Reassure. Inform. Convince.

A little over four weeks ago, we had the unbelievable honor of closing down LWP headquarters for 3 days and heading to Olathe, KS – the entire company, including “new guy” Kyle who had been with us just six weeks. It was a hefty financial price, but the cost would have been so much more had we not. Why Kansas, you ask?

For more than 17 years, Integrity Marketing Solutions has been helping attorneys build a more profitable and enjoyable estate planning practice with proven, effective and affordable elder law and estate planning marketing solutions, and we have been very friendly with them for all of those 17 years. At the last convention where we both exhibited, we got to talking shop and next thing you know we’re headed to Kansas to hear more about what they’ve been doing to transform estate planning law practices all over the country.

From the time our feet hit the farm, we got right to work and spent our first five hours talking about the uniqueness of marketing a small, boutique estate planning law firm. I could have gone home after that, it was so refreshing to finally get in a room with a marketing firm that speaks our language and our clients’ (attorney) language. The WOW factor for me was walking away, finally, with a vocabulary for how to support estate planning attorneys in their marketing efforts in a way that resonates for them. Here’s just a taste of what I walked away with:

1. Estate planning attorneys are selling transformation and motivation, which is hard to sell if you don’t intimately understand what their day-to-day world looks like, along with the daily lives of their clients and their referral sources;
2. The traditional “shock and awe” marketing strategies don’t work long-term in this industry. We have to use informational strategies;
3. The estate planning industry requires strategy that guides the tactics;
4. Estate planning marketing is a fine dance between linking what’s been successful while opening up the attorneys’ eyes to the next possibilities;
5. Everything we do is to calm people down, reassure them and minimize their risk. Shock and awe goes against the very fabric of an EP firm’s existence;
6. 100% of the time the goal is three things: Reassure. Inform. Convince
7. 7. People buy from people when they can say to themselves:
   • I belong with them;
   • They are authentic, real, down to earth;
   • They are like me;
   • I want to be with them.
8. Everything an estate planning attorney does from a marketing perspective needs to communicate in a quick, elevator speech fashion, “I am a passionate advocate for you.”

Can shock and awe copywriting transform your marketing? “Absolutely,” in the words of Jennifer Campbell, CEO of Integrity Marketing Solutions, “if you’re selling organic soap.”

Molly L. Hall, Co-Founder, Lawyers with Purpose, LLC, and author of Don’t Be a Yes Chick: How to Stop Babysitting Your Boss, Transform Your Job and Work with a Dream Team Without Losing Your Sanity or Your Spirit in the Process.