In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Chris Dreyer discuss:

  • Search engine marketing and SEO for lawyers.
  • Some of the main changes in content marketing.
  • Changing up how you write content.
  • Getting the most out of legal conferences.

Key Takeaways:

  • Leaning into SEO will look different depending on your field as well as your location.
  • The top-of-the-page marketing has changed because of the AI Overview on Google. Google likes brands, they like signals and clicks to resources such as videos.
  • The best conferences to go to are the ones that you put the most into and make a plan for.
  • PIMCon has been curated for the conferencegoers. They are bringing in some of the top people in the PI space to speak and they were invited to do so.

“In the search engine marketing side, one of the most challenging things is link building. And link building, by and large, is relationships. It’s the hardest thing to do.” —  Chris Dreyer

Read more from Steve at Above the Law: AboveTheLaw.com/tag/Steve-Fretzin/

Thank you to our Sponsors!

Ready to go from good to GOAT? Attend PIMCOM the inaugural personal injury mastermind conference Sept 15-17, 2024. Use promo code BeThatLawyer to get $200.00 off at https://www.pimcon.org/

Get Staffed Up: https://getstaffedup.com/bethatlawyer/

Lawmatics: https://www.lawmatics.com/bethatlawyer/

Episode References: 

About Chris Dreyer: Chris Dreyer is the CEO and Founder of Rankings.io, an SEO agency that helps elite law firms and personal injury lawyers obtain cases through Google’s organic search results. His company has the distinction of making the Inc. 5000 list seven years in a row.

In addition to owning and operating Rankings, Chris is the Wall Street Journal and USA Today best-selling author of “Niching Up: The Narrower the Market, the Bigger the Prize”, a real estate investor, and podcast host (Personal Injury Mastermind), as well as a member of the Forbes Agency Council, the Rolling Stone Culture Council, Business Journals Leadership Trust, Fast Company Executive Board, and Newsweek Expert Forum.

Chris’s journey in legal marketing has been a saga, to say the least. A world-ranked collectible card game player in his youth, Chris began his “grown up” career with a History Education degree and landed a job out of college as a detention room supervisor. The surplus of free time in that job allowed him to develop a side hustle in affiliate marketing, where (at his apex) he managed over 100 affiliate sites simultaneously, allowing him to turn his side gig into a full-time one. When his time in affiliate marketing came to an end, he segued into SEO for attorneys, while also having time to become a top-ranked online poker player.

Connect with Chris Dreyer: 

Website: https://www.pimcon.org/

Email: chris@rankings.io

Show: https://chrisdreyer.co/podcast/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiRS7BCssVkGrxcNsxCCa6Q

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisdreyerco/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/chrisdreyerco/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chrisdreyerco/

Connect with Steve Fretzin:

LinkedIn: Steve Fretzin

Twitter: @stevefretzin

Instagram: @fretzinsteve

Facebook: Fretzin, Inc.

Website: Fretzin.com

Email: Steve@Fretzin.com

Book: Legal Business Development Isn’t Rocket Science and more!

YouTube: Steve Fretzin

Call Steve directly at 847-602-6911

Show notes by Podcastologist Chelsea Taylor-Sturkie

Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You’re the expert. Your podcast will prove it.

FULL TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] Steve Fretzin: Hey everybody, before we get to the show, I just want to share that I’m now writing for Above the Law. If you enjoy this podcast, you might also enjoy my monthly columns. You can go to Above the Law and type my name into the magnifying glass in the top right corner to read my latest articles. Thanks and enjoy the show.

[00:00:21] Narrator: You’re listening to be that lawyer life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice. Each episode, your host author and lawyer coach, Steve Fretzin, we’ll take a deeper dive, helping you grow your law practice in less time with greater results. Now here’s your host, Steve Fretzin.

[00:00:43] Steve Fretzin: Hey everybody. Welcome back to the, be that lawyer with Brettson podcast. We are rocking and rolling. Fretzin 400 plus episodes. We’ve got, I’m writing for above the law. If you haven’t checked out my columns there, that’s pretty cool. And just continue to try to pump out great content for you, the lawyer trying to get ahead, trying to scale, trying to, you know, make the best out of your career.

[00:01:06] Steve Fretzin: And of course I always bring on the best guests. And today is absolutely no different. How you doing, Chris? We got Chris Dreyer waiting in the wings. 

[00:01:14] Chris Dreyer: I am so excited to be here. Thanks a lot, Steve. 

[00:01:16] Steve Fretzin: Yeah, we’ve had kind of a nice long history together of being on each other’s shows and in collaboration and I think and you’re now one of my one of my main sponsors with such, which is awesome.

