Gordon Firemark: Maximizing Content Creation Through Podcasting

In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Gordon Firemark discuss:

• Podcasting as a tool for branding, content creation, and growth
• Legal and ethical essentials for podcasting
• Streamlining podcast production with AI and tech
• Leveraging unique marketing strategies to enhance professional presence

Key Takeaways:

• Podcasting generates diverse discoverable content by utilizing video, audio, and transcription, which can be repurposed into clips, blog posts, or courses to expand reach.
• Preparation with detailed outlines, structured workflows, and AI tools simplifies production.
• Legal consent from guests is essential, covering recording, editing, and perpetual use, including AI-related content integrity.
• Success relies on audience-building through consistent, targeted content that establishes authority and drives client acquisition and referrals.

“Once you do [podcasting], I think it is a fantastic way of getting the word out and publishing your message on a regular basis.” —  Gordon Firemark

Got a challenge growing your law practice? Email me at steve@fretzin.com with your toughest question, and I’ll answer it live on the show—anonymously, just using your first name!

Thank you to our Sponsors!

Rankings.io: https://rankings.io/

Rainmakers Roundtable: https://www.fretzin.com/lawyer-coaching-and-training/peer-advisory-groups/

Episode References:

The Expert Edge Podcast with Colin Boyd: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/expert-edge-podcast/id1500505303

About Gordon Firemark: Gordon Firemark, widely known as “The Podcast Lawyer,” is a seasoned entertainment attorney specializing in podcasting law. With 32 years of experience, he advises podcasters and clients in theater, film, television, and digital media. A sought-after speaker and writer on legal issues affecting digital creators, Gordon has been featured in numerous podcasts, webinars, and industry events. He hosts the Entertainment Law Update podcast (since 2009) and Legit Podcast Pro, providing expert insights on podcasting law. Gordon is also the author of the Podcast, Blog & New Media Producer’s Legal Survival Guide and develops online courses for creatives, entrepreneurs, and small firm lawyers.

Connect with Gordon Firemark:

Website: https://firemark.com

Email: gfiremark@firemark.com

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/gfiremark

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

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

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

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

FULL TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] Steve Fretzin: Hey there, we’re heading into a new year and I’d like to change up how I open the show. Each episode I’ll be sharing a quick question and answer on your greatest challenges in growing a successful law practice. Additionally, I’d like to hear what you’re struggling with and answer your questions directly on the show.

[00:00:15] Steve Fretzin: Please email me at steve at Fretzin. com with something you’ve been struggling with and i’ll answer it directly on the show Only using your first name. Let’s try this out and see how it goes. Thanks and enjoy the show Hey everybody before we get to the interview want to just take a moment for our q a of the week This is coming from peter from chicago.

[00:00:33] Steve Fretzin: He’s asking I’m meeting people for coffee and it’s a big love fest. How do I convert this into business though? Thank you peter for the great question. This is, this is the difference between winging it and having a structured process. Sometimes when you go to a coffee, you talk the whole time, you build a great relationship.

[00:00:50] Steve Fretzin: I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that. I love that it’s a love fest and that people are connecting at a variety of levels. The problem comes in though, when you leave the meeting and people say, Oh, I’ll just keep my eyes open for you. And again, that may be fine from a standpoint of longevity with that relationship.

[00:01:08] Steve Fretzin: However, when I try to teach and explain to people is that you can have a love fest and try to connect each other. I mean, is there a better way to demonstrate value and build a relationship better than actually helping somebody in some way? So try to figure out in that coffee meeting, whether it’s through structure or not, one connection that you can make for somebody that’s going to be valuable.

[00:01:31] Steve Fretzin: And I’m not saying give away your top client. That’s not necessarily the case. I wouldn’t do that in a first meeting. I think like think about who they want to meet strategically. So for example, if it’s an estate planner you’re meeting with Not a state planner wants to meet an accountant, you know, a great accountant, make that in road is, you know, if you feel like they’re qualified and that they’re, it’s going to be, it’s going to be a good connection.

[00:01:50] Steve Fretzin: And what you’re doing is you’re actually testing the waters, not only to be a giver and help connect, but see how they reciprocate. And if they do reciprocate. With some mutual connection, how did they follow up? How did they, you know, you can like somebody and be friends with them. That doesn’t mean they’re a good networker or that they’re going to be valuable to your business long term.

[00:02:06] Steve Fretzin: I think that’s really what we want to do is think about how we can add value for others and help them help us to add value for us. And, and test the waters a bit, and that’s going to get you a lot more business and traction with networking other than just again, winging it and having a love fest and moving on to the next person and doing the same over and over and over again.

