This bodes well for the legal industry, not necessarily with each lawyer picking up a enough in ad revenue for an extra pint a week, but in other respects.

First the key points from Rodgers' article.

• 34% of global respondents to a March social media survey from Universal McCann said they use RSS feeds, a huge increase from just 15% a year ago.
• 19% of Americans use RSS feeds. Admittedly less than the RSS-addicted nations, Russia (57%), Brazil (55%) and China (54%).
• Gawker Media, one of the more successful blog networks, grew its revenue from feed-driven traffic by 300 percent in Q1 2008.
• Gawker now pulls an average CPM of $4 or $5 for its RSS inventory, only little less than they they get on the blog sites themselves.
• Some publishers are seeing their page views from RSS nearing the page views of blog and Web sites themselves.
• Google's FeedBurner will soon deliver AdSense ads contextual to the subject of the feed in addition to premium CPM ads directly sold onto RSS fee content.

I don't see lawyers needing to run ads on RSS feeds to keep a roof over their head. Some bloggers need to make money in advertising from their blogs. Such bloggers are akin to magazine publishers - ads keep the lights on.

Lawyers do not have to sell ads on their blogs and RSS feeds. Lawyers make money by blogging in an effective manner. Doing so lawyers enhance their reputation as thought leaders, landing business the lawyers want as a result.

But I see three areas where ads on lawyers RSS feeds hold value.

• Tasteful, brief ad mentioning that the blog and resulting feed are sponsored by a particular lawyer, law firm, or practice group. Much like an ad you would hear on local NPR radio. Low key for branding purposes.
• As revenue for a third party syndicating law blog content to to a lawyer's target audience (clients - current & prospective, bloggers, traditional media - trade & mass). Blogging lawyers will come to understand the tremendous value of such third party publishers aggregating (with editorial review) relevant and timely blog content for delivery of such content to this target audience. Syndicators with significant overhead in people and publishing platforms will need a revenue model. The alternative to ads is charging lawyers.
• The cost of maintaining a professional turnkey blog solution required by leading lawyers, law professors, and law students could be supplemented by ad revenue.

As traditional publishers are being pressed by declining distribution and ad revenue, we need to look for new opportunities to generate revenue. With increased use of RSS feeds and more cost effective ways to deliver ads on RSS feeds, maybe there's some opportunities.

Designed for blogs with feeds managed by FeedBurner-powered (most are), this will allow placement of relevant AdSense content ads on your blog. AdSense ads for the RSS feeds themselves, perhaps much more preferable to blog publishers, are not available yet.

A 300x250 or 468x60 text or image AdSense ad, like those depicted below, will appear below your first post and on archive pages once you have installed the necessary code. The ad content is automatically targeted to complement your blog's content and you may customize the colors so the ad unit fits your site's look and feel.

I am not a fan of running advertising for others products and services on lawyer blogs so as to generate ad revenue. It's cheesy. However, a well placed tasteful ad for your firm's services running after your first blog post may be a nice fit.