Hopefully, you are using YouTube to post education-based videos to market yourself and your law firm. If you’re not, I highly encourage you to do so.
Here’s a problem many attorneys and their video companies have when using video to market their practices…
They don’t use YouTube effectively. Most simply use it as a repository hoping someone finds their video. They expect that simply uploading their videos to YouTube is the magic button to get people to call. Ironically, attorneys oft en don’t know if anyone calls from the videos they created. They don’t know if their videos are being watched. They don’t keep track of how many minutes their videos are watched. They don’t even know if anyone ‘likes’ or ‘dislikes’ their videos. They don’t know if anyone shares their video. Nor do they know if anyone comments on their videos.
All they know is they expended a great deal of time, effort, and money to create a bunch of videos and relied on their video vendor to put those videos on YouTube. What happens after that is mostly left to chance.
That is NOT an ideal way to use YouTube to market your law firm.
Here are some things to remember about YouTube:
1. Google is the #1 search engine in the world.
2. Google owns YouTube.
3. YouTube is the #2 search engine in the world.
4. Both Google and YouTube are advertising companies. They make their money from people who pay to advertise on their platforms.
5. YouTube wants viewers to stay on YouTube for as long as possible. That helps generate click and ad revenue. That means the longer you get your viewer to stay on YouTube, watching and interacting with your videos, the more YouTube will reward you in search.
How do you get people to stay and watch your videos? The overly-simple answer is to create content your viewers want and need.
What if you don’t know what your viewers want and need? Then you have a big problem.
But as a practicing attorney, you know what your potential clients want to know.
You know what questions they ask you each day.
You know what clients ask you during their lawsuits.
You know what clients want to know before, during, and after their trial.
You know what clients need to know in order to investigate their case.
You know what clients need to know in order to start their lawsuit.
You answer these questions every day. That means you already have great content that viewers (prospective clients searching for an attorney) want and need to know.
So How Do You Get Viewers To Interact With Your Videos?
Can you engineer a way that compels viewers to want to comment and interact with you on your videos on YouTube? The answer is yes, you can.
“How,” you ask?
“Simple. Talk about controversial topics,” is one easy answer.
“Won’t that generate haters and hateful comments?” you ask.
“It might. Then again, it might give you an entree into discussing the finer points of your topic.”
For example, I created a video titled “Can I Wear a Red MAGA Hat During Your Medical Malpractice Trial?”
Why would I create a controversial title and topic like that in a marketing video designed to teach and educate my ideal clients and consumers? A few reasons. One is that it’s a timely and trending topic. Two, it will polarize people on both sides. Three, I know there will be strong opinions on both sides as well. Four, I know viewers will jump in to comment since they can’t help themselves when this topic comes up.
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Five, I make it a point during my video that such an attempt to wear this hat would be absolutely ridiculous and not further my clients’ case. It would detract from the proceedings and make the case about politics. (It’s a classic defense strategy to get the jury off track from what they should be focused on.) I use the controversy as a jumping-off point to then teach and educate my viewers about trials and strategies attorneys use during trials. Once a viewer is interested in my video, they tend to watch other similar videos. That prompts them to leave more comments on other videos, especially if they have left one already. It’s the same concept of a buyer who just purchased an item online with their credit card. A fresh buyer is already primed to make another purchase soon after.
Your YouTube Channel Is Not Merely A Depository.
It’s a platform to get a community of people in one place talking about your videos, talking about your topics, and talking about what you’re teaching.
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The inherent problem with attorneys creating video is that we are in a niched area. We specialize in certain areas of law. Our videos are not as popular as viral puppy and kitten videos. They not as popular as highlight reels of sports. Nor are they as popular as America’s Got Talent. Anyone who thinks their education-based legal marketing video is going viral is sorely mistaken.
What that means is that you must engineer a way to get your viewers to interact with you and your videos using ethical tactics and strategies.
3 Ways to Improve Your YouTube Channel…
1. Your viewers need to leave comments
2. You need to create playlists
3. You need more subscribers
COMMENTS Invite your viewers to leave comments. If you don’t ask them to do so, they likely won’t. Just like with your call to action at the end of your video, if you don’t tell your viewer what you want them to do, they won’t know what to do and will likely leave without taking any action.
“If you found this video helpful, do me a favor and click the like button below and leave a comment telling me what you liked best and what the one key takeaway from this video was…”
“If you have a topic you’d like me to talk about in my next video, leave a comment below and tell me why you’d like me to talk about it…”
“I’d love to know if you’re a little closer to the people who think doctors can do no wrong, or do you think that doctors should be held accountable for their actions?”
Ask your viewer’s questions. They will answer them. It doesn’t matter whether you agree or disagree with them.
The point is that they are interacting with you. You are having a conversation with them about the topic in your video.
You must respond to every single comment you get. Do not let your marketing intern or video guy respond to these comments. They need to come from you. You also need to develop a thick skin and a backbone. Don’t be upset or offended if some online troll gives you negative comments. Use it as a springboard to reply and take a stand about your position.
Warning: If your commenter leaves a hateful or racist or curse-filled comment, I recommend deleting the comment and banning that person from your channel. If, however, you simply disagree with the comment, use it to your advantage and tell your commenter you disagree, and here’s why. Other people will jump in and comment on your comments.
Playlists
Remember when I said earlier that YouTube wants your viewers to stay on YouTube as long as possible? One of the best ways to keep a viewer on the platform longer is to create playlists with similar video content. Ideally, you want the playlists just to have your videos. However, one bold strategy is also to include your competitors videos in your playlist. (That’s a topic for another day.) If you put ten of your videos in your playlist and now promote the playlist to your social media platforms, there’s a good chance your viewers will stick around and watch more than one of your videos.
Here are titles to a few of my playlists:
1. Closing arguments in a medical malpractice trial
2. Opening argument ideas in a medical malpractice trial
3. “OBJECTION!” Attorney yells during trial
4. How medical malpractice cases work in New York
Ideally, you should be creating at least one new playlist a week.
Warning: Do not use any company that says they can get you viewers, subscribers, or increase your watch time using paid services. First, it goes against YouTube’s terms of service and second, you want this to happen organically. That means no paid ads, no black-hat techniques. No buying non-sense. That means that a 45-second video talking about some arcane area of law should not have 37,486 views no matter how dynamic a speaker you are.
Get More Subscribers
The simple way is to ask your viewers to subscribe to your YouTube channel. “Hey, if you liked this video and want more videos like it, just click the subscribe button below, and you’ll get notified every time we release a new video.”
That’s the simplest and easiest way to get new subscribers. Ask your viewer to do something as simple as clicking the button. They don’t have to enter their email or phone number. Plus, if they find your videos, not to their liking, they can always unsubscribe.
Another simple way to get viewers to subscribe is to cross promote other people in your videos. Let’s say you’ve interviewed an accident reconstruction expert on your video. At the end, you might encourage your viewer to subscribe to your expert’s video channel to watch more of his great content. Then you can ask your expert to do the same on his video interviewing you or promoting you and your legal services.
Key Take Away
YouTube is a social media platform.
It’s a great search engine as well.
If you keep in mind that it’s a social media network and use it as such, you have the potential to generate interest with your ideal clients. You have the potential to get YouTube to realize you have useful content that your viewers love and want more of. That gets your viewers to stay longer, which often correlates to more watch time (and more ad revenue for YouTube).
Till next time, see you on video! ◆
