From The Vault: How to Stay Visible in the AI Search Era

From The Vault: How to Stay Visible in the AI Search Era written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

Listen to the full episode:

Episode Summary

Back from the vault! In this rerun of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I revisit a solo episode where I—John Jantsch—explore a topic that continues to reshape the foundation of online marketing: search visibility in an era dominated by AI search, zero-click results, and evolving Google behaviors.

Search engine optimization (SEO) has always been about rankings, but today that’s no longer enough. In this episode, I explain why the focus has shifted to search visibility—your brand’s presence across the entire digital ecosystem. From featured snippets and branded SERPs to Google Business profiles and authoritative content that aligns with E-E-A-T principles, visibility is about showing up where people actually find answers.

As AI overviews increasingly deliver information without clicks, your strategy must evolve beyond chasing keywords.

Key Takeaways

• SEO is now about search visibility, not just rankings. Brands need to show up in multiple answer-delivery formats.

• AI search and zero-click results mean most users get what they need without leaving Google, so multi-platform visibility is essential.

• Google is now an answer engine. Structure your content to provide direct, trusted answers.

• E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) signals matter more than ever.

• Use structured content like FAQs, TL;DR summaries, and hub pages to boost your chances of surfacing in AI answers and snippets.

• Local SEO still drives results. Treat your Google Business Profile as a publishing platform.

• Refreshing older content improves freshness signals and knowledge graph visibility.

• Prioritize quality, experience-driven stories, and unique insights over generic AI-generated content.

• Don’t chase head terms. Focus instead on long-tail queries and intent-driven content formats.

Chapters:

• 00:09 Opening
• 00:58 Evolution of Search Engine Optimization
• 03:01 The Current State of Search
• 03:41 Focus on Search Visibility Instead of Rank
• 06:13 How to Demonstrate EEAT
• 09:04 Audit Your Content Gaps
• 10:07 Help Pages
• 11:46 FAQ Pages and Trust Elements
• 13:03 Refreshing Your Content
• 13:41 Utilize Your Google Business Page
• 14:35 Find Out How AI Is Sourcing Information
• 15:42 Common Mistakes

Sponsored By:

Morningmate is the all-in-one work management platform for client-facing teams.

Manage projects, chat, and files in one place—simple to use and scalable as you grow.

Get a 30-day free trial today

 

Duct Tape Transcript

Email Download New Tab

John Jantsch (00:01.506)

Hello and welcome to another episode of the duct tape marketing podcast. This is John Jantsch and I'm doing a solo show. I'm going to talk about search engine optimization or as I've started to call it search visibility because the game has changed. Now, the first question you might be asking yourself is why is John wearing a cowboy hat? Those of you that are on the video version, I'm wearing a Stetson open road. this is the straw version in the cognac.

color is my favorite summer hat. just decided it's Friday when I'm recording this. just decided to put it on and wear it for the show. My grandfather and father had this style hat and a number of US presidents over the years chose this as their primary hat as well. So Stetson Open Road, there you have the story. All right. As I said, I'm going to talk about search engine optimization, what we've always long called, not always.

Believe it or not, a 20 year history with something called search engine optimization, which is really moving completely. There's been lots of changes over the years, different algorithms, different things, different search engines come along. But this is a fundamental shift in how that tactic or approach really is going to be applied going forward. And what what it actually is even going to mean to business and website owners going forward as well.

So I thought I would start with, before I jump into like eat and generative AI and AI overviews and things, just do like a 30 second kind of timeline on search. Well, I started actually playing around with search in 1998. And really, again, was my first website and it was, do we rank?

and get on page one, you know, what are the things we need to do? I won't go into all what all those things were, but most of them are not relevant today. At least, you know, that was in the early days of search engines. They were little infants and they were, you know, the game was to trick them into putting your stuff on page one. That lasted till about 2010. And then, you know, the search engines just got more and more complex and more and more, you know,

John Jantsch (02:21.142)

ability to understand what a page really was about rather than what we wanted them to think it was about. And so now you start having mobile be part of the deal. You've got the local search packs. You've got answer boxes starting to show up about, you know, from 2010 to 2016, roll up to about 2017. And now all of sudden voice search is a factor featured snippets become a factor.

near me becomes a factor also searched for. So a lot of things just keep getting injected. And of course, all the while the ad units and how they display all over the page, you know, are changing as well. Kind of really shifting what even ranking, you know, on page one even meant anymore. So I guess fast forward to today, 2024 or so it happened, you know, AI overviews.

