[Top Agency Series] Mastering Law Firm Marketing With Travis Hoechlin of RizeUp Media

Travis Hoechlin is the CEO of RizeUp Media, an agency specializing in helping law firms generate new clients, increase revenue, and grow their businesses through online marketing strategies. With over 15 years of experience in legal marketing, he has significantly contributed to the company’s rapid success, including making the Inc. 5000 list two years in a row. His expertise lies in managing various aspects of marketing, from website development to SEO and pay-per-click advertising. Travis previously worked in the mortgage business before channeling his competitive spirit and sales acumen into founding RizeUp Media.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

• [04:03] Travis Hoechlin discusses how RizeUp Media customizes its services, especially for small firms
• [07:07] The transparent approach that sets RizeUp Media apart from larger competitors
• [10:24] The pivotal milestones in establishing and scaling RizeUp Media
• [13:26] The essential qualities that made Travis the top salesperson at his company
• [15:38] Tips on prospecting and direct client engagement
• [20:55] Insights into the effective recruitment and onboarding process for a high-performing sales team
• [22:53] How to navigate the dynamics of a successful partnership in business
• [33:32] The value of answering phone calls and how it impacts client acquisition
• [37:19] Considerations for implementing live chat solutions for legal firms

In this episode…

In the competitive landscape of legal services, the ability to convert leads into clients is often the tipping point that determines success. While innovative marketing strategies are essential, few firms recognize that the cornerstone of client acquisition lies in fundamental practices — like simply answering calls. But what happens when hundreds of law firms miss out on countless opportunities by overlooking this fundamental step? How can someone change this persistent issue within the industry?

Travis Hoechlin, a marketing expert, unravels the challenges many law firms face when converting marketing efforts into tangible results. Drawing from his experience as a seasoned marketer for legal services, he shares a wealth of knowledge, including the critical importance of picking up phone calls, leveraging live chat features, and the necessity of providing custom solutions that fit the unique needs of individual law firms. His approach is straightforward and customer-centric, ensuring that every dollar spent on marketing counts toward growing the client’s business.

In this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast, host Dr. Jeremy Weisz sits down with Travis Hoechlin, CEO of RizeUp Media, about scaling legal firms through efficient marketing. Travis discusses how RizeUp Media customizes its services for law firms, the pivotal milestones in establishing and scaling it, effective recruitment and onboarding process for a high-performing sales team, and the timeless value of answering phone calls.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Travis Hoechlin on LinkedIn
• RizeUp Media

Special Mention(s):

• Bo Bryant on LinkedIn
• George Kaganovich on LinkedIn
• $100M Leads: How to Get Strangers to Want to Buy Your Stuff by Alex Hormozi
• How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie

Related episode(s):

• “[Top Agency Series] Unlocking Sales Potential With Video Case Stories With Ian Garlic” on the Inspired Insider Podcast
• “[Sweet Process Series] How to Save Hundreds of Hours a Month Using Top Productivity Tools with Adi Klevit of Business Success Consulting Group” on the Inspired Insider Podcast
• “[Top Agency Series] Growth Through Acquisitions – What is Your KPI and Northstar? With Jason Swenk” on the Inspired Insider Podcast
• “Building a Great Team and More Helpful Insights with Jason Swenk Host of The Smart Agency Master Class Podcast” on the Inspired Insider Podcast

Quotable Moments:

• “If you do it once, you can do it twice. If you can do it twice, you can do it four times.”
• “Outwork everyone else because there are very few people willing to put in that effort.”
• “If you do the right thing for folks, you’re going to get referrals.”
• “Most attorneys think their reputation is bigger than it is.”
• “Your territory is either an asset or a liability; sell and act accordingly.”

