When I was a little kid, my sister and I had a Saturday morning tradition. Our mother would give us each a couple of dollars, and we’d walk about a mile to Mike’s store. Mike’s was a tiny little convenience store with many different kinds of penny candy, and it was very popular with kids.

One day, on our way back home, I opened my little paper bag full of candy and pulled out a Cow Tale. I took a bite and hated it! I was right next to the canal, so I threw the rest in (the candy, not the wrapper!). I then noticed that no less than ten small fish swarmed the cow tale and ate it immediately.

The next Saturday, even though I hated the candy, I bought more cow tales. I went back to the canal to see if I could replicate the results. The answer: fish love cow tales.

What’s my point?

Let’s think about what would happen if my intent was to catch a lot of fish. I’d probably first think about worms, lures, etc. I might even go to the tackle shop and ask. Or turn on the T.V. and catch a fishing show. If it were today rather than when I was a kid, I’d just go online and do the research.

I’m sure I would get a lot of information on what works, what doesn’t, and I’d get lots of suggestions. But it’s safe to say that I wouldn’t end up with Cow Tales.

There’s a lot left to be discovered. Don’t just rely on what has been done in the past. Sometimes you need to throw candy in the canal and see what happens.

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Sometimes you need inspiration. Well, at least that’s true with me.

Keeping blogs and websites updated can often be trying and it takes a lot of effort. And sometimes I’ll ask myself: “Am I just wasting my time?”

I’ll look at the time I spend thinking of blog posts, writing, reading, etc., and do a little ROI analysis. It’s definitely a critical state of mind that leads to this. It’s rare, but it happens.

It’s times like these that make me look around for inspiration rather than validation. And today I found something truly great:

Hugh MacLeod’s “How to be creative”. 

If you need some inspiration, read this.

If you feel like you’re wasting your time, read this.

If you feel like you’ve got a great idea, but no one else agrees, read this.

Just read it. It’s that good.

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A couple of questions to ask yourself:

How do you foster the extraordinary?
Do you really want your firm to be seen as something special?

Which statement is true in your firm:

• We try new things.
• We take risks.
• We fail sometimes, but we learn from our failures.
• We do not take any risks whatsoever…..because we might fail.
• Not only do we not take risks, we repeat the things we know will not work.
• We are so dedicated to maintaining the status quo, that the thought of trying something new is unsettling.
• Please don’t talk to me. The risk of hearing a new idea scares me.

A thought occurred to me today, and I think I may be on to something. Sure, companies of all kinds say they want more business. They’re always trying to attract new clients. But maybe that’s not true.

I think we take for granted the idea that companies want to be innovative and better than the competition. Maybe that’s not the case.

When I think about it, why would you bother trying to put out interesting, though-provoking marketing materials, when you don’t want to be seen as extraordinary? When there’s no motivation to be better, the motivation switches to “let’s not be worse.”

If trying and failing is punished, wouldn’t you rather not try?

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This week has been fairly difficult for me to come up with blog posts. I’m doing some insanely monotonous, yet essential work, and it seems to have turned off the creative part of my mind. So, I have to apologize for continuing to point to Seth Godin rather than coming up with anything new.

Today, he has a post entitled “The two things that kill marketing creativity.” From it:

The first is fear.

The fear that you’ll have to implement whatever you dream up.
The fear that you will fail.
The fear that you will do something stupid and be ridiculed by your peers for decades.

Sound familiar?

Picture yourself in a conference room with your marketing committee if you have one. You have something that you really believe in; an idea that will get your firm noticed. It is clever, creative and smart. It stands out. It talks to your clients.

You’re really excited about it and you give a high-energy pitch to the room. And when you’re done?

Crickets.

And you hear the chorus of doubt:

• I think it’s a great idea…..just not for us.
• That’s cute.
• No one has ever done that before. Must be for a reason.
• Maybe some other time. Let’s go with what we’ve done before.
• Interesting idea. Let’s think about it. So, what was I talking about?

