How Law Firms Can Market Against DIY Will Kits Without Sounding Defensive
Here's the thing nobody says out loud at partner meetings: DIY will kits aren't really your competitor. Doing nothing is your competitor, and a $40 kit from the newsagent is what gets a lot of people to finally do something. If your marketing's whole message is "DIY wills are dangerous, come to real lawyers instead," you're arguing with people who already made a decision, and arguing with someone rarely wins them as a client. The better move is quieter and more useful: meet them after they've bought the kit, at the exact moment they're filling it in and hit a question it can't answer. 💖
What most firms get wrong
The instinct is to write content that's essentially "DIY wills are risky, here's why," stacked with scare stories about kits gone wrong. It reads as self-interested and talks past the actual person in front of you, who chose a $40 kit because a few thousand dollars for a will felt like overkill for their situation. The content that works instead answers a narrower, more useful question: "is my situation actually simple enough for a kit, or not?" That's a question a DIY kit buyer genuinely wants answered — and answering it honestly, sometimes with "yours is probably fine," is what makes the times you say "get this checked" land as credible instead of self-serving.
The DIY Will Kit Self-Check
List these as tick-box style questions. Any single "yes" is the trigger line for "this is worth ten minutes with a lawyer":
- Do you have children from a previous relationship, or a blended family?
- Do you own property jointly with someone other than your spouse?
- Does anyone you'd leave money to have a disability, addiction, or difficulty managing money?
- Do you run a business, or own shares in one, with other people?
- Do you want to leave someone out of your will who might otherwise expect to receive something?
- Has your family situation changed significantly since you last thought about this (divorce, remarriage, a new baby, an estranged relative)?
How to build this into your content
Start with the self-check checklist above as a standalone page or blog post — it's genuinely useful even to someone who never becomes a client, and usefulness is what earns the trust to be believed later. Pair it with a plain-language explanation of your fixed-fee will review or update service, priced clearly enough that "get it checked" doesn't feel like opening a blank cheque. Then build a short follow-up piece on the one or two failure points most relevant to your local audience, rather than trying to cover every possible risk in one article.
Please note: general information, not legal advice — check current official guidance or speak to a qualified professional before relying on it.
Mistakes to avoid
- Don't lead with fear or horror stories about "wills gone wrong" — it reads as self-interested and puts DIY buyers on the defensive instead of curious.
- Don't imply every DIY will is invalid or risky — most aren't, and overclaiming damages your credibility the moment a reader knows someone whose kit worked fine.
- Don't price your review service vaguely ("contact us for a quote") when the whole point is removing the fear of an unknown, large bill.
- Don't make the self-check so long or legalistic that it becomes its own barrier — six sharp questions beat twenty thorough ones.
Frequently asked questions
Is it ever appropriate to say a DIY will kit is fine?
Yes, and saying so is part of what makes your firm credible — a very simple estate with no dependants, no property complications and a straightforward single beneficiary can genuinely be covered by a correctly completed and witnessed kit. The nuance is that "simple" is often a self-assessment people get wrong, which is exactly what the self-check is for.
Won't this cannibalise fee income from full will-drafting services?
Some enquiries will be smaller than a full estate plan, yes — but a flat-fee review is still fee income, and a portion of reviewed clients will have complications they didn't realise, converting into larger engagements anyway. It's a trade-off, not a guaranteed net gain, and it depends on your existing client mix.
What's the biggest risk with will kits specifically, marketing-wise?
Witnessing and execution requirements are the most common practical failure point worth highlighting, because they're easy to get wrong without realising it and easy for a reader to check for themselves — which makes for genuinely useful content rather than vague scaremongering.
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