There’s a strategy in search engine optimization called the Skyscraper technique that basically says if you want to rank high for a search phrase like “best pinot noir”, “production music licensing” or “cybersecurity firms”, you just search those terms, check out the top results and write a better, more comprehensive article then the top-ranking ones.

So now you have a ton of these obnoxious 10,000-word Skyscraper posts that rank well in search for high-purchase intent, bottom-of-the-funnel search phrases.

But they aren’t really that useful cause you have to search through a long article for a simple answer, which is typically what you’re looking for before you dig deeper.

Now, artificial intelligence is beginning to neuter that approach. Which is a good thing.

Because if you search “what is doublespeak”, you don’t want 10,000 words. One of the ways Google improved the user experience in this regard was with rich snippets, those expandable Q&A kiosks that appear in search results, and cull short answers from longer articles.

A rich snippet kiosk for the phrase "SEO" in Google search results.

Nigel Stevens -- who was on our sister program the B2B Lead Gen Podcast -- does SEO for major players like Hotjar, Intercom, Unsplash, and Big Commerce says he’s starting to outrank skyscrapers ranking for shorter posts, that are more concise and succinct.

And Joe Romm, an MIT Ph.D. of Physics, argues stories are more compelling than facts, it’s all about the headlines. And if you want to master headlines study Shakespeare, the Greek philosophers, and Jesus Christ.

Dale Bertrand (@dbertrand), President at Fire&Spark, a Boston-based digital marketing agency specializing in SEO strategies for e-commerce companies, is a man on a mission, at the nexus of SEO and story.

His presentation at INBOUND was one of the most talked-about sessions. And he’s one of the rare birds who’s good at both arts and science.

I say that because marketing and PR people are overwhelmingly math haters, which is why so many are scared away from search engine optimization.

He runs a performance marketing agency called Fire&Spark in Cambridge, Mass that approaches SEO from a more purpose-driven, than technical standpoint.

But Dale devised a novel strategy that puts a brand’s mission front and center as a way of differentiating itself in the eyes of Google, essentially putting the message before the math, or the more technical aspects, of SEO.

What is Mission-Driven SEO?

What you’re doing to optimize canonical tags, sitemaps, crawl budgets is not going to get you the bang for the buck that it used to.

Google's getting a lot better at finding the most useful content for a query.

Why is it established brands out rank emerging brands?

It’s because they have authority from backlinks. People are linking to them from their websites. And Google sees those backlinks and treats them like endorsements. Backlinks are how Google measures authority.

SEO is so competitive nowadays that you need the authority to rank well in most markets. It used to be that you could just optimize for a keyword and you would rank but now you need to optimize for keyword and have some authority from backlinks.

Mission-driven SEO is about building authority. Mission-driven is a term that should resonate with cause related marketing professionals. By mission, Dale means cause.

So brands with a cause or purpose centered around their products,

AI, advanced algorithms, and big data have ushered us into a new era of marketing and consumption. 

We’ve seen disruptive technology impact consumer behavior and revolutionize our capabilities as marketers.

But should we be skeptical -- or more cautious -- with how we implement the latest martech or use AI within the B2B customer journey?

And, as consumers ourselves, how do we live in a world of constant distraction without giving up these digital tools that monopolize our attention, but provide value at the same time? Is it an all-or-nothing game?

These are the questions Brian Solis, sought to answer in his new book, Lifescale: How to Live a More Creative, Productive, and Happy Life. 

These are questions more people are asking as a result of the overwhelming success of the Netflix documentary The Social Dilemma, which looks at the consequences of driving user engagement through so-called “bubble filter” algorithms, that increase utilization by showing us more of what we’re already watching, insulating us from different points of view and contributing to today’s state of hyper-partisan political polarity.

The good news is, according to Brian, it’s possible to balance a life of purpose while also taking advantage of social media and other transformative digital technologies. What’s more, when it comes to the future of digital marketing in 2021, artificial intelligence and ethics do not have to be mutually exclusive.