[00:01:26] Steve Fretzin: You guys got to check out rankings IO and of course, PymCon, which we’re going to talk about soon enough, but I’m just excited to have you back. And of course, we’re going to start with our quote of the show because that’s what we do here. And it is this to me, Ideas are worth nothing unless executed. They are just a multiplier.

[00:01:44] Steve Fretzin: Execution is worth millions. And that’s of course, brilliant Steve Jobs. So Chris, welcome to the show and talk to us a little bit about why you love that quote. 

[00:01:54] Chris Dreyer: That quote to me is everything. When you talk to someone, they’re like, Oh, I had that idea for Amazon. I had that idea for the business. And the real challenge is execution.

[00:02:04] Chris Dreyer: I think Steve jobs, you know, he’s the epitome of this, like all of these brilliant people have ideas, but who’s going to roll up the sleeves and do the hard work to get it executed and cross the finish line. 

[00:02:15] Steve Fretzin: Yeah, it’s the beast. Execution is the beast. A lot of people want to do business development, want to grow their law practice.

[00:02:21] Steve Fretzin: It’s great to want. It’s great to dream. But again, it’s, it’s, it’s making a decision today to do something and, and, and then of course, execution and discipline. I think we got to add in discipline there of how to be consistent and do things in a way that’s going to get the job done. Otherwise, again, it’s just a dream.

[00:02:40] Steve Fretzin: You know, goals are just dreams that are written down or something like that. I forget that quote. That was another quote. So really, really great stuff. And you’re someone who executes. I mean, that’s, as I’ve, as I’ve met you, I mean, between your podcast and all of that, you’re just someone who’s continually demonstrating how to execute.

[00:02:54] Steve Fretzin: So, kudos. 

[00:02:55] Chris Dreyer: Yeah. I think, I think that’s how you learn too, right? Execute, iterate, improve. I, I had the saying, you know, quality comes through quantity. It’s really true. Like you have to put in the reps to really learn and understand, you know, the practice. 

[00:03:11] Steve Fretzin: The I think it was Alex Hermosi was always talks about two groups of people that had to do like, you know, I think it was like they were in some kind of like a ceramics class or something like one group was given the task of creating the coolest, like the most impressive like bowl or something like that.

[00:03:28] Steve Fretzin: And the other group was saying, hey, make as many bowls as you can and which one comes out better. And the ones that had to make many, many bowls. That was the ones, you know, of all different shapes and sizes, they ended up with the best looking bowl because they just had all that extra experience versus trying to make something perfect.

[00:03:44] Steve Fretzin: The first time or something, there was some, some iteration of that, of that type of thing, but I get it. It kind of goes in with what you’re saying. 

[00:03:52] Chris Dreyer: Yeah. Couldn’t agree more. I think the podcast too is tremendous, right? You do these interviews, access a feedback loop, you get to learn from other people’s experiences.

[00:04:01] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Yeah. And go back and listen to the first, you know, 10 episodes you’ve done in 10 episodes I’ve done and the ones that we’re doing now, very, very different exercise. Yeah, please don’t. Yeah, don’t do that everybody. We’re not, we’re not proud of those early episodes like we should be. So Chris, this, I think it’s your second or third time on the show.

[00:04:20] Steve Fretzin: I’m so happy you’re here. Give everyone a little bit of background leading up to where you are today. And then we’ll, we’ll dive into some topics. 

[00:04:28] Chris Dreyer: Yeah. So I’ve been doing digital marketing for 16 plus years and I started off doing affiliate marketing, basically selling other people’s stuff for a small percentage.

[00:04:39] Chris Dreyer: Then it started consulting for business owners, started consulting for solo practitioners and small law firms. And then basically that led to starting my agency. This is 2013. We’ve been at it for, like I said, 10 plus years. We work primarily with personal injury attorneys. I think for the most part, it’s because of how competitive it is.

[00:05:02] Chris Dreyer: It demands expertise. You know, if you’re the only trademark attorney in a city, you could rank just by the nature of being the only one. But as we both know, when you drive into a city and the amount of billboards you see, On the side of the road that there’s real competition. They need an expert. 

[00:05:19] Steve Fretzin: Yeah.

[00:05:19] Steve Fretzin: And again, I think without, without having some, someone in your corner that really knows the space it can, it can be a very expensive endeavor. 

[00:05:29] Chris Dreyer: Absolutely. You take, in my opinion, especially on the search engine marketing side, one of the most challenging things is link building and link building by and large is relationships.