Um, SGE from Google, 60 % of, of, of us Google searches ending with no click at all, according to search engine land, uh, the, uh, the infamous zero click searches, uh, instead of, you know, a list of 10 links on a page. Um, you know, we're now to the point where maybe you get featured as a source in an AI answer and hope that that generates a click, but,

six to seven times out of 10 today. That search is just gonna end in somebody getting the answer or getting the information that they wanted.

What I'm talking about now is this idea of a complete mindset shift away from search and optimization, away from trying to rank for keywords and more about this idea of search visibility. It's kind of your brand's share of the answers, the mentions, the knowledge panel, real estate, local pack slots.

John Jantsch (04:19.086)

really clicks for everywhere that, um, that, that a prospect looks, I think that's what we have to do today. So, you know, chasing one phrase or two phrases or something. mean, it's really going to have very, very little value. Um, unless it's just a very high intent phrase that, uh, if somebody searches that they're not looking for an answer, they're looking to purchase. Um, those are really going to be the, um, you know, the, the, the highly sought after, guess, um, types of searches.

So I think instead of, of thinking now in terms of like position ranking or impressions, it's really going to be this, this whole collection. And this is going to be hard for people to measure, but this whole collection of like branded SERP coverage, is really going to be the, you know, the, example. I use a case, a local dentist publishes like does whitening hurt. they have an FAQ short vid, TikTok video, Google business posts, a patient story.

you know, now that now they have the chance to actually own the FAQ snippet for that, maybe the local, local rank, map pack for that, maybe a YouTube carousel. mean, so that's how I think we have to start thinking about these is, know, there's no more. There's no more, you know, I want to show up on for this, you know, key search is it's how do I put myself into this idea of answers? And in fact, you know, a lot of people are actually calling,

you know, not even calling them search engines anymore. They're really answer engines. And the consumer behavior, you know, has changed so dramatically. Search behavior has changed so dramatically. You know, we were all very conditioned to type in six, eight words for what we were looking for and then hoping or maybe refining that search if we didn't find what we were hoping for. But now we can actually, instead of typing in, you know, plumbing contractor in my town, you know, now it's

plumbing contractor with 24 hour service, more than 4.7 star reviews within two miles from me, whatever. mean, you can type that long search in now and you're going to get that very specific, in most cases, you're gonna get that very specific result returned to you that you were able to kind of custom tailor to what you wanted rather than saying, okay, Google, give me what you think I want.

John Jantsch (06:49.39)

One of the things that, and I have to set this up a little bit, that we have to start thinking about when it comes to our content, you know, writing the 101, the how to blog content. And many people are finding that they're losing all the search traffic that used to come for that because why would they send them to your page? They can answer that very easily because it was just basic information to begin with.

you're wasting your time. If you continue down that path of just creating the 700 words on blah, blah, blah. very generic. And the bad thing is of course AI makes that really easy to do. You can, you can spin out 10 of those a day now, without really much sweat, it's, it's practically useless unless you are in just such a niche category that nobody else is trying to create content around it. It's practically worthless. So Google has this new

No, fairly new couple of years, acronym called EAT. And there's two E's in there. So E-E-A-T. And forgive me if you know all about this, but I'll explain it in very basic terms for those who may not understand it. But the idea behind it is that they want to see not just expertise. That's one of the E's, but they want to see experience. Have you actually done what you're talking about?

They want to see authoritativeness. That's the, the other a, or I mean, that's the a. So they measure that by, know, are you getting links mentioned, you know, are you in local press? I mean, are you appearing in industry lists? So they're measuring like, are you an authority on this thing that you're talking about? So experience, expertise, authority, and then the last one is trustworthiness. are there signals, of trust, warranties, refund policies, secure checkout badges.

real contact info. mean, all those kinds of things go into the mix as well. So what we have to do, I think, is it's no longer enough to write this article about how to do something. You have to actually have a case study in there. You have to have examples of maybe you doing it in actual real time or behind the scenes.

John Jantsch (09:02.603)

So that it's very clear that that you're not just talking about this. This is something that you do. This is something you're an expert on. This is something somebody can trust for you to do for their business.

John Jantsch (09:16.844)

So in March, 2024, I'm reading a stat here. Knowledge graph update extended each signals by 38 % to really surface credible people and brands again, according to search engine land. that certainly signals that this is not going away. I mean, that this is going to be a significant piece as well. So how do you compete in an eat world, in an AI world?