[00:02:27] Steve Fretzin: We need to have some, some progress with these people and figure out who we can bring in and maybe who we need to release and just be friends with. That’s okay, too. So hopefully that was helpful to you, Peter. And for everyone that’s about to watch the show, enjoy. We’re going to have a good interview.

[00:02:46] 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, will take a deeper dive, helping you grow your law practice in less time with greater results. Now, here’s your host, Steve Fretzin.

[00:03:08] Steve Fretzin: Hey, everybody. Welcome back. It’s Steve Fretzin and I am the host of the Be That Lawyer with Fretzin podcast. We are here for your listening pleasure and viewing pleasure. If you go to YouTube, we put all these up on YouTube. You can check them out there. And most recently we are transcribing these into two page blog casts.

[00:03:24] Steve Fretzin: So if you want to check out our blog cast, go to my website, Fretzin. com slash blog, and you can check out our blog casts, which are awesome. We are ready to rock and roll here to help you to be that lawyer, confident, organized, and a skilled rainmaker. I’ve got an, a really amazing and unique guest today.

[00:03:41] Steve Fretzin: I’m a huge fan of podcasting gordon like i’ve written four books i’ve been doing i’ve written for publications i’ve done all that stuff and nothing compares to podcasting so i’m super excited to have you welcome to the show my friend 

[00:03:53] Gordon Firemark: hi thanks for having me steve boy you said amazing or something you set the bar kind of high so i’ll try 

[00:04:00] Steve Fretzin: it just so you know everybody it’s all downhill from here no we are going to have some fun today we’re going to start off with our quote of the show and then i want to get into your background a little bit what got you here won’t get you there And that’s James Wedmore, an online business coach.

[00:04:13] Steve Fretzin: Talk to us about that, that quote of the show. I love it. 

[00:04:16] Gordon Firemark: You know, James is very much about mindset oriented changes to your life and your processes to move to the next level with him. So really what he’s saying is, look, you’ve achieved whatever success in your life you’ve achieved by doing what you’ve been doing.

[00:04:30] Gordon Firemark: But if you want to go to the next level, you’re going to have to change something. And that starts internally with you. So that’s really the point of that message. And I think that’s really a true statement. 

[00:04:41] Steve Fretzin: And I would just add, you know, maybe this is a different spinoff, but like what made you successful as a lawyer or made you successful as a professional in the last 10 years may not be, what’s going to make you successful in the next 10 years.

[00:04:53] Steve Fretzin: We have to continue to look ahead and what’s changing in the world and what’s changing in our environment in our industry and things like that so you know i thought books right just write some books and that’s gonna make me you know it’s this and it look there’s no question that books are awesome and that you know if you’re looking to be an authority books the way to go but i didn’t have the glimmer of podcasting in my eye 10 years ago like i should have i know you’ve been in this like before it became a thing.

[00:05:17] Steve Fretzin: But to that point, give us your background because that’s, it’s extraordinary. 

[00:05:20] Gordon Firemark: Well, so I’ve been practicing entertainment law since the early nineties when it came out of law school. That was right after the LA law surge in, in law school enrollment. So it was hard to find jobs and things like that.

[00:05:32] Gordon Firemark: Anyway, so I’ve been doing entertainment law and that’s, you know, all kinds of media, but I sort of focused on film and theater as my two main focuses. And yeah. And then as a strategy for marketing my practice, I was doing well, you know, this is before the email and I had a print newsletter and then I shifted that into an online email newsletter and a blog.

[00:05:54] Gordon Firemark: And at some point I discovered this thing called podcasting. I’ve always been an early adopter, a tech geek, and whenever I was a guy that I was following in the tech world who. Started his own podcast after he left a TV network he was on, Leo Laporte is his name. And I thought, Oh, that’s pretty cool. And I first, I became a listener and then pretty soon someone asked me to be a guest on their podcast.

[00:06:14] Gordon Firemark: I got to geek out with that. This is the, you know, the early, the mid 2000s, 2005 or six, I thought that. And got the bug. I started my own show back in 2009. 

[00:06:25] Steve Fretzin: Well, you know, it doesn’t hurt that you’ve got like this sexy broadcaster’s voice, right? Gordon, I mean, you’re 

[00:06:30] Gordon Firemark: here. I just woke up, Steve. 

[00:06:33] Steve Fretzin: Still got the film in your throat, right?

[00:06:35] Steve Fretzin: Hey everybody. Just so you know, Gordon Firemark is the owner of Firemark entertainment lawn. We’re gonna talk about podcasting. And podcasting is 100% not for everybody. There are certain people that probably shouldn’t be podcasting and I’m not sure who they are and I’m not gonna say, but who should be podcasting?

[00:06:52] Steve Fretzin: Like what kinds of lawyers should be podcasting and how do they even get started with something like that? ’cause it seems sort of intense to like start a podcast. 

