Gary Sarner 16:22
So I actually met Anidjar and Levine, Mark Anidjar and Glen Levine back in 2013. They were having an issue at my radio station with their salesperson, and I knew the Anidjar family because my ex-wife and I owned a hair salon in the neighborhood, and people were coming in. So I knew the name really well. I didn’t know any connection. And went over to his office. I got the appointment coat and tie the whole thing, and he’s in jeans and a T shirt and flip flops. Well, I had never been, fortunately, in a lawyer’s office before, let alone a personal injury lawyer’s office, so I really knew nothing about his business, but we hit it off. We had a great chat. He pulled my tie down. You come here. We have fun. And the best salespeople in the world can read upside down. And he had a stack of paperwork in his credenza. I’m like, are those your invoices?
He’s like, yeah. I said, do you look at those? He’s like, my people take care of me. Like, okay, well, I’m not going to say what I said to him, but I said, you’re taking it without any Lou and there’s a problem. And he really said to he’s like, what do you know about my business? I said, nothing. I know my business, and if you’re not inspecting what you expect from your partners, you have a problem. So he called me a smart ass, and we’re laughing. He says, audit a station. I did. There were a lot of errors. He was not being taken care of like he thought. And he’s like, you’re my new ad guy. I’m like, no, no, no, no, no, no. Well, I can tell you, over the next six months, I was getting his spot times to make sure that his advertising was running correctly. In the meantime, he spent more investment with me at the radio station, and all of a sudden, at the end of the year, I became his ad guy, and I helped him grow the firm, Mark and Glen, from a local South Florida law firm, into a statewide Juggernaut, and it was based in radio.
There was TV, a lot of Google, but their radio presence was really owning the dial, and we tried many different media plans to find the secret sauce and grateful that I was allowed to come up with these plans, and there was trust and there was failure, but at the end, there was a shit ton of success, because we went from market to market to market. And February 15, 2021 in the middle of the pandemic, not allowed in the office, sitting at home, working probably till two o’clock, then pouring a drink, that was really three drinks, and having a couple of them. So it was six, because that’s what you did during the pandemic. You couldn’t go anywhere. I get a call February 15, 8:30 at night that says, hey, we want you to focus on everything here at the radio stations and not handle their marketing anymore. Well, oh, wow, that was a left hook that I didn’t expect. I called Mark. He’s like, let’s talk tomorrow morning coming. I said, Dude, I’m not gonna f***ing sleep. He’s like, you’re not gonna sleep anyway.
So that’s who you are. Come in the morning and very grateful that he helped seed me to start this business. And when I opened up ROI360+, I was going to be this traditional ad agency that would work with Anidjar and Levine and maybe air conditioning companies, car dealers, retailers, anybody. And all of a sudden, after several calls, I ended up at the National Trial Lawyers conference. And there’s another story behind what I wear and how I got into that, but what I learned very quickly was…
Jeremy Weisz 21:53
And by the way, just really quickly Gary on that, if people are listening, there is a video component we can see when Gary says, what I wear. You can see this right here. And this is just one of many shirts that you can see. I remember seeing when we were in touch, looking at, I think it was maybe your LinkedIn profile or something like this. Guy definitely loves his crazy shirts.
Gary Sarner 22:21
Point in all my pictures. Talk about that. So I ended up at this conference with the crazy shirts and talking to all these lawyers because my shirt stood out. I don’t think anybody really wanted to talk to me. They were just like, who is this crazy guy walking through here in the loudest shirt I’ve ever seen? And I learned that personal injury law firms do not advertise on the radio all over the country. Everybody did TV and Google, and after three months of cold calling, stalking people on social media, I landed our second big client in Atlanta, Bader Scott. And once we had Anidjar and Levine, and Bader Scott, two very well respected firms, well-respected attorneys, businessmen, now all of a sudden, people are reaching out. What the hell are you doing for these guys? How do you do this? And very fortunately, with a lot of hard work, we started the process of working with clients all over the United States, and it went from me alone to now we’re a team of seven today. I’m very proud of that, and we care. And back to your question, why the point? Because it’s really about the end user. It’s about you. It’s never about me. If I do what’s right, my team does what’s right, and we put everybody else first, everything comes back.
Jeremy Weisz 24:46
There’s a story Gary about Bader Scott and so how, from the first client I can see the path and the journey, and that kind of helps seed you. And the whole business. And I love how you think about 80/20 and you really kind of thought about what’s the top 20% of the clients I love working with that I helped the most, and that was the PI attorney at the time. So how did you get your next client? How did you get Bader Scott?
