Law Firm Marketing isn’t one size fits all! There’s no full-proof formula to be successful, navigating it is a full-time job but if you’re up for the position…TAKE IT!
During the COVID lockdown, Amanda Shaffer took on the task to not only automate her firm but to make a name for themselves by revamping their marketing strategy.
She’s tested out different options and every day is another step in her journey to becoming a powerhouse in the courtroom and online.
Our new segment #FollowAttorneyAmanda is a Vblog dedicated to taking an inside look at Amanda’s marketing journey.
Tune in every Tuesday and take a peek into her journey and leave with some tips, tricks, and some “what not to do’s” like:
- Understanding the New Tik Tok Lawyer Trend
- How to spruce up your law firm’s boring content
- Utilizing other ways to showcase the success of client cases
- How to break out of your shell when networking
- How to create other opportunities for revenue for your firm
Video Transcript
Amanda Shaffer: Hi, my name is Amanda Shaffer. I’m an attorney at the Shapiro Law Firm in New York City. We practice immigration, family, and criminal law. You can check us out on Facebook and Instagram and YouTube and LinkedIn and Twitter. I think I got them all. I just got off the phone, or Zoom, with Steve and Megan, and they had asked me to put together a video blog about my experiences with marketing with the firms to share with all of you and hopefully give everyone some insight into what it takes to really build up your firm and what I’ve done and what works, what doesn’t, et cetera. So first, I’ll give you a little introduction about who I am, what my background is with all this. I do not have any business background, or marketing background, or advertising background. I was a political science and sociology major at the University of Michigan, go blue!
Obviously, I got my JD, I’m a lawyer and I was never that much into the business side of things. My dad is a CPA and I just thought it was all pretty boring. I had a big learning curve when it came to doing everything. Now, another important thing you need to, or I found I needed to be good at, to do this stuff on my own was, using technology, computers. I also do not have a background in IT or computer science or anything like that. I’ve actually had to teach myself everything that I have done. It’s not that hard if you focus and you want to do it, but it definitely takes a lot of time and a lot of patience.
So I graduated from law school in 2012 and I could not find a job at the time. The market was not great and Aaron Shapiro – he’s my brother-in-law he had started his own firm a couple of years earlier. Basically, he’s like, “You can come work for me. It’s just me, but I don’t really have a seat for you. I can only employ you part-time because I’m going to lose money.” Basically, He’s like, “if you can make us profitable, then you can work longer hours, and maybe we can turn this into something.” We could skip to eight/nine years later, now I’m a partner. My journey from literally at times sitting on the floor of his office to being his partner, it’s been a long journey, especially because, although I might not seem that shy, I’m not great at networking events, so I hate going to them. I feel so uncomfortable. That was part of the reason it took me a very long time to get off my feet when it comes to growth.
What happened was after I was working for him for a few years, he kept telling me, “You got to bring in business. You’re going to make more money. We’re going to grow if you bring in business.” I tried to do some networking, but I wasn’t that great at it and he seemed to have a natural ability with it. He could pick up a client on the street. I couldn’t. I said, “Well, why don’t I make a website?” We had some website, but you couldn’t even find it. There was no SEO and stuff. The first thing I did was I created a website. I used Wix.com and – oh, I also have zero design experience. My experiences are very narrow, so I didn’t really know what I was doing, but the one thing I did have was really good content and information.
I spent nine months working on the website – the initial website. I would go to work, I’d work 9-5, I’d go home, eat, work out, and then work on the website till 1:00 or 2:00 AM. It took me like nine months. When I finally launched it, in about a year, I doubled my salary. That’s what told me that, all right, I’m onto something here when it comes to marketing, digital marketing, online marketing, and we were doing pretty well with that. We have a blog which is very important, regularly updating the website on stuff like that, and everything was going okay. We were growing. I’d say I was getting frustrated with – we were steadily going up, but it was at a very – what’s it called? Narrow curve, not narrow curve, whatever. But the point is that COVID hit, so everything changed and when COVID hit and I’ll talk about that in my next video blog, what I ended up doing, that’s when I realized that we really had to make a shift in how we marketed and how we’re going to earn our clients because suddenly, a year ago today, I was home 24/7. I had my entire office at my home. The phone stopped ringing, because people were home and not making money. We had to figure out what to do and that’s what I’ll talk about in my next video blog series – episode, I guess. We’ll talk about turning to social media marketing. I’m not sure how I’m supposed to sign off, but I will see you next time.