[00:07:01] Gordon Firemark: Well, I’d say starting a podcast is intense, but being guesting, you know, doing guesting on people’s podcasts is a good way to get started, get your feet wet, learn a little bit about how to hook up a microphone to the computer and do the, you know, and honestly, since the pandemic, when we’ve all gotten used to doing zoom and being set up for these kinds of things, it’s gotten a lot easier.

[00:07:20] Gordon Firemark: More commonplace, but yeah, starting a podcast is, you know, there’s a small investment in equipment and technology and a bit of an investment in time and there’s a learning curve. But once you do it, I think it’s a fantastic way of getting the word out and you know, publishing your message on a regular basis if you’re consistent about it.

[00:07:38] Gordon Firemark: You’re making an awful lot of content and you know, sitting down and writing a blog post, there’s a mental thing where you just have to get into that headspace of doing it, but somehow talking into it, like at least for me and a lot of people like me, it’s just easy to sit down and talk in a microphone and say what’s on your mind.

[00:07:55] Gordon Firemark: And you don’t have to be quite as formal in the writing style. I think audiences actually really appreciate that. 

[00:08:01] Steve Fretzin: I was talking to a podcasting friend of mine. She’s in the legal, like health and wellness space. And she was telling me about all the editing she’s doing and taking out every and ah, and everything.

[00:08:11] Steve Fretzin: I was like, what? Like, that’s not, you don’t need to do that. Like I hit record with you. And then I hit stop and like everything that happens in the middle that’s the show like there’s no editing at all other than if my dog goes nuts or there’s a like a tremendous siren outside or something but it’s like you don’t have it I think part of it is it’s okay to be authentic and be informal to your point and not feel like you have to make it perfect you don’t need perfection.

[00:08:39] Gordon Firemark: Yeah, I mean really I do the same thing on my both of my shows are what I call live to drive You know, so press record we start doing the show I even roll the music and everything in automatically so that when I’m done, it’s really a finished episode and yeah, I think that Authenticity as you describe it is really the right thing.

[00:08:56] Gordon Firemark: I’ll tell you it does mean more prep on the front end But, and your show, Steve, is a great example that for your listeners, should live in a little bit on the background. So, you reminded me about six times about the call, so you were sure I was going to show up, and I’m sure you did some research and reading and looking into me a little bit, either before we booked the call.

[00:09:15] Gordon Firemark: Or as you were prepping to ask me these questions today, and you’ve also engaged in a little onboarding with me, so you do the work up front, so you don’t have to do all that post production and extract the story of things from, yeah, and you’re right about editing out the ums and ahs it’s If it’s too much of it, it’s one thing, but most everybody, it’s the way we talk naturally.

[00:09:36] Steve Fretzin: The thing that I had to fix about myself, and I’m sure that people that have listened to me for, you know, a year or more can pick up on, you know, the subtleties of things that I may say too often or that whatever, but like there’s somebody that would, that like they say you know, to be honest, and they keep saying that over and over.

[00:09:51] Steve Fretzin: They just say, you’re repeating the same word over and over again, and not realizing that you’re doing it. That can sometimes, you know, be, but I think it’s important to like, listen back to your shows, pick up on the patterns and make those adjustments. Are you smiling for a reason? 

[00:10:05] Gordon Firemark: My kids listen sometimes to the show, and they’ll say, Dad, 36 ums.

[00:10:09] Gordon Firemark: Yeah, right. Thanks for nothing. No. Nothing makes you It’s like a bad speech 

[00:10:12] Steve Fretzin: class all over again, right? The teacher with the, she’d sit there and she’d mark off and she’d, and every 10 ums, you got a lower grade or something. It was ridiculous. Shout out to mrs. Perry from my high anyway something else.

[00:10:24] Steve Fretzin: I want it now I’m gonna think about all the time. I say the thing I want to also mention is when I got into podcasting I assumed it was a tremendous amount of work on my end, and I was introduced to a podcast editing production company called Turnkey Podcast out of L. A., and shout out to the boys there.

[00:10:44] Steve Fretzin: And it really is plug and play to some degree, because I upload it into a software when I’m done and they literally handle it. So I just want people to know there’s, that you can do it yourself and DIY it all you want. You can hire a VA. A lot of options. It’s But it doesn’t have to be a major ordeal like we may think it is.

[00:11:04] Gordon Firemark: Yeah, I think you need a little more than a trained monkey, but yeah, you could train your kid to do it. You could train an assistant in the office to handle the uploading and the keywords 

[00:11:12] Steve Fretzin: and the, 

[00:11:13] Gordon Firemark: and the promoting. Actually, I’d say the hardest part of a podcast is promoting it, getting it out there to audiences so it gets listened to.