Action Steps:

1. Enhance phone-answering protocols: Increase client retention by ensuring every potential lead is attended to promptly.
2. Implement live chat on websites: This caters to the younger generation’s preference for texting over calling and can significantly improve client engagement and conversion rates.
3. Utilize local service ads: Effective for solo practitioners who need quick results and cash flow without waiting for longer-term SEO strategies to take effect.
4. Regularly monitor and analyze call data: This practice helps in understanding marketing ROI and identifying areas for service improvement.
5. Customize marketing strategies for individual needs: Ensure sustainable growth and client satisfaction, avoiding a one-size-fits-all strategy that may not meet all clients’ expectations.

Episode Transcript

Intro  00:15

You are listening to Inspired Insider with your host, Dr Jeremy Weisz.

Jeremy Weisz  00:22

Dr Jeremy Weisz here, founder of inspiredinsider.com where I talk with inspirational entrepreneurs and leaders today, is no different. I have Travis Hoechlin with RizeUp Media. You can check them out at rizeupmedia.com it’s with a Z. And Travis before I formally introduce you, I always like to point out other episodes of the podcast people should check out. Since this is part of the top agency series, which are the good ones? Ian Garlic, think you know Ian. We talked about Video Case Stories. And he basically helps companies capture amazing client stories so they can market them. And what’s better than client stories? He talked also about growing up in an entrepreneurial family and his dad at a restaurant Travis, and in that restaurant, they lived dolphins. Okay, I like that episode because it got my creative juices flowing, and that’s strange in general, I saw your reaction, but Ian’s in Orlando, so it’s like, okay, it’s kind of strange. But at the time, this restaurant was in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, so which is even crazier. So that episode was cool.

I had Adi Klevit on. Adi Klevit has an agency that has done-for-you SOPs. Okay, so if you want to capture and document your SOPs, from a client onboarding to a staff onboarding to whatever, they come in and they document it for you. And we geeked out on our favorite productivity tools, systems, process, like all the sexy stuff that’s behind the scenes that makes things work, right? That was a really good one as well. And there was a good one Jason Swenk talking about how he built up his agency to eight figures and sold it and been buying up agencies, then he started the agency, mastermind, agency 360 as actually, we met through Jason, of course. So check out those many more through inspiredinsider.com. This episode is brought to you by Rise25. At Rise25 we help businesses give to and connect to their dream relationships and partnerships. How do we do that? We do that by helping you run your podcast. And we’re an easy button for a company to launch and run a podcast. We do the strategy, the accountability and the full execution.

So Travis, we kind of call ourselves the magic elves. Kind of like what you are for law firms, except for we have for podcasts, we’re the magic elves that run in the background and make it look easy for the host and the company so they can create amazing content, amazing relationships and run their business. For me, the number one thing in my life is relationships. I’m always looking at ways to give to my best relationships, and I found no better way, over the past decade, to profile the people in companies I admire and share with the world what they’re working on. So if you’ve thought about podcasting, you should if you have questions, you can go to rise25.com or email us at [email protected].

I’m excited to introduce Travis Hoechlin. He’s founding partner and CEO of RizeUp Media. They’ve been in business since 2015. They made the Inc 5000 list for the fastest-growing companies in America two years in a row. He has over 15 years’ experience marketing for lawyers and law firms. They currently work with more than 400 law firms across the country, which is incredible. And Travis is here. I have a lot of questions. He’s some great stories and an amazing journey. So Travis, thanks for joining me.

Travis Hoechlin  03:49

Thanks for having me. Excited to be here.

Jeremy Weisz  03:51

Let’s start off with just rise I’m gonna there is a video piece to this. I’m gonna share my screen, but just talk about RizeUp Media and what you do?

Travis Hoechlin  04:03

Yeah, so we’re a full-service internet marketing company for law firms. We specialize in law firms, solo practitioners, up to about 10 attorneys. I mean, we have quite a few that are bigger than that, but probably 85% of the clients that we work with are one or two-man shops or firms, excuse me, and we do everything. I tell people, we do five things and do five things well. We build custom websites. Once those websites go live, we do SEO work so they show up on the first page of Google. We manage social media, we manage pay-per-click campaigns, and the fifth thing we do is we manage local service ad campaigns. And we like to say that we give the law firms the white glove personal attention and white glove treatment that they’re looking for so they can concentrate on what they do best, which is practicing law. And as you said, the magic is behind the scenes.