In a world where really the need for producing content is still there. mean consumers still need the information So now it's a matter of you know, how do we how do we stay visible so that we can get them the opportunity even to get them that information? first thing is There's five step plan here, right? Okay. Number one audit your content gaps. So

Export all of your site URLs. List the top 25 customer questions and use Google Search Console. Again, what we're trying to do is find how can we become an answer engine? So take a lot of your content. And again, this is a place where some of the AI tools are really good at this. You've written good, useful content. How could it be better? How could it answer more questions? How could you add FAQs?

to the end of all of your service pages. How could you add a table of contents to your long form content? How could you add a description box? Some people call it too long, didn't read TLDR, you've probably seen that. How can you add that at the top of your content so that these...

They're not really search engine spiders, but so that the AI tools that are going out there and trying to surface good sources for content can have a very quick view of what it's about. It gets very user friendly. It's very structured in a way that shows kind of the hierarchical structure.

John Jantsch (11:24.718)

I have for years been talking about this thing called hub pages. Um, and the idea behind that is that if you write about, I use an example, if you're a kitchen remodeler and you've got a whole bunch of blog posts about various aspects of remodeling a kitchen. Um, what if you turn that instead of just having them randomly placed on a blog, uh, out there in the ether, what if you turn that into a kitchen, uh, the ultimate guide to remodeling a kitchen and you took all of your content that you've written over the years.

And you placed it on that page. don't mean physically all of it on that page, but at least structure it in such a way that somebody can jump around to how to pick countertops, how to pick cabinets, how to pick finishes, um, how to pick lighting. And then those all, uh, you know, kind of becomes a playlist for anybody who's thinking about, uh, designing, um, or remodeling a kitchen. So we've been talking about that for, I would say at least eight or 10 years.

and the good news is it was a very effective SEO tactic. mean, it, as soon as we would build those for people, it would immediately change, how, how Google viewed their website, but it's also very user friendly. Somebody comes to that hub page and they want, they are interested in information. It's like, here's the whole guide, you know, on what I'm trying to do rather than I just found one, you know, I went out and randomly searched and found one, one blog post on something. So the, the, you know, the,

Again, doubly good news is that those pages really are highly rewarded in an AI world as well. So think about your top three or four services, your top three or four products, your top three or four things that your company does. And think about ways that you could create a very useful guide or a hub page around those and collect it. It's really, in some ways, it's the same content. You've just structured it dramatically different. Boy.

FAQs, and again, in an answer engine world, having answers to the questions that people ask is a clearly makes a lot of sense. It's also been a very useful piece of content anyway, but now really being rewarded in this answer engine world. So every single one of your service pages, every single one of your product pages, even your About Us page now, I think should actually, whether it's structured as a Q &A, or just has an FAQ section,

John Jantsch (13:42.826)

at the bottom of it and you know, pay some attention to the questions you're being asked. Again, the AI tools are pretty good at that surfacing, you know, common questions around things, but you might think in terms of even some of the questions that you're not being asked necessarily, but you should be people should be paying attention to so you can use that as an opportunity to educate around like why you and what you know, what you do that's different than competitors, for example, that they might not actually be asking about.

You know, monthly case studies, you know, measurable results, quotes from customers, those kind of trust elements, even, you know, badges that, that symbolize that you're in professional organizations and things that you've achieved certain certifications. mean, those, you know, the more we can double down on, on just proving that we do what we say, really quite frankly, the better. and then the last piece of the puzzle is.

John Jantsch (14:43.128)

How can you keep this fresh? So, what I'm telling people, and I need to do this myself as well, is we've got reams and reams of content that we wrote years ago. it needs to be freshened up. In fact, about every quarter, you ought to make a goal of saying, Hey, I've got these five blog posts that, know, are decent blog posts. How could I freshen them up, add more links, add more experience, add more proof.

in these, maybe I can structure them, you know, with a table of contents in that TLDR, maybe I could add FAQs to them. You will be highly rewarded for for refreshing that content. And I would last thing I would say is. Start thinking, and this is particularly true for local businesses, not as much for somebody who's really more of a national scale, but that Google business page, think of it as another

publishing platform. Now you don't own that platform, of course, but you have a lot of leeway and how optimized it is all the photos, the videos that you can add there, all the service descriptions you can add there. And you can post there. I would be taking again, in some cases daily if you've got a lot of content, but certainly weekly, create a Google or post in your Google Business page that can come from

can be just a shortened version of something that you've written, and published, you know, years ago, but you're giving it a new place, a new home. And again, it's just going to add all up to the soup of, know, how you get noted or, or quoted as a valuable source. The other thing I would tell you to do is to do a bunch of searches, in some of the AI tools that there were searches you'd love to show up in, you'd love to win. Now, hopefully you show up in front of those. So.