[00:11:21] Gordon Firemark: But You know, I’m bullish on this medium and lawyers, I think it’s a great way to showcase your expertise, position yourself as an authority and get into a groove of making content regularly enough that it makes a difference for SEO and monetization. Discoverability and all that stuff. 

[00:11:37] Steve Fretzin: So is it, so then is it better for some types of attorneys than others?

[00:11:42] Steve Fretzin: And maybe we’re talking about someone that’s a local attorney in a small town versus someone who’s national or international or to business versus business consumer, like talk through like. Who it might be best for, or maybe not so great for. 

[00:11:55] Gordon Firemark: Well, I mean, I think it can be great for anyone. I’ll say if you do motorcycle accident injury cases, chances are people aren’t looking for a podcast about motorcycle accident injury until they’ve been in one.

[00:12:07] Gordon Firemark: So you’re sort of, you know, at the mercy, if that’s the subject matter, you can find a subject that Motorcycle riders who are likely to get into accidents might be interested. So maybe you do a podcast about touring or about the gear, the bikes and you know, those kinds of things. Or maybe you just sponsor a show about something else that people, you know, wine or beer or something.

[00:12:27] Gordon Firemark: So, I think that if you have a business to business kind of a practice where there’s, you know, a market for, a thirst for knowledge about the field, even when there’s nobody with an actual litigation ready to start or something like that, it can be great, you know, for those of us that do transactional work and educating the audience, in my case, educating them.

[00:12:49] Gordon Firemark: Well, one of my podcasts is about other lawyers, you know, I educate other lawyers about entertainment law. It’s called Entertainment Law Update. And that, you know, it’s a very niche market that positions me with them and their referrals come. On the other side, you can do a client facing show that really just informs, educates, and enlightens the public and tells them about who you are.

[00:13:10] Gordon Firemark: When they do go searching for stuff, they find you and that can be really beneficial. 

[00:13:15] Steve Fretzin: There’s so many benefits that I have seen as a podcaster and I’ve probably gotten a dozen people into podcasting over the last number of years because I’m so passionate about it like you are. There’s the marketing branding side of how it helps you expand your brand, right?

[00:13:31] Steve Fretzin: And just. People start to get to know you and see you as an expert. And there’s a couple others I want to get into, but let’s start with that one and talk about the branding, marketing, and the value of podcasting as it relates to those two areas. 

[00:13:44] Gordon Firemark: Well, I’ll say, you know, one of the key elements of marketing and advertising is you have to make a lot of impressions in order to really a client or turn a prospect into a lead.

[00:13:53] Gordon Firemark: As they say, podcasting by its nature is episodic. So you’re doing it hopefully every week or whatever, so that you’re making a lot of those impressions. And people will start to associate you with your topic, or your title, or whatever it is. And yeah, it becomes a great way to, you know, position yourself in the mind of your audience.

[00:14:12] Gordon Firemark: Another thing that’s great about I guess I’m going to take us in another direction, Steve, is if you’re doing a show in a particular business niche and you do interview the experts and the leaders in the niche, it’s, I won’t say it’s a pretext, but it’s a basis for getting in front of those people that you might not otherwise have.

[00:14:31] Gordon Firemark: Hey, you know, you can call them up and say, Hey, well, you know, take you to lunch and they’ll, most of the time I’m too busy, you know, book something three years from now. But I want to have you on my podcast now. They get they’re interested people. Everybody’s their own favorite subject Right, 

[00:14:46] Steve Fretzin: and you’re not just talking about their favorite subject them, but you’re putting them on a platform that gives them exposure It gives them content It’s a value add And they’re more open to taking that meeting to your point than a lunch where they feel like they’re gonna get sold 

[00:15:01] Gordon Firemark: and it’s a memorable Usually a memorable contact one way or the other, make sure it’s a positive memory, but yeah, I think that’s great.

[00:15:07] Gordon Firemark: And then you also get the benefit of the sort of expertise by osmosis you’re rubbing up against people. You, some of their expertise wears off on you. And so again, it helps with the positioning and things. 

[00:15:19] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. I mean, look, I spend every day, all day working with lawyers on business development and marketing, et cetera.

[00:15:26] Steve Fretzin: And however, I also feel like I’m like a part time lawyer in some way, cause I’m hearing about their cases. I’m hearing about, you know, the depositions, I mean, all this stuff that they share with me and internally and all confidential, by the way. But at the end of the day, it’s like, it’s interesting to me.

[00:15:42] Steve Fretzin: And so when I watch detective shows and cop shows and in lawyer shows, my wife is just sitting there watching me cause she thinks I’m going to like guess the answer or how it’s going to come out. But I think to your point, there’s a marketing and a branding element and a content creation element.

