My friend Joe Pulizzi attended my Uprising retreat and was so moved by the experience that he wrote a beautiful lesson about it in his newsletter for content creators, The Tilt.

Joe and I are aligned on most marketing ideas, and his conclusion at the end of the post was profound and eloquent: “You don’t start with the room.”

He was reinforcing the idea that nobody just starts with a premium event, a smash YouTube channel, or a must-read newsletter. You have to earn that “room.” Or, in the case of my retreat, literally a room.

He wrote this so elegantly that, with his permission, I’ve quoted some of his highlights here. I think you’ll love his wisdom:

Last week I spent three days at Mark Schaefer’s The Uprising marketing retreat in Tennessee. It was small, around 40 people, and that was the point.

The room was filled with smart marketers, entrepreneurs, authors, consultants, and creators. But what stood out was not just the intelligence in the room. It was how quickly people became useful to one another. Helpful. Honest. Shockingly vulnerable.

That does not happen by accident. It happens when the right people are brought together around the right idea, with enough trust already in the room for something meaningful to happen.

Over three days of conversations, presentations, sidebars, meals, and big questions about where all this is going, one idea kept coming back to me.

In the next 12 to 18 months, small, trusted communities will matter more than ever.

Not because community is trendy. And not because AI is going to destroy everything tomorrow.

Because uncertainty is rising.

Search is changing. Discovery is changing. Content is exploding. Trust is harder to earn and easier to lose. People are overwhelmed, distracted, and suspicious. At the same time, they are desperate to find other people who understand what they are dealing with. That is where community becomes incredibly powerful.

But there’s a problem.

Everyone now wants to “build a community.”

That sounds wonderful. It is also mostly wrong.

Community Is Not the First Step

You do not build a community first. You build the reason a community should exist. That’s the part most people want to skip.

They launch the group. They open the Slack channel. They create the Discord server. They announce the membership. They schedule the webinar. They build the event page.

And then they wonder why nobody shows up.

The mistake is simple. They built the campfire before anyone had a reason to sit down in front of it.

A community is not a Facebook group. It is not a LinkedIn group. It is not a membership site. It is not a monthly Zoom call. It is not an event. Those are containers.

The community is the trust inside the container.

It is the shared language, shared struggle, shared progress, and repeated interaction. It is the feeling that says, “These are my people.” It is the sense that if you disappeared, someone would notice.

Mark Did Not Start With a Room

This is what made The Uprising such a good reminder.

Mark did not just rent a space, invite some people, and magically create a community. He had already done the work.

For years, Mark has published, spoken, written books, shared ideas, challenged assumptions, and built trust around a clear point of view. People came to The Uprising because they already had a reason to believe the room would matter.

The event was not the beginning of the community. It was an expression of the community. It’s where the community happened to be at that particular moment.

This is what so many people miss. They see the outcome and copy the container. They see the event, but not the years of trust. They see the membership, but not the audience.

Back to me.

Joe and I preach from the same hymnbook when it comes to community and its importance in the AI Age.

So how do you get there?

There is a process. It is not quick. It is not easy. But it works. This is the process I teach in my personal branding master class:

1. Where do you fit in your industry or marketplace?

Figure out your unique angle. What problem do you solve, and how do you uniquely solve it?

How do you finish this sentence: “Only I …”

That might seem intimidating but I’ve never had a class participant where we haven;t been able to figure that out. There’s still a big world of opportunity out there.

2. Find Your Space

Now you have the story to tell the world?

Joe was also very specific on this advice: Pick One Main Platform

“This is where people get overwhelmed,” Joe wrote. “They think they need a podcast, newsletter, YouTube channel, LinkedIn strategy, Instagram Reels, TikTok presence, webinar series, book project, and community all at the same time. Do not do that. Pick one main platform. One.”

To stand out, you have to be great. And you can’t be great in 12 places.

3. Stick to a Consistent Schedule

If you take my class, you will hear one word more than any other — “consistency.”

Consistency is more important than genius.

Once you begin, give yourself 18 months at least to see if it’s working. You can build your “room,” but you have to keep showing up. This also has powerful SEO and AI visibility advantages, of course.

You’ve implied to your audience that you’re going to help them solve a problem.