I use my kitchen contractor, remodeling contractor. So best kitchen remodeling contractor in X city would be a link that or something that they'd want to really show up for. Right. And take note of who shows up. That's important. But also one of the things the AI tools do is they tell you the sources that they went to, to, to make that determination. And in some cases, these are directories in some cases, you know,

John Jantsch (17:03.63)

common in the remodeling industry is one called house, that, they actually got a lot of that information from. So if you're not participating in any of those sources or you don't even have a listing in a directory as obscure as it may sound, there's your checklist of some things that you probably need to add to, what you do to get in those directories or to start participating in, you know, a Quora or a Reddit or a house, dependent upon,

you know, the industry that you're in. So, all right, a couple of common mistakes. Stop obsessing over a handful of head keywords. It just doesn't matter anymore. Don't write for algorithms. I think this has always been true. Think in terms of the human question behind any query that somebody is asking. We use a tool called Answer the Public. I highly recommend that you go there and...

If you're, if you're at a loss for what questions people are asking in your industry, that can be a great resource for that. Frankly, the AI tools are pretty good at it. They can surface what questions people are asking in, certain industries. You can't set and forget your website. You know, if I go and I look and there's your last blog post was 2022. We probably got some work to do. This is something that.

You just need to make it a weekly, monthly, quarterly plan that you're going to do X, Y, and Z and just commit to doing it. don't obsess over all the tools. mean, don't go down the rabbit hole. mean, Structured schema is important. there are plugins that, that can actually do that. So that when you write FAQs, the, underlying code, tells Google or tells the.

Whoever's visiting your website, this is an FAQ section. So, you know, spend some time on that part. Don't over obsess about, you know, over engineering tools on this. So here's what I would say. If you've got some ideas today, pick one. If you don't have any FAQs, that's where I would start. If you don't have any case studies, I would certainly think in terms of that.

John Jantsch (19:23.666)

if you haven't visited your Google business profile, I would highly recommend that you think in terms of your strategy there. pick, pick one of the things that, that, I mentioned here today and just start working away at it. mean, don't, don't listen to all the gloom and doom and look at your Google analytics and say, my traffic search your traffic's down because

there's a good chance that a lot of that search traffic wasn't that meaningful. Anyway, it was somebody looking for that how to article. They were not actually looking for your product or service. So search visibility being seen where people go to get their information, being seen as an answer engine, as opposed to an information engine is how we have to change the mindset. So if you got value, hopefully you will subscribe either to the YouTube channel or to the podcast itself.

Love those reviews on Apple or Spotify or wherever you listen, share the interview, share this episode with, one business owner who needs a little marketing clarity, who would like a little, simple, effective and affordable, good old duct tape marketing practical advice. All right. That's it for today. Thanks for tuning in. Hopefully I'll run into you one of these days soon out there on the road.

Scroll back to top

Sign up to receive email updates

Enter your name and email address below and I'll send you periodic updates about the podcast.

powered by

from Duct Tape Marketing https://ift.tt/bWMkLTB
via IFTTT

Building a Business That Runs Without You

Building a Business That Runs Without You written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

Listen to the full episode:

Overview

On this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, John Jantsch interviews Dr. Sabrina Starling, founder of Tap the Potential, business growth expert, and creator of the Four Week Vacation model. Sabrina shares her hard-won lessons on succession planning, letting go, and building a company that can truly run without you. After a personal tragedy forced her to step away for six weeks, she discovered the systems, mindsets, and leadership development needed to create a business that’s sustainable, profitable, and supports the lives of owners and teams alike. If you want your business to thrive—whether you’re present or not—this episode is packed with practical, people-focused advice.

About the Guest

Dr. Sabrina Starling is a business growth strategist, founder of Tap the Potential, and a sought-after coach, speaker, and author. Known for her expertise in people-focused systems and her signature Four Week Vacation approach, she helps entrepreneurs build companies that support—not consume—their lives. Sabrina’s work centers on leadership, succession planning, and sustainable, joyful business growth.

• Website & Resources: tapthepotential.com
• Four Week Vacation Model: tapthepotential.com/4weekvacation
• Download the $10,000 Activities Chart: tapthepotential.com/10K
• Podcast: Profit by Design

Actionable Insights

• Mindset is 98% of the battle—most bottlenecks in business start with owners’ beliefs about what’s possible and what they “have” to do themselves.
• Letting go can be forced by life—don’t wait for a crisis to test your business’s sustainability; plan, delegate, and build systems now.
• True succession planning is about protecting your team and your business’s legacy, not just who “takes over” someday.
• Simple, recurring reviews (every 1–2 years) are better than overwhelming, one-time estate planning attempts; aim for progress, not perfection.
• Don’t assume family will want to take over—groom and empower team leaders and create buy-in/ownership options thoughtfully.
• Delegation is a growth engine: Use the $10,000 Activity Chart to identify what only you should do and empower your team to take on the rest.
• A Four Week Vacation is a test—and a tool—for building a business that lasts. Start with small steps, unplug for a day, then build up.
• When you delegate, let your team own the outcome—don’t take the task back or undermine their growth.

