{grow}

Marketing to customers through AI is kind of like selling diapers.

The end user of the diaper does not make the purchasing decision. So we have to market to the caretaker responsible for the baby’s rear end.

Similarly, millions of people are turning to AI for their purchasing decisions on everything from vacations to insurance. AI is the customer now in many cases. This means that somehow, we have to crack the algorithmic code and influence this new decision-maker. But how?

In a new episode of the Marketing Companion, I sat down with Andy Crestodina, a digital marketing pioneer and founder of Orbit Media, to unpack what AI means for modern marketing. The big question we wrestled with: When AI is making decisions for our customers, and even becoming the “customer” itself, how do marketers adapt?

You can hear this vital conversation here, including some exclusive bonus Q&A content:

Here are the biggest themes and actionable takeaways from our conversation.

Andy described the emergence of AI as adding a transformative “middleware layer” on top of how we interact with the internet.

It enables a new kind of interaction, where people don’t just search—they converse, plan, and get advice that’s holistic and personalized. I recently experienced this firsthand: I asked an AI to plan my trip to Paris, and it generated a comprehensive itinerary, including hotels, transit, museum hours, and even restaurant recommendations. It didn’t just find answers; it made decisions, drawing information from sources I may never have found on my own.

This shift means customers now move even further down the purchase funnel before a human marketer ever appears on their radar. AI is already vetting choices, answering comparison requests, and forming recommendations—often before a prospect lands on any brand’s homepage.

So how does a brand make it onto an AI’s shortlist? We’re back to content marketing, but with an essential twist. Andy puts it succinctly: “Our job now is to train AI to sort of be a sales rep for our brands by feeding it all of the important sales marketing messages.” There are two core strategies here:

Your website is still your strongest platform. AI language models train heavily on *owned media*—your blog, your product pages, your case studies, your FAQs. It’s never been more critical to be *ridiculously* explicit about:

Every detail you add is another data point informing AI’s responses.

But it doesn’t stop at your own domain. AI also hoovers up data from:

Where SEOs once obsessed over backlinks, Andy notes the real signal for AI seems to be the “co-occurrence” of your brand name with industry terms, regardless of website authority. It’s about brand *mentions* and context, not just links.

Here’s a marketing must: Make sure you’re not blocking AI crawlers from your website. As Andy put it, “blocking your marketing content from an AI bot is like de-indexing yourself from Google.”

At a time when the biggest buyer guides and recommendations are being formed by automated systems, intentionally keeping your content out costs you visibility and opportunity.

I know there are creators out there who bristle at the idea of their content being ingested by AI with little credit or compensation. I get the emotional punch. But from a practical marketing perspective, if your content isn’t part of what AI sees, your brand may never show up when future buyers are getting advice and answers.

The economic value of content that is not seen and shared is zero.

So publish everywhere. Let algorithms and humans find your work. It’s time to let go and lean into the new reality.

Marketing remains centered on storytelling, differentiation, and connection. But the AI era means the “distribution mechanics” have changed:

Extreme clarity: Content must be unambiguous.  AI doesn’t reward cleverness or implication—it “reads” explicit statements.

Expand your digital footprint: Place your brand, with industry-relevant context, everywhere you can legitimately do so.

Collaborate widely: Guest posts, podcast appearances, and industry partnerships all feed the AI.

Don’t write for the bots — write for people, but be aware of how AI parses your material.

Andy’s biggest tip: “Just do good marketing, and look for chances to include your elevator pitch or value proposition in every piece of distributed content.” Over time, this builds an AI-friendly footprint.

Here’s a vital reminder: Even AI-optimized content doesn’t get the final word.

During my Paris trip, I let AI plan the itinerary—but I overrode the suggestions because of my own passions (a secret Monet obsession!) and personal recommendations from trusted friends. AI may shape the journey, but emotion, history, word-of-mouth, and direct relationships still close the sale.

Andy adds: “Word of mouth and good branding make big tech irrelevant. People only go to the web when they don’t have a top-of-mind provider.” All the SEO and content strategy in the world can’t touch the trust of a referral or the pull of brand loyalty.

