Episode 293 Building Crafted Identities with Rose Moran
Welcome to the wealthy woman lawyer podcast. What
Davina:if
Intro: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, Devina 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. Devina 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 Devina.
Davina:Hello, and welcome back to the wealthy woman lawyer podcast. I'm your host, Devina Frederick, And my guest today is Rose Moran, founder of crafted identities, a business development strategy and marketing implementation company that works exclusively with law firms and lawyers on business development. With more than fifteen years of marketing and business development experience, Rose helps law firms refine their business development and strategic marketing communications. Throughout her career, she has successfully managed and executed every stage of the marketing and sales funnel. Her MBA in finance allows her to bridge data and execution.
Davina:With experience leading large 40 plus and small teams, Rose is skilled at driving results and making things happen. She's led business development and strategic marketing efforts for one of the fastest growing AM Law one hundred firms. And she's advised at the firm practice and individual attorney level for intellectual property, labor and employment, litigation, healthcare, corporate technology, real estate law, and other business law areas. She has also collaborated with legal recruiting and new lateral attorneys to support law firm growth, developing the attorney and business development and marketing plans to ensure a seamless and profitable transition. Rose's passion for words and relationships led her to marketing.
Davina:An avid reader, she knows how to tell a story and that words matter. Words clarify, inspire, and build the foundation for a story that urges action and builds relationships. Words can make or break your marketing message and your client relationships. So please join me in welcoming Rosemarie Anne to the Wealthy Woman Lawyer podcast. Hi, Rose.
Davina:It's so good to have you here.
Rose:Thanks for having me, Devina. I'm excited to be here.
Davina:So I introduced you, in, before we got started, but I'd like for you to tell me a little bit about your background and how you came to do this kind of business development work for law firms.
Rose:Sure. Sure. Of course. So funny enough, I fell into it. It was just life.
Rose:So I've been in corporate marketing for twenty years, fifteen of which in legal. I was at a job working for a manufacturer and felt like I hit my limit. So I applied for a law firm job and I got it and didn't look back. I was at a big law firm for ten years, did everything from biz dev pitch proposal work to events to sponsorships to strategic communications. And then I moved over to a trial graphics company.
Rose:So night and day different on the legal spectrum from b to b corporate to primarily personal injury, med mal, construction defect. And then I decided, you know what? It's time to take the leap. And I went out on my own to use the skills I learned to help so many other law firms.
Davina:Yeah. Yeah. You and I have that in common. I worked in house for a law firm. It was kind of a medium size.
Davina:It was the largest law firm in our area, but it was kind of a medium sized law firm. And I was the you know, when you're the marketing manager, you kind of do special events. You handle corporate tables. You do PR. I mean, you sort of do it all, wear all the hats.
Davina:Right? But it's a great it's a great experience and great education on legal marketing. So tell us about your company now and how you serve clients.
Rose:Sure. So we help bridge business development strategy and strategic communications because you can't have the strategy without the strategic comms. Because the first thing anyone does is they Google you after you meet them. So you can have a great plan and a great strategy and know who you're targeting. And sometimes that does need a little help and we can step in and help you figure out how you find your edge and what makes you unique and build a positioning statement to help you get focused on how you talk to people, where you network, what you do.
Rose:But then you also have to have that digital presence anymore. It's not enough to just be great at what you do and tell people that. You have to prove it online. So how do we help make your LinkedIn profile look great and coincide with your website? How do we make sure your website bio, your practice pages all align?
Rose:And then how do we make sure that the thought leadership you're putting out is aligned with all of that as well? So it's sort of a multi tier approach to make sure that you show up strongly online. And then what we also try to do with our thought leadership is optimize it for SEO because there's no reason to do it if nobody can find it.
Davina:Okay. Alright. So let's so the name of the business is Crafted Identities. How what do you what does that mean to you? We say when we say Crafted Identities, is kind of tell me a little bit more about that.
Rose:Yeah. So the name does have sort of a a deeper meaning to me because I I really feel like our identity is who we are. It's tied up into our business, especially if we're our own business owner. We can't really divorce ourselves from the work that we do, and our our personal brand is really tied to our company brand. And as much as we want to say you've got a big firm platform, if you're at an AMA firm or a mid sized firm, it's still a people business.