[00:05:40] Chris Dreyer: It’s the hardest thing to do. You got to create content, you got to meet their editorial standards and their approval and it’s just all the, all the tactics combined and that’s what, that’s what really separates the, the good agencies from the bad in the SEO space in my opinion. 

[00:05:53] Steve Fretzin: Yeah, it is, is since we’re getting, we’re getting kind of down to it, I mean, is, is SEO for everyone?

[00:05:59] Steve Fretzin: I mean, is that, is that going to benefit everybody or is that going to benefit certain types of people, certain types of lawyers and different types of practices? 

[00:06:06] Chris Dreyer: I love this question. It’s a great question. I think that if you’re a litigating attorney that doesn’t have a low case select or high case selection criteria, meaning that you’re not willing to take soft tissue and volume, it could be challenging to go after ranking for terms like car accident lawyer and personal injury lawyer because one of the ranking factors under the category of prominence is review count and score.

[00:06:35] Chris Dreyer: So the review count, the quantity matters. So If you’re a large B2C advertiser on TV, radio, search, digital, you’re gonna, and you, and you have that high case selection criteria. So you’re willing to take, you know, a wider range is what I mean. You’re going to have more opportunities for reviews than if you just litigate and you’re very, you know, a very small pool.

[00:07:00] Chris Dreyer: So it just depends on who you’re, who you’re trying to market to. If you’re trying to originate your own cases then, and you’re willing to advertise, then could be for you. But if not, I would do the B2B play for referrals. 

[00:07:10] Steve Fretzin: Yeah, I mean, my, my concern is someone who is a lawyer at a big firm or a lawyer who, you know recognizes that to do SEO and the amount of content and quantity and in time that it’s going to take.

[00:07:23] Steve Fretzin: That they’re late to the game. For example, they’re just thinking about it now. And there’s been people in the space where, you know, they’re going to be a show up on page 60 and then to get up to page one could take, you know, how much money and time. So I’m just, you know, and that’s where I come in. Right.

[00:07:38] Steve Fretzin: So like, let’s focus on relationships and business development and other means of, of, you know, creating and getting content out maybe on social media versus trying to play the game of SEO when you’re not really going to ever get where you want to be. At the expense of time and money and energy towards it.

[00:07:55] Chris Dreyer: I couldn’t agree more. And by listening to this podcast, when you go to Facebook, you’re probably going to see an SEO ad that’s willing to charge 200 a month. But reality is they’re just not going to have the capital and the production requirements to rank, especially for personal injury or family law or criminal defense, some of these, you know, more competitive practices.

[00:08:14] Chris Dreyer: And that’s just the reality. You know, I’ll say one thing that that line that race that you mentioned. There’s a lot of bad players in the Mass Tort space, so you gotta protect yourself. But, that race could start. You know, for a new drug or a new, new lawsuit, it can start tomorrow and you’re at the same starting point as everyone else.

[00:08:36] Chris Dreyer: That’s the difference than, you know, competing with a firm that’s been around for 30 years for trying to rank for personal injury or car accident lawyer. 

[00:08:44] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. So getting in early, like if you identify something that’s coming up the pike or you identify something that just happened and you can get an early.

[00:08:51] Steve Fretzin: That may be the time to get in and start writing and having content and links and things that are going to help you versus, hey, car accident, Chicago. I mean, where am I going with that? Right? I mean, that’s not going to, that’s not going to play out. A lot of capital. Yeah. And, you know, the other issue with SEO, I mean, maybe similar to LinkedIn and Google even, right is, well, I guess that they all kind of fit together, but Is that there are changes happening all the time, the algorithms change and everything.

[00:09:17] Steve Fretzin: So what worked for me five years ago to rank may not be working now. What are kind of a couple of the main changes that have occurred in the last year that you could just share with everybody that that might be interesting? 

[00:09:31] Chris Dreyer: I think the biggest one that we’re really facing right now is content marketing strategies are changing.

[00:09:37] Chris Dreyer: A lot of the top of the funnel content is now eaten, eaten up by the AI overview section. And So in the past, we took a top of funnel approach down, right? The awareness piece and really, but now it’s kind of reversed and we’re taking a bottom of the funnel, targeting practice areas and essentially the, the attorney’s sales pages.

[00:09:59] Chris Dreyer: Because that real estate’s gone. It’s the traffic’s just not there. Now, there were zero click scenarios with rich snippets in the past, but now it’s completely gone with the AI overview. 

[00:10:10] Steve Fretzin: Okay. And what, and what kind of content is working best? Is it video content? Is it with transcripts? Is it articles?