It’s tempting to become obsessed with AI optimization, but the fundamentals haven’t changed:

Andy shared one of my favorite takeaways: use AI as a testing tool. Before launching a web page or campaign, feed it to an AI persona based on your target customer. Ask: *What questions did I leave unanswered? What objections weren’t addressed?* Use AI itself to spot blind spots in your content and approach.

The AI-driven future is here—and it’s a huge opportunity for marketers who are ready to meet it. Don’t drown in the details or lose sight of the human element. Master the new distribution game, but never stop investing in the relationships, experiences, and trust that make brands irresistible.

Please support our sponsor, who brings you this fantastic episode.

This episode is brought to you by Brevo (formerly Sendinblue). Brevo gives you the tools to attract, engage, and nurture customer relationships.

Now, any business can build automated customer experiences, email marketing workflows, and landing pages that guide your customers to your main message. We are here to support businesses successfully navigating their digital presence to strengthen their customer relationships.

Go to https://www.brevo.com/marketingcompanion to sign up for Brevo for free and use the code COMPANION to save 50% on your first three months of Brevo’s Starter & Business plan!

The post Wide Range of AI Signals Will Determine Purchasing Recommendations appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

• The AI Challenge Marketers Aren’t Talking About
• Building a simple AI assistant can transform your business now
• This is Why Social Media Marketers Struggle

My podcast features an unusual format: a rotating band of six co-hosts. This allows me to have smart, reliable guests, but on the rare occasion that somebody has a conflict, I get to bring in a surprise guest. In the latest episode, I was joined by my dear friend Gini Dietrich, a true legend in the world of PR, communications, and marketing. Our discussion spanned the evolution of social media, the enduring significance of relationships, the impact of AI on the attention economy, and, of course, Gini’s seminal creation: the PESO Model.

In this episode we cover:

Gini brought remarkable insight into how social media has changed since those early, “anything is possible” days. Social channels used to facilitate genuine relationships, connections, and organic reach—the building blocks of so many enduring professional and personal relationships. Now, the landscape feels more fragmented and transactional, with true organic reach having all but disappeared.

As Gini put it, “We had the ability to reach people around the globe that we never would have had access to in other ways. We were building relationships … that doesn’t exist today, which I think is really sad.”

Gini Dietrich

One of the most thought-provoking points in our discussion was the nature of the attention economy: it’s scattered across dozens of platforms, formats, and delivery mechanisms. The days of everyone reading the same publication or gathering around the TV are long gone. Now, as Gini noted, “there are really 12 distinct places that people are getting information.”

This is why her PESO Model (Paid, Earned, Shared, Owned) is more relevant than ever. It offers a framework for creating a unified brand voice across all these channels. The real magic, Gini emphasized, isn’t in dabbling randomly in a little of everything, but in *integrating* messaging and strategy across media types.

It was a delight to hear Gini tell the origin story of the PESO Model, as developed in her book “Spin Sucks.” What began as a way to organize and demonstrate the evolving role of PR and communications has evolved into a respected global framework, taught in universities and utilized by Fortune 500 teams.

This is a great story that illustrates how a bit of luck is at the root of almost every business success.

Of course, we couldn’t have a marketing discussion in 2025 without talking about AI. Gini shared practical, real-world examples of how AI is being cautiously (and creatively) woven into client work.

There is undeniable momentum: “the horse is out of the gate,” as Gini wisely noted. Yet legal, ethical, and practical questions abound.

Finally, I had to ask: what’s one “bad rule” in PR that desperately needs breaking? Gini’s answer was swift: the tired practice of measuring impact by media impressions and advertising value equivalencies. It’s time to move beyond archaic metrics and embrace more meaningful measurements aligned with business outcomes.

My conversation with Gini was a reminder of how quickly our field evolves—and how much wisdom we can gain from those who have shaped its evolution.

This is a fun, memorable conversation between marketing friends, and you won’t want to miss it. Just click here!

Please support our sponsor, who brings you this fantastic episode.

This episode is brought to you by Brevo (formerly Sendinblue). Brevo gives you the tools to attract, engage, and nurture customer relationships.