Jeremy Weisz  05:04T

alk about niche for a second, okay? Because I’ve seen in the law firm space. First of all, why law firms? We’ll get into that. But it’s interesting, because you chose not only law firm, but you have a couple different types of law firms that you serve, but you also serve a certain size of law firms as well. But start off with law firms. Why law firms? Because I know you came from the mortgage business.

Travis Hoechlin  05:33

Yeah, a long time ago. Yeah, that was many, many moons ago. But for the last 15 years, my partner now, one of my partners now, and we, like you said, came from the mortgage world, 2007 when that world all turned upside down, we decided to launch a company. Thought we’d be more nimble and make that work. And we did that for a couple years. And then it was just time to do something different. And so a friend, an old mentor of mine, was working in the lawyer marketing space, and he got me a job at a big box store marketing company for lawyers, and I worked there for eight and a half years.

And I guess, like most entrepreneurs, just realized, thought, we can make the widget a bit better and give our customers a bit better service. And actually five years, a little over five years ago, officially, I should say, I made the jump in and opened up our own, hung our own shingle, and here we are. Five years later, we’re working with more than 400 firms and growing like a weed. We made the Inc 5000 less two years in a row, and we feel like we barely scratched the surface. And just getting started.

Jeremy Weisz  05:36

What did you learn that you were going to carry into RizeUp? And I’m also wondering, what did you learn from the other company that you were realized, I’m not going to carry that into RizeUp.

Travis Hoechlin  07:07

I think no question, the biggest thing is helping them attorneys understand what they’re paying for, and being completely transparent of what expectations they should have, what they’re receiving on a monthly basis and goal set with them on where you’re going. I mean, most agencies, a lot of agencies, I should say, most, a lot of agencies out there to sell a product and try to fit all the different attorneys into a certain box. And we just didn’t feel like that’s not how you and I run our businesses. So why would we help somebody else run their business that way? And so we wanted to come up with a custom strategy and help and most importantly, help them realize what they’re getting for that right? What is their return on investment? Probably nine out of 10. And I’m being nice, law firms out there know what their ROI is, or return on investment is on the marketing, and they have no idea what that should even be. So why? Why even ask those questions? So we wanted to make sure we’re able to help them build and scale their business, if that’s what they’re needing.

Jeremy Weisz  08:17

So it was a transparency thing, it was an expectation thing. It was a goal-setting thing, and really focus on ROI thing.

Travis Hoechlin  08:26

Yeah, we wanted to be an outsourced kind of arm of their firm, right? Most attorneys, are just looking for somebody that they can trust, right, hand over a few bucks, make my phone ring, get me clients in the door, and let me check in every now and again, and know that you’re doing what you say you’re going to do, and that we’re probably at the risk of boring them to death, completely transparent of what they’re doing, showing them and letting them listen to all the phone calls that they’re getting email forms and helping connect the dots. Like, okay, you spent $5,000 this month and you made 25 and that you’re,, we like to say, as long as you’re picking up quarters for nickels, you’re probably in the right spot.

Jeremy Weisz  09:12

Why more? Again, I know the clients have a range, but you have a bunch of solo practitioners. I’m wondering why solo practitioners, as opposed to maybe ones that are really large law firms?

