All Eyes On You: How Lawyers Can Harness Video for Visibility – Legal Up Virtual Conference by InfoTrack

Episode Notes

Transcript

Joe Scott:

Hello and welcome to On the Road with InfoTrack and Legal Talk Network. I’m Joe Scott, one of the programming coordinators at Legal Up the annual virtual conference hosted by Infotrack. Over the next few weeks, we’ll present special episodes of On the Road Podcast to highlight some of the best insights from past events. This segment focuses on what has become a major part of our professional lives, as well as one that many people misuse. I’m talking about video meetings to help legal professionals avoid the many setbacks and pitfalls. We picked one of our favorite presenters from this year’s event, Temi Siyanbade. She presented all eyes on you, how lawyers can use video to amplify their reach. Temi is an attorney, she’s also a content creator and a video consultant who works specifically with legal professionals. And on this episode, she offers a terrific breakdown for getting your message heard. We really hope you enjoy this episode. And please don’t forget to pre-register for the Legal Up Virtual Conference at Legal Up 2020 six.com.

Temi Siyanbade:

I’d like to start by asking a question. Alright, so why do some lawyers get invited, quoted and seen while others don’t? We see the lawyers who seem to always get the interviews or the lawyers who seem to always get the clients though lawyers who seem to get into the articles. What is it that they’re doing? I know sometimes we think that, hey, maybe it’s the fact that they’re smarter, but guess what? That’s not it. Sometimes we think it’s because they’ve practiced longer. Hey, that’s also not it. They might have less experience than you. It’s also not the fact that they have more degrees. It’s not that they’re perfect and that they don’t mess up. And it’s not even that they’re more confident. It’s not because they’re better than you, it’s because they are visible and visibility changes everything. And that’s what we really want to unpack today.

And so that’s why we’re doing this All Eyes On You presentation, how legal professionals can use video to amplify their reach. I like to think of it as an opportunity to leverage our abilities to connect with people. A regular person like you can leverage video in order to gain visibility and it can literally change the trajectory of everything in their lives because that’s what it’s done for me. So today I want to empower us to really step into that. My personal goal is to turn, I could never do that into let’s go live, right? I want you to show up, not just as a lawyer, but as a leader. And I want you to feel like visibility isn’t a risk, but it’s your next bold move. By the end of this session, you’ll be able to walk away with tools to build brand authority, establish trust and credibility, and attract aligned opportunities.

We really want to make sure that you are able to step out boldly and really connect with the opportunities that were meant for you. So I’m very excited to jump in. Well, I want to start off with some statistics because I know we’re legal professionals. We like the logic behind it, right? It’s like I don’t want all that touchy feely stuff, but I’m going to give you a little touchy feely. I’m going to give you a little logic because I want you to understand that these things work hand in hand. So the first thing I wanted to share is that 87% of consumers said that watching a video convinced them to buy a service or a product that’s not a small percentage. So when they asked consumers, people who are engaging with online platforms, 87% said that video helped them buy a product or a service.

Alright? Another percentage or statistic that I think is helpful for us today, 91% of consumers say that video quality impacts their trust in a brand. This was up from 87% in a 2024 report, and this is done by Wise Owl. They do an annual report. They’ve been doing it for I think 11 years where they’re looking at the different trends in video marketing to see, okay, what’s happening? And so when they reached out to their different people and their audience, this is the statistic that they found. And so what we’re going to talk about today is the ready habit, a way to build visibility, relevance, and impact with courage and consistency. There are five steps. The first one is we’re going to reframe and I’ll talk to you about what we’re going to reframe in terms of what we’re going to kind of rethink. Then we’re going to talk about establishing some things.

Establish is one of my favorite words because it reminds me of something being grounded. And so we’re going to establish some things that are going to keep us aligned and keep us grounded in this process. And we’re going to talk about assembling some things, and then we’re going to talk about drafting, coming up with our plan. And then finally, yes. So the first step is reframing, reframe visibility as servant leadership, not performance, not vanity. You showing up on video, you showing up in person, you showing up is not for vanity purposes, it’s not for performance, it’s for service. I’m going to give you two examples from my own life. The first one I’m going to talk about just showing up in terms of my profession. I switched from being focused primarily in criminal defense into being focused on business law. But when I started business law, I was really insecure about it because I felt like I didn’t know enough.