Now, any business can build automated customer experiences, email marketing workflows, and landing pages that guide your customers to your main message. We are here to support businesses successfully navigating their digital presence to strengthen their customer relationships.

Go to https://www.brevo.com/marketingcompanion to sign up for Brevo for free and use the code COMPANION to save 50% on your first three months of Brevo’s Starter & Business plan!

The post Attention Economy 2.0 and the Impact on Marketing appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

• Building a simple AI assistant can transform your business now
• Attention to Intention: How AI is Rewriting the Rules of Marketing and Sales
• How to keep from being Cracker Barreled

One of the most underrated yet transformative tools in your business arsenal is the simple AI assistant. A custom GPT is so easy to create that even a non-technical person like me can do it. Recently on The Marketing Companion podcast, the brilliant Dana Malstaff (of Boss Mom and Nurture to Convert) explained how entrepreneurs — even those who aren’t coders — can leverage AI bots to accelerate growth, foster community, and reclaim those precious, creative moments of freedom we’ve all been missing.

Dana’s journey began out of necessity—a messy year filled with personal challenges that demanded her to be “on” for her business even when life was falling apart. Out of that chaos sprang something unique: personal AI bots tailored to her needs.

Here’s what I learned from Dana’s fearless embrace of AI and why you should seriously consider building your own digital sidekick.

Dana Malstaff

Dana first dreamed up what she called a “therapist bot” (affectionately named Atlantis) because traditional support systems weren’t always available at midnight when she needed them. Her bot became a judgment-free zone, combining the endless patience of AI with personalized prompts and questions designed to nudge her forward, both emotionally and in her business. That little experiment snowballed.

The next step? A “future self” bot. Dana structured it as a kind of time machine. She programmed it to act as the version of herself ten years down the line, having already achieved her goals, dealt with her hang-ups, and built out her business vision. The bot guides her (and now, her community) by asking not only what she wanted, but why she hadn’t achieved it yet, what she feared, and who she might need to let go of in the process. This wasn’t just surface-level affirmation; it was deep, sometimes uncomfortable self-inquiry that led to action.

And it works. Her clients, who used the bot built into ChatGPT, reported significant boosts in productivity, clarity, and decisiveness. Bots didn’t replace thinking — they supercharged it.

Dana’s not stopping at mental health or personal empowerment. She’s bringing bot-powered systems right into the core of business strategy and marketing implementation.

She is creating a truly AI-first business with an AI bot strategy built into the core of her business model.

It’s not about skipping the work, it’s about skipping the friction. Dana’s mantra: “The clarity is in the doing.” Bots help you get into “doing” mode faster, making it possible to implement, iterate, and improve at lightning speed.

Maybe the most empowering nugget of the whole conversation: Neither of us are coders, and that’s irrelevant. The “coding language” of today is simply good communication. If you can type thoughtful prompts and questions in English, ChatGPT (and similar platforms) will do the heavy lifting.

Dana’s advice for entrepreneurs and marketers: Just try it. Start a conversation with ChatGPT about your goals, your hang-ups, your tasks. Let it guide you with more questions, and keep refining as you learn. The bot isn’t perfect, but it evolves with you. And as your needs become more sophisticated, so will your prompts—and your results.

There’s an elephant in the room with all this talk about clones, bots, and AI-first strategies: Am I putting myself out of a job?

Dana’s answer is clear-eyed and optimistic: Absolutely not. Bots make the real you more valuable. They enable you to be “present” for your audience 24/7, democratize access to your expertise, and free you up to do what only you can do: reflect, innovate, mentor, and create real change.

In fact, as bots take over the repetitive or easily systematized aspects of life and business, what remains is space—potentially, for the first time in years—for boredom. And out of boredom comes creativity, innovation, and those big, bold ideas that actually move you and your business forward.

AI, in this manifestation, doesn’t replace humans; it supports us so we can dig deeper, go further, and do work that really matters.

Where is this all heading? Dana has her sights set on cloning herself via AI for both Boss Mom (providing life and business advice) and Nurture to Convert (offering strategic marketing coaching). It’s not about making herself obsolete; it’s about expanding her reach and serving her community, even those who can’t afford private coaching.

