, what that client is feeling as they come to you versus what is typically originally the message, which is I am a X law firm in Y city and I do Z kind of practice area.
• 26:10
  And that doesn't address that feeling in any way. And it doesn't address, whether you can really fix that problem for them. So the message needs to be adjusted so that it's focused on them. It's focused on their problem. And then secondly, how you've done that in the past to present yourself as an expert in understanding the problem and showing solutions for other people.
• 26:41
  But if you lead with that second part, which many, many people do, and you can imagine and visualize the website that I'm talking about, where you see this a lot in personal injury sites, where it's all about the problem in a negative way, like accident pictures, and then a lot of dollar signs. And it's so smarmy coming across as like, all we care about is the money. And all we care about is getting you through, you know, turning you through our factory law firm in order to get a check. And it just comes across so negatively that it works if they really kind of are looking for reputation building, like if they wanna have appearances on CNN and things like that. It sort of works sometimes depending on, you know, kind of what they're saying.
• 27:33
  But in terms of new clients, It just comes across, your interaction with those clients is gonna be really different in terms it's all gonna be money based. It's all gonna be, you know, what are you doing for me this minute? And I own you and I own your hourly and I'm paying this hourly rate versus I understand that you understand me and you understand my problem and we're kind of more emotionally connected. So it feels somewhat subtle, but when I come across a website or a marketing campaign that is not doing it right, it's instant. And I instantly look at it and think, okay, I, I can anticipate what kinds of issues they're having with their traffic.
• 28:19
  People are coming, they're heading this impression, and then they're probably getting a lot of bounces where they're going off to another site to compare.
• 28:28
  Davina: Interesting. Interesting. What do you think you and I had a conversation recently on your podcast, and we were talking about women and women in law Yeah. And the experience of women lawyers. Have you noticed differences in terms of marketing and and how women, tend to want to market versus how men tend to want to market?
• 28:51
  Yeah. I know these are generalities for for anybody who's listening going on different. Well, yeah, people are different. But I'm just wondering if they're in, like, broad sort of things that you've noticed, in terms of women law firm owners versus men law firm owners in the marketing world.
• 29:06
  Karin: Definitely. I I feel like the legal industry has historically been this kind of old old guys' club. You know, a lot of old Caucasian males. I kind of picture, the Augusta Golf Course where it's like invite only, you know, all these guys sitting around and it wasn't just women. It's, you know, all anybody who wasn't a old white guy, you know?
• 29:32
  But my personal experience as a woman is that, you know, I noticed that more specifically. But there is a different approach. And what we've been seeing, and you and I talked about is that old school approach just is not working anymore. That's not what a sophisticated, potential client wants to see. And they're overwhelmed by that.
• 29:56
  And that it's not what they want to feel when they're coming to their website. So now we're talking about all these feelings and this messaging and this level of communication that is typically a more feminine approach. And so we're talking about not leading with your, I went to Harvard and, you know, I just finished a case that, you know, got my firm $5,000,000 You're not gonna lead with that. Maybe that's super important if you're really trying to promote a certain kind of case, but we're still not gonna lead with that. We're gonna lead with, so let's let's kinda stick with personal injury.
• 30:35
  Let's say that you had a certain kind of injury case. We're gonna lead with, we know you've been injured and you're overwhelmed and you want justice. And, you know, these are not the actual words we're gonna use because it's kind of cliche. But we're gonna talk about what they're coming to you for. And it's the same case.
• 30:54
  Like it, you know, we're talking about somewhat subtle adjustments. And that's gonna pull them in and say, yes, this, yes, that's it. All we're looking for is like that. Yes. Yes, you get me.
• 31:06
  Yes. Whatever. And then we're gonna say, and we've done this. And we understand. And we've got your answer.
• 31:13
  And we've got your back. And we're gonna do this. And then maybe if it feels really important to mention that you went to Harvard, you know, we can do that, but I'm gonna have a conversation with you about why, like, why are we saying that? Is it, is this somehow related to Harvard or is this your ego? Because if it's your ego, we're gonna set that aside.