Great Moments (with Timestamps)

• 00:39 – The Real Bottleneck: Mindset, Not Systems
  Why “I can’t” thinking is the real block to business growth.
• 02:57 – What Happens When You Truly Step Away?
  How a personal tragedy revealed the power of systems and team leadership.
• 05:57 – Refocusing on Succession and Legacy
  The new lens of estate planning, sustainability, and impact after loss.
• 09:12 – The Team-First Succession Model
  How to protect your people and business, even if family doesn’t want to take over.
• 14:33 – Leadership Development, Not Just “Replacement”
  Why you must nurture leaders and build systems for a company to outlast its founder.
• 17:59 – The Four Week Vacation as a Reality Test
  Why you should step away before you feel ready—and what it reveals about your business.
• 18:39 – The $10,000 Activity Chart
  A practical tool for owners and leaders to delegate, focus, and grow.
• 20:56 – Growth for A Players
  Why empowering your team to own projects is key to their growth and retention.

Insights

“Mindset is 98% of the issue—most bottlenecks start with owners’ beliefs, not their systems.”

“Succession planning is ultimately about protecting your people and your business’s ability to serve—not just who takes over.”

“Don’t wait for a crisis: test your systems and your team’s leadership now, not someday.”

“The Four Week Vacation is more than a dream—it’s a stress test for sustainability and a path to real freedom.”

“Empower your team, delegate for growth, and let go—your business (and your life) will thank you.”

 

Sponsored By:

Morningmate is the all-in-one work management platform for client-facing teams.

Manage projects, chat, and files in one place—simple to use and scalable as you grow.

Get a 30-day free trial today

Duct Tape Transcript

Email Download New Tab

John Jantsch (00:01.304)

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jance and my guest today is Dr. Sabrina Starling. She's the founder of TAP, the potential of business growth and leadership development firms specializing in helping entrepreneurs build profitable, sustainable companies that support both their lives and the lives of their teams. Known for her work on the four week vacation model and her expertise in people-focused business systems, Dr. Sabrina is a sought after coach and speaker.

for owners ready to take their business to the next level without being the bottleneck. So Sabrina, welcome back to the show.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (00:36.692)

Thank you, John. I'm delighted to be here.

John Jantsch (00:39.392)

So you work, your work primarily centers around helping business owners get out of the weeds, struggle to let go, things of that nature. Do you find, you know, I know people probably come to you and say like, what's the hack? What's the system? What's the process I need to put in place? Do you find the first thing is really a mindset issue?

Dr. Sabrina Starling (00:59.124)

Mindset is 98 % of the issue, if not 100 % of the issue. And I know for myself, there's so many ways that I have over the years held myself back, held the company back, gotten in my own way, just from the statement of, I can't do that. That runs through my head. You know, we hear wonderful advice and ideas and strategies on podcasts like Duck Tank Marketing. And then,

For whatever reason, we'll say, well, I can't. And I have learned that we can do incredible things that, and we really need to shift any statement that starts with I can't, or I don't know how, or I don't have the resources to what can I, what resources do I need, what support do I need, where can I learn, and just start asking those open-ended questions to create possibilities.

John Jantsch (01:55.278)

Yeah, I know. You know, I've been doing this for a long time and I do know that, you know, one of the things that creeps up all the time for me even this is like, well, I could do it faster myself is one. The other one sometimes is, but that's kind of where I get like my joy or happiness, you know, even if that's like not where I need to be. Right. mean, so sometimes it's, I mean,

Dr. Sabrina Starling (02:12.56)

yeah.

John Jantsch (02:19.906)

Do you ever have sessions where you're like got the couch out and it's like, let's visit your childhood. Cause like, are, what are some of the reasons that these exist?

Dr. Sabrina Starling (02:28.276)

You know, I don't find it very productive to go back to childhood just because we don't have time in life to rehash and figure out where all these issues come from. What I have found is that when our back is up against the wall, we can do things we didn't think were possible. And especially when we have these things in our businesses that we hang on to because they're our fun.

John Jantsch (02:31.118)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

John Jantsch (02:40.066)

That's the doctor part though, right? So I just assumed.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (02:57.462)

our joy. So for me, that was a big example of that is the Profit by Design podcast. I love hosting the podcast. I love sharing and teaching. I love interviewing guests. And then in the summer of 2024, right before I was going to take a four week vacation, fully unplugged, it was the week that I was just wrapping things up.