And, crucially, as our routine tasks get handled quicker and with more precision, we finally earn back the gift of time—time to think, to be creative, to dream up what’s next.

Marketing, business, and personal growth hinge on helping people get what they want faster, with less friction. Dana’s fearless steps into AI-driven coaching and business systems offer a roadmap for any entrepreneur ready to embrace this new world.

So here’s my challenge: Don’t just read about bots — build one. Start small. Play with prompts. Get curious. Let AI shoulder some of your cognitive load and see what opens up for you.

A great place to start is by listening to this inspiring discussion with Dana!

To listen in, just click here:

Please support our sponsor, who brings you this fantastic episode.

This episode is brought to you by Brevo (formerly Sendinblue). Brevo gives you the tools to attract, engage, and nurture customer relationships.

Now, any business can build automated customer experiences, email marketing workflows, and landing pages that guide your customers to your main message. We are here to support businesses successfully navigating their digital presence to strengthen their customer relationships.

Go to https://www.brevo.com/marketingcompanion to sign up for Brevo for free and use the code COMPANION to save 50% on your first three months of Brevo’s Starter & Business plan!

The post Building a simple AI assistant can transform your business now appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

• Attention Economy 2.0 and the Impact on Marketing
• Wide Range of AI Signals Will Determine Purchasing Recommendations
• I Just Met My AI Clone. It Was 90% Me and 10% Existential Crisis
• The AI Challenge Marketers Aren’t Talking About
• New research points to the emerging “AI Frontier Firm”

If you’ve been anywhere near a marketing podcast, blog, or LinkedIn stream lately, you know artificial intelligence is everywhere—our conversations, our ambitions, and, yes, even our anxieties. But in our latest episode of the Marketing Companion, I had a revelation with my friend Mathew Sweezy that stopped my “hype train” in its digital tracks. The pressing issue with AI in marketing might not be technical at all. It’s not the software, the models, or even the mysterious “prompt engineering.” The real AI challenge is leadership.

Mathew, who’s leading AI transformation at the global digital agency Monks, dropped a line that every CMO needs to tattoo somewhere within eyesight: AI is a leadership challenge, not a technical one.

We started by talking about how corporate mindsets are splitting into two camps. Some are stuck in analysis paralysis, demanding to see hard ROI before dipping a toe. But the game changers—often Fortune 10 juggernauts—see AI as the next electricity. They’re moving decisively, driven by exec teams that understand one truth: if you wait, you miss the moment. AI isn’t about replacing people; it’s about expanding what’s possible and getting there first.

Mathew shared that the primary way companies are unlocking value with AI is simple but powerful: speed. With AI, inspiration in the morning can turn into production by the afternoon. Marketers are going from concept to campaign at a velocity that in the past would have been unthinkable, letting them be genuinely relevant, responsive, and—crucially—competitive. Reduced costs and greater creative output are important, too, but speed is the ace in the deck.

But here’s where things got interesting. AI isn’t the bottleneck with campaign launches anymore. People are. Most large organizations are still shackled by review cycles, legal approvals, and old-school processes. AI can generate a multi-channel campaign—TV spot, emails, the works—in a week. Yet, review and approval can drag on for weeks or months.

Why? Because big brands have far more to lose than gain by being fast. The old guard doesn’t want to risk a misstep, so speed grinds to a halt at the legal gate.

Mathew challenged me—has the balance of risk and reward shifted enough that we need to rethink the human review step? Increasingly, AI models can ingest prior review feedback and act as diligent gatekeepers themselves. At some point, more human reviews might not add value—they could just add friction. I didn’t agree with him. Maybe friction is exactly what we need right now!

Here’s another mindbender: With agencies deploying AI “agents” to create assets at scale, who owns the “brand brain”—the central agent capturing brand knowledge, style, and sensibility? Is it the brand’s to develop and guard, or does each agency make their own? Matthew predicts we’ll see brands taking sharper control, centralizing that “brand brain,” and letting agencies access it securely. This protects data, ensures brand consistency, and makes knowledge learning truly scalable.