• 31:32
  And, and that's not gonna be, you know, the, the critical part of this message where you've got like three seconds. So typically women are that I have worked with are more open to this cause they understand it. They understand it inherently from their gut. And they, they know that they can connect at this emotional level more easily. And especially older males who have, you know, a lot of times been in a firm for twenty plus years or whatever.
• 32:04
  That's always the hurdle. So when we're starting to work with a firm and they say we've plateaued. And then I'll say, okay, so let's talk about the decision makers in your firm. And we need to make sure that they're part of these conversations. Is there, you know, Larry, who I see is named on your, you know, on your website.
• 32:26
  He's one of the named partners. He's not here today. And is there a guy named Larry who's gonna come in at the last minute after we've done all this beautiful work and spent months figuring this stuff out? And he's gonna think, ew, this is weird. I don't feel comfortable with this.
• 32:41
  Like, we're not gonna do that. We're not gonna, you know, put all this effort into it and have Larry come in and throw a grenade in it at the end. So let's bring Larry in and we're gonna, you know, like slowly walk him through some, you know, mindset changes. But it's always this Larry at the top of the firm who is this hurdle that we need to get through. And I can't think of a time it's ever been a woman.
• 33:05
  Davina: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I I can I used to work for that type of law firm and Yeah? Golf I was golfing and the men always went golfing and they had retreats around golfing.
• 33:16
  And women were coming up as partners into it, went along with the golfing and all that, but they were only white women. Yeah. And, that was their idea of diversity. And so, it used to be very because like I said, for me, I was working for an agency in the nineties, and we did those online brochures. And Yeah.
• 33:37
  We're law firms. They were very formulaic, and it was always we put each of the lawyer's credentials. So their bio pages were these very long, and they're on the board of this and the board of that. And Yeah. And this is the way it was written.
• 33:50
  And it was all and I think the shift is it used to be I've seen this with my parents' generation. They look at doctors and doc everything comes out of a doctor's mouth is correct. Yeah. Even if their doctor hasn't studied medicine or knows nothing about nutrition for In six years. As long as they have.
• 34:06
  Right? Yeah. And and people used to look at lawyers and say, lawyers were up here and I'm down here. Right. And and I'm just gonna follow your good advice.
• 34:16
  And I think we live in a world now where people rely a lot on, I mean, with, with everything, all the knowledge of the world, right in your pocket, people don't rely on you for all of the, their legal answers. There's a lot of that. I can find answers in a lot of places. I have a cousin who's a lawyer. I research the law.
• 34:38
  I'm a highly educated person. You have sophisticated users and who have a lot of answers at their fingertips. So we have to instead of saying I'm this person on high who's delivering this expertise to you and you're gonna pay me a lot of money for it, we have to start looking at it more as we are working together to solve this problem for you. So it becomes two of us together working. And I think women are inherently, better at that.
• 35:08
  Again, generally speaking
• 35:10
  Karin: Right.
• 35:10
  Davina: Of me working as a team working together to solve the problem as opposed to me telling you what to do. Yeah.
• 35:17
  Karin: Well, and I I do think that's part of your intake process to figure out if the person you're talking to wants to work together. So when I send a proposal, the terms of our agreement is called a mutual agreement. And I do that very intentionally because we have a lot of, there's a lot of any project that requires feedback and input. I do not know you know, if we just met five minutes ago on the phone, I I do not know as much about your firm as you do. And so I need you to tell me what's going on.
• 35:53
  There's a good chance we're not even close to each other geographically. So I don't even know what your office looks like. Is it is it beautiful? Should we take some photos and use that as part of one? Do you get exactly.
• 36:05
  Are you virtual? Or do you have piles of cases that are collecting dust behind you and it's a mess? You know, so, so you need to be an active participant in this marketing process, but at the same time, if you are a micromanager or you feel like that's a necessary part of this process, it's going to fail. And so from the beginning, if you're hiring someone, if I'm hiring someone to change the oil in my car, I'm not gonna get under the hood and ask them what kind of screwdriver they're using. I am going to trust them.