[00:15:55] Steve Fretzin: There’s a direct business element. The other piece that I love, love, love, love is the development of my network from a standpoint of meeting you and meeting all these experts in legal. They’re never going to be clients of mine. That’s okay. But they’re legal tech people, they’re legal marketing people, they’re podcasting people, they’re book, they’re book.

[00:16:16] Steve Fretzin: So if somebody needs something, I’m like, they should go to you first. I’m the resource now because I’ve got 450 episodes of meeting all these amazing people that I never would have met otherwise. 

[00:16:30] Gordon Firemark: Absolutely. I’ll tell you another thing, that Entertainment Law Update, you know, because we’re doing a legal story, legal case briefs, essentially, I think it makes me a better lawyer.

[00:16:41] Gordon Firemark: I’m staying on top of my field in a way that most other lawyers are relying on me to do for them. So, I’m forced into studying and reading those opinions and And doing some analysis and thinking about them and talking it over with people. 

[00:16:54] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. And I facilitate a lot of meetings. I have my rainmaker round tables made up of managing partners from around the country.

[00:17:01] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. And I run a provisors group here in Chicago, which is like a 10, 000 person national thing. And I, I’m not like a professional, like DJ or anything, but I feel like I’m able to facilitate so much better and ask really good questions and keep things moving because 450 opportunities for me to.

[00:17:19] Steve Fretzin: Interview and evaluate and have conversations that are being recorded and they’re going to be put out there that can’t suck. And so that’s been a huge side perk and benefit that I didn’t even think about, you know, five years ago. Yeah, right. 

[00:17:32] Gordon Firemark: You get to be a curator, not just of information, but of people and connections, which is great.

[00:17:38] Steve Fretzin: Any thoughts on the monetization of a podcast and how people monetize or just use it as a profit center? 

[00:17:46] Gordon Firemark: Yeah, I read an interesting quote by a fellow friend of mine named Tom Webster, who’s a statistics guy, a researcher, and his point was, You don’t monetize a podcast, you monetize an audience. I think that’s important to remember.

[00:18:01] Gordon Firemark: So you have to have the audience, and if you build it, they will come, doesn’t work. You have to have an audience. And so that’s the real strategy play, is figure out how you’re going to get people to pay attention to what you’re doing and listen. That said, I don’t think every podcast has to be monetized directly.

[00:18:17] Gordon Firemark: I think that, myself, I’m an example. I’m not looking to sell ads on my show. I do. I mean, every once in a while you’ll hear or see an ad on one of my shows, but that’s not how I’m expecting to make my money. I’m monetizing by positioning myself in a way that people are gonna either refer business to me or call me directly as a client.

[00:18:39] Gordon Firemark: And so, again, it’s just my marketing channel. That’s all. Of choice 

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[00:19:01] Steve Fretzin: Can’t deliver. Get more rankings, get cases, and schedule a free consultation at rankings. io today. Hey everybody, Steve Fretzin here. Man, I thought I was a good marketer, but maybe not. Lawyers have been approaching me asking, what’s the Rainmakers Roundtable? Well, I tell them this is a special place created exclusively for rainmaking lawyers to continue their journey of prosperity.

[00:19:24] Steve Fretzin: Our program is unique as every member has a significant book of business and is motivated to grow it year after year. Where else does this exist? If you’re a managing partner who’s looking to get off your lonely island and talk shop with America’s top rainmakers, please go to my website Fretzin. com and apply for membership today.

[00:19:44] Steve Fretzin: So there’s a little bit of the legal side I want to talk through with you. So as you mentioned, I’m pretty prepared for my guests and part of that is having them fill out a form so that I have all their, you know, the Twitter handle and all the details and background and their bio and all that jazz. But at the end of it, I have this statement that says, by signing below, I agree to granting permission to Steve Fretzin to be that lawyer to record interview post content on the internet obtained during the interview and promote the content once published, any editing will not be possible, which by the way, I love that because I don’t want people coming back to me saying, can you take out that can you take out that like sign off that, that you trust me enough to let me do this the way I do it.

[00:20:21] Steve Fretzin: Talk about the legality of that and just generally when you’re podcasting, what you have to be prepared for. 

[00:20:26] Gordon Firemark: Yeah. So just for background, when I started my show, I, as an entertainment lawyer, I kind of knew the ropes, but I decided I really needed to know how this podcasting thing fits into that equation.

