Should My Law Firm Do a TikTok Video?

TikTok has gained global popularity since its inception in 2018. It’s now a great way for individuals and companies to grow and market their brand or services. With hundreds of millions of active users, TikTok has great potential for law firms looking to grow their marketing strategy and reach a greater audience than ever before.

5 Reasons Why Your Law Firm Should Create TikTok Videos

There are many reasons why your law firm should get on TikTok, but these are the most common ones:

Gain Free Exposure

TikTok is a free platform that’s extremely popular, especially with younger users (Millennials and Generation Z). By creating and maintaining an account, you’ll be able to reach greater audiences and get free exposure for your firm. Plus, in the digital age, most businesses benefit from having an online presence.

Get Quality Leads

Newer or less established law firms can promote themselves by creating videos and growing their audience. A portion of your followers could become quality leads for your firm’s legal services. Eventually, people who may have simply viewed your content or interacted with your firm or attorneys via TikTok could become clients.

Increase Your Advertising Potential

The platform has great potential for paid and free advertising. This advertising is customizable and can be low-cost, depending on your firm’s needs. Once you have enough followers, the opportunity to connect with influencers to promote your brand could emerge.

Connect With Your Audience

Besides gaining followers and generating quality leads, your firm can use TikTok (and other social media) to connect with and educate your audience. Producing high-quality, informative videos and interacting with your target audience will result in trust and help you connect better with your audience. Plus, your firm’s videos can educate your viewers about legal concepts they may not have learned otherwise.

Improve Your Firm’s Approachability

Many people either don’t understand legal issues or are intimidated by those in the legal profession. By making videos on TikTok, you can help bridge the gap between your firm and your audience. For example, our law firm is located in Huntsville, Alabama. If one of our Huntsville divorce lawyers makes an informative TikTok video that relates to the people locally in Madison County, Alabama, then it allows us to be more approachable in the eyes of the public.

Ways to Use TikTok in Your Law Firm’s Marketing Strategy

There are several ways for your law firm to use TikTok to your advantage. However, you should always be mindful of a few things when using a new platform such as this.

Plan Your Content Strategy

Understanding your audience is key to connecting with them, building trust and converting them to clients. Before uploading videos, make a plan for maximum results. Start by creating an ideal customer persona based on their socio-demographics (age, education level, economic status, location, etc.) and plan your videos around that.

For example, if you do have a playful sense of humor and are very outgoing then you might put yourself out there a bit more than someone that isn’t known to be particularly funny or is a little stuffy. If you are not able to loosen up too much, then you can still provide good information for the public in a playful way by using images and other media to provide the entertainment as a backdrop to what you’re talking about.

Upload Videos Regularly

Consistency is key. With many social media platforms, including TikTok, consistency is vital to growing your audience. Post a new video every day, especially in the early stages of your account. Don’t be afraid to experiment with the style and content of your videos. Change it up until you find what works best for you and your brand. Whatever else, try to find ways to make your audience engage with each video.

One example of a lawyer using TikTok creatively and consistently in 2021 is @ethenostrofflaw. He’s a personal injury lawyer in Pennsylvania that has gathered a large following on TikTok over time. One thing that this lawyer does that anyone using this platform should remember is to not take yourself too seriously and never try to just use it to promote your business. If you watch his videos, you’ll see that he is self-deprecating and humorous, never stating calls to action at the end. He doesn’t say “Call Now” or give out his website information. It is all about providing helpful information to the public or other attorneys in an entertaining way. Just take a look at his post called When Ostroff Law Wins Your Case. If you aren’t willing to do that kind of video on the internet for the entire world to see, then you will have to find another way to be entertaining. You have to be able to have fun on the platform or users may not find you too engaging.

Focus on Video Content and Formatting

Improve your chances of getting noticed on TikTok by doing the following things in your videos:

• Use natural language that connects with your audience and allows them to understand the concepts or topics in your videos.
• Be as authentic and genuine as possible.
• Take advantage of the TikTok editor to help your content pop.
• Insert text over your videos to help beat the algorithm. Change up the background in your videos to prevent them from being marked as “repetitive” and hidden by the algorithm.
• Ask a question in each video’s caption and include a CTA (call to action) to boost user engagement. Not a CTA to call your law firm, but to engage as a user.
• Always respond to comments in a timely manner. Always.
• Make your videos as professional as possible with good audio and lighting. If necessary, follow a script but try to act natural.
• Keep your videos short and engaging. As long as they’re consistent with your brand, feel free to mix fun videos in with informative ones.

Balance Entertainment With Information

More than half of all TikTok users are 34 years old or younger and are looking for short, entertaining content. Some of the most popular videos on the platform are how-to videos, tutorials and lists. Find a balance between educating and entertaining your audience to catch and keep their interest. Whenever possible, give your viewers actionable advice or information.

Once you’ve established a presence on the platform and have a loyal following, it’s time to start answering your audience’s most asked questions. Not only will this allow you to interact with them better, but it will also keep them coming back for more content and information.

Follow What’s Trending

TikTok’s interface allows you to see what’s trending, such as topics, events or challenges (dance, memes, singing, etc.). Stay current by keeping track of standout topics or trends as you plan out your content. Frame your videos from a legal standpoint with useful information or commentary. If possible, take part in one trend or challenge each day, and be sure to use relevant hashtags.

A great example of this is @bradshear. His video called Is Brittany About to be Freed was a timely one that kept the focus on the law while also providing some humorous entertainment (and check out his hashtags). Lawyers that are able to find creative ways to take a quick and humorous legal take on some current pop culture news will likely be successful in getting followers.

Connect With Other Accounts

From related accounts to influencers, it never hurts to connect and engage. Depending on the relationships you’ve built, you may even be able to collaborate with other law firms or influencers directly, thus building your audience even more.

Tips on Using TikTok the Right Way

As with any social media platform, TikTok has its drawbacks. When creating videos for your law firm, here are some things to keep in mind:

• Tasteless humor could make your law firm or attorneys seem unprofessional or not serious. Balance entertainment with informative content to negate this and it doesn’t always have to be about getting a laugh. Check out this video by Attorney Brad Shear and you’ll see that it is more informative and quickly answers a question in an entertaining, but not laugh out loud humorous, way.
• Plan out your law firm’s image in advance so you know what type of content to share. You might want to be more about dropping informative information with humorous or entertaining backdrops while you stay professional instead of dancing awkwardly and getting comments about your dancing abilities that can ruin your weekend.
• Always use a disclaimer letting your viewers know the information you provide is not legal advice or a guarantee of what they could get if your firm were to represent them.

Bottom Line

Ultimately, with a good marketing strategy and high-quality, informative and entertaining videos, TikTok can be beneficial to your law firm. One of the many reasons to do this at all is that all of the user activity on your TikTok page can provide link juice to your website and help with search engine optimization (SEO). Not only this, but it also gets more eyes on you in the public, which is a great way to get some free advertising. The platform can be used to help build your brand, educate your audience on obscure legal concepts, possibly help to improve your website rankings, and even generate leads through the platform itself.