• 36:45
  Bless you. Like you, I should be busy enough in my day that I've got something else to do while they're changing the oil in my car. And so think of it in that way. You do not need to be checking the fine details of my work. And if you feel that way, if you're getting that gut feeling, there's a bigger problem.
• 37:06
  And so let's take a step back, and I've been doing this long enough to know to have these conversations. Let's get on Zoom. Let's look at each other's faces. Let's talk about what's going on and what where that feeling is coming from. We're not gonna keep with that feeling because there's we're not gonna keep doing that.
• 37:22
  We've got other things to do. I've got other things to do. I know what I'm talking about. And I I want you to have confidence in the work that we're doing. But if you feel that way with your agency, don't just keep doing that.
• 37:36
  Figure out what's going on. Are they failing? Because then move on. Find somebody that you can trust and you can hand it over to. And, you know, for example, in my podcast, my producer knows that, you know, I don't even know if I should say this, but when she puts together social media graphics, I hardly ever even check them.
• 37:54
  She's so good. And I know I have confidence in her is what I'm trying to say. You know? And it's not that, I'm lazy. It's that I've been working with her for years to know that, she's good.
• 38:06
  She knows what she's doing. She knows how to find stuff. And sometimes she'll, you know, find little quotes and clips and do a thing that I wouldn't have thought of. And so I and so I've handed it over to her with a good degree of confidence. And it's really critical in whoever you're hiring, whatever they're doing.
• 38:23
  Davina: Yeah. I think it's I think that's very interesting. I have a social media. I mean, I have multiple people in different channels because I found that not everybody is the knower of all things. Yeah.
• 38:32
  And so I tend to have different areas of and so I have a someone who does my Instagram, and it's she's always the one, like, oh, Instagram has this new feature and whatever. And I'm like, I could care less. My eyes glaze glaze over. I'm glad she tells me. I'm glad she's on the lookout, and she looks for how we could leverage it.
• 38:49
  Yep. But I'm not the one going, you know, oh, good. Let's do this this way and that way. You know, I've got ideas. If I have something, I'll throw it out, but she takes and runs with it.
• 38:59
  And and that's a And I can tell
• 39:01
  Karin: you I'm not the
• 39:01
  Davina: one I don't wanna be doing it.
• 39:03
  Karin: Exactly. And when we're working with a firm, that we're excited about, I'm gonna go that extra mile. When you and and we don't do this anymore. We don't work with firms we're not excited about. We don't, have people come in and micromanage.
• 39:17
  So this is kind of like more in the past when we had worked with and learned these lessons, I am doing the bare minimum. I am checking the box and moving on. And this happens in every work situation. If and, you know, this is why there's so many books. I'm not a lead in a way that inspires action and it gets people to take the initiative and, and all of that.
• 39:38
  But you're stifling the potential for these people to be excited and offer more and go, you know, farther than you would have even potentially considered by, you know, micromanaging and getting in there and feeling like you gotta do it yourself. So, I mean, even at the very least, like when, we're helping them to arrange a photographer and they'll say, okay, what shoots do we need? What, you know, what angles and what, what, dimension should the photos be? And I said, okay, first of all, I've helped you find this photographer. They know what they're doing.
• 40:09
  Don't worry about the resolution of these photos. They are gonna send me what I need and leave space for them to be creative. If you are getting going to all this hassle, putting all this cost and effort and time into having a photo shoot or maybe a video shoot, leave some space for them to show up and look around and think, oh, you know what'd be cool is blank. And that's where the gold is, where you haven't hyper managed and controlled the creative process. And you've left them some space to do something cool that, you know, you wouldn't have thought of.
• 40:48
  Davina: I wanna ask you this question before we end because we're coming to the end, but I wanna you're not the you are not the least expensive. No. Service provider on the market. And, so I want I want and also, then you're saying, in addition to me doing the strategy, and we'll have somebody develop your website, you may need photos. We may need to do some, pay per click campaigns.
• 41:14
  We may need to do something on Instagram. We may need to do whatever. And you're kind of bringing these resources to your clients. And so there are additional things that they're gonna be investing money in. Right.