[00:10:18] Steve Fretzin: Is it just getting great links? Is, what’s kind of the play that, that Google is looking for now to say, Hey, you’re the authority. We want to put you closer to the top. 

[00:10:27] Chris Dreyer: Google really likes brands. So that’s one thing they really like. The signals and clicks to, to, to a resource so if you have a video that keeps a consumer on the page longer, that’s a good signal.

[00:10:42] Chris Dreyer: The, the thing is, in the past, you could write an article on a topic and just by the nature of being the first person who wrote it, you would rank most of those evergreen topics have been written. So now you have to think about how am I going to take a different approach and be different. Maybe you take the department of transportation, who’s always two or three years behind on their accident data.

[00:11:04] Chris Dreyer: And you’re the one that goes, cleans it up. And we’ve done that in certain markets. And you’re the resource as opposed to. You know, other individuals that you know, now you’re being cited from the media. 

[00:11:17] Steve Fretzin: Okay. Well, that’s really interesting. Cause I mean, I’m, I’m, look, I’m creating content on a regular basis, video podcast, thinking about a fifth book.

[00:11:26] Steve Fretzin: There’s all kinds of stuff, articles, things I’m doing. And I, and I always want to make sure that when I’m putting them on my website, that I’m going to get value and I’m going to get credit for that. Are there any tips about how to do that effectively? 

[00:11:41] Chris Dreyer: Yeah, let’s take a podcast. I think, I think having a transcription of the show is a good idea because it gives the guests something to reference and link to.

[00:11:51] Chris Dreyer: It, it’s a good way to acquire backlinks naturally. I imagine if we threw your site into A Refs and all these transcripts, probably have a ton of links and that’s going to contribute to your SEO. And so I think The main point I’m trying to make on the creative side, when I say creative, I mean the copywriting, the quality of the video, the hooks, the story, the compelling information.

[00:12:19] Chris Dreyer: It’s so much more important now because of the competition and, and all those entry points of just write an article and it’s really basic. You can’t do that anymore. You got to put more emphasis on, on the creative, which is the quality of everything. 

[00:12:34] Steve Fretzin: Okay, and then, then does also Google pick up on the chat GBT created stuff so that it so that that hurt may hurt your ranking 

[00:12:43] Chris Dreyer: absolutely.

[00:12:44] Chris Dreyer: Yeah, the so they’ll they’ll filter it out on on certain things that if it’s too similar to other content on your website or out on the in the search results there. They’re not going to give Google’s spiders the ability to crawl those pages. It’s just. You know, so that’s where you’re you’re you have to emphasize backlinks and those endorsements to get Google’s attention that something’s changed to get it crawled again.

[00:13:08] Chris Dreyer: The web’s too big in 2016. They were like 6 trillion web pages as 2016. I have no idea what that number is now, but. It’s, it’s astronomical and Google just doesn’t have the ability to crawl every single landing page at all time. 

[00:13:22] Steve Fretzin: Right, right. Okay, got it, got it. Well, I mean that’s something I wanted to kind of pull out of you were some, some things that have changed and some best practices and, and the other thing I know you’ve got this, this amazing PymCon coming up and before we get to that specifically, Oh, there are a lot of marketing, business development and straight up business conferences for lawyers every year.

[00:13:45] Steve Fretzin: I mean, I don’t know what, I don’t know if you have an idea of like how many there are a year. I’m sure it’s dozens that maybe we went to 

[00:13:51] Chris Dreyer: 30. legal conferences and probably half of them had some marketing component. Okay. Okay. So there’s legal 

[00:13:58] Steve Fretzin: tech, right? But then there’s a whole other category of, of marketing business development and just general business.

[00:14:05] Steve Fretzin: And I think it’s hard for lawyers to sort of understand which ones make the most sense and which ones they’re going to get the most value out of. And so what are your kind of like, how, how would you suggest lawyers approach the various opportunities that exist out there to find the ones that. They’re going to actually either learn the most or make the most contacts or get the most value from 

[00:14:27] Chris Dreyer: such a big question.

[00:14:28] Chris Dreyer: And I think you’re the perfect person to answer this. Genuinely. It’s like you’re, you’re going to do an 

[00:14:33] Steve Fretzin: answer, but I thought I’d dish out to you first. You’re 

[00:14:35] Chris Dreyer: going to get the most out of the conferences you put the most effort into. 

[00:14:40] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. 

[00:14:41] Chris Dreyer: I think national trial lawyers, the one that launches in January and Miami is a phenomenal conference for trial attorneys and PI.

