Marketing for lawyers: a content system that wins clients

You're good at the work. The calls just don't come in steadily, and the agencies emailing you want a retainer. You're not alone. In the ABA's 2024 TechReport, solos and small firms rated their confidence in their own marketing 2.7 out of 5. The fix is content. Answer the questions clients already ask you, on camera and in writing, and let that one answer feed every other channel. This is the whole system, with templates and a month filled in for a family-law attorney.

Content is the engine under every way a client finds your firm

A client reaches a small firm by one of five paths, and content runs under all of them. The five paths a client takes to you are referrals, warm outreach, content, cold outreach and paid. Most firms run one of them well, usually referrals, and leave the other four to luck.

Paid ads are a volume knob on content that already works. They stop the day the budget does. A video you record in October still plays for the person who looks you up in spring. Content is the engine under every other client channel makes the full case. For a firm, the engine is one client question, answered every week.

Start a list today: every question a client or caller asked you this week, in their words. "How long will this take?" "Do I have to go to court?" "Can he take the kids?" That list feeds every path.

Aim every post at the client in your county

A post works when someone who needs your kind of lawyer, in your area, sees it and calls. That's the whole test. Why 10,000 followers can still get you zero clients calls this qualified attention. The right viewers beat more viewers.

Picture a parent at 11 p.m. typing "can my ex move out of state with our son". Nobody in that spot searches "family law services". A clip seen by 50,000 people in other states did nothing for you. A three-minute answer watched by 40 parents in your county is the one that brings calls.

Before you post anything, ask the two questions I give in my video on landing paid speaking gigs: "Who exactly is this for? And what do I want them to do after they watch it?" If the honest answer to the second is "like it", start again. Then open every video with one line: "I'm [name], a family lawyer in [city]." It tells the viewer they're in the right place. It tells search engines too.

For what to post, rotate four kinds: authority, proof, process and personal. Each answers a different worry a client has before calling, as a founder's weekly content plan explains. Proof can be a published court opinion, explained in plain English. Keep client details out of every post, and run anything about results or reviews past your state bar's advertising rules. Social media for lawyers has the rest: the platforms for each practice area, hooks for every kind of post, and scripts.

Every post needs a path to a booked consultation

A post brings a client only when every step after it works. The five-link chain from a Reel to a booked call was written for coaches, and a law practice runs the same one:

1. The content. An answer that stops the right person.
2. Your profile. They tap your name to check you're real and local. It should say who you help, with what, where, and how to book.
3. A post that asks. Every few posts, ask for one small step, such as booking a consultation or getting your first-meeting checklist.
4. The conversation. Point them to a call or a message, and reply the same day.
5. The consultation. They arrive having watched you explain their problem, so the call starts warm.

Most lawyers who post and hear nothing built link one and skipped the rest. The usual break is the intake form. A scared person facing twelve fields closes the tab. My rule, from my video on getting coaching clients, fits a law firm just as well: "Don't make them fill out some super long form just to talk to you."

Some content should do the closing. In my video on building an audience that buys, I call it decision content: what working together looks like, when it's the right time to reach out, and what makes your approach different. It "removes the final objection," and almost nobody makes it. For a firm, that's an intro video pinned to every profile and a video on your first consultation. The social media guide has a script for the intro video and a profile template.

Three things behind the content catch people who aren't ready to call

Most people who watch you won't call this week. Give them somewhere to go. I list three things to set up behind the content in the same speaking-gigs video, and each fits a firm:

• A free lead magnet named for what the client wants, such as "What to bring to your first custody meeting".
• A weekly newsletter for past clients, referrers and everyone who downloaded the checklist. As I put it, "your email list is one audience that you actually own."
• A website with fresh content, where every long video becomes a page. That page is what Google and ChatGPT find, and what a referrer forwards.

Keep each one small. A one-page checklist gets read. A 40-page guide doesn't. A newsletter can be this week's video and two lines on why it matters. The reader who opens it in March may call in June, when the problem finally lands on their kitchen table.

Content makes referrals and reviews easy to give

Referrals die in the gap between "you should call this lawyer" and the call. Content closes it. A lawyer will forward a good answer long before they dig out your card.

Give referrers one sentence and one link. The sentence says who you help with what: "divorce and custody for parents in [County]." The link answers their client's first question. Send this to two lawyers this week:

Subject: The question your clients ask about [divorce]

Hi [name],

When clients ask you about [divorce or custody], this
short video answers the first thing most of them want
to know: [link to your video or page]

If one of them needs a [family] lawyer in [county],
I'm glad to talk with them.