• 41:25
  Talk to me about how that value comes back to them. How do they see that value come back to them, and how quickly do they see that value come back to them? And I know you have different clients and different you know, some who only need this and some who need the whole array of things. So Right. But give me an idea of, like, how you, show them that that value is there.
• 41:50
  Karin: How much and how fast? Like, that's what the question of any business is, like,
• 41:53
  Davina: how much
• 41:54
  Karin: is it gonna cost and how fast can I get it? But, in, you know, of course, most businesses, the answer is it depends. Like, you know, I want a car. Well, if it's okay, how much do you wanna fit? But, all of that being said, we don't look at anything less than a year.
• 42:11
  And that doesn't mean that things don't happen within that year. But, when you're it depends on your geographic area, what your practice area is, where you're at now, what your expectations are. But it it you should be planning out for six months to a year for a lot of SEO campaigns. There are a lot of things you can do in the meantime that show a much more immediate, response. We do a lot of local service ads.
• 42:37
  That is a real quick way to turn things around and I won't bother explaining what that is. But if, if that's something that you urgently need leads, that's one of the first things that we turn to is local service ads. It's a different kind of pay per click ad. And like I said, I won't go into that. We have whole episodes on that.
• 42:56
  But it's something to, to look into if that's where you're at, if you've got a good budget. But what we, what we need to do is look at the whole year plan, you know, how much they're gonna spend, where their budgets are and, and then work backwards from there. And what we like to do with this fractional marketing, service that we offer that we are we call marketing co counsel, is we like to have a flat amount monthly so that, they know what their marketing spend is and they can plan that out, which is which is in the past really rare. It would have been like this much for your website, you know, tens of thousands here for the website and then, you know, a few thousand here for this and a few and it's like so hard to keep track and plan for any of that stuff. So by looking at a year, you can more easily kind of plan that, that budget out and kind of figure out how much you're gonna spend.
• 43:51
  Excellent. Excellent.
• 43:52
  Davina: And then you guys are really you mentioned earlier, you're really, very much data focused in your Yes. Model. One of the challenges I see sometimes with collecting data is, is that we can track as marketers, you can track to a certain point. And then once that call hits the office, we lose the ability to track unless there's they're doing it. So this really is a partnership in terms of you have to have people within the law firm who are willing to follow through with the tracking.
• 44:27
  Right. Once that call is coming in or once that email form is coming in or whatever, and the following up and collecting that data. Is that something that you kind of Yeah. Teach people how to do or tell them how you want them to do it? Or
• 44:41
  Karin: Well, and it depends. So to go back to local service ad thing, Google will actually record those calls, which has been fascinating because you can do it, use that data in a few different ways. Obviously, you can, track and say, Oh, this turned into a case that brought us this much money. So that's a nice way to fulfill all the blanks that used to be, you know, there in a typical marketing campaign where there's a, a cutoff where it's like, you know, they said that they came from Google. Well, was that the case or did they see a sign and then they Googled it?
• 45:14
  Or but now with those kinds of things, they can track the call and they can say, okay, this was Mr. Hernandez and his case was this much. That's number one. And then number two, you can also do sort of a secret shopper thing, which is not so secret because your team should know that you're listening. But where you can listen to the calls and say, what is happening?
• 45:34
  You know, are they answering and grumpy? Are they actually asking for people's phone number? Are, you know, is there some problem in the actual, answering of these calls? So, the at the end of the day, and I said this for years and years, even when SEO was a completely different thing, it shouldn't take a rocket scientist to know if your if your marketing is working. You know, in your not even in your gut, you know, in if your phone is ringing, you know, if you're making more money, you know, if the numbers are up.
• 46:05
  And, that's where to start. So to know if things are working and rolling, you it should be very obvious. You shouldn't need, you know, some expert to tell you that your phone is ringing and you're getting more clients. When it comes to where they're coming from and how that's working and which blog posts they're clicking on, yeah, that gets more in the weeds and everything. But keep it real high level in your own mind.
• 46:30
  I mean, there's a certain amount of the data that even for myself, it's like, I don't need to know every click on each blog post. I just know that there's a certain number of a certain amount of traffic coming in. And I know looking at it, oh, all these posts we're doing on AI, they're going bonkers, you know? So, okay. Like everybody wants to know about AI.