[00:14:48] Chris Dreyer: And the reason last few years, they’ve had at the lows. The Lowe’s has one central bar with ton of seating where everyone congregates whether you drink or you don’t drink. I mean that’s It’s just a very nice central location. It’s very easy to network. I’ve been to other conferences where it’s so fractured.

[00:15:06] Chris Dreyer: It’s like some people are hanging out there. Some people are hanging out there and it’s more, especially for an introvert like me, it’s harder to stir up those conversations. I think it depends on your goal. Like, look, if you’re wanting to be a better trial attorney, like check out TLU, if you’re wanting to network and, you know, see what’s newer hip or whatever, you know, Bob Simon’s got some great stuff is a lot of girl marketing initiatives you’re looking at.

[00:15:30] Chris Dreyer: You know, anything Michael Mogul’s putting out is going to be top notch in terms of quality, but I think it generally comes down to you, though, if you go to the conference without the right attitude, without willing to put in the effort to get something from it, you’re, it’s just not going to be beneficial.

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[00:16:29] Steve Fretzin: They help law firms win new business, speed up intake and boost efficiency. They integrate smoothly with your favorite practice management tools like Clio, Smokeball and Practice Panther. And get this, on average, Lawmatics users get 25 percent more clients, save six hours a week and grow their revenue by at least 25%.

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[00:17:13] Steve Fretzin: To get staffed up, they will help you by staffing your law firm with incredible full time, offshore executive assistance, legal assistance, marketing assistance, and much more. The best part? They will find you a highly qualified English speaking VA based in Latin America for only a few dollars. Fraction of the cost locally at Freson, we use Get Staffed up for Marketing Fretzin and you know how good our marketing is.

[00:17:36] Steve Fretzin: Learn more@getstaffedup.com slash be that lawyer. And the thing that I, I want to continue talking about those conferences, but the way that I think about it from a business development perspective, A, there’s, there’s plenty to learn. So if you’re going there to learn. As one of the top elements of why you’re paying the money and going and traveling or, or spending your time that way.

[00:17:56] Steve Fretzin: I mean, that’s number one is you want to go somewhere where you’re going to learn things that are going to help you improve your life, improve your business, whatever. From a networking perspective, I think it’s important to in business development perspective, it’s important to consider how are you planning for the event?

[00:18:10] Steve Fretzin: Are you just going to show up? Are you actually going to like go through lists? Are you going to see who’s attending? Are you going to talk to the conference people to figure out? Where’s the best value for your time for dinners for for the drinks for the things outside of the presentations, right? The educational side of it.

[00:18:26] Steve Fretzin: So I think that planning piece is there. I think execution of knowing how you’re going to, you know, what’s your infomercial, how are you going to, you know, sit down at a table and immediately figure out out of the six people who are the two that you really want to spend more time with. Right going around and learning about them and the biggest mistake.

[00:18:42] Steve Fretzin: I think people make in conferences is they meet 5 10 15 great people mean people that could do business with them or network with them and those cards just sit on their desk for you know week 1 week 2 week 3 week 4 and basically it’s done if you don’t wait if you wait that long. Reaching out to those people, they’re not going to really remember you.

[00:19:00] Steve Fretzin: And it’s not going to be as easy to get back into a flow of how we can work together, how we can do business. So I think it’s sort of like a story. There’s a beginning, a middle and an end. And most people are going into conferences without thinking about any of those. They’re just showing up and kind of hoping for the best.

[00:19:15] Chris Dreyer: I couldn’t agree more. I couldn’t agree more. And I’ve been to many and that’s just, that’s just reality of it. 

[00:19:21] Steve Fretzin: So like I’m part of Provisors and shout out to Provisors, but like, I, they have a group leader get together every year in October. I don’t just show up. I mean, I make lists of the people that I want to meet, why I want to meet with them, what I’m going to talk to them about.

[00:19:34] Steve Fretzin: I go there, I search out those people, I leverage people in the room. To get me to the names of the people that I don’t know because I know they know them. And then again, I’m following up scheduling meeting after meeting after meeting when I’m done so that I didn’t just throw away three days, you know, I’ve taken those three days and I’m leveraging it into, you know, what, six months of meetings and, and, and value.

[00:19:55] Steve Fretzin: So I think that’s a huge part of any conference, but I also like the idea of these educational business growth conferences. So maybe that’s a good leading to talk about pin kind of a little bit. 

[00:20:06] Chris Dreyer: Yeah, you teed that one up for me and I should have mentioned that in terms of the conferences earlier.