My husband, Ned, passed away suddenly and unexpectedly. The trauma around that, can't even, I don't have enough background as a psychologist even to go into the level of what that did to me. All I was able to do is call one of my team members and say, don't worry about the business. We're going to figure it out, but I can't be there right now. And

The beauty of that was that somebody in my family had already notified the business. So they already knew, thank goodness. And my team member said, Dr. Shabrita, don't worry, we've got this. You just go do and take whatever time you need. I ended up being completely out of the business, fully out, like I couldn't track anything for six weeks.

And that meant the podcast was just completely taken from me. And I was so relieved that it was. My team member, Melissa, stepped up and started leading the podcast. you know what? We had this whole transition plan in place where she was going to take it over and it was going to take a year and a half for us to get there. Well, this switch flipped overnight and she stepped up and took it.

And she's done amazing things with it and our listenership has grown. We're getting incredible feedback on it. And so, but in my head, back to the mindset issue, I had created like, this is going to be hard. And Melissa had created stuff in her head about the hosting the podcast and all the mental space that would be involved for her and why it would be hard. And all of a sudden we didn't have an option. She just had to run with it.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (05:21.526)

and make it work.

John Jantsch (05:24.238)

Well, and I know that you have in some ways refocused your work a little bit on this idea of secession and sustainability. I think it was always about getting out of the weeds, but I think maybe it's taken a new level of, of, of legacy and impact perhaps. and you, you, you did tell, you did share the story about your, your husband's death off air. so again, I can't imagine, but, talk a little bit about, you know,

Dr. Sabrina Starling (05:32.297)

Yes.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (05:36.649)

Absolutely.

John Jantsch (05:53.954)

that kind of refocus or shifted focus, I should say.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (05:57.633)

So the shift in focus that it created for me, he and I were in the midst of estate planning. Because we're young, you don't expect that life is going to end at this phase of, at this stage of life. And so we had postponed our estate planning for two years for various reasons. You know, we would get started and stop. No, one of the main reasons is not fun.

John Jantsch (06:12.163)

me.

John Jantsch (06:19.722)

It's not very fun is one of the main reasons.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (06:24.842)

But one of the things that I became acutely aware of is one of the barriers for us is there were so many things that felt so complex and so many things to figure out. And so we kept postponing decisions, like we would kick that can down the road. And we'll talk about that next month. We got too much going on this month to deal with this issue. And now that I'm on the other end of it, of feeling the pain of all of our decisions that we didn't make,

John Jantsch (06:34.732)

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (06:54.384)

and living through it and all the complexity that has been created because we didn't make these decisions. It's made me highly aware of all the people in my life that I don't want to put through that, including the business. And so I've really started looking at the business from the lens of if something happened to me today, what's going to happen to the business and most importantly, what's going to happen to my team members who put

everything they have into coming into work and serving our clients. I want them to know they still have a job, a paycheck, and that their opportunities continue to exist regardless of if I'm here or not. And because I know if they're okay, they will take care of our clients. So I'm looking at it from the perspective of what do I need to put in place to make sure that my team is okay. And then I'm looking at it from the perspective of

You know, I don't know what's gonna happen 10 years from now, so I'm not doing my estate planning 10 years from now. I'm doing it based on here's where we are right now. And if something were to happen to me this year or next year, and then I've got a reminder in my scheduling system every other year to prompt me to review my estate planning and the succession planning at Tap the Potential and update it. And that will be how I...

handle things just from a one to two year perspective rather than trying to figure it all out because that trying to figure it all out is too much. And I have a 19 year old and I have an 11 year old who neither of whom have any interest in owning tap the potential or running tap the potential. And so

What does that mean for my team and for the legacy that's been created at Tap the Potential? Tap the Potential has been in existence for 20 years. We support business owners in taking their lives back from our business. We're passionate about what we do. I don't want that to stop if I stop for some reason, right? So how do I ensure that this operation can go on? Well, everything that I've been teaching

Dr. Sabrina Starling (09:12.449)

for how do you build a sustainable business that's profitable and that can run without you applies when it comes to succession planning. Because we're looking at how does the leadership team run the business so that my daughters could continue to own it. And we can create the opportunity for members of the team to purchase it down the road if they so chose. But even if they didn't.

there could still be, it can still be owned by my daughters, but the business can continue to run with the leadership team and the systems that are in place.

John Jantsch (09:51.182)

I'm curious, this kind of launched you on a little bit of understanding more legal structures and financial structures and things that maybe somebody who does exit planning for a living would do?