“The promise does not need to be clever, ” Joe said, “It needs to be clear.”

Over time, you become part of your audience’s weekly routine. Your goal is to become a habit.

4. Build Your Audience

Joe advised, “Audience building is not just publishing. It is relationship building. This is the part that gets missed because it is not scalable at first.”

He offered specific advice:

Make a list of 20 people who matter to the future of the audience you want to serve. They could be peers, customers, readers, event organizers, authors, podcast hosts, niche experts, future collaborators, or people already gathering the audience you care about.

Then help them. Share their work. Comment with substance. Interview them. Send the useful email. Introduce them to someone. Buy their book. Attend their event. Meet them in person when you can.

The future may be AI-powered, but trust is still built person by person.

5. Audience Precedes Community

Most creators miss the biggest opportunity. Once they build an audience, they stop there. But the most value, the most fun, the most connection comes through a community.

A community differs from an audience in three ways:

1. There is communion. People know each other and become friends.
2. There is a shared purpose.
3. There is a shared direction (which might change over time as the community pulls you forward).

This is the room. This will matter the most in the AI Era.

How do you know you’re ready? Do you have a few super fans? It doesn’t have to be a big group. Maybe 5-10 people who just want to know more. They comment on your posts. They ask questions. They’re excited about your ideas.

If you want to know a whole lot more about community-building, please take a look at the book Belonging to the Brand: Why Community is the Last Great Marketing Strategy.

Build the Reason First

I’ll let Joe Pulizzi take us home on this post. Here are some of his concluding comments:

I keep thinking about that room at The Uprising.

The trust. The conversations. The openness. The willingness to help. The feeling that the people there were not just attending another event, but participating in something that mattered to them.

That is rare. I believe more of us are going to need that.

The people who have real trust with a specific audience will have an advantage. The people who have direct relationships will have an advantage. The people who are known for something will have an advantage.

Start with the person you want to serve. Start with the problem they are embarrassed to admit. Start with the one platform you can commit to. Start with the 20 people you can help. Start with a promise you can keep every week.

Do that long enough, and the community has a chance to appear.

Build the reason first. The campfire comes later.

Need a keynote speaker? Mark Schaefer is the most trusted voice in marketing. Your conference guests will buzz about his insights long after your event! Mark is the author of some of the world’s bestselling marketing books, a college educator, and an advisor to many of the world’s largest brands. Contact Mark to have him bring a fun, meaningful, and memorable presentation to your company event or conference.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram

The post Content creators don’t start with “the room” appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

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:

1. The Evolution (and Challenge) of Social Media

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.”

2. Fractured Attention Economy

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.

3. The PESO Model’s Enduring Relevance

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.

4. Navigating AI in Communications and Marketing

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.

5. Breaking Bad Rules in PR (and Marketing)

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!

Click here to enjoy The Marketing Companion Episode 320

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

Bravo for Brevo!

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!

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I think everyone should work on having an effective online presence — a personal brand. It’s like an insurance policy for your career. If you’re “known,” more doors will open, more calls will be returned, you’ll have more choices in your career.

Like most people I know, Amanda Russell barrelled into her brand without a clear plan. When her career as an elite athlete was upended by injury, she took her re-hab exercises online and became one of the first YouTube fitness influencers.

She leveraged this experience into business ventures, starting and selling a couple businesses. Her next venture was in academia, creating pioneering programs at Northwestern University and the Univerisity of Texas. Along the way she’s consulted to some of the biggest brands in the world.

Sounds like a dream, right? But something was missing. Amanda realized she wasn’t practicing what she had been preaching — authenticity, human connection, and taking risks. She spent months working through her next step and she discusses this journey in the next episode of The Marketing Companion.

I think this is an interesting point in time to look at this issue. Some of us have been working on personal brands for years … 15 for me! But many are out-growing their skin and it’s time to evolve. Amanda provides a case study on personal brand evolution.

Click here to enjoy Marketing Companion Episode 311

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

Bravo for Brevo!

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 Exploring the personal branding pivot appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

I’m a big fan of Rick Beato (one of his 4 million subscribers!). He is a passionate, intellectual YouTuber who dissects and explains much of the music that I love.