[Your name], [firm], [phone]

Outreach to lawyers lands better with content behind it. When you message another lawyer and they look you up, there's something to find. Open with an easy question instead of a pitch: "Do your clients ask you much about custody?" Then spend ten minutes a day replying to posts by local lawyers, accountants and financial advisors. Those comments keep your name in front of the people who refer.

Reviews come easier with a ready message. Ask every client the same way, and offer nothing in return. Send this when a matter closes:

Hi [name], thank you for trusting me with this.

If you're willing, a short Google review helps the next
person in your position find a lawyer. Here is the link:
[your review link]

Write whatever you like, and only what you're
comfortable sharing.

Reviews and videos both land on your Google Business Profile, so fill in every field. Google says complete and accurate profiles are more likely to show up in local results.

Turning one answer into a page, an email and a post is where most lawyers stall. CreateSocial writes all three from what you said on camera, in your voice: a blog post of 1,500+ words, an email to your referral list and a LinkedIn post. You check every legal point and send.

How ChatGPT and Google's AI find a lawyer to recommend

They search the web and name the lawyers whose pages, videos, profiles and reviews answer the question. So the content you're already making is what they find. We read Google's and OpenAI's documentation in October 2026, and neither offers a shortcut.

Google is blunt. Its AI features page says "there are no additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, nor other special optimizations necessary." It may split one question into several related searches, which it calls query fan-out. Its guide to generative AI search adds two things a firm can use. These answers show what's said about products and services "in blogs, videos, and forum discussions." And a Google Business Profile can help a local business appear in them.

OpenAI's ChatGPT search help page says that when it searches with a partner, it "typically rewrites your query into one or more targeted queries." It may also use an approximate location from the user's IP address. It is plain about the odds: "Placement is not guaranteed." There is one hard rule. Sites opted out of OpenAI's search crawler, OAI-SearchBot, "will not be shown in ChatGPT search answers," says its crawler page. Ask whoever runs your website to check that robots.txt doesn't block it.

That leaves three things you control. One page and one video per real client question. The same name, practice and city everywhere you appear. And reviews and real mentions from people who know your work.

Video earns its place. When Ahrefs studied 75,000 brands in December 2025, YouTube mentions had the strongest link to how often ChatGPT, AI Mode and AI Overviews named a brand, a correlation of about 0.74. Those were large brands, not law firms, and a correlation isn't a cause. Saying your name and city on camera still costs nothing.

Guest spots count too. My advice in the speaking-gigs video is to get on the podcasts your clients listen to: "Every episode is one more thing that shows up when someone searches your name." For a family lawyer, that's a local parenting podcast.

Skip the shortcuts. Google says you can ignore AI text files such as llms.txt, and "seeking inauthentic 'mentions' across the web isn't as helpful as it might seem." Count what works on the Friday sheet below instead.

Record a month of answers in one afternoon

One afternoon a month keeps all five paths fed. A month of content in one afternoon lays out the batch: 8 to 12 videos in one sitting, written posts from the best of them, then the schedule.

The other half is in recording day shouldn't be thinking day. Deciding, saying, recording and editing are four jobs. Doing them in one seat is what makes a sharp lawyer sound stiff on camera. You'd never draft a brief at the podium. Don't draft your answer with the camera rolling either.

So pick the month's questions a few days before. On the afternoon, record every answer back to back, in sections: the hook, each point, the close. Fluff point two and you redo point two. Don't edit between takes.

This is the afternoon CreateSocial is built for. It suggests the month's questions from your own website, with hooks and talking points ready. On the day, your points sit on the teleprompter near the camera. Each answer is its own section with one-tap retakes, and Dual mode frames 16:9 for YouTube and 9:16 for Reels and Shorts in one take. How to look natural on camera helps with the nerves.

Two hours a week moves the content, and Friday counts the calls

The afternoon makes the content. The week moves it. Once the month is recorded, this takes about two hours a week.

Thursday brings the referrals, so protect it. If a week gets away from you, skip the comments and keep the emails. Use this sheet every Friday:

Week of [date]
New inquiries: [number]

Where each one came from:
- Referral from a lawyer:          [ ]
- Past client or their friend:     [ ]
- Google search or Maps:           [ ]
- YouTube or social media:         [ ]
- ChatGPT or another AI tool:      [ ]
- Other:                           [ ]

Which video or page did they mention?
Which question did I hear twice this week?