Brian is my longtime friend, the bestselling author of eight books, a keynote speaker, and a world-renowned futurist who always has amazing insights to contribute when it comes to AI and the future of digital marketing. 

We unpacked a lot during this conversation so you won’t want to miss this podcast.

But if you’d rather read than listen, these are my favorite takeaways:

Don’t be scared of AI. Retrain the algorithm.

Many people say AI is the future of digital marketing. And we know AI can be powerful from a brand perspective. But is AI a risk as well? And what toll will it take on our livelihoods, mental health, politics and relationships as individuals? 

Is the current state of affairs simply a trailer for more of what’s in store?

Brian explained how AI, algorithms, and the companies that leverage them, use our own insecurities against us while simultaneously making us feel in control. And he transferred the responsibility of how we engage, interact with, and react to that content back on our shoulders as consumers with three simple words: “personal accountability” and digital literacy.

“They [social networks] align content and advertising around what the algorithm deems important to us. They stoke our cognitive biases, said or unsaid vulnerabilities. And they create engagement and activity around those things because they are extremely charged. As you share, others share back.And make no mistake, that’s all by design."Brian Solis

There are many case studies that show how igniting people’s emotions or being opinionated lures clicks. And that’s simply what makes the money.

We can’t blame social media - or even the growth marketing campaigns that exploit it.

We need to become literate and honest about what’s happening.

Taking on some more accountability, you will remember that you don’t have to engage with everything. Nor do you have to give up social media and the digital media technology that can be really beneficial.

You can actually retrain the algorithm to show it what you want to consume by liking and en...

If you’re wondering how to find a Digital PR consultant to get press coverage for your startup, you've come to the right place. Whether you're looking for a B2B tech PR specialist or someone to help with travel PR, hiring the right public relations person to handle your project can be tough.

Who doesn't want a robust digital marketing outreach program with SEO, content marketing, digital PR, and social media strategy? 

But instead of diving in all at once or hiring a team of PR and SEO consultants, it’s critical to prioritize from the get-go. 

Here to help you ask the right questions and hire the right PR agency is Jay Baer, Founder of Convince & Convert, hall of fame marketing and customer experience keynote speaker, and author of 6 best-selling books, including Youtility: Why Smart Marketing is About Help, not Hype.

Jay has years of experience creating winning marketing strategies, much of which was spent in agencies. 

DOWNLOAD this graphic

In our recent interview, he shared why companies shouldn’t hire a one-stop-shop agency, the important things you need to know and have before hiring, and one major red flag to look out for before you hire a PR agency for your startup.

Knowing if you need to hire a PR agency, a digital marketing consultant, a PPC agency -- or all the above

As a company, you need to determine the business objectives you want to achieve and make sure you are seeking out the right partner. Jay was able to provide some great explanations to help you match outcomes with the right type of content agency.

So, let’s look at the first question I often see come up when discussing PR for startups. Is it better to hire a digital marketing agency who can do some PR or to hire a PR agency that can do some digital marketing?

If you want an end-to-end solution, a digital agency may be the best bet.

However, if you accept the premise that public relations is about influencing the public and incentivizing behavior change -- which trails belief change -- an all-in-one approach probably won’t cut it.

Though there are digital marketing consultants and agencies that know digital public relations, there aren’t many digital firms that do it well.

Really, if you want to do both you do need to hire both.

You need to separate these efforts and hire for individual outcomes, instead of thinking about PR and digital marketing as two sides of the same coin.

When you’re looking for earned media, you are looking to hire a PR firm.

When you’re looking for shared media or an owned media strategy, you should be looking to hire a digital marketing consultant or agency.

DOWNLOAD this graphic

You may then be asking: Is it better to hire a PPC firm that does organic, or an organic marketing agency that can do PPC?

Not surprisingly, Jay’s response was much the same here.

You don’t want to lose sight of the fact that PPC is a media buy. And organic content is not that.