He recently created a video called The Real Reason Music is Getting Worse, and as I listened to his reasoning, I felt as though he was talking directly to me as a marketer in the AI Age. If you haven’t discovered Rick and you’re a music lover, I hope you’ll check him out. But in the meantime, let’s see what he says about making music in the AI Age and discover if this speaks to you, too …

Music, and Marketing Content is getting worse

Here are the notes I took from Rick’s video:

Technology makes the act of making music too easy. It’s difficult to play an instrument, and it’s really hard to record it well and produce a record. Rick received this note from a fan: “I wrote this song using AI, and I think it’s pretty good, but I literally know nothing about music.” Music has been commoditized.

Technology allows you to save a lot of money and take shortcuts, but the artistry and soul are stripped from the music. He compared an original recording of John Bonham drumming to a loop of the drumming, and it’s a hygienic version.

A creative dependency on technology limits the ability of people to innovate because they don’t know the craft.

When everyone relies on the same tools, you create a homogenized sound and a lack of diversity in the music. Music today is formulaic because people follow trends of certain types of sounds that are in style in the moment.

Ease of production speeds up the process, creating an oversaturation of music and making exceptional work harder to find. AI songs will make the level of saturation even worse as record labels produce their own AI songs instead of using original artists. One new song is added to the streaming catalog every second.

Finally, he explained why human creativity is undervalued. In the golden age of music, you would have to have a job to make money to buy a record album. You had to expend energy to find, buy, and consume the content. There is no sweat equity needed to enjoy music today. You can pay $10.99 per month and have access to any song ever published. So music becomes value-less or at least under-valued for many people.

A record bought for your collection became part of your identity, part of your history. A record was something shared among friends. We would read the album cover and learn about who made and produced the music. The creator and creative team had value.

Lessons for the AI Era

See, I told you he was speaking to marketers. This is EXACTLY  the problem we face when AI churns out content at lightning speed. We risk drowning in a sea of mediocrity. The craft of marketing — the human touch, the unexpected twist, the soul — is in danger of being automated away.

AI presents many existential issues, but here is the one that haunts me the most: When we eliminate all the entry-level jobs, how will young people learn their craft? And if they don’t learn a craft, all we’ll have is “auto-tuned” perfect content, stripped of artistry and soul.

Like artists, will we become so dependent on the same technological tools that everything becomes homogenized?

Here’s what will drive AI adoption: cutting costs. Sorry, that’s the way of the world. So it seems inevitable that we’ll experience an AI pandemic of dull as every possible task moves to a machine.

The other day, I picked up my car from the shop and the technician had tuned my radio to a pop station. I don’t normally listen to current pop music, so I listened for a few days. The music today is truly awful, and I’m a person who embraces new musical ideas.

But here’s what excites me. True artistry still breaks through. I recently saw Jon Batiste in concert and no AI on earth will hold that man down.

As a marketer, you’ll have to be that Jon-Batiste level outlier to swat back the AI. Create work that no AI could dream up. Be so good they can’t ignore you.

There is still room for the crazy ones who push boundaries—there always will be. Start pushing, my friends.

Need a keynote speaker? Mark Schaefer is the most trusted voice in marketing. Your conference guests will buzz about his insights long after your event! Mark is the author of some of the world’s bestselling marketing books, a college educator, and an advisor to many of the world’s largest brands. Contact Mark to have him bring a fun, meaningful, and memorable presentation to your company event or conference.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram

The post The Real Reason Marketing Content is Getting Worse appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

Ed Keller is one of my marketing heroes. He’s considered the godfather and preeminent authority on word-of-mouth marketing and he wrote the seminal book on the subject in 2003, The Influentials. Ed is still researching the subject today as a professor at the University of Pennsylvania.

To illustrate my Ed Keller fanboy level, I used to drop by his office whenever I taught at Rutgers University just for a chance to meet him. I never did. So what a thrill when one day Ed reached out to connect to me on LinkedIn!

Since then, we have collaborated in a few ways, including a conversation within my RISE marketing community.

Word-of-mouth marketing has never been more relevant and never less understood. If this is a new idea to you, this article on the difference between influencer marketing and word of mouth might be a great place to start.