[00:20:37] Gordon Firemark: And there are some significant differences between other forms of media. So I wrote a book, I did a bunch of research and it turned into the podcast blog and new media producers, legal survival guide, and I, I, that’s how you position yourself as an expert. As we said earlier. So this has been my evangelical mission for podcasters is if you’re interviewing guests, get them to sign a release, something that says, I consent to you recording me, I consent to you editing the recording, I consent to you publishing the recording, and this is irrevocable and I’m not going to ask you to take it down or change it once it’s up.

[00:21:11] Gordon Firemark: So kind of what you’re saying. I’ve recently added an extra sentence into the language that. Also gives the assurances to the guest that if I’m using AI tools in the process of editing and producing the show that I’m not going to change the meaning or context of what’s said. I think that’s a big concern that people are starting to have around AI and, you know, just they, again, they’re consenting to the use as long as it doesn’t do these things.

[00:21:38] Gordon Firemark: So I think it’s hugely important because some of us live in states where we require one party of consent for recordings. Others live in two party states and I’m, that’s really more about wiretap laws, but I think it’s just smart, a smart move to always get your guests to say, yes, go ahead, do it. Use it as how you see fit.

[00:21:56] Gordon Firemark: I also include language about. Any and all media now known or hereafter devised and in perpetuity. So if I decide to write a book and use excerpts from my podcast in the book, I don’t need to go back and ask for another permission. 

[00:22:11] Steve Fretzin: Okay. Okay. Really great stuff there. I love that. The but that, that brings up kind of the, the direction I want to go, which is, you know, when you write a book or when you write an article, you have content that can be repurposed and can be put up on social and everything.

[00:22:26] Steve Fretzin: The beauty of podcasting in my, and I want to get your take on it, but you have, so we have the audio of this, right? I also have the video of this because we’re both on camera. All right. We have the transcription of this. So we have three different mediums that can all be repurposed and reutilized. Talk, talk through that a little bit and the value of that.

[00:22:46] Gordon Firemark: Well, the obvious thing is you could publish it as a video, full length video, you could publish it as full length audio, you could take the transcript and publish that separately or treat or break it up or whatever, and you can chop it up. So you could do short form video for TikTok and Instagram if your audience is there.

[00:23:03] Gordon Firemark: You can do a tweet of a sentence that’s been extracted from something one of us says. Those kinds of things all. So you could actually generate probably a hundred different pieces of content from doing one video recorded interview in, you know, all these different media, you could turn it into blog posts, you could take, like I said, the social media, you could, you could make an online course and build stuff into it as well, and maybe even monetize by productizing some of the content and yeah.

[00:23:33] Gordon Firemark: Yeah, I mean, the, the opportunities are sort of endless if you’re willing to put in some time and or hire a VA to do it’s what I do is my VA in the Philippines who after I publish my weekly episode on YouTube, she goes and downloads the video and chops it up and then you’ll see tech talks and Instagram posts and things like that.

[00:23:52] Gordon Firemark: And, and we’re figuring out what’s working and what’s not and experimenting and that’s the nature of marketing. You have to experiment. 

[00:24:00] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. And, and again, I think there’s a misnomer that you have to do it all yourself and that just couldn’t be further from the truth. People know I’ve got a full time VA who curates all of this content for all the different channels and creates the videos.

[00:24:14] Steve Fretzin: And there’s also, you know, software that’s integrated, like Opus can break a podcast down into five clips. You’ve got transcription services that are, I don’t know, 15 a month or something that transcribe it. But now we’ve got AI. And i want to just take the last little section of our show and talk about a i the thing that i’ve been doing i mentioned this.

[00:24:33] Steve Fretzin: Just before and by the way if you’re listening you you like hey you know what i want to hear that the you know the podcast but i don’t have time or i want to get a quick synopsis of it i’m creating something called blog cast where i’m taking a twenty page transcript. Using AI with specific prompts to bring it down to a two page 700 word summary and posting those up on my blog.

[00:24:54] Steve Fretzin: So talk a little bit about AI and how you see that infiltrating into the podcast space and helping us to curate the content. 

[00:25:02] Gordon Firemark: Well, I think there are a lot of great AI tools that, you know, you mentioned Opus Clip, which is one for taking video and condensing it into one minute. Shorter form stuff. There’s others out there.

[00:25:13] Gordon Firemark: There’s one called Cast Magic. There’s one called Cap Show that podcasters are using to create transcripts and pull those excerpts and things like that. That can be really beneficial. There are some legal and ethical concerns that we have to address about those things. I mean, I’m not thrilled with the idea of training the worldwide AI systems on my content.

[00:25:35] Gordon Firemark: Sometimes I do it, but as I think about it, I realized, well, maybe I don’t want everything I do to be run through chat GPT or one of these other services so that it’s there. And I’ll say as lawyers, we really have to be concerned about what we say that relates to our clients stuff. I don’t do litigation, so I’m not too worried that I’ll make a statement about law that then might be quoted in a brief from the other side in a case or something, but it could happen.

