Make Money Monday: You’ve Got Some ‘Splainin to Do!

Screen Shot 2016-08-15 at 6.53.04 AMRemember the “I Love Lucy Show” where Lucy would get herself into some kind of scrape that she’d conceal from her husband Ricky – but then be forced to ‘fess up when he demanded, in his heavy Spanish accent, that “you’ve got some ‘splaining’ to do.” In doing so, sometimes Ricky wanted his wife to take accountability for her actions, while other times he truly didn’t understand what the heck was going on.

In many instances, our clients are often as flummoxed about the work their lawyers do as Ricky was about Lucy’s behavior. Some clients simply don’t understand the importance of a well-prepared trust or a strong contract, while others haven’t any idea about how a proceeding – whether a divorce or a DUI – will proceed, or how a particular firm will handle their case. In these situations, we lawyers have some ‘splainin’ to do.

That’s where Explainer Videos come in. Explainer videos are a category of videos unto themselves – those catchy, minute long shorts  that cut the core of a matter and show how to solve it. Some explainer videos have narration, others don’t but all are short, sweet and compelling to watch.

Lawyers can use Explainer Videos to quickly summarize for clients how a legal procedure might work. Or to share why their firm is different or show off a new product or service that their firm plans to introduce.

What’s best about explainer videos, though, is that they’re inexpensive to produce. Not inexpensive, as in a few-hundred-dollars inexpensive, but rather, five to ninety-nine dollars inexpensive! For example, on Fiverr  (a service I described before),  there’s a full category of providers who will create and deliver an explainer video for five dollars. There are also a bunch of DIY services, where you can create one yourself – Powtoon , Animator and Biteable, which is the one that I used for the video below (for a company that I’m launching soon): (Note: I paid the $99/year to remove the watermark):

 

Now that I’ve explained Explainer Videos, get out there and make one yourself. Your clients have questions – and you’ve got some ‘splainin’ to do!

4 Comments

  1. Paula Simon on August 17, 2016 at 3:15 pm

    Hi Carolyn – I found this article interesting and was intrigued by your “explainer” video for your new business. As someone with vision problems I wanted to let you know I had trouble reading the copy on the screens that had a green background with white text. I’ve just started having these problems recently and I am finding that a lot of people don’t think about how things look for people with impaired vision.



  2. robin may on November 5, 2016 at 2:09 pm

    Mandela effect strikes again. Desi Arnaz never ever said: “Lucy, you’ve got some splaining to do”.



  3. Dina Lynch Eisenberg JD on November 16, 2016 at 8:59 pm

    Hi Carolyn, I loved your article on explainer videos because they are so darned useful. Not only do they save time, but videos are excellent for SEO and marketing purposes.

    Today, 83% of consumers visit your website before deciding to contact you. Those videos allow the visitor to get to know, like and trust and your brand much better. Going to see an attorney is a scary event that causes a lot of anxiety people, and I think a video goes a long way to alleviating some worry or doubt.

    I love Fiverr, although I know most people struggle with it. I’ve had a lot of success finding trustworthy, talented folks, and it sounds like you had that experience as well. The key is to prepare properly, especially for a creative endeavor like a video. The result will only be as good as your guidance and instructions. I prefer Upwork for video work. It’s easier to work with multiple sellers, like your script writer, with their workroom feature.

    I really enjoy reading your blog. Thanks for everything you do.



  4. Anastasia Animatron on January 16, 2017 at 4:24 am

    Hi Carolyn, great overview of how important (and useful) explainer videos are. I wonder if you heard about a tool called Animatron? It’s an online animated video maker which not only lets you create animated videos like the one you have designed (I loved it!) but also combine your homegrown videos with free animated objects, characters, text, and add various effects to customize your videos. Works best for explainers and marketing videos. The coolest thing is that subscription starts from $0. Hope you’ll have time to check it out!



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