So let’s get to Ed. Here are a few excerpts from my conversation with him and how word-of-mouth marketing is especially relevant in the digital age. These are quotes from Ed, which have been edited for brevity:

What is an influential?

For a long time, we have had a misconception about how influence works. These are certain people — about 10 percent of the population — who are interested in acquiring knowledge, keeping up with things that are new. They like to talk to people about what they learn. As they acquire this new information, the process gets turned around, and they get sought out for their advice since they seek so much knowledge.

So it’s not any kind of pushy influence like you would want to avoid. An influential is actually someone you’d like to run toward as a trusted friend. We live in a complicated world, and it is a complicated consumer marketplace. We need somebody to make sense of it for us. That is the role of the influential and word-of-mouth marketing, as it has been throughout history, and especially now in the digital age.

Trust in traditional institutions has plummeted. And that doesn’t just count for trust in advertising. It’s trust in corporations, government, and media.

And so more and more often, these influential people play the essential role of trusted advisors in our own social circles. We rely on them to make sense of complexity.

The science behind word-of-mouth marketing

The research shows that across cultures, roughly one in 10 people are influentials. There’s not like a hard statistical cliff there. There’s sort of an influence continuum. But for research purposes, we had to establish criteria to show that either you’re an influential or you’re not. We looked at three things:

Knowledge base — In order to be influential, you have got to know your stuff. You’re not going to be influential if your head is in the sand and you don’t know what’s going on around you. So we came up with a battery of tests that allowed us to identify people who keep up with things that are new across a range of different categories, everything from politics to cars and technology to travel and financial services, etc.

Authority — We would not ask people, “Are you influential?” but we do ask people, “Do you tend to get sought out for your advice and recommendations?” This is an indication of trust and authority that leads to influence.

Network — Finally, in order to be influential, you have to have a fairly wide social circle. I can keep up with things that are new, but if I just keep talking to the same small group of people over and over again, I’m not going to spread things widely into the population as a whole. So we also looked for people who have a fairly wide social circle. This has another advantage. The wider the circle, the more new things influential will learn along the way.

From that, we developed a zero to 100 scale of word-of-mouth influence. Then we really studied the top 10 percent. Who are they? What makes them tick?

Word-of-mouth marketing in the digital age

The foundational research was done through surveys. Now in the digital age, we can also study a person’s social graph.

Obviously, a person like Kim Kardashian has a massive number of active followers. That counts for a lot on social media. But the pendulum has swung toward more narrow influencers if you will, people who have a smaller number of followers, and a lot of that has to do with this issue of trust.

If you’re an influential because someone’s paid you to hawk a product, you’re really just the paid commercial spokesperson — you haven’t earned that. On the other hand, if you’re known and you’re publishing content, then you’ve earned a following. Then you can be very influential and maybe build a community. You can certainly earn the right to be influential.

During the pandemic, people were not physically gathering face to face for a lot of word-of-mouth engagement.

Despite the rise in social media, a huge number of people still engage in word of mouth offline in live interactions, but also in texting, Zoom chats, and so on. You don’t see it by scraping social media sites.

Online versus offline

One of the most important things that my colleagues and I learned is that social media is not a mirror of offline word of mouth. If you follow social media trends, you’re not looking at the things that the average American is also talking about. In fact, we won some awards by demonstrating that there’s no correlation in the trends between what gets talked about offline and what gets talked about online.

The question is, how could that be, and why not? The short answer is that everybody, for the most part, engages in offline word of mouth — we all talk every day with people about new products, ideas, what to watch on television, etc.

But something like 6% of people are posting 80% of the content. So what you see on social media is fairly concentrated. The other thing is something my academic friends call social signaling. If I post on social media, I’ve just been to a hot restaurant. I’ve just been on a great place on vacation. It reflects well on me. The rest of my life … well, I’m just not choosing to put on social media.

On the other hand, if we’re face to face and having dinner together, then we’re going to talk about a whole lot of things, some of which will be earth-shattering and other stuff that is mundane — but nonetheless important.

So no correlation between the two, and yet each contributes about equally to sales and brand health.