And don’t worry, creative people: AI doesn’t spell the end. In these new agentic workflows, creative directors are still calling the shots, just now with a team of digital “specialists” who never tire, second-guess, or run late for a meeting.

This all points to a future where a marketing department isn’t just a mix of strategy and creative, but a system that learns, iterates, and rebuilds itself on a weekly—or even daily—basis. The wall between “art” and “machine” is coming down. Matthew—who’s also an artist—envisions exhibitions where artists create entire galleries in a day, reimagining the scale and pace of creative production.

Like me, he sees the symbiotic relationship between artist and machine as amplifying, not diluting, creativity. Suddenly, your limitations as a creator—whether they’re artistic, logistical, or even emotional—become machine problems, not human ones.

So, where does this leave us? For leaders ready to accept the risk, AI can transform not just your marketing output but your whole organization’s metabolism. For those still clinging to the old ways, the real risk is getting left behind by brands who see “speed” as non-negotiable.

This isn’t a time to be timid. It’s a time for bold leadership, creative experimentation, and a willingness to reprogram the very rules we’ve always followed. AI is here. The question isn’t “should we use it?” It’s “how fast can we lead?”

Every conversation with Mathew is a mind trip, and you won’t want to miss this  new episode of The Marketing Companion:

To listen in, just click here:

Please support our sponsor, who brings you this fantastic episode.

This episode is brought to you by Brevo (formerly Sendinblue). Brevo gives you the tools to attract, engage, and nurture customer relationships.

Now, any business can build automated customer experiences, email marketing workflows, and landing pages that guide your customer to your main message. We are here to support businesses successfully navigating their digital presence to strengthen their customer relationships.

Go to https://www.brevo.com/marketingcompanion to sign up for Brevo for free and use the code COMPANION to save 50% on your first three months of Brevo’s Starter & Business plan!

The post The AI Challenge Marketers Aren’t Talking About appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

• Building a simple AI assistant can transform your business now
• I Just Met My AI Clone. It Was 90% Me and 10% Existential Crisis
• When to compromise with content

My friend Tim Peter, the brilliant author of Digital Reset, had a provocative post on LinkedIn. He lamented that he was tired of following all the “marketing rules” and boldly posted a link within his content — an algorithmic no-no!

It was a small act of defiance that ignited a lot of emotion in the comment section. It seems that many marketers are tired of the constraints of social media rules that make us compromise with content.

I just wrote an entire book about breaking bad rules for good reasons (Audacious) so Tim’s post got me thinking — how do we approach this constant dance of give and take? Do we create to win the attention of our customers, or the attention of the search engines? Or … do we have to somehow please both?

What are the guidelines that let us know when to compromise with content?

I thought this would be a great topic for a podcast conversation with Jay Acunzo, who thinks deeply about such things. On a new episode of The Marketing Companion, we talked about:

… and much more.

To listen in, just click here:

Please support our sponsor, who brings you this fantastic episode.

This episode is brought to you by Brevo (formerly Sendinblue). Brevo gives you the tools to attract, engage, and nurture customer relationships.

Now, any business can build automated customer experiences, email marketing workflows, and landing pages that guide your customer to your main message. We are here to support businesses successfully navigating their digital presence to strengthen their customer relationships.

Go to https://www.brevo.com/marketingcompanion to sign up for Brevo for free and use the code COMPANION to save 50% on your first three months of Brevo’s Starter & Business plan!

Illustration courtesy ChatGPT

The post When to compromise with content appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

• The AI Challenge Marketers Aren’t Talking About
• Building a simple AI assistant can transform your business now
• Five ways to influence your brand message when consumers are in control
• Goodbye Google? Dissecting the role of AI and SEO
• Protecting Your Content From AI: Not So Fast!

Other than AI, is there any word about marketing more prevalent than “authenticity?” And yet, it might be one of the most misunderstood and abused words out there. When it comes to establishing a brand, there is a both a benefit and a curse of authenticity.

In this deeply personal episode of The Marketing Companion podcast, Amanda Russell and I discuss how authenticity can help you, how it can destroy you, and how it might be more of a strategy than a default setting for a personal brand.