[00:26:04] Gordon Firemark: And so we have to be a little thoughtful, certainly don’t reveal direct client confidences, but also thinking a little further ahead about how we talk about things. And of course there’s lawyer advertising rules as well that have to be complied within in some jurisdictions. I think the first amendment is strong here and, and this idea that you might have to register every podcast episode with your state bar.

[00:26:30] Gordon Firemark: There’s a couple of state bars that seem to think they should do that. Hopefully that’ll go by the wayside before too long. 

[00:26:37] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Yeah. But I think, but I think it’s added, you know, the AI continues to help us, you know, curate the content in a way that’s, that’s, you know, useful for everybody. I mean, we’re winning on, on the automation and it’s less cost than doing anything manually and the audience is winning in the sense that they’re getting all this.

[00:26:57] Steve Fretzin: You know, chunk down content that’s easy to digest, which since we all have attention spans of fleas, we need, 

[00:27:04] Gordon Firemark: I sometimes use AI on the front end to create the outline for the, for the show or to come up with a catchy title for the episode or like, or those kinds of the subject line kind of thing, or to turn or to extract some content from the episode to make an, an email message that goes out in my weekly newsletter to my, my clients in the past, all of the, so the AI is, is really Yeah.

[00:27:25] Gordon Firemark: Part of the pre and post production process, and it just does it faster, maybe not better, but faster. So that’s valuable. I 

[00:27:33] Steve Fretzin: mean, we’ve laid out a lot of reasons why someone should consider podcasting and, and, and going into that, into that, taking that dive into that pool. Are there, are there, are there people that shouldn’t and if so, why?

[00:27:47] Gordon Firemark: You know, I think that if your, if your voice and your manner and your, your presentation isn’t your strong suit, isn’t a strong suit, if, if, if, if there’s something about the way you present yourself that might be a negative, you know, you’re, you’re, you’re an irritating person. Irritating person, or you’re just sort of a soft spoken sort of shy and, and it doesn’t put forward your best, best you, maybe stay away from it.

[00:28:14] Gordon Firemark: Or maybe use it as a, as an intermediate tool and maybe don’t publish the episodes, but use it to create content or those like, 

[00:28:20] Steve Fretzin: okay. 

[00:28:21] Gordon Firemark: So that’s one, one of the big objections that a lot of folks had that I think is not really a valid objection is how much time it takes. It’s true. It’s a bit time consuming.

[00:28:31] Gordon Firemark: But when you think about, I don’t know about you, but I used to go to bar association lunches where I would, you know, sit and hear a speaker and I’d talk to the eight people at the table I was seated at and maybe hand out a couple of business cards and I’d maybe make a follow up contact with two or three of them.

[00:28:47] Gordon Firemark: And that’s two, three hours out of my day. I’d much rather spend those two or three hours out of my day making a piece of content that is going to land. With 30, 50, 100, a thousand subscribers or more with a podcast one time and do that every week. So, 

[00:29:01] Steve Fretzin: yeah, the other person that shouldn’t do it from my take is if you’re not good at staying consistent with things.

[00:29:08] Steve Fretzin: If you find yourself like excited about things and then not following through. So you’re gonna do five episodes or ten episodes and give up and you might not know that until you try it. But I think if you if you kind of know yourself and realize like, you know, yeah, this is just another You know, flash in my brain that I’m going to do and probably give up after a period of time and invest time on your energy and not stick with it.

[00:29:30] Steve Fretzin: And not everybody should stick with it, but I’m saying it’s something you really do need to be consistent with. 

[00:29:35] Gordon Firemark: I agree. I think, I think it’s worth a try for anybody to see if you can develop a system that will get you into a groove and a habit of making it. I mean, I do a show every Thursday afternoon.

[00:29:45] Gordon Firemark: I do it live on video on YouTube and stuff. And my workflow is such that on, you know, Sunday night, I think about the topic for five minutes or something. And I start to get it going in my head. By Monday, I’ve got an outline. Tuesday, I write a script or, or a detailed outline or whatever. And then, you know, Wednesday, I sort of give myself the To let it percolate so that Thursday I’m able to record that episode a little bit every day and it’s become a actually I have it in my to do list every day.

[00:30:13] Gordon Firemark: So today we’re going to do this and it’s five minutes here, ten minutes there and I’m done and anybody can be consistent with that. Small enough chunks of that, right? 

[00:30:24] Steve Fretzin: Well, I think we’ve given people a great story to consider of why podcasting might be something to get into and, and, and, and there’s just, there’s just again, I couldn’t be a bigger fan and I wish I had done it when you did it when you started 16 years ago.