One of my favorite quotes of all time was something I read in Sally Hogshead’s “Radical Careering.” It’s great: It has a picture of the ugliest camel you’ve ever seen, and it says “A Camel Is A Horse Designed By Committee.”

It seems as if the committee is a machine that takes in a raw material called “creativity” and outputs something called “safe.”

But to be fair, it’s not the idea of the committee that’s the problem. It’s the fear. Why take a risk when you can compromise and get mediocrity?

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You know, Seth Godin is unique in that his writing makes me feel excited, inspired, hopeful, as well as depressed, amateurish, and boring at the same time. It’s because he’s THAT good. In fact, you know that moment when you read something and say “That’s EXACTLY what I was thinking! Why didn’t I write that…” or better, “I never thought of it that way, but it makes total sense now!” And in that moment, when you’re nodding your head while reading…….That’s what should be called the “Godin Nod.” Which would be defined as:

Godin Nod- Involuntary head movement that denotes a moment of clarity as a direct result of reading anything by Seth Godin.

His latest post is entitled “Nobody Knows Anything“, and in it, he really breaks down the idea of marketing to the most basic level. And it could be a little scary to those of us in the marketing professions!

Rather than throwing in my two cents about his idea that “There are two kinds of marketing analysis, both pretty useless”, I’m telling you: go read his post.

You need to read this.

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Are legal blogs advertising? Should they be regulated as advertising?

I don’t think so, but boy do I have a bias!

The Argument: States want to protect their consumers from lawyer advertisements disguised as editorial content.
Well, I can understand that. Just like they regulate the little ads in magazines and newspapers masquerading as actual news stories with the -5 font “Advertisement” disclaimer. I was really thinking about buying some plates from the Franklin Mint once. And another time, I really thought that scientists had made a breakthrough discovery, and that if I bought a copper wristband, it would increase my energy, make me much more intelligent, and seem both warm, witty, and kind to women. But I saw that one little word, and came to my senses.

Okay, I’m being sarcastic. I apologize.

Could blogs be considered advertising? Absolutely. I would be dishonest to try to ignore the fact that the goal of most law blogging, in the end, is acquisition of clients. If the goal in blogging is to establish expertise, it follows that that expertise is going to result in business. If the goal is to get the firm’s name “out there,” the same applies.

But should every blog post be submitted to a disciplinary committee for review? I don’t see how that could happen.

One of the strengths of blogging is that it is immediate. A story breaks, and bloggers are on it. People come to blogs because of their frequently updated content. And authors can post said content because it is so easy and effortless. New rules and regulations would take away the one of the main reasons for the popularity of blogs in the first place.

But another question comes to mind: How do you identify what is advertising and what is not?

On this site, I’ve compiled Ethics Rules on Legal Advertising and Marketing for all 50 states. Looking through them, I have read many rules on where a lawyer or firm may place an advertisement. But I have yet to find a clear definition of what an advertisement is.

One definition I’ve seen is that advertising involves an active quest for clients. But is having a blog an active quest for clients?

Well, if after every post, I put “See how I can help you make more money with your law firm by calling me at 555-555-8785″, I’d see that as an active quest. But what about if I just have an email link somewhere hidden in the depths of my blog? I’d see that as more of a passive quest.

But now I’m getting into semantics. Back to the issue at hand.

One of the appeals of blogging is that (and this is a mantra repeated often) blogging is a conversation. People like blogs because they show a person’s perspective on a subject. While many marketers spend hours creating buzzword-heavy text that is meant to look like editorial content, people just don’t buy it. As the web matures, our BS meters are becoming increasingly well-tuned. And the emergence of splogs makes us even more aware when we’re being duped.

The truth is: if you’re an attorney who is just writing “give us your business” text and passing it off as a blog post, you’re not going to get very far.

So, with that all said, I don’t think legal blogs should be regulated as advertising. Are there some bad apples out there? Of course there are. Are some people going to take advantage of blogs to plug their businesses? Yep. But should we treat anyone who blogs as a potential scam artist? I don’t think that’s the best way to handle it.

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