The last line becomes next month's recording list, and the answer that brought the best calls gets a second video. This count beats any view number. It measures the one thing a firm needs from content. My advice, in my speaking-gigs video, is to "give it three to six months before you judge it," because "this stuff stacks up." Month one is the thinnest your library will ever be.

Posting shouldn't eat your Tuesdays. With CreateSocial you schedule to TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, Facebook and X, and we post it for you once your accounts are connected, each with a caption written for that platform.

A filled-in month for a hypothetical family-law attorney

Take a solo family-law attorney who handles divorce and custody in one county. The one line on every profile and referral note: "Divorce and custody for parents in [County], explained in plain English."

Before week 1, the attorney writes the profile opening, records the intro video, matches the firm's name, address and phone on every listing, and checks robots.txt.

At the end of week 4, the attorney runs three prompts in ChatGPT, Gemini and Google's AI Mode:

1. Who is a good custody lawyer in [city]?
2. How long does a divorce take in [state]?
3. Can I move out of [state] with my kids after a divorce?

For each answer, write down:
- Was I named? Which other lawyers were?
- Which pages or videos were cited? Was one of mine?
- What did the answer miss that a video of mine could cover?

Watch prompts 2 and 3. Nobody controls who gets named for prompt 1, but becoming the cited page for the others is a fair first goal.

How CreateSocial runs a small firm's content marketing

CreateSocial helps lawyers build a reputation that brings in clients, referrals and speaking invitations, without content taking over the week. It learns what you know and runs the whole content week, video and written: ideas, scripts, posts, recording, editing, thumbnails and scheduling.

• The month's questions, ready before the afternoon. Your knowledge base reads your website (scan it and pick the pages you want) and past videos, and you get 80 personalized ideas a month from it, each with a hook and talking points or a full script. Trending Now adds what your niche is discussing every Monday. "Ask me first" asks you questions before it writes, so the script sounds like you.
• Eight answers in one sitting. The teleprompter sits near your camera, at your desk or on the iPhone app. Each answer is its own section with one-tap retakes, and Dual mode frames 16:9 and 9:16 in the same take.
• Editing is mostly deleting words. Delete words from the transcript and the video follows. Remove Silences takes out the pauses, eye contact correction keeps your gaze on the viewer, and subtitles go on in one of 11 styles. Find Clips pulls standalone clips from a CLE talk or webinar of 8 minutes or longer.
• The page, the referral email and the posts. Each answer becomes a blog post, an email to your referral list, LinkedIn posts or an X thread. Or write them from your knowledge base, no video needed.
• Posted for you, on schedule. Schedule the month to TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, Facebook and X, and we post it for you once your accounts are connected, each with its own caption. A 16:9 YouTube video goes up with the custom thumbnail you picked, made from your video and photos of you. The Analytics page tracks views, comments and followers on your connected TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn and Facebook accounts.

Also in the one plan: competitor tracking, LinkedIn carousels with PDF and PNG export, screen recording with your camera as a bubble for walking through a court form, reaction videos in Layout or Stitch mode, green screen and virtual backgrounds with or without a real green screen, B-roll from free stock video, and platform safe-zone guides for TikTok, Reels and Shorts.

A small practice knows the value of one person in charge. CreateSocial has one too. I'm Ben Moore, and I built CreateSocial on my own, bootstrapped, here in Cincinnati, Ohio, so you talk to me directly. Feature requests come to me, and a lot of what customers ask for gets built. Before CreateSocial, my agency generated millions of followers and millions of dollars in revenue for its clients, and I've generated hundreds of millions of views.

It costs $129 a month, or $99 a month billed annually, with no add-ons and no per-feature charges. Start your free trial and record week 1 of the month inside it. Want to map your first month of client questions together first? Book a free strategy call with me.

Answer this week's client question today

1. Write your one line: who you help, with what, and where. Put it on every profile, your website and your email signature.
2. List this week's client questions in their words, and pick one.
3. Write a hook and three talking points for it.
4. Record the answer in sections and turn it into a page. A free CreateSocial trial gives you the teleprompter, the blog post and the schedule.
5. Send the video to two lawyers who get calls in your area of law.
6. Ask "How did you hear about us?" on every first call, and count the answers on Friday.