“Are you looking to achieve your goals by spending money (PPC) or creating content (organic)? Both can get you there, but you have to choose. The idea that organic and paid are very closely related is also misguided,” said Jay.

How to know if a particular PR agency will be worth the investment

The questions you could ask an agency before hiring them run the gamut from,

When it comes to delivering well-timed, relevant messages as a brand, it’s important to know what’s going on in the world, your industry, and consumers’ minds. And you need to know what’s happening right now.

We all talk about content marketing best practices. But it really starts with understanding the data around the types of topics and information your customers and prospects are looking for and suing to make purchasing decisions and utilize products and services.

Data-driven marketing starts with data, and that’s what this podcast is about. It’s about monitoring the data around what your audience is reading and discussion online, in the news media and on social networks.

Content may be king. But context is queen. And she controls the king’s schedule. So content is not the only thing that matters. Context tells you where, and why people consume content.

Brand monitoring, news media monitoring, social media monitoring, broadcast media monitoring, and online reputation management have evolved into a sophisticated specialty skill capable of correlating news media coverage to website goal conversions. But the insights are only as good as the inputs. Garbage in, garbage out.

Conversations move at a rapid pace online. Brands often have minutes to respond to trending items, news, and customer sentiment, lest they risk tarnishing their brand as tone deaf or out of touch.

I spoke with the industry’s top news and social media monitoring experts about how they track conversations, sentiment, and anticipate demand by analysing the data.

DOWNLOAD

In this podcast, they discuss the major challenges organizations face around news and social media monitoring to inform organizations on how their brands are perceived in the marketplace. 

This panel was recorded in association with the release of the 2020 Media Monitoring Buyer’s Guide, a FREE vendor-neutral report on the most popular media monitoring solutions available and includes: 

Discussion of the benefits and challengesIntro guides to the top 10 platforms The guide include a features comparison chartsUser ratings on the top platforms

This panel discussion features news, social media and brand monitoring experts featured in the report including:

Johna Burke, Global Managing Director of AMEC, The International Association for the Measurement and Evaluation of CommunicationsJonny Bentwood, Global Head of Data and Analytics at GolinEric Koefoot, President and CEO at PublicRelayKatie Paine, Measurement, Insights and Analytics Consultant at Paine Publishing

Our discussion was varied and nuanced, as you’ll hear if you listen to the full podcast episode. If you work in media monitoring, you don’t want to miss this episode!

For this post, I’m going to summarize 6 takeaways that came out of our panel discussion that you can employ when configuring a social media monitoring tool to track online conversations about brand.

It is by no means conclusive and can’t possibly cover in detail what’s in the report. But for the sake of a top-level overview, here they are.

1. Look for a partner, not just a vendor

When choosing a social media monitoring tool and service provider, you should be seeking out a partnership. Pick a vendor with a business model that offers you and your company the support you need to be effective.

That often means doing both social media monitoring and traditional media monitoring together. “Fishing where the fish are,” as they say,

When presenting an argument, Western education stresses reliance on science, reason, and logic.

But it turns out, that’s the wrong formula for creating viral content online.

The reality is, we decide based on our emotions and rationalize our decision to ourselves based on information.

Facts are not what persuade us. Sure, facts may be peppered into your story. And you can certainly have a persuasive story that includes facts.

But the real secret to going viral with your content and reaching millions of people is about striking an emotional chord and using persuasive language to make it memorable. In viral marketing, that means coupling emotionally charged stories and A/B testing to discover the headlines that resonate best. 

But how do we do that? And how do we replicate those results time and time again?

While some chalk viral marketing up to chance, Joseph Romm PhD,  former acting asst. secretary at the US Dept. of Energy and 6x best-selling author disagrees.

Understanding the art of creating something that’s “clicky and sticky” is what Joe has dedicated his career to. 

How to Go Viral and reach Millions by Joseph Romm delivers on the title.

While discussing some of the takeaways from his latest book: How to Go Viral and Reach Millions on a recent podcast episode, he shared some tried-and-true ways to make content sticky and clicky.