This was a discussion with more than a few “a-ha” moments, and I’m sure you’ll enjoy it. To listen in, just click here:

Please support our sponsor, who brings you this fantastic episode.

This episode is brought to you by Brevo (formerly Sendinblue). Brevo gives you the tools to attract, engage, and nurture customer relationships.

Now, any business can build automated customer experiences, email marketing workflows, and landing pages that guide your customer to your main message. We are here to support businesses successfully navigating their digital presence to strengthen their customer relationships.

Go to https://www.brevo.com/marketingcompanion to sign up for Brevo for free and use the code COMPANION to save 50% on your first three months of Brevo’s Starter & Business plan!

Illustration courtesy MidJourney

The post The curse of authenticity appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

• The AI Challenge Marketers Aren’t Talking About
• When to compromise with content
• Exploring the personal branding pivot

Microsoft published a new report on the characteristics of what it describes as a “frontier firm” leading the way into AI integration.

More interesting, the company has been collecting detailed data on its customers, which is both fascinating and creepy, like …

All of this is intended to demonstrate the significant benefits of applying AI in the workplace.

This launched a discussion between Andy Crestodina and me about what is driving AI and innovation at agencies these days. What creates a frontier firm?

In a new episode of The Marketing Companion podcast, we also cover wild ideas about what will NEVER change in human-based agencies and the increasing need to explore human purpose and meaning going forward.

You won’t want to miss this show and all you have to do is click right here to hear it!

Please support our sponsor, who brings you this fantastic episode.

This episode is brought to you by Brevo (formerly Sendinblue). Brevo gives you the tools to attract, engage, and nurture customer relationships.

Now, any business can build automated customer experiences, email marketing workflows, and landing pages that guide your customer to your main message. We are here to support businesses successfully navigating their digital presence to strengthen their customer relationships.

Go to https://www.brevo.com/marketingcompanion to sign up for Brevo for free and use the code COMPANION to save 50% on your first three months of Brevo’s Starter & Business plan!

Illustration courtesy MidJourney

The post New research points to the emerging “AI Frontier Firm” appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

• When to compromise with content
• How to be an AI Forward company
• The curse of authenticity

On the new episode of The Marketing Companion, AI guru Paul Roetzer and I explore some fantastic new ideas about AI and humanity. I really loved this “AI Forward” quote from Paul:

“Everybody has leaned into this AI First term, and I made an intentional choice not to use it a couple years ago. I generally look at it as AI Forward. And the reason I made that distinction is that AI First implies AI over humans — that we are leaving humans behind. And so I wanted AI Forward to be a human-centered approach to this. Let’s use  AI every time we can to drive efficiency, productivity, innovation, and revenue, But the purpose of all of that should be to benefit the people.”

Some of the other fascinating topics in this conversation include:

You won’t want to miss this show and all you have to do is click right here to hear it!

Please support our sponsor, who brings you this fantastic episode.

This episode is brought to you by Brevo (formerly Sendinblue). Brevo gives you the tools to attract, engage, and nurture customer relationships.

Now, any business can build automated customer experiences, email marketing workflows, and landing pages that guide your customer to your main message. We are here to support businesses successfully navigating their digital presence to strengthen their customer relationships.

Go to https://www.brevo.com/marketingcompanion to sign up for Brevo for free and use the code COMPANION to save 50% on your first three months of Brevo’s Starter & Business plan!

The post How to be an AI Forward company appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

• New research points to the emerging “AI Frontier Firm”
• The curse of authenticity
• Six practical tips to stay ahead of the marketing learning curve

Each year, I read Man’s Search For Meaning by Viktor Frankl. It is one of the greatest books ever written and a reminder of the best and worst of the human condition.

The central premise of this famous book is that “to be human is to suffer,” and that how we handle our suffering defines us.

This became an unexpected topic of conversation with my friend Dana Malstaff. We were speaking at the same event recently, and I took advantage of the opportunity to bring together some friends for dinner. When the other two people paired off in conversation, Dana had a chance to say something to me privately—she was going through a gut-wrenching and stressful period.