Dr. Sabrina Starling (10:03.497)

Yes, so absolutely. It's also led me to look at what is the most simple solution to put in place, because there's a lot of legal complexity that could get added into this and financial complexity that a lot of small businesses just aren't in a position to take advantage of and it wouldn't serve them. really looking at, we know this business can run

with the leadership team running it. It has been, we have the processes, we have the systems. So what's really the next level to get the business where if I'm gone and I'm completely out of the picture and a 19 year old and an 11 year old are owning this business, obviously with a trustee, somebody who is guiding them in the background, but ultimately they're the owners.

What needs to happen? Well, the first thing that needs to happen is my daughters need to know the team at Tap the Potential, right? And my team needs to know them. They need to know my intent. All of that needs to be documented. The operating agreements need to be updated at Tap the Potential. That's what my attorney is looking at right now as we speak. And so these are things that

John Jantsch (11:08.973)

Mm.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (11:29.335)

can be done in any small business from the perspective of, if you, John, you have family who want to be a part of duct tape marketing and continue that legacy, but not every small business owner has that. And so.

John Jantsch (11:44.974)

Yeah, but even even up, so I will say, you know, it was not anything intentional, anything planned. You know, she came back from backpacking, you know, after college and said, I need you, do you have like some work I could do? You know, that was literally, you know, how she got into business, you know, 15 years later, 13 years later, you know, she's the CEO. But we have, I will say we have not been intentional. It's been, hey, I know you, you know, me, we trust each other, we'll make it work. And it has.

But I wouldn't suggest that that's probably the path for everyone, is it?

Dr. Sabrina Starling (12:16.535)

If it is an opportunity and a possibility, it's a wonderful thing. But we have so many small business owners at Tap the Potential where the business owners come to us because they're frazzled, they're burnt out. We support them in getting that business profitable and it can run without them. And a lot of times they'll say, now that it's running so smoothly, I don't really want to sell it. I'd like to own it. I like it again. It's fun.

John Jantsch (12:29.388)

Right.

John Jantsch (12:39.918)

I like it again.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (12:45.585)

And so great. And really that's where I am because when I came back, I thought, you know what, I can't run a business. don't want, I need to sell this. I need to get out because my head is just not here. Well, so first off, when you're grieving, you don't make any rash decisions. So fortunately I did not act on that. I just allowed that feeling to be there.

John Jantsch (12:54.208)

Mm-hmm. Mm.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (13:08.311)

And now that I've stepped back in and it's, you we're a little past a year out and I reflect on it, I'm looking at, okay, things are running really smoothly. I can do the parts that I love, which is coming on podcasts and the visibility sharing our message. And one of the things that we wanna be so intentional about it to have the potential is sharing our learning and the journey that we are on. So that's why we're talking in full transparency about this.

But I've seen so many business owners who have family members, adult children, who are maybe in the corporate world and they're hoping to somehow lure those kids to coming in and taking a leadership role in the business. And for one reason or another, it rarely works out. The kids don't have necessarily the same passion that we have, we who founded the business and started it.

John Jantsch (13:46.839)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (14:04.428)

But there are people on our teams who have that passion, who own our immutable laws, who bought into our vision, who help us grow that vision. And it's a very organic process. And so really looking at how do we take what's already strong in the business and allow that to grow and not bottleneck it by saying, I want to continue to own it.

John Jantsch (14:08.364)

Yes.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (14:33.876)

and be in it, there's a difference, then that's transition that I'm in. Now I'm working about 10 hours a week at the most, a lot of weeks it's less than that, and really looking at how do I serve the business, but most importantly making sure that anything that I'm doing can run, can continue without me. So the systems are there to make it happen.

John Jantsch (15:00.301)

So.

What I'm really hearing you say a lot of times too is you're right a lot of times the dream is like, I want my kids to take it over. But you know, really what the typical business really just needs to start actually grooming that was probably not their best word, but grooming leadership folks almost from the beginning, right? I mean, start identifying them with the idea that that however many years from now, you you're going to need leaders if you grow, but also that's your best bet for transitioning.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (15:31.703)

Yes, and it may not be that the leaders buy the business. A lot of times we talk business owners off the ledge. We just had a conversation in one of our small groups this past week where a business owner wanted to give ownership percentage to a member of the leadership team to kind of create a safety net there that that person is going to then take over the business and become a co-owner.