Rose:So how do we make sure that you as a person are represented in a way that feels comfortable and authentic to you, but also aligns with your practice and with your firm identity? And so it really all has to be crafted and put together in a really cool package that resonates at all levels of the firm.
Davina:Right. And so you work with, individual attorneys within a law firm to help them develop their own presence, as well as working overall with the law firm with kind of what the mission is. Right? Yep. Absolutely.
Rose:They both have work together.
Davina:So tell me a little bit more about that. How does that work?
Rose:Well, typically if you've in a larger firm with a lot of attorneys, you have a strategy and you know what that strategy is, but sometimes as an individual, I don't want to say contributor, but I'm gonna say business developer, you have to find a way to tell that strategy in a way that's unique to you. And not everybody wants to write articles. Not everyone wants to speak at events. Not everyone wants to go to networking events. But there is something that feels right to you.
Rose:And so what we do is we help find what that is, that avenue, and we use your firm strategy. And if it's your own firm, that's super easy because it's very much tied to what you do every day to get out there and help you share that message with people. And then also use that strategic communication piece to make sure that it shows up online in the
Davina:way that you're showing up offline. Right. You you touched on something that is very important. It's very important to me in the way that I talk with people about their marketing. And that is to kinda let people off the hook that you don't have to go do things that feel unnatural to you to be able to develop and grow your practice.
Davina:Right? Right. You, in fact, it's not going to be very effective. And I think a lot of people get locked into this idea of it has to look a certain way. And I know this comes from this traditional law firm mindset of where we used to have to go to networking meetings, and we had to write articles and be published and all this kind of stuff.
Davina:What are you finding now in the market, that some of the things that lawyers are doing to stand out and connect with potential clients and bringing business for other firms? What types of things are they doing?
Rose:The activity that they're doing are really built around credibility and authority. And so, you know, as I mentioned earlier, it has to resonate and feel authentic to who you are and how you practice law. But I've really found building your personal brand within the context of your firm is a big help. And everybody does that a different way. LinkedIn, I feel like it's still very powerful and it's a great way to share your firm message and your individual message.
Rose:But you don't have to always write content about your firm. You can showcase the more personal aspects of your life and create those connections online that you do in the personal world. Because when you go to a networking event, you don't only talk about the cases you work on. You talk about your family. You talk about your hobbies.
Rose:You build a relationship. And so what we try to tell people is when you're talking online and when you're talking offline, what are the things that resonate with you that you like to talk about that help you build those relationships? And so we try to infuse that in your bio, infuse that in talking points, help you use that when you send outreach messages to potential clients or even to clients to check on them to see how they're doing. Because everybody wants to build a relationship, whether it's legal or, you know, personal. I really feel like what we do in the legal space is very personal.
Rose:And so let's capitalize on that. And then let's make it feel authentic to you. Another thing that really helps is still the the writing. Being in front of people, whether it's through email, through social media, or through that very strategic thought leadership builds your credibility. It helps you show up in search.
Rose:And it also sometimes helps you get your ideas around topics for you to talk about offline. Is what we really like to recommend is the legalese topics are great. The law review topics are great, but those aren't necessarily the ones that people are looking for to help them make a buying decision. And so how can we talk about the bigger picture topics that resonate with people as they make a decision on what law firm to go to and how credible and authoritative you are?
Davina:Yeah. And I think this can be an a sticking point for a lot of lawyers who have this, you know, idea that, I remember when blogging was a thing. Mhmm. And a lot of lawyers would a blog, and you would read what they're writing, and it's like a legal brief. And I'm like, nobody wants to read this, especially even other lawyers don't wanna read it because, you know, when you're scrolling social media, the last thing you wanna do is get into this deep legal analysis.
