In this episode, Jim and Tyson will explain and discuss why is it so important to introduce personal stories in your firm’s marketing strategy. Also, they will go through some examples of how you can do it.
Personal stories let clients get to know you and connect better. This will make them feel closer to you and trust you more. This episode is full of great stories and example from Tyson and Jim that will make you laugh and will inspire you to apply new strategies to your marketing. HUGE TAKEAWAYS!
You should get:
The Ultimate Sales Machine: Turbocharge Your Business with Relentless Focus on 12 Key Strategies Paperback – May 27, 2008
by Chet Holmes
https://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-Sales-Machine-Turbocharge-Relentless/dp/1591842158
Hacking’s hack: A book. Get more connected to yourself. Meditate. The Surrender Experiment: My Journey Into Life’s Perfection by Michael A. Singer
Tyson’s tip: https://www.tableau.com/
Tableau helps the world’s largest organizations unleash the power of their most valuable assets: their data and their people.
Read more at https://www.tableau.com/#AIOvVaBIiIFoXxaW.99
Have you used it? Please let us know what you think!
Thanks so much for listening to the show! If you want to know more about this and keep on maximizing your firm, please join our Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/403473303374386/ or like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MaximumLawyerPodcast/ and comment!
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Transcripts: Personal Stories and Marketing
Jim Hacking
We want to build connections with our readers or our listeners in ways that are above and beyond the normal. Hey, this is what you need to know about the law. You know, so often lawyers feel comfortable talking about what they know. And so anything we can do to sort of build a bridge to clients or potential clients, it really goes a long way towards establishing rapport getting people to, as you say, know, like and trust. Run your law firm the right way.
Unknown Speaker
This is the maximum layer podcast, podcast. I’m
Jim Hacking
your host, Jim hacking and Tyson metrics. Let’s partner up and maximize your firm. Welcome to the show. Welcome back to the maximum lawyer Podcast. I’m Jim hacking it I’m taking matrix What’s up, Jimmy? Oh, Jason, good to be back on the air. Always happy to have guests and always happy to be on with you. Lots to talk about today. I think we’ve got a good topic and you want to introduce it?
Tyson Mutrux
Yeah. Before I do, though, I want to give a shout out Todd Mandel. He’s a listener. I didn’t know it was a listener. He’s an attorney at St. Louis. I ran into him in the elevator yesterday. And he said he liked the show. And he said he wanted to come on. Sometimes we I get them on. So I just want to give them a shout out right to this topic.
Jim Hacking
I think it’s interesting that you say that because, as you noted, one of our biggest listened to episodes so far was the first one with will Norman and I think that people really like it when they have on lawyers that want to discuss what’s going on in their own practice. I think that’s been sort of our more popular trend of, of episodes.
Tyson Mutrux
It’s not one of the most listened to will Norman’s first episode is the most listened to episode that we have. And John Fisher’s was before and is killed John Fisher’s so sorry, John, will not get off the mountain itself. Anyway. So I think you’re right. I think that people love listen to really people that are in their similar situations that they are so but the topic of the day is really introducing our personal stories into our marketing. This is your idea. And I think it was really great. I think it may have come after we listened to Marcus Lemonis speak is that where the idea came from? Yeah, that
Jim Hacking
was definitely part of it. And then Pat Flynn had an episode on Smart Passive Income that made me sort of remember why it is that we infuse our marketing with our personal stories,
Tyson Mutrux
really funny. So this is all sort of tying together. I talked to Mike Campbell the other day, and Mike Campbell has got a very, very personal story about personal injury, that I’m not going to tell all it, let him tell it if you ever want to tell it, but it’s something that really allows him to relate to his serious injury client. And I was telling him that he needs to when he’s comfortable, he needs to really use that message because it allows you to connect with your clients. And I think it’s so impactful when you can bring those personal stories to the table, whether you are meeting with a client, whether it’s over the phone, whether it’s in your marketing messages, whatever it may be, if you can bring in your personal stories, it just allows that added layer of connection.