[00:20:11] Chris Dreyer: Yeah, so, so we’re hosting a conference specific for personal injury attorneys and it’s, it’s September 15th through 17th and there are a lot of different formats, right? There’s work, there’s workshops and panels and, and breakout sessions. We have a main stage speaker that we have selected. They didn’t pay to get there.

[00:20:31] Chris Dreyer: And it’s. Someone in the discipline, right? So Dan Morgan, obviously Morgan Morgan, the biggest PI firm. He’s the keynote speaker. Alexander Shannara, massive, probably in the top three to five biggest PI firms. You know, a top dog law, James Helm, Jen Gore for social media. These people are in the trenches and that’s what our conference is about.

[00:20:53] Chris Dreyer: So it is about how to generate leads through marketing. It’s, that’s it. It’s, it’s not to be a better trial attorney or. Or you know, operations and things like that is about marketing. 

[00:21:05] Steve Fretzin: But if you’re, if you’re focused on having that main stage and giving top level education, top level speakers, there’s still some soft skills, like I was talking about, that people need to keep in mind that, hey, you know, it’s one thing to go and learn all these, you know, the most amazing from the most amazing minds in the space.

[00:21:20] Steve Fretzin: You also, you know, you need to set up your coffees, your lunches, your drinks, and really make sure that you’re networking. Because if, you know, Yeah, you’re so that in the people that are coming, these are like personal injury attorneys from around the country, right? 

[00:21:31] Chris Dreyer: Yeah. And I, and Steve, I was really intentional about choosing the Phoenician in Scottsdale.

[00:21:37] Chris Dreyer: And the reason I chose it is because when you enter the lobby, there’s this long horizontal bar with a lot of seating very, very lounge oriented. And it’s like a central location that everybody’s going to, because you have to pass it to go to the restaurants. Yeah. And so it’s like you go in and to the left is the conference and to the right is food.

[00:21:58] Chris Dreyer: So it just makes it easier to bump into people. It’s not, you know, over in this place or that place. It’s very centralized. 

[00:22:07] Steve Fretzin: Well, I think, you know, the, the location is a big, a big part of it. The lineup is a big part of it. And so what, so the people that are, that are coming into this, what’s their, what’s their mindset?

[00:22:17] Steve Fretzin: What types of personal injury attorneys, I mean, there’s some that just, you know, sit back and wait for the phone to ring and there’s others that are being proactive and, and want to grow and want to scale. 

[00:22:25] Chris Dreyer: Yeah. I think this is the, the epitome of, of those that want to deploy capital that want to invest in marketing and grow their firm.

[00:22:33] Chris Dreyer: I think if, if you’re wanting. I, and I don’t use this word negatively. If you want a lifestyle practice, and that is great, right, and you’re, you’re happy and with your current volume and you got some good referral partners, then I wouldn’t say this is the conference. If you’re, if you’re wanting to know the latest channels.

[00:22:53] Chris Dreyer: the newest tactics for marketing and how to deploy your capital from a lead gem perspective, this would be more catered to you. 

[00:23:01] Steve Fretzin: And so it’s, it seems like a little bit different than many conferences that, that break things up quite a bit with lots of different breakout sessions in different rooms that you got to sort of pick and choose where you want to be.

[00:23:12] Steve Fretzin: This is just like, Hey, everyone’s in the same room. Listen to the same top level players. 

[00:23:17] Chris Dreyer: Yeah, it was, it’s, it’s been curated and I’ll tell you this, this is me being transparent, Steve. Look, there’s a reason why there’s panels and breakout sessions is because you get more speakers and more people talking about the conference.

[00:23:32] Chris Dreyer: So from to market your conference, because there’s like you said, there’s a ton of conferences. It’s harder. You don’t have as many people talking about. So you gotta there’s there’s challenges to that. But I want to be really. Purposeful and, and, and specific on who I wanted on the stage. I didn’t want anybody that paid to get there.

[00:23:50] Chris Dreyer: I want them to be invite only. 

[00:23:53] Steve Fretzin: And you’re looking for people that, that have a lot of value to share. So it’s like you’re, you’re drawing in people through the Venetian, through the, the quality of the speakers, through just the, the, I mean, just as like, like first class versus being, you know, again, just kind of slop together and, and geez, let’s, let’s hope that people show up.

[00:24:13] Chris Dreyer: Oh, yeah, we’ve been I’m sure the speakers have been super annoyed about us on their topics and what their their presentations and what’s approved and what’s not approved and but I think you have to be and I’m not look it’s I’m not trying to be super annoying to the speakers, but you want to make sure that they’re they’re prepared and they’re ready to present and give value.

