At Real Lawyers Have Blogs, Kevin O’Keefe (whose Lexblog beer for bloggers meetups, by the way, are run in true Irish fashion: everybody drinks, everybody pays) posts about how public relations “professionals” (Kevin’s choice of words) should approach bloggers.

I just got off the phone with a good friend in Manhattan. She was talking with a large consulting firm that had begun to work with large law firms.

As a means of marketing to this new vertical (for them) the consulting firm’s PR professional advised outreach to influential legal blogs. Outreach by commenting on the blogs, emailing/calling the blog publishers introducing their firm, and perhaps offering to write guest posts. She asked for my counsel.

Wrong approach I advised. The consulting firm would be looked at like a wolf in sheep’s clothing. If you’re going to engage bloggers, you need to blog. It’s as simple as that.

It’s never clear what’s meant when someone writes about “influential legal blogs.”  Other than those whose fortunes are inextricably tied to blogging and social media, many of whom working their butts off trying to convince us that these media matter when experience suggests nothing of the sort, no legitimate blawger I know touts his “influence.”  I’ve been doing this for a while, and don’t have any clue whether anything I’ve written has persuaded any more than a handful of die-hards to buy a book, see a movie, change a thought. 

Yet PR folks, whom I refuse to call professionals given that it’s a job without licensure, educational requirement, “hard” code of ethics (meaning that a violation of which results in their being banned from every annoying anyone again), seem to think that bloggers can be of value to them.  For this reason, we’re deluged with their propositions.

It’s unclear to me why PR folks think that we might have any interest whatsoever in being their freebie promotional vehicles.  I’m sure there are many bloggers who do so because their own marketing gurus tell them they must to tap into the vast riches of the internet, but who have so little to write about that they are happy to post smarmy crap pre-written for them by PR folks.  These are the bloggers who have absolutely nothing to offer, but that doesn’t stop them from pretending they have a blog.  Kevin might dispute my description.

Kevin’s solution to the PR people is to “engage” bloggers; to blog themselves.  I have a difficult time seeing exactly how that helps, as there isn’t a chance in the world that I would care one way or the other whether the PR people blog.  I wouldn’t read it.  I wouldn’t care.  And if I did read it, judging from what I read by the marketing people and social media gurus, it would strike me as embarrassingly devoid of thought or value.  Stringing buzz words together in random order, or empty phrases that these people so love to use, mostly provides an opportunity for ridicule rather than engagement.

Rather than urge the PR people to blog, I have a different solution.  It begins with a basic premise.  You have something that you’re being paid to promote.  Maybe it’s something of interest.  Maybe it’s not.  But to the extent there’s any chance in the world that I would be inclined to even consider writing about whatever it is you’re selling, I would first have to like it.

This must be a novel concept, as maybe 1% of the emails I receive from PR folks offer to provide me with the opportunity to read, see or use whatever it is they want me to promote.  I’m perpetually amazed at this.  You want me to promote your movie (which would likely be of interest given the sort of stuff I write about), yet expect me to do so without seeing it?  Would I write book reviews without reading the book?  Would I urge people to eat at a restaurant I’ve never tried?  It’s absurd.

If I’m to take seriously Kevin O’Keefe’s understanding, that PR people sincerely want to “engage” with “influential bloggers,” then the first thing I would urge them to do is stop being pathological idiots.  Under no circumstances would I ever consider promoting something I haven’t used.  None.  Never.  Ain’t happening.  And any blogger who would do so is worthless and incredible.  If you expect me to consider writing about whatever it is you’re selling, the first step is to provide me with it, whether physically if it’s a gizmo or by access if it’s a movie or program or whatever. 

But here’s the rub.  Anybody with any credibility whatsoever will, after using, seeing, whatever, your product, write an honest review.  This means that there’s a chance that your efforts would not only result in giving a blogger a free ride on the use of your widget, but that the blogger hates it and posts about what a useless, worthless piece of crap it is.

You see, legitimate bloggers aren’t going to color their appraisal of whatever it is you’re selling because they got a free ride.  Legitimate bloggers will take your freebie and rip it to shreds if it’s a piece of crap.  That’s what makes them legit.  Their reviews are credible because they are not influenced by anything other than the quality of your product.  No matter how many empty adjectives you use in your press release, the product has to stand or fall on its own merit.

Based on my experience in fielding the dozens of PR pitches I get every week, very few have any interest in seeing whether their product can pass muster.  Most are just bulk emails to as many bloggers as then can find in the hope that some will be so desperately in need of fodder that they will post the crap blind.  Are these the “influential bloggers” that Kevin is talking about and that his “friend” in New York is trying to harness?

As for me, if you don’t think it’s worth your effort to show me what you’ve got, don’t waste your time (or mine) trying to pitch me.  There’s no way I’m promoting anything I haven’t both used and think is worthy of promotion.  Kevin says his idea is “simple.”  I think mine is too.  The only difference is that my way requires a bit more effort and a lot more substance.  If your PR desire isn’t strong enough to produce your goods, then drop me from your list and spend your time on Kevin’s “influential bloggers.”