Jim Hacking
Yeah, you know, obviously, I don’t do personal injury work anymore. But I have been a plaintiff of my own, I was involved in litigation. And I remember what it was like to get emails from my attorneys and being able to tell that to clients when I was doing tort work, I think it really helps build that connection. And that’s really what we’re talking about today is that we want to build connections with our readers or listeners in ways that are above and beyond the normal. Hey, this is what you need to know about the law. You know, some so often lawyers feel comfortable talking about what they know. And I don’t think they’re necessarily doing it in a braggy way, I think we just sort of slip back into lawyer speak, we spent a lot of time with other lawyers, we were trained to talk a certain way and think a certain way in law school, and that that sort of builds this artificial wall between us and potential clients who obviously are not lawyers for the most part and do not sort of run in those circles. And so anything we can do to sort of build a bridge to clients or potential clients. It really goes a long way towards establishing rapport and getting people to, as you say, know, like, and trust us.
Tyson Mutrux
Yeah, and so uh, you know, does a really good job of this is this goes to your point about all the attorneys do the same thing is, if you go to a lot of attorney websites, their marketing is blank number of years in business or have experienced, they got these awards on their website. They’ve got a free consultation, all that kind of stuff. Right. You look at Steve Bartels website, he has a really good one where he, he talks about why he became an attorney and why he does what he does. And it’s really great. So if you’re going from website to website looking for a client, that’s a really good way of differentiating yourself because everybody I’ve talked to that I’ve shown Steve’s website, they are really just shocked about how great it is and how you can really build that rapport early on with just your change of your homepage. So that’s a really good way that that attorneys listen to this can really see you go just go to your webpage, change it, make it more personal tell clients, why you’re doing what you’re doing. Feeling, it’s really going to allow you to build that rapport before they even call your office.
Jim Hacking
What are some ways Tyson that you have tried to be more personable to be more relatable, and to maybe some specific examples of times where you’ve talked about yourself or revealed about yourself that sort of made a connection that you know, with some of your readers or listeners?
Tyson Mutrux
Well, I will say this, I usually is, you know, I came from a blue collar background, I mean, one of my parents graduated from high school, my dad’s mechanic, so you have to know your audience. And so but anytime I’m meeting with a client that is in a lower income category, I always sort of try to bring something like that up. Because a lot of times, what they’ll do is you have these, these sort of these barriers that you’re you’re talking about between you and the client, because they automatically assume, you know, I’m an attorney, these are just assumptions that they make. I’m an attorney that, you know, I’m wealthy, you know, I’ve got really nice suits drive a sports car, I have a nice house. And so they have these thoughts about you. And these, you have these barriers you saw at the break down. And so anytime I go into a house or meet with a client, my office, that is of lower income, can you even tell at times, I tell the stories I tell the stories about growing up, I do all the time, I do without exception, because I want to be able to relate to those clients, and they really love it, they really do. You can tell you can see as their shoulders start to, you know, get more comfortable that they start to breathe a little easier. They know that I’m just not some suit, I will tell you that I do that without exception, because it does allow me to relate to these clients.
Jim Hacking
Well, that’s great, because anybody that knows, you knows, in fact that you don’t have any really good suits that you drive a crappy car, and then you don’t have a nice house. So I think that the faster you can get that to people.
Tyson Mutrux
Right, that’s right. I’m gonna get you.
