Thinking Outside the Blog: An Update

Since I last posted about Gary David Goldberg's blog entry, "WWAKD: What Would Alex Keaton Do," there have been two major developments.

To backtrack a bit, Gary David Goldberg (creator of "Family Ties" and author of the new book, Sit, Ubu, Sit) posted a blog entry on his Web site. I'm fortunate enough to be handling the online portion of Gary's comprehensive book promotion campaign.

The article moved me, and I asked for (and received) permission to "think outside the blog" and pitch the article to other media outlets. Within 24 hours, the New York Times blog, Campaign Stop, posted Gary's article. That was on March 3.

A couple of days later, on a hunch, I checked Google and discovered that the blog entry had spread virally. Blogs ranging from Politico to the Atlantic had linked back to Gary's article (as published by the New York Times blog). I published, in my previous blog entry (Thinking Outside the Blog) a partial list of the links back to the article I'd found as of a couple of days ago.

I'm excited to report that the article is still spreading around the Internet in the best example of viral marketing that I've ever been involved with. New York Magazine's Web site has linked back to the article, and the Los Angeles Times' LA Funny Pages 2.0 blog has also featured part of the article and a link back to the complete text on the New York Times blog.

And if that weren't enough, the real-world version of the Chicago Tribune ran the article yesterday, and its Web site featured the article, as well. The (Allentown, PA) Morning Call also ran the article yesterday and featured it on its Web site. And the LA Daily News is running the article this Sunday (and I feel confident that it will show up on their Web site, too).

Gary David Goldberg is a fantastic writer with an unmatched instinct for choosing topics that are current, poignant, and controversial. His work has inspired "water cooler chats" for decades. So it's not surprising that his thoughts about how an iconic character whom he created, Alex P. Keaton of "Family Ties," would vote in the upcoming presidential election has garnered a tremendous amount of interest and discussion (as of now, there are 215 readers' comments posted on the New York Times blog).

Good for him. Gary David Goldberg is a man who's earned success and found it many times over, and it's unsurprising that he's found more of it with this article. But there's a lesson for all of us to be drawn here, and that is simply this: blog! And when you think you don't have time to blog, blog anyway! And then extend your blog entries beyond the blog. See how far you can take them. You might be able to launch a viral marketing campaign of your own just because of one great piece of writing. It's hard to overlook the success this particular blog entry, "What Would Alex Keaton Do," has enjoyed.