Marketing in the Courtroom: What Jury Duty Revealed About Human Behavior

Back in May, I received a piece of mail that a lot of people dread: a summons for jury duty. For weeks, I dreaded my appearance date. But I’m so glad I served, because I can’t stop thinking about what I learned about marketing that day.

Serving jury duty is an extremely human experience

When you serve jury duty, you check in, hang out in a huge holding room, and pray that your name is not called. After about 10 minutes, the first group of 18 jurors were called. Score. I wasn’t among them.

Then the second group was called. I was number 12 out of 18. We were assigned to courtroom 350. Hence, the image you see below. That was my identity for the day. Juror 12-350.

Two bailiffs gathered us and explained what would happen next: We would file into the courtroom. Jurors 1-12 would sit in the jury box. The other six would sit in the back of the courtroom.

The judge was kind, funny, and personable. She welcomed us and explained that we were there for a criminal case. Juicy, I thought.

Jury selection began. We each answered a series of demographic questions (giving everyone a peek into each other’s lives). After a few rounds of questions and juror dismissals, the jury was announced. I was the sixth of six (only six jurors are needed for a criminal misdemeanor case).

But what was the case about?

On August 21, 2024, the defendant was charged with a DUI. A state park ranger found her sitting atop her motorcycle alongside a dirt trail. He gave her a citation, because motorized vehicles are not allowed in state parks.

But while interacting with her, he noticed slurred speech, an unsteady gait, and a strong smell of alcohol. He alerted his supervisor, who called the police.

After she failed two of the three field sobriety tests, she was arrested and charged with a DUI.

Seems cut and dry, right? Nope.

As a defendant, you don’t have to take the stand. But she did.

She explained that she and her boyfriend at the time had been out riding their motorcycles that day. They stopped at a liquor store on their way home to buy some drinks to enjoy with dinner.

She freely admitted that she drank two shooters after crashing her motorcycle on the dirt trail. She was really upset. Her motorcycle wouldn’t restart, it was brand new, she fell hard on her left side and was in pain.

Her boyfriend thought a couple of shots would help calm her down. He didn’t want to leave her motorcycle there, so he headed home on his motorcycle to get their truck. Shortly after that, the ranger found her.

But did she drive drunk?

The burden is on the prosecution to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty. They did not meet that burden.

Did the defendant drink before she crashed? Maybe. But there was no proof.

My fellow jurors and I deliberated for about 20 minutes and agreed on the verdict: not guilty.

When the verdict was read, she broke down in tears and mouthed “thank you” to us. I nodded and smiled at her.

This trial had been hanging over her for 11 months. I can’t imagine the relief she felt.

What I learned about marketing that day

And this brings me to the entire point of this blog post. Serving on a jury was a window into someone else’s story and experience. And THAT’S what made the day so fascinating.

We are drawn to human stories and experiences. I firmly believe we need more of them in our marketing, because when we share stories, people respond.

I also believe this will become even more urgent with the proliferation of AI-generated content. It lacks soul and personality, because it lacks a lifetime of real human experiences, the joyful, the heartbreaking, and the small moments that shape our lives.

There is never a better time than now to be vulnerable in your marketing

My small business owner friends and I realized something last year: Our LinkedIn posts that are vulnerable, that share our struggles and doubts and exhaustion, are the ones that get the most engagement.

The defendant shared details from what I’m sure was the worst day of her life with a courtroom of strangers. I was thoroughly engaged all day while listening to testimonty from six witnesses and plenty of cross-examination.

The next time you sit down to write a social post, can you share a recent mistake you made, an assumption that turned out to be wrong, or a lesson you learned in an unusual situation? I bet you’ll get more engagement than you thought possible.

Share personal information – that’s where connections are formed

My friend Nicole showcases her two dogs on her website as team members (which reminds me that I need to do that with my own dogs!). And she has formed quick connections with others by sharing her passion for horseback riding and polo.

Likewise, my friend Adam, who is a tax accountant and CFO-for-hire, write about candy corn, bowties, Buccee’s, and many more fun topics on LinkedIn that have nothing to do with finance. Boy, does he get great engagement.

People in my network know that I live to snowboard (and will take days off to chase fresh powder). They know I hike a lot, attend a lot of concerts, and am an active member of a Bavarian schuhplattler dance group.

As you read through our above interests, did you connect with one or two of them? Do you want to learn more about how Nicole got into polo, why Adam writes about candy corn, or what the heck is Bavarian schuhplattler dancing?

I leave you with one final thought:

Is “humanity” the next big societal trend?

One of my favorite columnists at the Washington Post, Dana Milbank, recently wrote that he will shift from covering politics to writing about “the tonic of wildness”. Three years ago, he moved from the city to the Virginia countryside, and readers devoured his occasional columns about country life.

“I took up hunting (yes, from my bathroom window)” he wrote. “I bought a tractor (and promptly got it stuck in the mud). I shared my personal space with bugs and snakes. I injured myself with power tools. (As I write this, a splitting maul was just delivered to my front door. What could possibly go wrong?) I got certified as a master naturalist. I planted hundreds of trees and meadows full of wildflowers and native grasses. I wrote about my rural community’s struggles to develop housing, to secure broadband access and to keep the local newspaper going.”

Dana’s experiences resonated with his readers. He noted that, “In short, we are losing our sense of what it means to be human — and the challenge of our time will be to recover what we have lost.”

It’s obvious to me that we want – no, we need – to hear and learn from each other. We want to connect. And we want to serve each other.

What about you? Do you think being more human is a societal trend? Will you do more to weave humanity into your marketing?