Jim Hacking
I think that you’re right that I was talking to my son Yusuf yesterday, and, and he said, Dan, most people hate lawyers. And I think we forget that sometimes, especially when we are in our lawyer bubble that a lot of people just sort of come in, like you said, with preconceived notions about about us and who we are. And I think that, you know, they sort of assume we were born on third base, and that we just sort of, you know, got a lot handed to us. And I think that anything you can do to relate like to talk about jobs that you had, when you were younger, or, you know, that’s the real thing about about personality in your copy or in your messaging is that what you’re trying to do is just find something that connects to someone else. And, you know, John Fisher told this story when he was on our show. But when I first was in Bend glasses coaching group, I went to the first conference that he had, and then a year later, I went back and during the course of that year, I had gotten his newsletter, and I had read a lot of his messaging. And I knew that he was a marathon runner that he runs marathons with his sons. And that when I came back from that second conference, I had literally, I don’t think spoken to them, or maybe I talked to him for just a minute. But I said to my wife, when I came back, I was telling her about the conference and I, and I said, Yeah, my friend, Ben Glass, ran the the Marine Corps Marathon a couple of weeks ago, because she’s a runner, and she likes to run. And it just struck me that I introduced this person to my wife, conceptually that I had never actually met. And so to call him my friend, when it’s someone that I hadn’t even met, that really stuck with me, and it became, for me, one of my guiding principles in my weekly newsletters is, you know, not only do I not want to be boring, but I also want to introduce people that in a salesy way or boast the way but just, you know, like telling things that happen around the office, like one of the things that I got a lot of reactions to was, when I did that interview with Channel Four. And on the day that they called, I was dressed like a bum. So I had to put on a shirt and tie. And they went out and sit on the street and get interviewed and my shorts, and my oxford shirt and my tie, and I could have been a big fuddy duddy and just, you know, taking that picture that someone took me and put it in a file somewhere. But that just seemed like something that would break down one of those barriers of a stuffy attorney and people absolutely loved.
Tyson Mutrux
That is actually my favorite picture of you. It’s pretty, pretty awesome. I always prefer a little more clothing on you, though. But that’s just my personal preference. You know, it’s really interesting. So Chet Holmes, his book, Ultimate Sales Machine, he talks about how you should always incorporate your stories into your marketing messages. And so that’s something we actually have tried to focus on on the initial phone call. And so anytime we tried to either have engineer Kelsey tell stories about me or Chris, or, or about similar clients, obviously, I don’t mention the clients name, but similar cases to those clients. This also sort of build that connection because Chet Holmes just talks about the same. It’s all about building those connections. And so at any point, you can insert that message and that’s where like The way you do, it’s great because your social media and with your newsletter, you are always tying in those personal pictures. You know, I think you hit something with you and Amani, I don’t know if it was her birthday, or if it was your all’s anniversary, I can’t really remember what it was. But it was, I believe, is a picture of you and a Barney and your newsletter. It was really great. And can you speak to I know, personally, that any Facebook posts where I incorporate my family, especially my kids get a ton of clicks and shares. It’s just incredible. Do you have any numbers? Or just anecdotally, do you know, like, click throughs for your newsletter if they if it’s increased with that as well? Oh, yeah,
Jim Hacking
I mean, I don’t have specific numbers. But I know that we’ve gotten a lot more engagement. Whenever I tell stories, about things in our family, people always just from the responses, I always get many more responses when I’m telling something like So on Monday, I was doing my Monday newsletter, and it happened to be my daughter’s eighth birthday. So I just sort of talked about her in her, you know, sort of her birth story and then about how she’s, you know, such a great part of our life. And then, you know, then I sort of segwayed from that into talking about how, you know, just as much as I love my daughter just as special as I think my daughter is my clients who are living in Syria trying to get to the United States, or who are living in France and want to be reunited with their mother, they feel the same way about their family. And so I always try to do a little bit of teaching about immigration and try to make it relevant. So you know, like, a Nora and I once went to an indoor soccer game, and there was a client of ours playing for the ambush. And, you know, so I was able to sort of tell that story about, you know, how Nora got to meet the soccer player, and he’s has this kind of ease, and I use that to sort of tell the story about the visa and you know, so that’s one part of it. But really, the greatest example I have of the is, using my social media, my most popular things are with stories about my clients. So, you know, immigration is generally a happy place when people are done. Immigration, not deportation. But immigration is a happy place. And people when they get their green card, or they get their citizenship, that’s something where I can, it’s completely about them. It’s not about me at all, I tell the people story, I talked about how they’re contributing and helping out in America. And I really do that to sort of combat the anti immigrant messaging that’s out there. But also just to help build connection. And people look at it and say, Well, if that person can do it, then I can do it. And it’s just so much more interesting than, you know, not to bang on our buddy, Gary. But sometimes these emails that we get with I got $100,000 verdict and blah, blah, blah, or $100,000 settlement. I know that’s important, but it’s just sort of dry. And it’s not story based when Gary gets with clients on and has them tell their story or talk about how good Gary is or when Gary tells stories about diving and his trips, I think people find those much more interesting.