[00:24:33] Steve Fretzin: No doubt about it. No doubt about it. So I think, you know, what we’re kind of just talking about is, is the importance of lawyers figuring out which, which conferences are going to make the most sense before you spend the money. And for personal injury attorneys that want to grow significantly and invest in their business, this is the one to go.

[00:24:53] Steve Fretzin: And then the, and again, everybody would, you know, maybe would say that. I think you, you’re kind of more on, on, on line with it, but what are, what are some of the things that. Okay. That you’re hoping to get out of running this. Let’s take it from the other perspective. You’re the one that’s running this thing and what’s the, you know, what, what are you hoping that people are going to say about it?

[00:25:11] Steve Fretzin: And what’s going to like, what are you hoping to be the end result of investing time, money and energy and putting something this massive together? 

[00:25:17] Chris Dreyer: I love this question because I don’t think very many people would ask it. I’ll, I’ll, I’ll be candid, right? Not 

[00:25:23] Steve Fretzin: my first 10 podcasts. 

[00:25:25] Chris Dreyer: Right. The reality is.

[00:25:27] Chris Dreyer: We’re all trying to get attention and lift your brand, and this is a new channel of distribution that I own, like the podcast. One of the reasons why I know you love it and why I love a podcast is ’cause I own the distribution I get to own and who’s gonna come on and what material goes out. Now, from a revenue perspective, anyone that tells you that they make a lot of money on the front, front end is.

[00:25:51] Chris Dreyer: probably lying. There’s not a lot of money made on the front end. It is very costly from F and B’s to the everything involved to run a conference. I mean, we’re talking, this is our first conference. We got a million and a half in it right now. We’re in the hole, right? Due to the advertising you guys spend to do it.

[00:26:09] Chris Dreyer: But the true power is the back end. It’s the relationships, the brand list, the networking. You know, if I happen to sell some retainers, I’m not going to realize that money out of the gate and break even. And so the real money comes on the back end, 

[00:26:26] Steve Fretzin: but you recognized it as not only good for today, but good for tomorrow.

[00:26:30] Steve Fretzin: And, and back to our original kind of quote of the show, you know, you’re executing on something that you believe and believe and have seen work. And it’s just a matter of, of continuing that execution to get it done. And then if it goes well next year, you keep this as, you know, obviously rinse and repeat if it goes well.

[00:26:48] Steve Fretzin: And that’s the key. Yeah. 

[00:26:49] Chris Dreyer: And I’ve definitely taken some of my licks. I’ve had the hard learning experiences, which comes through execution and that I will definitely not do next year.But. Yeah, it, it, I equate this to look, investing in brand is not immediate. That’s really what this is. 

[00:27:08] Steve Fretzin: Mm-Hmm. 

[00:27:09] Chris Dreyer: It is.

[00:27:10] Chris Dreyer: When you invest in tv, you’re, it’s not like you’re gonna get immediate high volume out of the gate. A lot of times people tell you need to invest in TV for a year before you see a return. That’s kind of the equivalent to a conference. 

[00:27:23] Steve Fretzin: But that’s, but you know what, again, I think, you know, when you, when you put out something quality, you get good people there, they talk about it, the buzz.

[00:27:31] Steve Fretzin: And then, of course, the, you know, the potential for them wanting to work with you and all that, it all adds up. So, really, really interesting. So, if people want to check out, I think we’re giving a discount too, like if people use the Be That Lawyer in the, in the discount code, I think they’re going to get some, some bucks off.

[00:27:47] Chris Dreyer: Yeah, if you use that coupon code, Be That Lawyer to be 200 off, you can go to pemcon. org, that’s P I M dot O R, or P I M C O N dot O R G. Mcom. org and check it out. But yeah, all the details are there. 

[00:28:05] Steve Fretzin: Awesome. Awesome. Hey let’s also wrap up with our game changing book. Ready fire aim, which is, which I’ve heard about for years.

[00:28:12] Steve Fretzin: I don’t think I’ve ever read that, but it I think they’re making, they’re making a point. So what’s the point? 

[00:28:17] Chris Dreyer: Yeah. Michael Masterson 

[00:28:19] Steve Fretzin: fire. I’m confused. 

[00:28:20] Chris Dreyer: Yeah. Yeah. It’s so many, it goes back to my original quote. So I guess I’m putting myself in a, in a box here, but it comes down to execution. Yeah.