The analogy that I like to use is rowing. If you row with one arm, you’ll go in circles. If you’re rowing with two arms, you’ll get to where you want to go. To understand the world in marketing, you need to consider both online and offline conversations

Impact of COVID on word of mouth marketing

During COVID, so much of our life got thrown into upheaval that the volume of word of mouth offline, increased, not decreased. People had new things they needed to talk about; they were trying to work their way through things that were very difficult, very complicated. Nothing was familiar anymore.

People found new ways to communicate with others, even if it was over Facetime or Zoom. We’re coming back down to Earth on some of those technology-driven solutions and people are looking for ways to experience things out in the real world again, but both ways of connecting remain important. So we had an expectation that everything was going to be different in terms of word of mouth. And it turns out that it’s an important force, and it continued to be quite important to people during and after COVID.

Mark Schaefer is the executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He is the author of some of the world’s bestselling marketing books and is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant. The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak at your company event or conference soon.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram.

Original Illustration courtesy MidJourney

The post The surprising impact of word of mouth marketing in a digital age appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

I love great writing. I hang on to magical sentences when I read a special book, dreaming that I could write that well some day. For that reason, it will take me weeks to savor the wisdom of Ann Handley’s newly-revised edition of her classic Everybody Writes book.

However.

Since this is a new book that should be at the top of your book-buying list, I wanted to provide a few big lessons for you now. Here are ten lessons:

1. The Big Ask

Lesson number one came from opening the box and seeing the book!

I’ve heard Ann say, when you have a Big Ask, there needs to be a Big Give. So the first lesson is how Ann presented this book. It arrived in a handsome box which spilled over with glittery streamers when I opened it. She included a personal, hand-written note and a little personalized gift.

In a world of relentless distractions, this attention to detail and personal care stands out. I have a pile of books that have been sent to me. But of course I will review your book, Ann!

I’ve written about Ann’s artisanal style of marketing. She knows there’s a difference between personal and personalization. That is a great lesson for any form of marketing today.

2. The beauty of bite-sized

When was the last time you saw a business book with 95 chapters? It’s no sweat with Ann’s book because the chapters are so short.

The lesson is, Everybody Writes is a user-friendly book. You can read a little between meetings and not feel lost. Everything we do needs to be user-friendly!

Side note: I know the chapters in my own books are LONG. I need to do better!

3. Set your content free!

I first turned to chapters with the most provocative titles, starting with “Should you gate your content?”

She offers a resounding NO. We agree. Thank you, Ann.

There is no economic value to content that’s locked up and never seen. Ann provides an excellent case study in this chapter that you can use to convince your team to eliminate the gate!

Magic sentence from this chapter: “Sweet Cheez-its. The robot is back.”

You can tell that Ann sweated over these chapter titles. They pull you through the book.

4. The GPS framework

Ann introduces a 17-step system for better writing. That sounds like too many steps for my little brain. Except, it’s perfect.

In fact, this is exactly the same process I use … I just never articulated it so well before. So yes, this system works, and you can use this right away to improve your content.

One of her steps is to read your work aloud. So simple, but hardly anybody does that. If it doesn’t sound the way you speak, you should probably change it.

Magic sentence from this chapter: “Reading your final draft out loud is the best way to hear your voice, literally. Yeah, you sound like a nutloaf, talking to yourself in the middle of your office. So?”

5. Start with Dear Mom …

I turned to this chapter simply because it had an interesting title. Yeah … her titles are that good!

Ann recounts the advice of John McPhee who says to start a project with “Dear Mom to neuter the fear of a blank page.” I like that. Also neuter. Unexpected word bonus point.

Magic sentence from this chapter: “It’ll relax your claws on the keyboard. And it’ll uncoil your writing voice into sounding natural, loose, and friendly.”

Claws.

Uncoil.

Doggone it, Ann. Stop that.

6. The ideal length for every piece of content

I flipped out when I saw this chapter title. I can’t believe Ann would sell out for such a Buzzfeed headline.

Doesn’t she know there IS NO ideal length for your content?

Yes, she does.

And that’s the message in the chapter. Create something that is true and sincere. In journalism school we were taught, ” Give it what it’s worth.”

Magic sentence: “Your reader will love a 2,000-word email newsletter if it doesn’t feel like 2,000 words — If it feels instead like a fun, useful inbox romp.”