Davina:And, yeah, the lawyers are well, that shows my expertise, and then I know what I'm talking about and the credibility. Have you noticed a shift in that mindset as particularly as younger generations are coming into the workforce and maybe getting into rainmaking activities? I think it's starting. There's definitely still this idea that you have to be super technical to show your ability and your skill,
Rose:But someone's talking to you knows you have the ability and the skill. You are a good lawyer. That should be table stakes and it is table stakes in a lot of conversations. But being able to speak business, to have a personal conversation, to not necessarily use legalese in every marketing avenue, I think is a benefit. And I I do see it starting to to turn.
Davina:Right. Right. So how how are older lawyers taking to social media? What kinds of things are they struggling with? And what kinds of things are you seeing that are going really well?
Rose:I think people always struggle about what to share that's not work related. Because everyone says, oh, LinkedIn is only to showcase my wins and how great we're doing and promote client deals and successes. But your firm culture, personal life outside of work to a point, of course, is what really does resonate with people. What are your experiences? What are your opinions?
Rose:What are your thoughts on current events, you know, within reason that resonate with other people that help you make those connections and showcase who you are as a person. For the maybe older generation of attorneys that didn't ever have to use LinkedIn and relied on more of their offline BD activities. It's it sometimes is a mindset shift. But those that embrace it and understand that the world looks at the digital presence now so much more than they used to. They are seeing traction and it is a win for them.
Rose:But it very much is a mindset shift. I mean, for myself talking about not just my work, but what I do outside of work and what my thoughts and opinions are. It's hard and doing it for yourself is hard. But once you get over that initial hurdle, the ball does start to roll.
Davina:Yeah. Yeah. I I struggle with that. I'm a I'm a Gen Xer, and so and I really value my privacy. So I really I agree.
Davina:I hear you. Yeah. I also came up in a culture where you didn't talk about your personal beliefs and your personal life outside of work. You were to leave that outside of work and you're explicitly told leave that outside of Nobody cared what you were doing other than if you did something that reflected negatively on the firm, on the business. Right?
Davina:So if there were pictures I mean, if there were pictures of you out partying and they came up on social media, I mean, that was a negative sort of thing. So I've noticed there's a real shift. A lot of young lawyers, particularly starting their own businesses, are putting their whole selves out there. I have a client who, dances. She dances.
Rose:Oh, cool.
Davina:After, after hours, that's what she does for hobbyists and she loves it. It's a passion of hers. Dances in heels. And so it's very sexy dancing and she's very good at it. And she puts that out there and then she also puts out content related to her, freeups and divorce and her brands around that.
Davina:And she says, you know, for her, it's about putting her whole self out there so that people see I'm a person, not just this talking head lawyer who's telling you what to do. And, and for me that, you know, I look as somebody who was brought up in a culture where that was the opposite. That's the opposite of what you do. Yeah. But I see a lot more lawyers are bracing that and doing so successfully.
Davina:Yeah. I've got a client who gets 98% of her business off social media and her brand is single mom attorney. And she developed that as a showcase of she developed that to develop community when she was a single mom going through law school and it has grown into a huge brand and she's been able to open multiple offices in her state as a result of the work doing that. And for those of us who kinda came up in a law firm culture, we look at that and go, oh my gosh. Are you kidding me?
Davina:I would never like put myself out there that way. But it's so it's kind of refreshing to see people doing this and becoming so successful at it. And just to see that mindset shift. What do you tell people, like me who are like, you know, I really don't. I didn't really wanna share, you know, that me playing with my dog or hanging out with my husband or going for like, my life's not very exciting.
Davina:It's all reading and playing with the dog.
Rose:I think that's very exciting. Right? I know that's very exciting.
Davina:What do what do people like us do, who are you know? I I certainly know with women lawyers get older, people are like, I don't wanna be on camera. Are you kidding me? Like, what do you how do you help them sort of overcome that reluctance to be more visible and share more of their personal lives?
Rose:I I would say it's baby steps. I mean, you're not gonna go from sharing nothing to sharing pictures of yourself dancing overnight. And so, what are those milestones and what are those smaller things that are relatable that you might think are boring, but other people would love? Like you have a dog and you're passionate about, let's say, fostering dogs. That's an amazing thing to share.