[00:28:29] Chris Dreyer: Execute and iterate and change and improve. It’s the biggest thing, but I do like what you mentioned. It’s it’s consistency. It’s, it’s. one of our core values at our agency is true grit. It’s, you, you gotta, you gotta be willing to do it day in and day out to really build something of value. 

[00:28:47] Steve Fretzin: So ready, aim, fire, which we all know is the way that you use a gun, I think.

[00:28:52] Steve Fretzin: And, but, but as we talk about business with lawyers, I think there’s so much time spent on the aim that they can get ready, but then the aim is like, then they get the analysis paralysis, their perfectionist kicks in and they never execute. They don’t get to the point where they actually fire. And that’s why I think ready fire aim makes a lot of sense.

[00:29:12] Steve Fretzin: You don’t want to fire too much and too crazily, but I think. Without the execution as we go back to the beginning, there’s, there’s where everything falls apart. 

[00:29:20] Chris Dreyer: Yeah, it reminds me like Gary V talking about, you know, putting content on social media. It’s like, don’t overthink it because you’re not going to be good at the beginning, no matter how much planning you do.

[00:29:28] Chris Dreyer: And the, and the, the, the Alex Hermosi, you know, the pottery thing you mentioned. It’s, it’s, you gotta, you gotta practice and execute. You know, if you’re going to go out and play basketball, you got to shoot a lot of free throws and threes before you expect to be good. Yeah. 

[00:29:43] Steve Fretzin: Well, the other, as long as we’re doing like a ton of quotes, the other one that I love is a Lombardi.

[00:29:47] Steve Fretzin: I see this all the time. It’s not practice makes perfect. It’s perfect practice makes perfect. And I think what, what people do is they go out and they make the same mistakes over and over and over again, and they don’t learn. They don’t have someone kind of in their corner, you know, helping make sure they’re going in the right direction.

[00:30:02] Steve Fretzin: And so therefore they just kind of, you know, keep practicing and properly you’re doing some of the same thing over like networking is a great example or going to conferences, right? I’ve been a dozen conferences. I never get anything out of them. Well, have you changed anything? No. Okay. Well, there you go.

[00:30:15] Steve Fretzin: There’s your, you know, you’re practicing conferences, but you’re not improving. So awesome, man. Of course, want to take a moment to thank our sponsors. Chris Dreyer of rankings IO who we’re talking to with PymCon, we’ve got, get staffed up rocket it, just get staffed up, man. A lot of people picking picking them to, you know, be their full time VA.

[00:30:37] Steve Fretzin: And then of course, law Maddox, which I’m continuing to work on and use leverage for automations and grow my business and keep in touch with people and contracts, everything. It’s awesome. A shout out to those guys. Chris, if people I think we kind of hit this, but if you want to get in touch with you directly to hear more about rankings io or they want to hear more about pin con talk to you about it Maybe they want to be a sponsor.

[00:30:57] Steve Fretzin: I don’t know what you know what they want to do, but best ways to reach you 

[00:31:00] Chris Dreyer: Yeah, the best way to reach me directly, just, just Chris, C H R I S, at Rankings. io. If you want to shoot me an email, happy to answer anything. Put in the subject line, be that lawyer, so I know where you, where you heard me. And if you want to check out PymCon, that’s September 15th through 17th, just go to PymCon.

[00:31:16] Chris Dreyer: org. 

[00:31:17] Steve Fretzin: Yeah, it sounds amazing. Maybe I’ll be a little cooler by then as well. 

[00:31:21] Chris Dreyer: I hope 

[00:31:23] Steve Fretzin: because you could cook an egg real fast in Arizona these days. That’s for sure. Anyway, wonderful. Well, Chris, thanks so much for being on the show, sharing your wisdom. I’m excited for PymCon. I think it’s going to be awesome.

[00:31:33] Steve Fretzin: And I hope that the the PI attorneys, and again, if you’re not a PI attorney, you know, let, let people know about it. Don’t be shy. But just thanks, man. I appreciate you coming back. 

[00:31:41] Chris Dreyer: Yeah. Thanks for having me on the show. 

[00:31:43] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Yeah. Thank you everybody for spending time with Chris and I today on the Be That Lawyer with Fretzin podcast, helping you to be that lawyer, confident, organized, and of course a skilled rainmaker.

[00:31:51] Steve Fretzin: Take care, everybody. Be safe. Be well. We will talk again soon.

[00:31:59] Narrator: Thanks for listening to Be That Lawyer, life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice. Visit Steve’s website, Fretzin. com for additional information and to stay up to date on the marketing trends. For more information and important links about today’s episode, check out today’s show notes.

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