I think “romp” should be one of my keywords for the coming year.

7. Make your customer the hero

If you read one chapter, make it 53. It’s the tale of how Ann crafted a speech about Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. I had the honor of seeing this speech live, and it was the second-best speech I’ve ever seen (only eclipsed by Ann’s epic “Bun the Bunny” talk!).

So, I was anxious to learn her behind-the-scenes secrets.

In this chapter, she applies a classic children’s tale to a marketing storytelling framework. It’s genius because by centering on this beloved story, it’s easily relatable, and we see it through a fresh new lens. Ann explains that Rudolph was really a “product” that saved the hero, the customer (Santa).

In the following chapter, Ann templatizes this useful framework.

Magic sentence: “Every story needs conflict. What’s the audience’s problem?”

8. Brands as Media Companies?

In this chapter, Ann re-introduced me to an old friend, GE Reports.

More than a decade ago, I blogged about GE and its brand journalism as the standard for customer-focused content marketing. Seeing them in this chapter made me look them up again.

I was disappointed that they’ve re-branded as GE News and have more or less reverted to bragging about their products and executives. Does anybody really subscribe to this content other than employees?

Brand storytelling is overhyped by most marketing gurus today. Content marketing is not as viable, accessible, or effective as it was 10 years ago.

GE Reports was interesting when I wrote about it in 2010 because it was singularly unique … and we didn’t have Netflix, Spotify, or Mr. Beast competing for our attention. But we do have those distractions today, and I’m not sure there are many brands that can shell out the money necessary to compete in today’s media environment.

Brand as a media company? Ann effectively challenged me in this chapter and has me thinking about it again.

Magic sentence: “Algae explosions are fascinating? Who knew?”

9. 20 things marketers write

This is the most actionable part of Everybody Writes. If you’re hammering out copy for social media, websites, or even image captions, go straight to this section. There are a quintillion good tips, and it’s hard to pick one, but let’s go with this:

Magic sentence: Writing about email newsletters, Ann says: “Create reading momentum.”

Isn’t that an interesting challenge?

These pages are already covered with highlighter ink. So much gold here. Yellow, actually.

If you need a quick-start jolt for your writing, start reading this book on page 277!

10. Everybody Writes, and you and I can be better

When I hear Ann speak, or when I read her writing, I’m inspired to be better. I need that — you need that — to remain relevant in the world today.

In this book, Ann sets a standard for quality, generosity, and effortless reading that we all should aspire to.

In Everybody Writes, Ann has opened up and let us in on her secrets. What a gift. She reminds us that writing is a craft. I am nearly finished with a new book and after reading this book, I’m going back one more time to make it even better!

Consider this book deeply, but don’t be overwhelmed by its 400 pages. You don’t have to start at the beginning. Find the section you need right now and capture three or four ideas you can use in your work today.

Come back later. Explore another section. I’m going to spend months absorbing this book.

And that is my greatest lesson from this book: Keep pushing. Keep improving. Be “Ann Good.”

Mark Schaefer is the executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He is the author of some of the world’s bestselling digital marketing books and is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant.  The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak at your company event or conference soon.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram.

The post 10 Unmissable lessons from Ann Handley’s new “Everybody Writes” book appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

I recently interviewed my friend Dana Malstaff for a new book project and she provided some extraordinary advice about entrepreneurship and leadership.

Dana is the powerhouse founder of BossMom. She has this energized, confident, visionary drive toward the future of marketing and community that inspires me every time I talk to her. I wanted to know … how did she get to that place? What drives this vision?

She told me a story about how, when she was little, she loved to help her stepfather on his business ventures. She got to see first-hand how entrepreneurship works.

As she started to take on more tasks for the business, she asked for direction on what she needed to do to succeed. Her step-father said:

“I’ll tell you what I don’t want when I see it.”

I thought this was an exceptional piece of leadership advice. It’s so empowering. He’s saying, “Find your own path. I trust you.” And yet, he also leaves open the opportunity to mentor her when problems arise.

Anyway, I thought this was cool and I wanted to pass it along since it might have a positive impact on you, too. Dana Malstaff is a brilliant leader. I want to be like her when I grow up.