Gary Sarner 25:24
So after making a lot of phone calls, sending out a lot of blind emails, nobody responding, nobody. I mean, I could not get an email back, other than out of the office or please remove me from your list. And I was not a big social media guy. I was on Facebook. I didn’t even have an Instagram at that time, and I went on Instagram and I set up my own and I set up the ROI360+. And on the ROI360+, the only people I followed, other than Elena and my kids, were law firms, and because I had a lot of time on my hands, especially since I wake up at 4 am I must have liked every post, every lawyer that I connected to had on the internet, on Instagram or Facebook. And one day I get this message, hey, how do I know you? I’m like, I’m your freaking stalker. And we set up a phone call. Turns out that Seth lives in Atlanta, but grew up in Miami. I grew up in Atlanta, now live in Miami, this whole Jewish connection, bop, bop, bop, bop, bop. He invited me to Atlanta, and I flew up there, and we spent an entire day together talking about marketing, not specifically radio.
And there was this connection that happened pretty quickly with Seth, where we started talking about life and ex-wives and children and just a normal conversation that you say, prospective client became friend very quickly, and within a week, we had everything put together and paperwork done. I don’t like the words contract or agreement, it’s paperwork, much easier for people to work with. And the next thing you know, I fly up to Atlanta again, and we meet with all the radio stations, and we put everything together and plans in motion. And that’s 39 months ago. And I am very grateful for Seth and the relationship that I have with him. He’s a friend first, and we’ve been very fortunate to grow to where we have grown and work with the great law firm partners that we have across the country. And there’s a bunch to highlight. So we’re not going to go through everybody today, but it’s funny, day before Thanksgiving, I’ve got so much to be grateful for, between my kids, my business, my family, the sky’s the limit out there, if you put your mind to it.
Jeremy Weisz 29:11
Gary, I want to hear about some of the learnings and mistakes. One of the learnings was a bit of a phone number that you changed. Can you talk about that? How that turned things around for one of the campaigns.
Gary Sarner 29:26
Anidjar and Levine, as they are starting to grow through the state, had this phone number, 1800 7473. And after almost 13 years that number is just in my head forever. I have said it and typed it and called it million times and when we launched a new market up in North Florida, it was the first time the campaign wasn’t working. I mean, no response. And we’re talking to different people trying to figure out what the hell is going on, and it sounded like they weren’t local. And we met with everybody up in the area, talked to them, and we made a change on the phone number, and all of a sudden the phone started ringing. People are inquiring from Anidjar and Levine. Wait a minute. I want to talk to you guys. I want to hire you guys. I need your help, and it’s amazing when you actually listen to people, vendors, people that you trust, and take the suggestion from sounding like the big national firm and just dumbing it down to a local number, all of a sudden you’re a part of the community.
And not all markets are like that across the country, but once we went back into the studio and changed all of the radio, phone started ringing. People start hiring them. Boom, boom, boom. Blocks get knocked down. We add television to the campaign. And fortunately for them, they were able to buy their own building in Jacksonville. Their entire success of the market really came from that one change the 800 number to a local number. Part of that lesson was learning to understand the market before you actually put out commercials. The media plan didn’t need to change. The messaging needed to change. And fortunately for Anidjar and Levine, they have done very, very well in the state of Florida over the last 13 years. I’m very grateful for both of them.
Jeremy Weisz 29:34
Gary, what are some of the mistakes you’ve seen people make? Because I’m sure people come to you, maybe they’ve tried it, maybe they haven’t. Maybe they’re like, Gary, we’ve tried it doesn’t work right. And obviously it’s just someone who’s not doing it right that’s not working. Because it does work for people. But what are some of the mistakes you’ve seen people make?
Gary Sarner 33:21
So through my entire career in radio and spending 35 years at stations, whether it be in sales or in management or national sales, which I ran for a long, long time, I learned that those who are committed to their investment in marketing generally don’t lose. Now, messaging is very important, but the commitment to a new medium is paramount. So for us at ROI360+, we won’t work with somebody who wants to try something, because most people who try fail, people who commit succeed. So all of our partners, and they’re not clients, they are partners, agree to an annual commitment. Now, are there areas where they can get out of this commitment? Absolutely. You don’t want somebody who isn’t happy, to be stuck in something no different than a marriage. People get married for life. Unfortunately, 50% get divorced. Business relationships are very similar. How do you nurture the relationship for it to be a long-standing partnership? For us, I’m very proud of my team and all of our partners. We have only lost two. You know what the funny thing is about those two? They are both thriving on the radio. The relationships ended over money.
Jeremy Weisz 34:45
You mentioned messaging, Gary, what are some of the components of good messaging on the radio?