Science of Viral Marketing 

It is the ego that drives our desire to be win arguments. We all want our words to be influential and persuasive. But the people who have succeeded at that truly understood the history of human communication.

Reading and writing are relatively new concepts. Long before we had iPhones and Google, most of the population was illiterate.. 

In those days, we learned through stories. 

And the storytellers of the past played on our  emotions to help people remember those stories and, ultimately, to try and bring us over to their way of thinking.. 

The three emotions most likely to lodge information into our memories are::

Awe

Anger

Anxiety 

To go viral, you need to illicit one of these emotions, and you need to do it in your headline. Because the reality of the digital world is that most of the content you create today will disappear without ever being read. The headline, on the other hand, is quite likely to get read. Our perceptions are driven by sound bites or viral content that few ever actually read.

Nineteen out of 20 blog posts are not read past the headline.

What’s Remembered is Believed 

As a marketer, it’s your job to know how to tell stories. 

Going back to my opening idea here, it’s not the facts that make people believe what you are saying. It’s how well they remember it. 

Start with a deep understanding of who you're talking to. Then, take these 3 steps to create memorable, viral content:

Tell a story

Use figures of speech like rhyme, repetition and metaphors

Trigger one of the three memorable emotions 

Even if you understand the concepts of viral content and viral marketing, you still have to test. What people will click on and what they actually do, is unpredictable..

Fortunately (or unfortunately), we live in an era when we can use technology to show us what re...

What if you could use your existing content and artificial intelligence to automate social media posting to all accounts and boost your engagement rates at the same time?

Kate Bradley Chernis

Kate Bradley Chernis is the Founder & CEO of Lately, a startup with a platform that uses AI to autogenerate podcasts, videos and text articles into social posts that drive engagement.

Lately works with rich media too. You can use it to autogenerate social media posts with audio and video clips attached as well. That's how Gary Vee is using it.

enjoying playing with this on @garyveetv, would love to hear what you think https://t.co/eIJdrlepmx— Gary Vaynerchuk (@garyvee) July 8, 2020

Gary Vaynerchuck is powering Gary Vee TV, a new Twitter feed he launched in April, with Lately autogenerated video clips. The account, which is nearly 100% automated, has already got close to 10k followers.

Jason Calacanis is an investor in the company, which emerged as the winner from LAUNCH ACCELERATOR program's demo day.

Lately's Aha Moment

Kate used to run a marketing agency.

She came up with the idea of using AI to autogenerate social media posts while manually managing social media editorial calendars with spreadsheets for Walmart.

While she mastered social media engagement and brand storytelling, generating a 130% ROI for her client, the process was a backbreaker. She knew there had to be a better way.

In this podcast, we discuss:

Guiding a startup during COVID - How investor and customer engagement has changed.Key challenges marketers face when trying to increase social media engagement.Measuring the effectiveness of social media engagement to your business.Essential elements of an engaging social media post.What to do if you follow all the rules and consistently post good content but people just aren’t engaging with it.Great tactics for connecting with your audience and increasing engagement. Main factors Lately's algorithm uses to pick out viral content from long-form video.Should we be afraid of AI and which jobs are most at risk of replacement?What she's learned from AI other than which words resonate with target customers.And much, much more.

Subscribe to the podcast edition of PR Tech Wednesdays or join us live next Wednesday for the latest tips and tactics on how technology is changing earned media relations.

Here's a video of our discussion, which includes the product demo.

https://youtu.be/yZiO3YiSYIo

Photo by Franck V. on Unsplash

Subscribe to the podcast to be notified and Register to Attend the Live Webinars.

If you’re white like me, it can be easy to think, “If I’m not racist...there’s no racism.” Or, “I don’t see it, so it must not be happening.” 

But that would be denying the fact that the past influences the present or that our upbringing has no impact on our outlook. 

And that would be denial.

The truth is, racism in America is alive and well - and deeply embedded in our country’s history. You could even say that America is a living definition of what institutional racism is. 

