I was standing in the lobby of the Wake County Register of Deeds office with six television cameras lined up filming me. There were balloons surrounding me and microphones shoved in my face.

It was fantastic!

Here’s the story:

We wanted some free publicity for our family law practice.

The idea was to give away free marriage licenses on Valentine’s Day. We’d tell the local media what we were doing and see whether we could get on TV and in the newspaper.

It worked. It really, really worked.

We worked with the elected official who issues the marriage licenses. She was very careful to make sure we didn’t break any rules. She agreed to allow us to set up outside of her building with a poster and balloon display. The poster, of course, featured our firm name and explained what we were doing.

I stood next to the poster and balloons and handed out envelopes of cash for anyone headed in to get a license. At that time, they cost about $50 each. We handed out cash all day, and couples streamed in and bought licenses. Many of them headed across the street to be married at the courthouse.

Throughout the day, reporters came over and interviewed me and some of the couples. We had a few print publications, some radio stations, and then, finally, the TV people showed up. It was odd how they all came at the same time. It was great. It was chaos—good chaos.

The media loved the irony of a divorce lawyer promoting marriage. It was a perfect, amusing story to fill the news on an otherwise uneventful holiday.

The story appeared on all of the local stations and even made its way to CNN. We were everywhere you looked on the Valentine’s Day TV news and in the papers the next day.

Mission accomplished. It was a great Valentine’s Day.