[00:30:38] Steve Fretzin: I’ve only been in it five years and I’ve just, I’ve had the time of my life. I’ve, I’ve never been so happy with a decision in my business career in 20 years is podcasting. So I’m, I’m just, I’m just thrilled. Let’s wrap up though with our game changing podcast the expert edge podcast with Colin Boyd Talk to that a little bit Gordon.

[00:30:57] Gordon Firemark: So Colin is a really interesting guy He’s a client of mine, but I would have been saying it’s about his show Warren He’s an Australian gentleman whose focus is on training public speakers to to create speak You know speeches and talks that sell sell from stage Academy is his is his So the expert edge is sort of extending that and talking about you know, how, how to present story, how to use story to, to advance your own, whatever interests you have, but also just sort of getting into the mindset and he talks to a lot of folks about their social media.

[00:31:36] Gordon Firemark: He does interviews with people who are crushing it in social media, media content, those kinds of things. And he’s always got an interesting take on things and It tends to do sort of short form, but 15 minute long episodes, most of the time when it’s a solo episode, at least, and, and I find that eminently consumable.

[00:31:55] Gordon Firemark: So yeah, 

[00:31:57] Steve Fretzin: well, I, I always tell people, I asked this selfishly because I’m sometimes I get a little state, some of the podcasts I’m listening to get a little stale and I may be listening to too many that are political and I need to like go a different direction and I just love micro learning. That’s become a big thing these days.

[00:32:12] Steve Fretzin: And so anytime I can just take. 30 minutes or an hour and learn something from, from, from an interview or from a really smart podcaster. I’m on it. As we wrap up, want to thank our sponsors, of course, rankings IO, helping you get your marketing done and get the business in the door. And I also just want to promote my program sales, free selling.

[00:32:30] Steve Fretzin: If you’re a lawyer that is looking to make equity, you’re looking to, you’re on your own, you want to double, triple your book of business and really do things in an efficient way and non salesy, you’re going to want to come and audit one of my classes. I teach every Tuesday morning from 8 central. I’ve got 14, 15 lawyers from around the world.

[00:32:47] Steve Fretzin: In this class where they’re building skills things you never learn in law school so if you’d like to talk with me about that you can just go and email me at steve at Fretzin dot com will set up a quick chat and then get you into the class to audit the things that people say about it i i have actually all that recorded i need to just put that out on social but like it’s everybody’s just blown away because they’re just like like tip after tip after tip that they just never realize you Like how much we’re covering in 90 minutes in a class.

[00:33:13] Steve Fretzin: So cool stuff there, Gordon. People want to get in touch with you. They want to hire you as their lawyer. They’ve got a podcast and they want to get some legal advice and they want to talk to you. What’s the best digits. 

[00:33:24] Gordon Firemark: Well, I’m I’m fortunate to have a name that is fairly distinct. Yes, true. Firemark.

[00:33:30] Gordon Firemark: com or Gordon firemark. com. We’ll get you. In the direction of my stuff, firemark. com is the law firm, gordonfiremark. com is all the other stuff that I put out there, online courses and coaching and masterminds and all those kinds of things. And yeah, follow me on YouTube or, or any social channel, gfindermark is the way to find me there.

[00:33:50] Gordon Firemark: Yeah, 

[00:33:50] Steve Fretzin: well, thanks for coming on, man. I’m glad that we, we connected and that we were able to come on in and put our collective wisdom down about this podcasting thing, because I think there’s attorneys that just wonder if that’s something they should invest in and, I think you and I are both on board with that and again, if you have the personality for it and you, you, you, you know, it’s just, oh, there’s just so many, but I’m not going to go through the whole list again, but thanks.

[00:34:10] Steve Fretzin: Thanks Gordon for being on the show and I just appreciate you and sharing all this great wisdom. 

[00:34:15] Gordon Firemark: Well, Steve, I feel the same way. Thank you for the opportunity and, and for helping lawyers do what we do and, and make the most of it. So 

[00:34:22] Steve Fretzin: that’s a dirty jerk. Shit. Somebody has got to do it. And I’m that guy.

[00:34:26] Steve Fretzin: Anyway, thanks everybody for spending time with Gordon and I today on the Be That Lawyer with Fredson podcast. We are here for your listening pleasure and viewing pleasure and reading pleasure and all the different things that we just talked about in in how we repurpose content. But listen, it’s all about you being that lawyer, living the lawyer’s life.

[00:34:42] Steve Fretzin: And, and, and that means confident, organized, and a skilled rainmaker. Everybody take care. Be safe. Be well. We’ll talk again soon.

[00:34:52] 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 latest legal business development and marketing trends. For more information and important links about today’s episode, check out today’s show notes.