Rose:That's personal, not super personal, but also very relatable. So I think having that conversation and understanding of what you love, what your passions are, what other people talk about and would find interesting and that you would wanna talk about with them too is where we like to start.
Davina:Yeah. I mean, I do think the there is this idea now that everybody wants to feel like they know somebody. And I think one of the advantages of social media, whatever platforms you're on, is the know, like, and trust factor kind of occurs, before you even know people. And it's a little creepy sometimes because people are like, oh, you know, I just I know you so well. How's your mother-in-law doing in in your move to Colorado?
Davina:And you're like, oh, yeah. I forgot I did talk about that on the podcast. And then you know nothing about them. But, I it's a very powerful whereas we used to have to develop that know, like, and trust after they hired us. Mhmm.
Davina:You know? Now we have to develop it. We developed it before, and it makes the hiring piece a lot easier.
Rose:Mhmm. Yeah. It does. And, you know, for a lot of business owners, they have started their own business. I'm sure this is probably true for a lot of your listeners because they wanna select and work with the clients they wanna work for.
Rose:And by putting your whole self out there and being authentic in your messaging on social media, it helps you attract those people as well. And you don't have to go to the extreme and talk about very Politics. Politics. Exactly. I take the words out of my mouth.
Rose:But you can talk about things you're passionate about. Like, if it's dog rescue or if it's dance or if it's advocacy in some other way shape or form or your kids. I mean, all of these things are relatable to potential clients to those in your community. And one thing I really like to stress when we think about content and social media is the social part. Like, it's turned into a big marketing machine, which is great and it does help.
Rose:But by being social, it helps build that know, like, and trust factor for the people get to know you, wanna hire you before knowing you, and maybe when they only sort of know you.
Davina:Right. Right. Right. Currently, now, I'm binging on content for from a realtor who's in another state. But I'm thinking I might invest in real estate in that and just hire her because I love her so much and love her content.
Davina:And I'm, I, I am looking at it going, man, how do I create this kind of content? Part of it is I love her topic. Right? Oh yeah. So I gravitate to that and I, I don't, you know, wouldn't couldn't talk about that topic, but it's she's so compelling as a speaker and a person and so real.
Davina:And Yeah. I could see how, you know, like and I think a lot of attorneys it used to be that attorneys, and, and I still is to some degree, particularly with bigger law firms with male attorneys. I know there's a lot of this idea that, like with doctors, lawyers used to be here. We were the keeper and holder of this claim of knowledge that other people didn't have. And so we were looked at as these trusted advisors on a, on a level where, you know, what my doctor says is sacrosanct.
Davina:Well, my lawyer says is sacrosanct. And now that's not really how we're functioning in the world. So much information is available to people out there. It really does come down to kind of a personal relationship more than this going and putting your CV on the website. Well, I went to Harvard and I graduated here and I did that.
Davina:And, you know, I'm on these boards and all that. I remember in the late nineties, we were putting a lot of, we were creating a lot of websites for lawyers and they were all like that. They were all green and gold or blue and gold, and they all had the every lawyer's resume on there. And that was the important thing. Are we seeing a shift in that now?
Davina:And what kinds of things are we seeing?
Rose:Yeah. I I think the resume part is still important, but how many people graduated from Harvard? You know, how many people have won this type of litigation case? And I think taking all that and blending it with some of the more personal is what we're starting to see in more and more firm bios, big or small. Because those personal facts are really what connect you to a client.
Rose:And what I've heard talking with clients is the feedback they get from their clients is the bios that are a little more personal are the ones that are fun to read and the ones that help them seal the deal and make the connection with the prospect. Because again, it's all about relationships. And your firm platform is very important and you shouldn't disregard that, But it's you still have a very personal, intimate relationship with the client. So sometimes being a little bit vulnerable does pay off to build that know, like, and trust factor.
Davina:So have I don't know if you've worked with, smaller firms, but one of the struggles of small firm owners is a lot of them are really good at building the brand around their personal identity, and they're the face of the brand. Then they start growing and they start hiring team members. Then there's this push pull of, I want to involve more people and have this team involved, but everybody wants to hire me. And so how do you help them sort of overcome that through their crafted identity of their law firm and their team and all that? What kinds of things, what advice would you have for people in that situation?