Tyson Mutrux
Let’s rag on Gary for a second. And we’re gonna allow him to defend himself, we can bring it back, God, you’re right. And I think that that’s a good example of bad marketing. All right, well, let him defend himself. People don’t care about your million dollar settlement. Whatever other attorneys they give, like on a hey, congratulations, whatever. But guess what, you’re not building a connection. And actually, a lot of people are turned off by it lobby, like, oh, my gosh, this guy bragging about how much money he’s got, right? So I think you should maybe whenever you’re crafting your marketing message, and try to incorporate these stories, think about how the end viewer is going to view it. And if they’re gonna be sort of turned off by it, you may not want to do it. Now. I will say he does something through LinkedIn where he does something very similar. However, I think that that’s probably a better way of doing it, because I’m guessing he’s fishing for referrals there, which is a good idea. So you show how great you’re doing a personal injury, attorneys are going to be more likely to refer you cases because they’re going to get you the most bang for the buck. So I could see maybe that’s why he’s doing it there. In his newsletters. I completely agree with you. So he got changed the message, we’ll bring him on we’ll let him Let him defend themselves in way and we can compare side by side yours versus and I’m not saying one way or the other. But that one element of his newsletter he needed to cut out just because I just don’t think people care about it. I think that they’re most people are turned off by it. Just because it’s a it’s more bragging than anything else. Is there is there is a formula somewhat that you use, right where you where you break up your newsletter, like how much of its personal how much? How much of its business?
Jim Hacking
Yeah, I almost always lead off with a story about something that’s the family or something with the firm. Like if a doubleheader baby or something happens. It’s interesting that about, like real life stuff and not about the law. I think that’s a good way to start. And I think Gary has come a long way in his defense. I mean, when he first broke off from his partner and wanted to do his same old marketing of a lot of those Missouri Lawyers Weekly reprints with the settlement, that judgment and all that stuff, and that’s all well and good, but in all honesty, when I see those my eyes just sort of glaze over. I scroll down to the next thing to find something interesting. Hey, I want to read you an email that I got a while back and so Oh, one other example of this working was when the latest Star Wars came out, I guess it’s Episode Seven, back in December of 15. I sent out an email. Actually, I made a YouTube video, I got all my old 1970s Star Wars toys, and my daughter and I set them all up my Millennium Falcon, my depths are all my little action figures. And I set them all up on the table. And then I, I went through a video with her and showed who all these people were and everything. And then I sent that out in my newsletter, and obviously has nothing to do with immigration law. And I also talked about how my son Ibrahim, and another story was doing a class presentation on being a lawyer or like he had to act like he was a lawyer, and one of my clients from Iraq sent me back this email. Hi, dear Jim, I always read your weekly email info you share with you and I feel so honored of that. When I read about how much you like Star Wars movies, since you were a kid, I feel Wow, how nice you share that with me because I like that too. And today in the morning, I read about your son who has the same name like my dad had, Abraham was so wonderful. To take a part of that information you bring in the lawyer, it feels like I was reading about my favorite nephew, that email made my day. Thank you so much my best wishes to your wonderful family.
Tyson Mutrux
Very nice. I love it. And that’s that personal connection that you’ve built with that client? That’s fantastic. How’d that make you feel? And you got that?
Jim Hacking
Well, I think I think that we, when we meet with clients, we’re actually probably pretty good at building rapport. And I think that most people who were talking to people look for one way to make a connection. I mean, who would think that a fella from Iraq who does happen to be around my age, would like Star Wars as much as I did. So you never really know what’s going to build that connection. And I think it really is a way that you know, you never know what you’re going to hit on and what’s going to spark a note with particular people. So I think that, you know, half the content I write, I don’t necessarily do it with an agenda, I just write it sort of both the chips fall where they may.