To understand what that means, how it impacts organizational communications professionals and what we can do to change it, I hosted a panel of experts on multicultural issues.

We discussed diversity and racism in America. And we talked about how it impacts corporate and social media communications with the goal of finding practical solutions for change. 

We also discussed the impact of racism on public relations, social media communications and governance.

But before we jump into that conversation, let's take a look back at how we got here.

“Because when it comes to truly explaining racial injustice in this country, the table should never be set quickly. There is too much to know, and yet we aggressively choose not to know it,” says Pulitzer Prize winning reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones in “What is Owed,” which appeared in The New York Times Sunday Magazine.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cB50M9luiH8

History of racism in America

Our first president, George Washington was a slave owner.

So were 10 of the first 12 US presidents.

America was founded as a slavocracy. The real reason we separated from England was because they were ending slavery...and we didn’t want to. 

Which is why Fredrick Douglas spoke about the US being much more of a hypocrisy than a democracy

We only became a democracy because Black people demanded equal rights - rights which they still haven’t received. 

If it wasn't for Black Americans, there would have been no civil rights movement, and many others besides Blacks who experienced discrimination wouldn't have benefited.

“We’ve known for years that there’s racism, injustice...classism in our country, and yet no one does anything about it,” said Bill Imada, CEO of IW Group in our discussion.

But before we dive into that, we need more context first.

“Minneapolis is not a Black problem. It’s an American problem. Equality before the law is as American as the flag. We will have change when all Americans realize that this is a problem and that all Black Lives Matter,” said former Director of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson on CNN.

After World War ll, Germany took collective action to “rid German and Austrian society, culture, press, economy, judiciary, and politics of the National Socialist ideology.” It was called denazification.

But not only did we fail to root out white supremacists, they've become stronger, more organized and more politically connected.

Preserving the Confederacy

When I was retained by The Defense Commissary Agency to advise on their digital marketing strategy, I traveled to their headquarters at Fort Lee in Virginia.

General Robert E. Lee commanded the Confederate Army during the American Civil War in defense of slavery.

The phone rang. It was Toyota digital marketing calling.

It was one of those phone calls that was exciting, scary and life-changing, all at the same time.

Mind you, this was many moons before coronavirus or on demand webinar services like Zoom, GoToMeeting and Google Hangouts existed.

In fact, it was before using live webinars as part of B2B content marketing campaign was popular, because it was still pretty tough technically to pull off.

Back then, live streaming video online was a risky proposition for even the slickest digital marketing consultant.

It was hard enough to get online marketing consultants to agree on what is a webinar, let alone agree on how best to produce webcasts vs webinars.

No Easy Way to Live Stream

Back to the phone call. The internet marketing team at Toyota was concerned.

In the past, they’d always revealed their new models exclusively for the news media at the Detroit Auto Show.

But the economy was in bad shape, and only a third of the press pool had pre registered to attend their press conference. 

At this time, newspapers were canceling their Automotive sections all together.

Automotive advertisers were strapped for cash too, and the mainstream press has already started to feel the impact classified advertising defecting to digital media.

It no longer made sense to give their news exclusively to the mainstream media.

It was time to go direct to consumers with their news, much as the movie studios are doing these days with the movie theaters shut by COVID-19.

The financial meltdowns and pandemics accelerate digital transformation.

Dawn of Owned Media

My owned media marketing channel framework. Owned media should be the first step of an organic growth marketing campaign. Download this graphic.

If they wanted to get their news out broadly, Toyota would have to become a media company almost overnight, and they needed help.

Toyota Motors USA wanted to live stream the reveal of the new Prius online. They had no idea how many people would view concurrently. And they wanted my startup to produce the live internet broadcast.

And to make it even tougher, they didn't want it password protected. They wanted anyone to be able to watch the live stream on the internet.

Well it took a small army of engineers and a lot of sleepless nights, but my company did it. We took the live video feed via satellite and encoded and streamed it live to their website in near real time.  