Rose:I think that's actually super common. What I tell people is it comes down to values. And so when you hire people and you grow your team, oftentimes you hire people with a similar value set and a similar skill set. So like, while they may not be getting you the owner of the law firm, they're getting someone else that is a representation of you and your brand. And so that they can rest assured and know that you've onboarded this person.
Rose:They have the skill sets. They hold the same beliefs. They reflect the firm's values, and they'll be in just as good hands. And you're also over here. Should anything happen, it won't, but you're all you're still there.
Rose:And so you work as a team. You support each other, and you're all a reflection of what the firm stands for from what you built.
Davina:Yeah. And how do you bring them into the visibility piece of it? How do you bring in other team members to if you're the face of the brand, what kinds of things are you doing with clients to help them get some of the other lawyers on their team to be a part of that without appearing to be distinct from them?
Rose:Right. I I think a lot of it comes down to your strategy. And so what are those values? And how do we infuse that language in the content that they're creating both for your firm, whether that's articles, blogs, what have you, podcasts, or individual social media posts on on LinkedIn or another platform? And then also, tagging and talking and connecting with each other on the platform to show that you are a team.
Rose:You do work together. You share similar ideas. But it it does have to feel connected and cohesive. You can't have one person talking about, you know, a and somebody else is talking about w. It's gotta gotta work together in your plan.
Davina:Yeah. You talk a lot about LinkedIn. I know that a lot of my clients don't like LinkedIn. They prefer Facebook. And they say, well, I've been doing Facebook attorney moms groups.
Davina:Yep. Since 02/2007, I don't like LinkedIn or I found Instagram to be much more fun. Are we seeing that? Because I know a lot of people think of LinkedIn and they think professional, and I know we see that with a lot of larger firms. Are we seeing that a larger firm sort of also coming out on some of these other social media sites, or is LinkedIn the place?
Rose:So I I like LinkedIn. I feel like the algorithm is more in favor of the person putting content out there. You're gonna get more views. You're gonna get more interactions just because of how meta Facebook, Instagram has evolved over time. That's not to say you shouldn't use Facebook and Instagram.
Rose:But for me, when I think about the person coming to those platforms and where their mind is, typically for Facebook and Instagram, it's a more social platform. You wanna see what people are doing. You wanna understand where they are, what's happening in their lives or their work lives. And so what we do is if you wanna have a specific strategy for each social channel, Facebook, Instagram are great to showcase your people, your culture, and what you're doing in the community. That gets a ton of traction.
Rose:Or if you've been on a lawyer mom group since 02/2007, you've probably unknowingly been very vulnerable, very personal, and built those relationships and connections that way. But those that are just starting or wanna think about doing something different, LinkedIn is shifting. It's no longer just your CV. It's no longer just work updates. People are sharing more personal information.
Rose:And so being on there when someone is in more of a work mind frame can be very helpful for an attorney building a book of business.
Davina:Okay. And, I mean, give me some sort of, insight into the best way to sort of build relationships on LinkedIn because I know there's a lot of this anybody who signed up for LinkedIn knows that you sign up, and you're gonna get all these inbox spamming things. Yeah. Yeah. People will get lost trying to connect with you because you get so many.
Davina:So how do people use LinkedIn in a way to really build those relationships if we're getting if if it has this problem and it does have this problem with
Rose:Yeah. So I it's a I think it's about being social. So social media, you have to have a social component to it. And so if you don't feel comfortable posting your own content, comment on people's posts whose content aligns with your values, with your work, with your passions. And so if someone else is a another female mom lawyer posting about mom life in the law firm, comment on that.
Rose:Send them a message. But when you comment on their post, it doesn't show up in the inbox of a whole bunch of spam that you get. I understand I've been approached by probably like 12 VA companies this week alone. And that's wonderful and it works for them and there's a reason they do it. But if you're there to build relationships and community, you're gonna get that more through interacting and engaging with people's posts and then sending them a message.
Rose:But also making sure that your profile is optimized because people do search on there for specific individuals, law firm services. So making sure that your headline, your about really aligns with what you do, you're easy to find, and then it also aligns with your website.