Mark Schaefer is the executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He is the author of some of the world’s bestselling digital marketing books and is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant.  The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak to your company event or conference soon.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram. Discover his $RISE create community.

Illustration courtesy BossMom

The post An important insight on leadership from Dana Malstaff appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

Adam Grant is a best-selling author, an expert on motivation and meaning, and Wharton’s top-rated professor for seven straight years. He hangs out with filmmaker J.J. Abrams and author Brene Brown. My hero Malcolm Gladwell is one of his best friends.

He is also a modern Twitter philosopher. His prodigious tweeting is legendary. I mean, my tweets are usually something like “Thanks” or “My plane is late,” while Adam is spouting business poetry like:

“Having fun isn’t the enemy of efficiency. It’s the fuel for finding flow.”

Wait. What? Are you making me THINK here, Adam? On a tweet?

So I enjoy following Adam and living vicariously through his exciting intellectual life but a tweet that went viral last week made me stop in my tracks. That was something to see. There I was, squarely on my tracks and I stopped.

Here is the tweet:

Dude.

You can only say this because you ALREADY HAVE  a powerful personal brand.

Adam is a Tweeting Monster and he has a massive online presence:

• A top-rated podcast with A-List guests
• A monthly newsletter (more than 100,000 subscribers)
• A blog answering reader questions (such a good idea)
• A YouTube channel
• Four best-selling books
• Daily philosophical posts on Instagram (1 million followers)

It seems to me that Adam is spending an enormous amount of effort on something other than “investing in personal relationships.” If he stopped doing this important work building his online authority and reputation, and turned instead to “personal connections” he would quickly lose momentum. And he needs momentum. Almost all of us do.

Adam has spent years nurturing an effective personal brand, and it’s worked. It’s just not popular to say so. And that’s not right.

The necessity of the personal brand

I learned the lessons of personal branding the hard way … when I didn’t have one.

When I was in the corporate world, I was the global director of eBusiness for a Fortune 100 company. I was the go-to guy in the world for eCommerce, digital marketing, and CRM.

But once I stepped out of the friendly confines of my company to start my own business in the “real world,” I instantly became the go-to guy … for nothing.

Nobody knew (or cared) about my old title, team, or accomplishments. Nobody ever saw the awards on my walls or annual bonus checks. In this online world, there is only one thing that matters. Either you’re known, or you’re not. The most powerful professional equity you own is your personal brand.

If you’re known in your industry, you’ll get more business opportunities, sell more books, and have a bigger payday at speaking engagements. You might even get to meet Malcolm Gladwell or Brene Brown.

Creating an effective personal brand does not mean you’ve sold your soul or turned into an inauthentic character. It simply means you’re establishing the presence, reputation, and authority to get your job done.

The ONLY REASON Adam can get Brene Brown on his podcast is because he is known due to his powerful personal brand. Fun fact … I tried to interview Brene for my last book and she turned me down. Adam’s brand is more powerful than mine. I have to keep working. Maybe next year Brene : )

Let’s be honest about personal branding

Adam is clearly working hard on his personal brand. I’m willing to bet he’s got a social media team behind him to keep the beautiful and relevant content flowing every day.

So ironically, it’s inauthentic for Adam to claim he’s not mindfully, systematically, and aggressively building his personal brand. It’s a preposterous claim.

But somehow it’s become popular to dismiss this idea. His tweet was liked 5,500 times and retweeted 1,200 times. Isn’t that amazing? Are people even thinking about what he’s saying here? We are only seeing this tweet because he’s KNOWN, not because he has a personal relationship with us.**

** Adam, you are always welcome at my home so we can work on our personal relationship. We can sit by the lake and eat smoked meat. Unless you’re vegetarian. Then we will eat corn. Please bring Malcolm.

Please. Don’t listen to Adam this one time.

Here’s the truth. In many careers, the strength of your personal brand is the difference between “meh” and spectacular success. Don’t avoid building a personal brand. Embrace it. Fight for it every day. Like Adam Grant.

I HATE the suggestion that working on a personal brand implies you’re “inauthentic.” Nothing is further from the truth. Trust me, in this world, people can sniff out a fake in 140 characters or less. Having an effective online presence means you need to be more of who you are at your best.