You know that new feeling whenever you’re starting a new thing, a new practice area, a new subject matter, all of that angst. And I remember talking with one of my friends and she was telling me about a situation in the business realm. And as she was sharing, I was listening to her and I realized she made a huge mistake. And I was like, even in my insecurity and in my inexperience, I had information that could have helped her avoid that mistake in my fear, I held back, but as a leader, I can show up and I make it my desire to serve people. So me showing up on video is not about me being vain and saying I’m all that. It’s about me figuring out how can I serve people? And that might require a little bit more vulnerability, but my primary goal isn’t it’s service and it’s leadership.

The other thing that I want us to keep in mind is that I want us to understand that listen, once you signed up to be a legal professional, you signed up for a leadership role. Now, if you were in the same school that I was or the same classes, they might not have covered that. That was that one class that we offer. Forgot to take that leadership, legal leadership class that we all need. Because here’s the thing, when you walk into a room and you say, I’m a lawyer. When you walk into the room and you say, I work in the legal profession, there is instantaneously a level of credibility that is associated with you because people look at you and say they’ve gone through some things and they’ve been educated and trained in a way where they can provide insights. Now, sometimes they undermine it, they go and they look at Google or chat GPT and say, chat g PT told me this, or Google told me this.

But for the most part, I think we can recognize that people really do look to us as leaders. So we have to reframe that. I don’t think we can run from it. I think because it’s naturally going to happen anyways, we might as well embrace it. So our visibility then is not a matter of vanity, it’s a matter of leadership. One of my favorite leadership experts, John C. Maxwell writes and he says this, consistency leadership is influence. And we are in influential positions to help people understand the way the law actually works. I tell friends, family, people who watch me on YouTube, I say, listen, there’s a way you think the law works and a way it actually works. My role is to help you navigate the way it actually works in a way that helps you. So when we reframe visibility from a place of vanity into a place of servant leadership, it allows us to step out a little bit more.

It gives us a little bit more courage because now it’s not, oh, I’m trying to make myself look cool. No, I’m trying to help people. And it shifts our internal focus from being very self-centered to being other-centered. And that leads us actually to our second part of the ready habit. The second part of the ready habit is establishing your message and your audience. Who specifically are you speaking to and what are you saying? Now, this is something that I apply not just to video, but literally every type of presentation. When I was preparing for today, I said, okay, who am I speaking to? I’m speaking to legal professionals, right? I’m speaking to people and my message, my message is, let’s be courageous. Let’s be brave. Let’s go out there and lead like our profession requires of us, right? We are attorneys and counselors of law.

So you have to think about that. But what might that look like? Sometimes that looks like focus, right? When we’re establishing our message in our audience, I can’t speak to everyone, right? I might not be able to speak to medical professionals the way I can speak to a legal professional. I might not be able to speak to every single person, but how can I focus on the one person? So when you are just trying to establish your audience and your message, I want you to ask the one question, what’s the one question I can answer today? Who is the one person that I can serve? What is the one concept that I can simplify? What is the one problem I can solve? I shared this with a friend of mine. We were presenting about coaching and social media, and when we shared this, we could sense the shift in the room because again, when you hone in on the one, it makes it a lot easier.

Everyone isn’t watching my videos. Everyone isn’t saying that they’re helpful. But if one person can watch a video and receive clarity, that makes it easier for them to navigate the legal industry, and it makes it easier for them to experience success, it makes it easier for them to work with me and others in our industry, that’s success. So focus in on that one problem that we can solve. What’s the one concept we can simplify? Here’s the secret. When we’re trying to figure out, okay, what do we want to say that resonates? When you focus on that one, you gain clarity and you glean structure and purpose. So this is the secret to using video. If you look at my videos, they’re focused. I don’t try to do everything. I don’t try to solve world hunger. I want it to be solved, but I can’t do that.