Gary Sarner 36:00
So it’s interesting the legal business, which is where we specialize. 98% of the people don’t need a personal injury lawyer today. So what matters to a law firm and to the general public who you are, what do you do and how do I reach you? It is frequency of message. I want the firms that we get the privilege to work with to be top of mind all the time. Now we live in this internet age. I mean, we’re looking at each other through computers. When I started back in 1987 in radio, when I was 20, there was no internet. There was no thought, by the way, the only cell phone you could have was built into your car, and I got one of those back then, thought I was hot shit because it was the worst investment I ever made. But in today’s world, you have to be top of mind and you have to be known, because what rules the shopping world today? Google. Nobody says Bing. They all say Google. And then there are several other providers out there for search engines.
So as we started looking at how campaign should look, we came up with a system that was built around frequency of message, who you are, what do you do, and how do I reach you? Because 98% of the people don’t need a lawyer today. Now you happen to be in the podcast-hosting business, right? Anybody could have a podcast, anybody, whether it’s free or it’s 20 grand a month investment, the world is out there for you to have. You could market your services, and anybody could contact you who might have a desire to put themselves out on the World Wide Web. You can’t make somebody call a lawyer. You have to have a need for a lawyer, whether it’s a divorce attorney, a personal injury attorney, an immigration attorney, there has to be a need. But if you don’t build the brand in your market, why would somebody choose you?
Referrals are great. That’s the lifeblood of all businesses. What we do is make our firms be a part of the listeners lives, the viewers lives, so when that need comes, hopefully our firm is the number one choice. Do most people search for law firms by name? Nope, they still go to Google and they do a search for an attorney. That’s why your pay-per-click matters. That’s why your LSAS matter, your GMB matter, by the way, all those things are at the top of the fold on Google. You’re paying for it. Everything else is below the fold. So you want to stand out so people do a search directly for you. It’s not easy. It takes a long time to build a brand. You know what’s interesting in the legal business, there’s nobody that has a 10% market share in a particular place. So how do you connect with the public. So in their time of need, they know to choose you or they know who you are. So frequency of message matters, storytelling matters, being genuine matters, caring matters, and you better answer your goddamn phone fast, because you’re going to go to the next one.
Jeremy Weisz 41:35
I’m sure you’ve seen, I don’t know, every mistake in the book, but a lot of them. So I love the storytelling you talk about, the frequency you talk about, obviously, the fundamentals of answering the phone and quickly, another thing you do talk about is demographic and that’s an important component too, because people, I’ve heard you say people focus on the wrong demographic, right? Because you could dominate a demographic. Do you want to talk about how do you think about from your niche, the demographic that you’re serving and frequenting, the messages to?
Gary Sarner 42:18
So in the personal injury world, nobody knows who’s going to get into an accident next. Does the firm want to reach the market? And let’s just keep it simple and say the market is Hispanic, white, and African American, because everybody gets in accidents. And if we knew when, it would be really easy. But we don’t know when, so we have to decipher with the law firms that we work with, what is your target? Can you afford to market to everybody, or do we need to niche down? And some people want to target the African American radio stations, the Hispanic radio stations, or the generally white radio stations. The best plan is to go after the market and own the market. That’s an investment, and it takes time to make a difference. What is the largest law firm in America? Do you know? It’s Morgan & Morgan. You ever heard of them?
Jeremy Weisz 43:56
Only because I’ve been listening to you, but —
Gary Sarner 43:58
Okay, they’re all over the country, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that, because they’re the biggest that people are going to actually hire them. So your messaging as a law firm, you’ve got to find your niche. But that niche doesn’t only mean black, white or Hispanic. What you say and what you ask people to do really matters, and we have firms that we work with all over the country, and their messaging is always unique to who they are and who they want to serve, and these guys and girls get a really shitty rap. They’re the ambulance chasers. Well, no. They’re not, because there are catastrophic injuries that happen on a daily basis across the country, and without these personal injury law firms, nobody would get the somewhat of relief that the lawyers helped them get.
Look unfortunately, people die in car accidents. There’s nothing worse than a sudden death. But without these lawyers, there’s no relief whatsoever, and they are experts in finding insurance out there, and most people are underinsured. So if you do take anything from this, anybody that’s listening to your podcast, Jeremy, call your insurance and make sure you have uninsured motorist coverage, because 25% of the population drives without insurance, and God forbid, one of those people hit somebody you care about, there’s no coverage.
Jeremy Weisz 46:20
Gary, this goes back to how you choose who you work with, and at this point in your career, you can choose who you work with, right, and you can be pickier, but you ask a specific question to determine that. Can you talk about that?
Gary Sarner 46:41
So my favorite question is, what’s your why? And anybody that I speak to in person, so we have to be invited to sit down face to face. I asked that question face to face. There are many answers, and we all have a different “why,” but when it becomes money first, and it’s not about people, that’s not our ideal partner. If it’s about people, and then you do great work, money will always follow. And it doesn’t matter what you do for a living, people come first.