It was the world’s first live stream of an automotive reveal.

Someone posted a link to the stream on Digg, a popular social link sharing service at the time. 

And we saw a huge spike in traffic.

But we managed to keep the stream and their website up, with the help of a team of streaming video specialists working behind the scenes.

The good news is, you don't need a streaming video team anymore. Now you can do it yourself.

Tools like Restream make it possible to simulcast live streaming events to multiple destinations at the same time.

Marketing in Times of Crisis 

This week on PR Tech Wednesdays, a panel of public relations specialists from motion picture, music and television came together to discuss the state of the entertainment industry.

Entertainment Panel

Erik Deutsch, Excel PR - Clients include the California Film Commission and the Association of Film Commissioners International

Wynter Mitchell Rohrbaugh - 10 years of experience covering premieres, celebrity interviews and press junkets.

Alfred Hopton - A 24 year professional in entertainment publicity, talent relations and marketing. Talent producer for Penn & Teller Fool Us

Staying current on advancements in PR Tech is an ongoing challenge.

Don't wait for the next big conference to find out what's new.  Join me at PR Tech Wednesdays, every Wednesday from noon to 1pm Pacific Time for a weekly webinar on the latest in PR Tech.

I'm a PR specialist, tech entrepreneur and best selling author who's passionate about PR tech. These are in-depth conversations about the state of PR tech with thought leaders.

Let's track how tech is changing earned media relations together!

While there’s plenty of competition from new outlets like Cheddar and Business Insider, Forbes is still one of the most influential business media brands in the world.

As a result of their annual power lists, Forbes has an enormous brand cachet.

It is a symbol of success and wealth, but it's also so much more.

It's a community, helping business leaders across a wide variety of industries connect and grow. Not to mention, share their hard-earned business insights with a captive audience of business professionals.

One way in which Forbes has embraced community-building is through Forbes Councils which, for select leaders, offers a powerful platform for business success by offering members access to visibility, connections, and growth.

I recently spoke to Ryan Paugh, COO / Co-Founder of The Community Company and the coauthor of Superconnector.

https://youtu.be/OvwtSnZNJ44

In 2016, his company partnered with Forbes to launch Forbes Councils.

This is not a Forbes Council Review. I am not a member so I have no first hand experience. But it is an interview with one if it's founders, and its sheds light on the benefits of Forbes Council membership.

Community Matters, Now More Than Ever

In talking with Ryan, one of the common themes that came up was the importance of surrounding yourself with the right group of people if you want to be successful. We discussed Malcom Gladwell's Outliers and how the highest achievers maneuver a finite group of very exceptional people around them.

We also discussed how incredibly difficult this is to achieve in our modern-day social media era without some form of curation.

Superconnector, the book Ryan co-wrote with his business partner Scott Gerber, touches on many of the same principles.

They make a point to debunk the fallacy of "bigger is better" and actually dare readers to shrink the size of their inner circle. Scott even wrote a piece about this in the Harvard Business Review. 

That's one of the things that The Community Company focuses on with all of its projects, including Forbes Councils.

Everything is by invitation only and applications are vetted by several members of their internal selection committee. In most cases, you're also going to pick up the phone and talk to a member of their team.

Share Your Insights & Expertise

When Ryan and I spoke, we touched upon their company's thesis: why thought leadership is so important. When you publish and share valuable, non-promotional content on a regular basis, it builds credibility, which then creates more business opportunities.

When it comes to thought leadership on Forbes Councils, an editorial staff works with members to develop high quality content. Based on a comprehensive set of guidelines, member articles get published on Forbes.com as a Council Post. 

Because it is a paid program, you are not becoming a Forbes contributor.

Forbes Councils’ editorial staff reviews all submissions, not the Forbes editorial staff.

The frequency in which a member can publish depends on a few things. First is the quality of the writing and the creativity of the content. Is it well thought out? Is it succinct? Is it interesting and credible?

Second is their content approval process, which on average runs four to six weeks.