But what can I help people do? I can help them navigate choosing what legal entity they’re going to select for their business. I can help them understand the trademark process. I can help them break down what business succession looks like. And for you, it might be I can help them understand what going to court on the first day might look like. I might be able to help them understand, Hey, how do I dress or what to expect, right? So focus on clarity. Focus on the purpose. Don’t get bogged down in trying to be all things to all people. Focus on the one. One of the other things when we’re talking about our messaging is figuring out our topics. So here are a couple of things to consider when you’re trying to figure out what topics you want to discuss. Many of the best performing videos address common questions and concerns.

So these videos through answering these common questions and concerns can often reveal your personality even if you don’t intend to. They can answer questions that you might be tired of answering, like that’s a hack, by the way, that’s a hack. There are questions that you’re tired of answering and you’re like, everyone needs to know this. Record a video for it and then send it to people when they ask you and just send them a link and say, Hey, I answered this question. Watch it. That will also show you who’s really serious about moving forward and who’s serious about getting things done and who’s just like, I don’t want to do things. It can reveal to you where your potential clients are, the people that you’re serving, but current events is another one. Webinars. So we’re breaking things down. Case studies, testimonials, myths and mistakes, meeting your team, opinions and stances, inspirationals wins, transformation free offers.

I’m going to hone in on two or three of these that I think are important. So one of the ones that I’d like to share is the meet the team. Meet the team can be really valuable when you want to help people begin to have trust in your team to reframe that, oh, I only want to talk to the lawyer. No, help them to understand that you’ve done a great job at assembling people to support you and that all of these people are part of how you deliver great service. So introduce people to your teammates. Have them record a quick video that says, Hey, this is who I am and this is how I work. And people love that. It really connects. The other one that I think would be really helpful is I’m going to say webinars. Now, I’ve done webinars quite a few times with my clients or with potential clients and things like that.

And I think depending on your practice area, a webinar can be really instrumental to us in the legal profession because we also have an industry where people can be reactive. So if you are in a proactive area of law, so for example, business law in some regards can be proactive. Estate planning can be proactive. Sometimes people have trouble understanding the relevance of what it is that we do, but a webinar can create a forum where you can explain the relevance. You can start where people are and bring them to where they need to be to understand the value that you add. So start with the questions that they have, but guide them forward. So I just wanted to break down some of these has ways that we establish messaging and audience. So we’ve done two, we did reframe and we did establish. Now we’re going to move to assemble.

And so if you’ve ever watched any presentations that I’ve done or if you know me, I love gadgets. So I’m kind of excited about this section. This is assemble your gear and set up to record. How can I make it easy without sacrificing quality? The first time that I showed up and on video was on my phone. And I want you to know there are a ton of legal professionals who that’s their tool, and guess what? That’s enough, right? But let’s talk about some other things that you can do to easily and quickly enhance your video. One of the most overlooked aspects, I think of good video is sound. If you improve your sound, listen, it transforms everything. If I turn off my mic right now and I use the mic that was built into my laptop, you’re going to sense a difference and it’s going to sound different, and it just shifts the quality.

So I want to encourage us to really think about ways that we can use sound to improve our presentations. So just here are our few. I’ve used the Blue Getty. That was one of the ones that I used when I first got started. Actually, the first microphone I used was one that was a hand me down from one of my sisters slash mentors. And again, I didn’t have the fancy setup and it was a plug and play. And since then, I only use plug and play. I’m not super, I don’t have a nice huge audio setup. No, this mic that you see here is the road pod mic, and it’s A-U-S-B-C plugged it into my computer, but it improves the quality. You can also have different types like a lapel microphone. So I’m actually recording myself, and I have a microphone that is attached to me that allows me to move around and also produce great quality sound.

That’s a lapel mic. A shotgun mic is a mic that you might put on top of a camera. But listen, let’s just extra for the people who are into the gadgets. You don’t need all that to get started, find a simple plug and play microphone. You can find one for as cheap as $45 and plug it into your computer and improve your sound. The next thing I want to talk about in terms of assembling our gear is our lighting light makes a difference. Now, I’m a woman of color, as you can tell, and lighting makes a huge difference. But a lot of the videos that you all might see on my YouTube channel, I recorded them in my office and I was using natural light. I have a lot of windows. I positioned the light in the right place and you could see me clearly, right?