The deep sadness on her face resonated with something buried in my own heart. For a moment, we were connected by the quiet acknowledgment that suffering, as Frankl taught, is universal—sometimes the greatest comfort is knowing you’re not alone in it.

The private moment passed as the server brought our food, and the four friends resumed a more public conversation. I felt inadequate as a friend, knowing that an opportunity to comfort her in the moment had passed.

The next day, I flew home to the other side of the country, but I could not get that look on Dana’s face out of my mind. I wrote some words of encouragement to her based on my own experience with suffering. I knew how hard it was to keep operating as a human and a business professional when the world crashes around you.

She appreciated my advice and suggested that our next Marketing Companion podcast episode could explore the theme of “persisting through suffering.” How do you keep going as a business leader when your mind and body want to quit?

I could not imagine a scarier topic. Which means … I should do it.

I didn’t know how this would go as a podcast episode, but I’ve learned that when something is out of my comfort zone, I need to pursue it. This is when I grow as a person.

So Dana and I talked openly about our suffering and our strategies to persist when the world won’t let us step off to catch our breath.

Before I turn to this conversation, I want to emphasize that I am in no way comparing myself to Viktor Frankl and the horrors he experienced in a Nazi concentration camp. I started this post with his quote because it is part of my psychological approach to life, and to introduce you to this book if you did not know it.

As this podcast enters its thirteenth year, this episode certainly stands out as a unique and gripping human tale. While it might seem like “suffering” has nothing to do with marketing, it has everything to do with marketing, a profession that runs on empathy and understanding.

The illustration on this post is “At Eternity’s Gate” by Vincent van Gogh.

Please support our sponsor, who brings you this fantastic episode.

This episode is brought to you by Brevo (formerly Sendinblue). Brevo gives you the tools to attract, engage, and nurture customer relationships.

Now, any business can build automated customer experiences, email marketing workflows, and landing pages that guide your customer to your main message. We are here to support businesses successfully navigating their digital presence to strengthen their customer relationships.

Go to https://www.brevo.com/marketingcompanion to sign up for Brevo for free and use the code COMPANION to save 50% on your first three months of Brevo’s Starter & Business plan!

The post Finding Meaning in Suffering: Business Leadership When Your World Is Falling Apart appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

• How to be an AI Forward company
• Exploring the personal branding pivot
• How to infuse humanity into an AI World
• New research points to the emerging “AI Frontier Firm”
• Has the pressure of success made me less creative?

I’ve known Carla Johnson for many years and admire her book on creativity. I was lucky enough to have her sub-in as a co-host of The Marketing Companion to talk about the crisis of imagination in the marketing field when I had a revelation.

She said that one of the things that derail our creativity is “living up to what we think is expected of us.” This hit me like a thunderbolt, and I think it unraveled a mystery for me.

In the early days of my blogging, I was a nut. It was really sort of a stream of consciousness that may or may not have anything to do with marketing or blogging. I felt like I was at a creative peak. Most notably, I was funny.

Here is a blog post from 2010 imagining what Barbie would be like on Twtter. It holds up. Still made me laugh!

I am acutely aware that I don’t show up as funny as I used to. Sure, I can be entertaining — a clever phrase, maybe even a dad joke here and there. But for many years, I’ve never written a post with the explicit goal of being funny.

And I never knew why. Am I simply not as funny as I used to be? Has the pressure of success changed me in some way? Am I less carefree or less creative?

When Carla put this issue in the perspective of status, it provided a clue to the mystery. In 2010, I wasn’t an author or speaker. I was just establishing my post-corporate “second career.” I had nothing to lose so I just let it roll.

Today it;s different. I know that people look up to me. It feels awkward to say that, but I recognize that I’m in a privileged position to have a platform where people pay attention to me. I can set an example and I take that seriously. I’m proud of my work but recognize that the creative output is different.

Any way, my conversation with Carla got me thinking and I think you’ll enjoy it too. In this podcast episode, we get into some deep ideas about content and creativity. One of the most fun shows I’ve ever done!

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The post Has the pressure of success made me less creative? appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

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