Davina:Yeah. I think Sales Navigator is a a good tool that LinkedIn has added where you can use that tool to help you, sort through kind of and look exactly what you're looking for. And I know a lot of, our lawyers have been using that to help connect with people for recruiting purposes because Absolutely. You know, they're they we also have to approach recruiting in a lot of the same way we recruit we approach business development. Mhmm.
Davina:And that you have to kind of look from more of a relationship standpoint, start building relationships with people who might know people who may be looking to make a change and stuff like that. So they're starting to use that kind of tool in LinkedIn as well. Go back. Let's go back and talk about your business. And I know at the beginning you sort of, told us the.
Davina:How you make that, how you bridge that gap. Right? But I'd like to go in a little bit more detail because I know a lot of may not understand what, you know, communications are and what strategic plans are, you know, and how that all fits together. Right? Because we are approached as lawyers, we're approached by a lot of companies who say, I'm a marketing company.
Davina:Yeah. A marketing company could be selling us Google ads. They could be selling us social media services just for Instagram. They could be so I really wanted people to get clear, on exactly what are what you do so that they can understand the services you provide. I think what's unique about what you do is that if you've come up in the professional services businesses, you know that there are business developers or rainmakers within a business.
Davina:And then there are marketing folks who kind of do a lot of implementing and things like that. Right? So there's different levels, marketing coordinators and marketing managers and marketing directors and business developers and ring makers, and there's all different kinds of names for different things. So if you could provide some clarity on how you fit into that picture, I think you're gonna help people.
Rose:Sure. Sure. So I've had the privilege in my career of doing both. And I really think to do both well, you have to do both together. You can't have a business development plan to figure out what you're gonna talk about, who you're gonna go after, how you're gonna approach people separate and apart from how you talk about yourself.
Rose:And that's really what marketing communications is, is how do you talk about yourself online? And so what we do is we help you if you don't already have one. Figure out what is your strategy. Who are your target clients? What is your audience worried about?
Rose:What are the pain points that you solve for them? And once you really clearly understand that and you know where they are offline and how you're gonna connect with them in that way, you've got your business development strategy. But the first thing anybody does when you meet them offline or they're referred to you by another colleague or friend is they Google you. And so they're gonna look at your firm bio. They're gonna look at your firm website.
Rose:They're gonna look at any content that you've authored. They're going to look at your LinkedIn profile most of the time too. And so we like to make sure that that is all shored up as well. And it aligns with what's being said offline and even ladders back up another level to your firm strategy. Because your personal business development strategy should tie to your firm strategy because everybody wants to grow.
Rose:And so when we all grow, it's what's the saying rising tides lifts all boats. Yeah. And so we wanna make sure that that happens. And what we do on the online part is we really like to look at your SEO because someone can Google your name and it can show up with all of this we do. But sometimes they forget who you are and they just know, oh my god, was referred to this really specialized biotech patent attorney in North Dakota who focuses on this.
Rose:And so how do we make sure that the content that we produce not only positions you to align with what you've said about yourself and what people have said about yourself and what your website says about you, but it shows up when people are looking for the services that you provide. And so by combining those three areas, we really set you up to be successful, to make those connections, to build that trust, and to build the authority and the credibility.
Davina:Right. Right. So really, once you help them do the deep work of Mhmm. Your core values, your ideal client, where they hang out, then you're helping them work on that messaging, which
Rose:really takes it
Davina:down to that level of what a cohesive message of what we're putting out there.
Rose:Right.
Davina:And, so from a practical standpoint, are you working on if you're doing SEO, are you working on developing websites and doing SEO, or are you looking at SEO of other types of content and making sure there are keywords, or what kind of things are you doing there?
Rose:All of the above. Okay. So we can help with websites. We can also help you create the content. So so many times attorneys just don't have time to do it.
Rose:It's a nice to have for them, not a need to have, but really it's a need to have, when people are looking for you. So we can go straight the content. It's super easy. We interview you usually at one of the more broader topics, not a very in-depth case, analysis or legal brief type article. And write the content, work with you, optimize it for SEO.