It makes a difference and improves the quality. So position your primary light source behind your camera. So for example, I’m looking at a camera directly over here in front of me, but my light source is back there. It’s not over here because that’s going to distort the way things look, right? So you want to think about those simple tweaks, these little changes. When I’m on a Zoom, I might not have this big setup, but I usually have a desk lamp that again, is lighting me so that whoever I’m communicating with can see me. Again, we’re leaning into visibility, not being about vanity, but being about leadership and to lead. People have to see you. People have to hear you. People have to know you. Alright, let’s talk about what people are usually very curious about your camera. Now, a lot of people want to start here, but I don’t think that’s the most important starting point, but a good camera does make a difference.

Now, I will say that I advise you again, start simple. Use your cell phone. Our cell phones, the quality. Now what? They’re amazing. Use your cell phone. You have what you need. You don’t need anything else. You don’t need to find a fancy gadget. If you want to be a little bit fancier, something a little bit more stable. The videos that you see from when I first got started on video on YouTube, if you look back, maybe 20 18, 20 19, those videos, they were all films using a Logitech C nine 20, right? So this is a simple camera. When you’re on video, small things can make a difference. Like how you position your camera. If you position your camera where you’re looking at eye level, you’re connecting deeply at levels up. People are like, how do I look good on camera? Adjust your camera, adjust the position, right?

Make your background free from clutter. Now, some people might be like, Tam is so neat. That’s because I’ve hidden the clutter. It’s over there. And you can control that and you can make the focus of your presentation. You can connect with people because that’s all that matters. I want you to hear the message. I don’t want you to get caught up in all the other things. I want you to hear the message that I’m conveying to you today. That leads me to one other tool that I want you to know about is your tripod. When I first got started, again, I didn’t have all the tools. I didn’t have the nice tripod. I used books. I would stack books up, and I had a box because the books by themselves weren’t enough. So I had a big old box, cardboard box, and I put books on top of it, and I put my camera, I put my laptop with my camera on top of it on top so that it was angled directly at me.

Nobody could tell, right? And then if you want to, again, you can go and you can get all of these other tools. Tripods are not expensive. You can find something that you can throw in your bag and be on your way. Again. So I’ve kind of shared some of these things, but that’s assembling our gear. I wanted to quickly just touch on this. I’m not going to go into any detail, but different tools that you can use to edit. Those are some of the tools that you might, but one of the things is you can record a video that doesn’t require editing. It’s an idea. It doesn’t have to be all the things, but you want to assemble your gear so that you know, okay, I’m ready to go. Particularly when you want to be consistent. So for example, I know that I record videos on a regular basis.

My setup that I have here is stable. I don’t come and move things around. It’s a consistent setup. If you’re not able to have a dedicated space for recording, you need to simplify your process. You don’t need 5 million different tools, because if you need to set that up every time you record, it’s going to slow you down. So keep it simple. All right, so we’ve talked about reframing. We’ve talked about establishing, we’ve talked about assembling. All right, let’s talk about drafting. I want you to draft with direction. I want you to plan what you will say with clarity and confidence. So what does that mean? That means that when you’re coming down, for me, it’s not about having legalese when I’m drafting or trying to figure out what I’m going to communicate to people. I don’t want that to be the time, particularly if I’m talking to my target audience, I’m not talking to legal professionals.

That’s not the time for legalese. It might not also be the time for oversharing, right? Because this leveraging video is not about becoming the next Paris Hilton, even though I haven’t heard of Farris Hilton in a long time. So maybe she’s not the big talk of the town, but it’s not about that. It’s not about becoming a Kardashian. So you don’t need to overshare. You don’t need to share all the details of your life if you want to. No harm, no foul, right? But you don’t have to do that, and it’s also not being about being perfect. You’ve heard me today. You can see I’m being authentic. I’m being real. It’s not about perfection. Your great content when you’re drafting should be about having a clear purpose. What are you intending to communicate to your audience today? You align that with what you actually say.