Jeremy Weisz 47:40
What are some of the most memorable answers you’ve gotten? There’s one that sticks out to me, but I want to hear what comes to mind for you.
Gary Sarner 47:48
Thinking about the window blinds I got to sit down with Jim Under in St Louis. I got a call from him out of the blue. I was sitting at dinner one night, and I had reached out. We had met, but never really chatted, and I excused myself from the table and Jim’s like, hey, I want to talk to you, and I want to get on the radio. I flew out there immediately. Within three days, I was at his office, at dinner, picked me up, we went to dinner, and I asked him, what’s your “why?” Jim, I’m sorry, but he had tears in his eyes, and he told me about this landmark case about window blinds. You have them right next to you on your left, is there a pull cord in yours?
Jeremy Weisz 48:20
There is, well, they’re twisting. They’re twisting blinds, actually.
Gary Sarner 49:04
Okay, so twisting right? You remember the old blinds where you pulled the cord? Jim proceeded to tell me about two children every month die from the pull cord. Now think about where we put our children’s cribs, near windows, so as they learn to stand up while holding on to the crib, they could look outside and see whatever’s out there to stimulate them, and these pull cords were getting wrapped around necks. It was a really moving story that just made me so fond of a man who cared to change the world, to save babies, and yes, we market about car accidents, but he was able to change and make a difference across the country, because the major retailers cannot sell the pull cords on the blinds any longer. Manufacturers have to make them with the spin or some other mechanism so children don’t choke on the pull cord. So all of my very first initial meetings, which are all unique and interesting, that one meant the most to me and to want to help drive his business, which his business is helping people in a time of need, just like all the other law firms that we get to privilege to work with on a daily basis.
Jeremy Weisz 49:07
Yeah, thanks for sharing that, because it is to think deeper about the mission and the why, and to get that out in the universe for people to understand, right? Because that’s unique to that person, that company. Gary, I have one last question before I ask it. I just want to thank you for sharing your journey, your stories, everyone can check out ROI360plus.com to learn more. And my last question is, some of your favorite resources? I know you do a lot of reading of blogs, listen to podcasts, and go to a lot of conferences as well. I think you were just at Chris Dryers last conference. I love to hear some of your favorite resources, whether it’s conferences, podcast, blogs in the space.
Gary Sarner 52:14
I’ve always considered myself a people person, and I sit here and do this podcast with you on a video camera, and I wish I was sitting right next to you so we could really see what’s happening. Body language matters. Understanding people matters, understanding what their why is matters. I listen to podcasts in the legal industry, and there are a lot of really good ones out there. I want to understand why clients choose the law firms they do choose, why lawyers do what they do to help people, why anybody does what they do really is to help somebody, and then we all end up getting paid for hopefully doing really great work and really caring about the end user.
I wish I read more. I don’t. I’m better at listening to a book, even though I told you upfront, I’ve got way too many credits in my account for books, but you did give me a good one today, which I did not even know was written, and it’s been my question for many years, not just recently, but it’s about people. How do you help people so they can either get well or be better. My four kids, how can they be better to help make the world a better place? And it might be by touching one person, 10 people, 100 people or 1000s of people, but just try to make the world better. We all fuck up, own them and apologize and move forward. Don’t get stuck in a bad spot in life.
Jeremy Weisz 54:40
You mentioned how important is to kind of just be in person and meet people. What are some of your favorite conferences that you’ve been to?
Gary Sarner 54:50
So they’re all unique. They all offer something different and have a different type of crowd. You. Chris Dreyer’s conference at PIMCON, which was his first, was really different from many of the other conferences, because there was no vendor on stage and there’s something that happens in the legal marketing industry is there’s pay for play. If you sponsor, you could be on stage, versus if you bring value, you could be on stage. There are some places where the value is amazing, somewhere you know, not the right people that you want helping your business. And that goes across many industries where there are lots of conferences, but at the end of the day for me, I go to as many conferences as I can, to meet people, to touch people, to be face to face with somebody. Because even though this internet age has made it easy for you and I to do this, I would much rather be sitting in your office having this conversation face to face with you than doing it via technology. People matter. So if you take something from this today, connect with somebody. Have the coffee, have a cocktail, have a lunch. But connections matter, because people matter. And whatever business you’re in, it’s still a people business.
Jeremy Weisz 56:55
Gary, I’m gonna be the first one to thank you. Thanks for sharing your stories, your journey. Everyone check out ROI360plus.com more episodes of the podcast, and we’ll see everyone next time. Gary, thanks so much.
Gary Sarner 57:07
Thank you.