Travis Hoechlin  09:28

Well, in our space and agency, that’s typically where that’s who needs the help, right? Some humongous national firms or international firms, they don’t really market. They do PR, they do whatever they’re doing. They’re not trying to do SEO. They’re not trying to do different things. They have 500 lawyers, 1000 lawyers at their firm that are supposed to bring in business, and that’s why they get paid the big bucks. Most solo practitioners, what we found up to about five or 10 attorneys are in that sweet spot of they need our help, right? They don’t have the ambition or want the headache of hiring a whole internal marketing team, right? It probably doesn’t make sense financially for them, so they would then reach out to someone like us, and that’s where we found where our  sweet spot is. That’s who needs it. That’s who we can help best.

Jeremy Weisz  10:19

What was the first major milestone in starting the company after you went out on your own?

Travis Hoechlin  10:24

I think getting the first million dollars, right. In our world, that seems to be like before, I listen to as many podcasts as anybody else, and listen to different things, and there’s always like, this million dollar mark that seemed to be this big hill you had to get over. And we hit that pretty darn early and realized it wasn’t that big of a deal, right? And we just kind of, ever since that point went okay, if we can, I heard Kobe Bryant saying, like, just focused on the step ahead of you. And if you can do it once, you can do it twice. If you can do it twice, you can do it four times, or whatever.

And so that’s kind of just the mentality we took right, wrong or indifferent, where we’re like, okay, we did a million. That wasn’t earth-shattering. Can we do the second million quicker and faster, and obviously making sure the clients are happy, and all that good stuff, and we’re doing good work. And that’s what we prior to number one, but, and that’s what kind of we did. So when we hit that first million, which sat from everybody else’s, from the outside, seemed like a big deal, and then realizing it wasn’t that big a deal, I think that’s where we went oh my gosh, we can do something special here.

Jeremy Weisz  11:44

What made you decide, after over eight years, to start your own because I can see you at that point, listen, I have a good thing here, maybe not and just keep doing that.

Travis Hoechlin  11:59

You know what? It was, a couple different things. There’s two, two main reasons. Number one is, I worked at a Fortune 500 company, which had hundreds of salespeople, and I was the number one guy for six years in a row. And I kind of looked in the mirror, and I go, I’ve pretty much redlined this. I’ve pedaled to the metal here, and I don’t think I can’t grow any better. I can’t grow my income 50% no matter how hard I work or whatever. So that was number one, and I not that it was great timing, but I just had my second kid and my wife, I asked my wife a lot, man, I’ve been talking about it for years, and it was, and finally, she kind of challenged me and said, are you gonna keep basically, you’re gonna keep flapping your gums about this.

Are you gonna do it? And I went, okay. And that was she chose, your manhood is what you said. Basically, yes. And then, like most stories, I had a manager that just didn’t respect me. Story for a different day, but it was the last 1% that pushed me over the edge, and I went out on paternity leave, and I said, I’m not coming back, and I never did, and I wish I would have done it five years earlier.

Jeremy Weisz  13:13

What were you doing, you’re number-one salesperson for six years? That’s pretty incredible. What was it about your process as a salesperson that worked?

Travis Hoechlin  13:26

Ambitious, hustle, I’ve never been listen, I played baseball all growing up, all the way through college, and signed a professional contract play independent ball, and I was never once taken the field and been the most talented ball player, salesperson, what have you, but I always took pride in outworking everybody. I figure I probably have to work twice as hard as everybody else to put out the same result and what you tend to find out is there’s very few people that are willing to give that much effort. And so it’s always kind of worked out for me, and it was no different.

Once I got into sales and business, it kind of was, all the lessons you learn in baseball and failure and competing and teamwork and all that kind of stuff, especially competition. I’m the most competitive person you’ll ever meet. Like, I just cannot handle not winning. And sales was perfect for me. Sales like, okay, who’s, who’s the competitors? Who am I competing against? And what are they doing? I’m gonna go figure out. I’m gonna go pick all their brains, figure it out, and then I’m gonna add that knowledge with my work ethic, and I like my chances, and so that’s what I did there. And it worked. It worked out. And it’s bring the same mentality over here, and  I’d like to think we’re going to get similar results.

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