So you have to have a plan. I would say that’s one of the things that has really helped me is I don’t speak without a plan. I know that even if it’s going to be a short video, I have an outline. I have an introduction. I have a body and I have a closing. My introduction has to have a hook. The hook doesn’t have to be complicated. It could simply be the common question that people are asking me. It could be the relevant situation that the audience member is in that allows them to say, oh, this speaks to my pain right now, but I have a hook to make sure that they’re engaged. Then I take ’em into the body of my presentation. I like three points. I’m not always going to do three points. Sometimes there’s more, sometimes there’s less. But three is a nice number in terms of making sure that you have some things that are tangible.

There’s a rule that talks about primacy and recency. People only remember what the first thing you say and the last thing you say, right? So you want to make sure that your points are also structured in a way where your strongest points are, what you start off with and what you end with. The ones that that strong can be in the middle. And then finally, you end with a closing. Now, one of the areas that I see that when we’re talking about visibility on video, and it’s an area I had to grow in as well, but we don’t often leave people with the next step. You’ve given all of this beautiful information. Now people want to know, what do I do with it? You tell them that in the closing. Give them a specific call to action. Go download this resource. Find help, which could be me, right?

Like all of those things, specific next steps. And so final step is yes. All you have to do is say, yes. I know that the hardest part is saying yes to showing up even before you’re ready. But listen, you don’t need the perfect time set up or look, visibility through video begins with one decision, and that’s a decision to show up and you can start small. Before we went through the pandemic, I was already showing up on video, right? I told you I started with my cell phone, but I was also getting used to just navigating it through communication. So making sure people were meeting with me virtually. Most of us are already familiar with that, right? So we’ve already started. Now you can start implementing it. Also with regards to training your staff. So when I was navigating trying to train people in my team, so how to navigate this or navigate that, I leveraged video.

Some of you are saying, I’m too old. This is an older gentleman, and he has been consistently saying yes to showing up, and people come to him to find out information about estate planning. We’ve seen different practice areas leveraging video. You can also leverage video to share your wins, but it doesn’t have to be through your own voice. There can be testimonials or I like to call it archiving. So this is someone who helps someone else, and they had someone say, Hey, tell them about your experience with me. If you notice this video, I’m telling you all these fancy things to say, okay, make your video like this. Put on lights here, put lights there. But guess what? Again, it doesn’t need to be perfect. This person sharing their authentic experience with this attorney is them leveraging video. They’re saying yes. They’re saying yes. Stanley Tate is an amazing attorney.

He does student loan law essentially, and he leverages video in a way that I just think is so powerful. He’s on YouTube, but one of the things he has on his website is he has this line that you see there of videos of real people sharing their experience. So it’s not just about you. You can have people use video to talk about you, and there’s something that’s beautiful about the fact that they don’t all have a fancy setup. You can tell people are talking on their cell phones. You can tell that they might just have their laptops open. They’re authentic. They’re connecting. They’re saying yes. And so I want us to say yes. Now, again here, this is me on different platforms. I didn’t start this way, and I’m still on the journey. I would be lying to you if I said that. Every time we show up on video, we feel a hundred percent confident and we feel like we look perfect and like everything’s perfect.

That’s not the reality. But you can choose to say yes because you are ready. Even if you don’t feel ready, you are ready. So you need to make your yes scene. You need to show your videos on your websites, on social media platforms, in your email marketing, right? When you are showing up with referrals, send them videos and say, you can use these videos to help your clients. You can use webinars. All of these are areas where you can make your yes known. All it takes is one video, one platform, one decision. That’s where it starts. So guess what? If your desire is to really show up and serve people, you need to show up because guess what? When we don’t show up, when we choose to remain invisible, there’s a price. We miss opportunities to build trust. We create more room for the doubt to grow louder.

We basically create voids that someone else will fill. And then here’s the thing, with no visibility without trying, there is no room for feedback. There’s no room to grow. There’s no room to say, okay, how can I do this better? How can I improve? So the same crippling doubts that you have become worse and you’re not able to figure out ways to conquer them again, you are ready today. We are attorneys and counselors at law. We are here to help the people. I want you to know that you are ready, even if you don’t feel like it. I want to encourage you that you have everything that it takes to change, not just your life, but the lives of those who are around you. We need you to choose visibility. We need you to choose readiness.

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