Tyson Mutrux
Alright, I want to sort of highlight the points that we’ve made here, like where you can insert your messages. And I’ll give you a couple more examples where you can, or at least from me, but you do it in a newsletter, you can do it in the initial phone call, you can do it once hold while people are waiting to talk to you, you can do it. In almost I said newsletter, I think I said newsletter, newsletter initial call initial meeting to do three videos. So that’s something that I’ve done with our staff. So people get to know the staff is I’ve interviewed them on camera. And that video goes out to the call on to clients so they can get like they get to know they’ve been put a face to a name and sort of get to know your staff. That’s another way of doing it. And it’s something you reminded me with that email of one, we sent out a Christmas card every year. And it’s a picture of the family with the dog sometimes not always a picture of family. And it goes out to everybody. And I remember one year, a client posted on Facebook and tagged me and he said he said the only Christmas card I got a system like not even didn’t even get any Christmas cards from family, the only one he got was from his attorney. And he posted it on Facebook with a picture. It was fantastic. So there’s things like that where you connect with people, you don’t really realize it until until they let you know. So you’re making more connections with these people than what you think whenever you do really insert these personal messages. So do you have any more, I guess, ideas or tips or feedback and how people can insert those messages into their marketing or into their operations?
Jim Hacking
Well, I just think that if you took all the types of ways to communicate about yourself and to convey personal stories, that video is without a doubt the easiest, the quickest. And the deepest way to build a connection with someone. I mean, they don’t call Facebook, Facebook for nothing, it’s about the face. And so anytime that people can see your face, and your personality will come through when you have 20 or 30 videos on YouTube, people are going to get to know you by the way you talk, the way you smile, the way you act the way you laugh. And I just think that video, there’s no substitute for it. And it can be on a green screen like we do it can be at your desk. I mean, it’s just it’s there’s no substitute, you could take all the other ways to try to build rapport other than face to face but video is the one way where you can do it and it’s working all the time for you because people can watch your videos whenever they want or wherever they want. And there’s just no equal substitute for the way that you can tell your story. And only your story on video.
Tyson Mutrux
Yeah, I mean Jimmy I watch a lot more of your videos if I can blow your face out so I don’t but now just kidding I couldn’t agree with you more video is a game changer. If you think that you’re too late to the show on the for the videos. You’re not still up dive. John Fisher did point out something that came here if it was on maximum lawyer or bathroom experience, but he did say that he’s talking about how there’s so many junk live videos now. It’s sort of a I’m diluting a lot of the messages. But I still think that there’s plenty of opportunity there. And even if you’re not going live, actually doing recorded video on YouTube, it’s showing up a lot of miners showing up in the searches and yours are as well. So I think that’s still a great way to go with video, they get to know you, it’s really interesting. The type of client you get whenever they’ve seen your video, as opposed to one they just found on the internet or heard whatever it may be. It’s really interesting how different it is. I had a client couple months ago, she’s telling me how great she loved the videos. And then she went to our YouTube page and her channel and watched a bunch of other videos to go Oh, my gosh, is so great. I had all these questions I was going to call you about I did I didn’t have to because I was just watching your videos, because they keep doing it. So there’s plenty of benefits to do in video. So do you have anything else that you want to get to the tip of the hat of the week?
Jim Hacking
I want to know when you’re going to start your newsletter and start telling people your stories week to week.
Tyson Mutrux
Well, how about this, I want to give you a firm commitment. A week for Monday. So this is going to hit I think in two weeks maybe. So the first the week that this launch is I will have my first newsletter out deal.
Jim Hacking
Yeah, it would have come out the day before, right? This episode. Come out on Monday, right? Well, you have all the tools now with the new infusion, soft email builder, it’s just as easy as can be. And once you build out the template, then it’s just a matter of coming up with the stories each week. And you’ve got plenty to talk about. And it’s not like you don’t have any news in your life. So you got plenty that’s
Tyson Mutrux
true. I did send an email last year and I don’t really like that or these newsletters. So I do send emails throughout the year that are a little personal. I sent one on Halloween, I sent it one on Christmas Eve but instead on Christmas. And it was about, you know what, how we growing up enjoyed Christmas Eve and the excitement about it. So those are just a couple more ideas that you can actually insert personal messages. I think on the Halloween one, we talked about how awesome it is to sort of get kids dressed and in their costumes and all that. So I do insert those messages throughout the year just not necessarily through a newsletter. So I’ll definitely have the newsletter, or maybe I’ll even, maybe I’ll even plug my, my least favorite immigration attorney in it. Who knows. So give us your hack of the week.