• 46:50
  So, you know, just know some high level things like that. And that helps you steer the ship so that as you're planning your strategy and going, going from quarter to quarter and knowing how to, what fine tuning adjustments to make. You say, oh, okay. I see, you know, we should be talking more about AI. And then what's dropping off the bottom?
• 47:08
  What what are people not caring about anymore? And, you know, in my case, email marketing. I'm gonna get to find out it's a big deal, but people aren't clicking on that as much. So let's do a little, you know, how how do we balance it out based on just what I'm seeing at a high level?
• 47:24
  Davina: Right. Right. Right. I think dedicated phone numbers are really good too for tracking your marketing once you get in once you get past that line because we Yeah. You can track all the all the website traffic, all the blog clicking, all of the LSA ads and all of that.
• 47:40
  But if you are if there isn't something that's showing this is where this is coming from Yep. That you you're dropping the ball. And and so it really is a it really is a partnership with your agency on looking at all the things of where because I think sometimes agencies get blamed for this isn't working or that isn't working. And really the issue, like you said, is the person answering the phone Yeah. Or the person who's taking the consultations doesn't have the right formula to close them, or there's not a tracking where we know where it's coming from.
• 48:11
  So we can say, you know, you're getting all this traffic, but then I don't know why you're not getting clients. Well, it's because Betty Sue on the phone is having a bad day.
• 48:20
  Karin: Exactly. Yeah. Well, and here's the other thing is this, it's usually not gonna be just one answer anymore. People don't just Google and then call. They're so when I know it's a good client, they say things like, hey.
• 48:34
  I listened to your podcast. And then I came and read an article, and then I saw that you, did x y z and you worked for this firm. And then I saw that you were over here on this other podcast with Divina and whatever. And they're seeing me all over the place. And each of those interactions with my sees keeps like ticking another little notch on the belt.
• 48:55
  And they're thinking. And then when it comes to the time where they're like, okay, today's the day I need to do something about my marketing. They think, okay, what am I, who am I gonna call? All of a sudden it's my name and face that pops into their brain and it's by design. It's not accidental.
• 49:11
  Davina: So Yeah.
• 49:11
  Karin: It should be that that case where you're not putting all your eggs in one basket and assuming that that is the path that everyone is gonna take.
• 49:18
  Davina: Yeah. I think that's a I think that's a great note to end on and a very powerful statement that, good takeaway for people is a marketing strategy involves a formula of these are the different these are the different ways we're going to reach out and be visible. And for us, for you and I, podcasting is a big role in that. Yeah. For other people that they may not care a thing about doing a podcast, and their audience may not listen to podcast.
• 49:45
  And so they may choose something else. But it there's a formula. There's multiple ways. Like with me, I do a podcast. I run ads.
• 49:52
  I have different social media platforms I'm on. And so it's the multiple touches that people say, well, I've listened to you for a while. I love your podcast. And Yeah. Then I you know, your face keeps popping up in my ads.
• 50:05
  And so I'm going, I really need to call her or whatever. So everybody's got their little mix of formula that they that they use that make a lot of sense. Yeah. Courtney, thank you so much for being here discussing marketing with us. I think there's some good takeaways in this episode for our law firm owners.
• 50:21
  Karin: I hope so.
• 50:22
  Davina: Tell us how we can find out more about you and connect with you.
• 50:26
  Karin: Well, I've followed my website, Conroy Creative Council. And you can either Google that or it's just conroycreativecouncil.com. And then all the links to all the social media, the podcast, all of this stuff is is on on there. So that's the easiest option.
• 50:41
  Davina: Good. Good. Good. Thank you so much. And we'll have it in the show notes as well for people.
• 50:45
  I appreciate you being here. As always, it's been fun, and I'll talk to you soon.
• 50:49
  Karin: Thank you so much.
• 50:51
  Intro: If you're ready to create more of what you truly desire in your business and your life, then you'll want to visit us at wealthywomanlawyer.com to learn more about how we help our clients create wealth generating law firms with ease.