Rose:So look at those keywords that people are searching for. Make sure they're in there. And then do some more technical stuff on the back end, to make sure you show up in search. And make sure that your message is resonating and being found by the people that need to find you. Because if you are not doing that, your competitor's doing that.
Rose:So we want you to be in control of your brand and your brand story, and what's being found online should be dictated by you, not by someone else.
Davina:Right. Right. Do you have pushback from attorneys who say, you're a non attorney. How can you write for me? Of course.
Rose:Of course.
Davina:How do you respond to that?
Rose:I can say, well, I have lived and breathed legal for so many years. The people that work on our team have legal experience as well. I think But my
Davina:special my special edit area. I know.
Rose:I get it.
Davina:Nobody else does.
Rose:I get it. But how we do ghost written content is it's based on an interview. Super painless. We look at what people are looking for in the internet related to what you do, And then we pick a topic based on those keywords or that idea. And we ask you a whole bunch of questions about it.
Rose:And then we come back to you with an article that's done for you to say, yes, this looks great. No, tweak this word, that word, the other word. It's very painless. And it helps get your name out there, the firm's name out there, and it helps you show up in search and kinda control your message. Right.
Rose:Right. You can then use that for client emails and for social media. So it's really a a very good way to do something once and use it a gajillion times.
Davina:Right. Good. So do we have to be on video? Because I know this comes up a lot for people who are like and and I don't know if you've experienced it, but I've experienced some people that no matter Yes. I had a client one time who was so great when she was talking spontaneously, but the minute you put a front a camera in front of her, she went into attorney mode, very and it was very robotic kind of thing.
Davina:She just froze up. And she had the most compelling personality when she was just talking. There was no camera in the room. So what do you think? Because we're hearing
Rose:a lot
Davina:of of marketers out there saying, you really everybody needs to be on video now. That's what we need to be doing. What are where do you land on that spectrum? I think that
Rose:goes back to what we talked about earlier and finding what feels authentic and genuine to you. If you don't wanna do video and it doesn't land with you, don't do video is what I tell people. If it's better to do shorter content on LinkedIn, let's do that. If we're gonna have a firm focus for a specific area to show up for search and really push for growth, let's do that. If you love video and you wanna talk, let's figure out how to do video for you.
Rose:So I I think it really has to tie back to not only the firm strategy with what you're doing, but at the individual attorney level, it it has to be what's comfortable for you. Because if you make a video and you you awkward in it and you hate doing every second of it, it's not gonna land with your your target audience.
Davina:Yeah. Yeah. I recently had something. So I've been doing this podcast for six years, and I've done a lot of videos. But I I recently was experimenting with something, and they wanted me to write a script and, do this presentation with a script.
Davina:And I had somebody else who's listening to it. I'm like, you know, and script just isn't there. Like, oh my god. Yes, Devina. Never use a script.
Davina:Just talk about things. Like, this is not you at all. And I think it's really, important to we're not gonna change our personalities No. In to do marketing. We really have to find a way to work within our personality Yeah.
Davina:In a place that fits. But I always tell people, like, there are so many options out there now for marketing. It used to be, like, you had to go to networking events, and you had rubber chicken dinners, and you had to buy the corporate tables.
Rose:Yeah. Yeah.
Davina:All of these things. Absolutely. That that's why small firms couldn't get a lot of traction because it was they were going to chamber meetings, you know? Yeah. Right.
Davina:And even the chamber was divided into like, here are the really legitimate people and here are the small potatoes over here. Right? And so now it's with the internet, with social media, like it's really leveled the playing field. Just thinking back when we were doing websites, starting out, you, a, a, a small firm can put up a website even more amazing than what a big firm had. Yeah.
Davina:And you, you would see people's creativity come through and their, how they differentiated themselves would come through. Yeah. And so I'm that excites me, and I think we're getting a lot more of that. Let's talk about AI for a minute. Oh, yeah.
Davina:What are your what are your thoughts on AI? What do you have you encountered, people say, well, I could use AI for that. Or have you said, you know, how can we use AI in our business to help our clients better? Right. Right.