Jim Hacking
So when we were getting ready to leave Infusionsoft convention, we did, or I did count a little bit of Vern Harnish. And he led off with three books that he recommended, and I’m making my way through two of them. And one of them, I really don’t know what to make of it. I don’t know why he picked it, I think I think it’s going to come up to a business point towards the end. But I’m reading this book by Michael singer called the surrender experiment. And at first, it’s all about him and this hippie lifestyle he had back in the 70s. But it’s the craziest thing, I can’t stop listening to it. I don’t particularly love the book, I don’t think it’s the best book ever written. But the story in the way the author reads the story, and I’m listening to it on Audible. But anyway, I think that it’s gonna teach me some lessons. And it’s definitely teaching me some lessons on just chilling out. But in general, I think it’s gonna get to a point where he’s talking about how we can get, you know, more connected to ourselves and sort of steal our mind. And from a standpoint right now, as busy as we are anything that I any chance I get to be quiet or to meditate, it’s really time will will take
Tyson Mutrux
and that’s a really good one. Before I get to my tip of the week, I do want to remind everybody, we haven’t done this on the show, to go to the Facebook page, request to sign up for or not sign up. But request to join the Facebook page. Make sure you like us. On Facebook, there’s an actual group and a page to go to both. And then also make sure give us a five star review on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast helps quite a bit. We’re getting some steam we’re getting our listens are going up quite a bit. But we need people to actually like review, it helps us get more listeners. So and this is a free podcast, it doesn’t cost anything, don’t even have advertising. So it’s good to least share and we appreciate it. So my tip of the week is actually an app. And it’s an app slash or website. And I’m gonna I’m actually going to give a tip of the week on something I have not used, but it’s something that is really, really cool. That I want to use I’ve not really appears on because I want to sort of get feedback from listeners to see if they’ve used it. See it’s worthwhile to look called Tableau. Ta b l e au Have you heard of that, Jimmy? No, I haven’t. Okay, so what it does that really, you plug in all of your services that you use, marketing wise, business wise. So QuickBooks, you plug in any other say like square use that for sales to take credit card purchases, you’re gonna plug in Infusionsoft, you’re going to plug in RingCentral you’re gonna plug in all the services that you use, and it’s going to break down a basically digest all the numbers for you. So it’s got these algorithms and what it does it It identifies weaknesses in your business. It identifies opportunities in your business and analyze those that data. So I think it’s a fantastic idea. It looks pretty friggin awesome. I just haven’t had a chance to use it. So if anyone any listeners have had experience with it, I’d love to hear back from you. Email me, Tyson at maximum lawyer.com or Jim Jim at maximum lawyer.com We’ll have you on the show have you had some experience with it? Because it sounds like a really, really awesome service that could benefit us as attorneys. So I wanted to give a tip I want those ones right that not all the other ones we’ve either used or benefited in some way. This one I have not so just take that small caveat. But Jimmy getting the else. Yeah, I
Jim Hacking
was just gonna say that if any of our listeners want to get on the show, they should shoot us an email or hit us up on Facebook that I think that those episodes when people have something they want to talk about or get our feedback on those have been the most successful and most helpful I think and the ones that people feel the most connection with so if you want to be on the show, just send us a message on the maximum lawyer facebook group page or message us and and we’ll get you on
Tyson Mutrux
we know there’s a couple people that have requested to come on we haven’t had you on yet. We will have you on we promise just with scheduling between me and Jim and then also the the other guests that can be behind the times we’ll get to we promise that again. Yes, absolutely. Jim, we have people that want to come on we we love having people on sort of analyze or whatever it was say your situation and maybe help you talk through it and walk through it and everything else. So give me all anything else. Thanks. Pretty good episode. Everybody