Personal relationships are important. Some of my favorite relationships are with people. But this does not mean you can’t work on your personal brand, too.

And by the way, Adam Grant is great. Just not this time. I recommend that you follow him and enjoy his beautiful and thought-provoking content, as I do.

Mark Schaefer is the executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He likes the idea of personal brands and would like to eat meat with Adam Grant. Mark does not have a million followers on Twitter but he is the author of some of the world’s bestselling digital marketing books and is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant.  The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak to your company event or conference soon.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram. 

Background graphic courtesy sketchepedia.

The post The Adam Grant Rant appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

If you’re a fan of The Marketing Companion podcast, you’ve no doubt enjoyed the funny original intros at the beginning of each show. For many years, Scott Monty has created these little works of art and in the last year, Tim Washer has added his voice and comedic skill to explore the funny side of marketing.

If you’d like to experience a recent sample, try this:

A funny thing happened … 

Brooke and I had a schedule conflict and I thought it would be fun to bring these fellas to the BIG SHOW to explore the funny side of marketing in a full pordcast episode! We covered:

• Mark Zuckerberg
• Favorite brands
• The next big marketing trend
• TikTok
• Influence marketing

You won’t want to miss this! It’s so easy to listen, just click here:

Click on this link to listen to Episode 219

Other ways to enjoy our podcast

• Try this! “Alexa, play the latest episode of The Marketing Companion.”
• Click here to download the latest episode or subscribe on iTunes
• Listen to us on iHeart Radio
• Find us on Google Play
• Find the podcast on Stitcher
• Complete Marketing Companion Episode Guide
• The Marketing Companion YouTube channel

Please support our extraordinary sponsor. Our content is free because of their generosity.

B Squared Media is the premier provider of online customer care solutions and done-for-you social media marketing. Think conversation, not campaign with B Squared. Marketing Companion fans can take advantage of a truly extraordinary offer — $10,000 off your customer care contract or $1,000 toward your first online advertising campaign, Click here to learn more about this amazing opportunity!

The post The funny side of marketing with @ScottMonty and @TimWasher appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

Something important and unexpected happened on our Marketing Companion podcast last week. Let me set the scene for you.

Brooke Sellas and I had a chance to interview the legendary Tom Peters, one of the greatest thought leaders in business history and the author of the bestselling book in business history, In Search of Excellence. This is significant because Tom is retiring and he has declared that his latest book, Excellence Now: Extreme Humanism, is his last.

So, I regard this interview as an important show, and certainly a milestone in the history of the podcast. But something happened in this interview that took my breath away.

Sure, Tom dropped a lot of precious insights and business truths. You would expect that. But then something extraordinary happened in the last minutes of the show.

Brooke asked a final question: “Tom, you begin your new book with an urgent plea. Essentially you are saying, ‘Listen to me dammit!’ We have thousands of marketing leaders from around the world hanging on your every word today. Now at the end of your career, if you had one message specifically for marketers, what would it be?”

Tom was quiet for a long moment, gathering his thoughts. He looked off into the distance. Then, he said something so unexpected and profound that I was left speechless. And … he was SO RIGHT!

When the show was over and recording had stopped, I told Tom that this was an extraordinary piece of advice I had not heard before. He replied, “Me either. I’ve never said anything like that.”

So now, you know you NEED TO LISTEN to this show! One of the most unmissable episodes in our nine-year history. Let’s get to it:

Click on this link to listen to Episode 217

Other ways to enjoy our podcast

• Try this! “Alexa, play the latest episode of The Marketing Companion.”
• Click here to download the latest episode or subscribe on iTunes
• Listen to us on iHeart Radio
• Find us on Google Play
• Find the podcast on Stitcher
• Complete Marketing Companion Episode Guide
• The Marketing Companion YouTube channel

Please support our extraordinary sponsors. Our content is free because of their generosity.

B Squared Media is the premier provider of online customer care solutions and done-for-you social media marketing. Think conversation, not campaign with B Squared. Marketing Companion fans can take advantage of a truly extraordinary offer — $10,000 off your customer care contract or $1,000 toward your first online advertising campaign, Click here to learn more about this amazing opportunity!

The post Tom Peters’ profound and unexpected advice to the marketing community appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.