Davina:What kinds of things, thoughts do you have around AI?
Rose:I have a love hate relationship with AI. Okay. I I think if you use AI as it is, it's terrible. I tell people AI is a great starting point, terrible ending point. And so I if you don't use it to help with your efficiency in some way shape or form, you have a screw loose.
Rose:But I don't think you can rely solely on it. People have become very aware of AI. And so what comes out of chat GPT, perplexity, Claude, you can read it and based on sentence structure, you know, trigger words, you know that it's AI. So I tell people, please don't do that because it it sometimes does more harm than good. You know, the rocket ship emoji.
Rose:It it's like a telltale sign for me. But use it to help you brainstorm. Use it to figure out a calendar. Use it to put together an outline and then flush it out yourself. Because when you do that, you add that human emotional experience story into your content that you will never get using AI.
Rose:No matter how good you program it, you won't have it. So Mhmm. And that's the stuff that really builds the relationships is the the more vulnerable, the more personal. Like, AI can't talk about the specific details that you did with a client that would relate to another client about a case. And that's the interesting stuff.
Rose:Yeah. So I know I I like it, but I don't love it.
Davina:Yeah. It's interesting because I've used it recently for something, and it worked really well. But then I was thinking about my I just this year started this monthly newsletter, and I've been remiss, and and March has not been the best consistency month for me. But April there'll be another one in April. And, I was thinking about my newsletter, I was thinking, really can't use AI for my newsletter in because of the way that I write my newsletter.
Davina:My newsletter is very personal. Me sharing personal story in that or personal stories of my clients. And I was thinking, how could I use AI for this? And AI is a great tool in a lot of ways, but for what I want to accomplish, that I was, I was, I was thinking about that going, how would I use this? What could I do that get part of the work done for me?
Davina:And then I could go in and sort of put my own personal touch on it. So I think, I know that a lot of attorneys are embracing AI. I've been asking a lot of questions about that lately among my colleagues, and a lot of them really are loving it. Like, it's front leading edge, and they're using it in a lot of ways in their law firm to increase efficiencies. And then I'm also members of all these copywriter communities.
Davina:And my copywriter friends are going, oh my god. No. Like, years of the work that we've done to be able to be such persuasive copywriters. And then we're seeing people just go, oh, well, Lily, we can just use AI for that. And you're like, no.
Davina:It's really not the same thing. So I definitely, definitely agree with you on that. Before we wrap up today, could you share with, our audience of women law firm owners maybe, two or three pieces of advice, gold nuggets, so they can go away with when it comes to not only developing their brand strategy, but actually, getting their mess their unique differentiators out in the world. Because I think a lot of lawyers struggle to say, well, how am I different from the lawyer down the street who's also offering estate planning services or or whatever? So what kinds of things do you tell them to help pull that out of them?
Rose:The first thing I say is don't aff don't be excuse me. Don't be afraid to be yourself. And I think that's really what sets so many of us apart. No one has our experiences. No one has done the work we've done.
Rose:No one looks at the world the way that we do. And so how do we take those things and marry them and put them out into the world in a way that is truly reflective of who you are. But if you are a bright bold person, let's use bright bold language and bright bold colors. If you are a more conservative individual, let's make sure that that's reflective in your language and who you are. And you're going to attract the people and the businesses that align with that.
Rose:And those ideally, for many of the law firm owners, are the ones you want to work with anyway. So I I always say lean into who you are and embrace it. And I know it can feel very scary to do that because it's a level of openness and vulnerability that most of us are not used to. But doing so really does pay off enormously.
Davina:Right. Right. I think that's great advice. Alright. So how can we connect with you if we wanna connect with you and find out more about crafted identities?
Rose:Reach out to me on LinkedIn, Rose Moran, or send me a note on my website. My email is also it's easy. It's Rose@CraftedIdentities.com. Wonderful.
Davina:Thank you so much, Rose, for
Rose:being here.
Davina:I really enjoyed our conversation. I always love to talk shop with fellow marketers. So me too. Great.
Rose:Alright. Yeah.
Davina:Thank you so much. Thank you.
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