John Jantsch (15:54.646)

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (16:00.183)

A lot of times we've seen that go awry over the years too. And so what we have to remember is that we, the business owners have put a lot of blood, sweat and tears into building these companies. And if we give someone ownership percentage and yes, they may be an incredible leader in the company and they may be doing, you know, they may have great strategic vision and being a huge support. But if we're going to just give the ownership

what are we really doing to that A player? So right, one of the things psychologically that we have to be mindful of is that A players are intrinsically motivated. We show up, we work hard because it matters to us to do a good job. And so when we start giving bonuses or incentives financially to reward an A player who works hard, that takes away that intrinsic motivation. It can interfere.

John Jantsch (16:57.39)

Hmm.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (16:58.432)

with it. And so I'm not saying don't ever give ownership percentage to leadership team. That's not where I'm saying I'm saying be very thoughtful and make sure there is a clear plan and way that that is going to be done. And I would really encourage looking at creating the possibility for people on the leadership team to buy into the business over time, just like you want to buy stock on the stock market into another company, create

those opportunities versus just here you go because you've been a wonderful team member.

John Jantsch (17:32.238)

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So in, in light of everything you've shared today, the four week vacation almost, almost feels trite. You know, because I mean, it's like, I'm sure people that are hearing their story are like, I need to take a four week vacation. Cause who knows what's going to happen tomorrow. Right. And I know that's something you're known for. In a way.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (17:40.376)

you

Dr. Sabrina Starling (17:52.76)

Right.

John Jantsch (17:59.576)

Do you find that sometimes people are like, okay, yeah, that's the goal. That's the goal. I'm to get myself there. But you kind of explain something where maybe just do it and like rip the bandaid off. Do it even if you don't feel ready and see what happens.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (18:13.941)

Yes, so do it and be planful. Like the worst way to do this is, know, sudden and unexpected. When we support business owners in getting to the point where the business can run four weeks without you, we say start small, start with the baby steps. So it's not overwhelming because none of us can talk ourselves into just saying, okay, team, I'm going to be gone for four weeks. Good luck. We're never going to do that.

John Jantsch (18:36.472)

Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (18:39.767)

But if we look at what's the longest we've been able to be away from the business fully unplugged and increase that. So if the longest is four hours, because let's face it, some business owners are tied to their phone constantly feeling like they have to respond to everything. So maybe you take a full day off where you are fully unplugged and really look at what is going to fall through the cracks and

what can be delegated, what can come off my plate. We use a tool called the chart of $10,000 an hour activities. And it is an incredible delegation tool. And it really comes at things from the perspective that we're spending the majority of our time on things that give us very little personal satisfaction and can be competently handled by another person. The statistic is that we spend 44 % of our time.

on activities that offer us little to no personal satisfaction and can be competently handled by another person. And so we want to start moving in the direction where most of our time is focused on these $10,000 an hour activities. We are doing a $10,000 an hour activity when we are working from our strengths, making everything else easier or unnecessary for ourselves or others.

That definition means that every person on the team can be doing $10,000 an hour activity. And the beauty in that is that as we start delegating and taking things off our plate, we will have leadership team members who become overwhelmed and start to burn out because everything we're putting on them, they're kind of just like, I can't breathe.

John Jantsch (20:25.601)

Yes, right.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (20:28.355)

So guess what? They have to learn how to delegate too. And they pull out their chart of $10,000 an hour activities and look at what's the highest and most valuable use of their time around the sweet spot and what drives the profit in the business and start delegating down. This, when we're delegating down in that way, what we're doing is we're creating a business that is highly desirable for A players to work in because A players want one thing.

John Jantsch (20:52.621)

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (20:56.309)

opportunities for growth. Not necessarily advancement, opportunities for growth. And so when we hold on, like when I held on to the podcast hosting, I thought I was just doing it to keep my team member from being overwhelmed. She jumped in and she grew and she is so proud of what she has done with the podcast. Now I just come on, I'm kind of like a guest on my own podcast and we banter back and forth, but she's grown.

and she owns it and she feels proud and that's the rule of thumb around delegating is once you've delegated it and the person has handled it you don't take it back because when you take it back what you're saying is I don't think you're that competent like yeah you handled it in a few weeks but you can't handle it long term and so this this chart of ten thousand dollar an hour activities you can download it at tapthepotential.com forward slash

John Jantsch (21:39.638)

Yeah, you failed, right. Right. Yeah, right.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (21:54.426)

10K. That is the baby step forward to really thinking about how do I get this business where it can run without me and it can live beyond me.

John Jantsch (22:07.522)

That's the perfect segue because I was going to say, what's the one simple thing you just gave it to us? It's tapthepotential.com slash 10 K. So, Sabrina, I appreciate you stopping by, the duct tape marketing podcast. think you'd invite people to find out more at tap the potential anywhere else you want to invite people to connect with you.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (22:11.065)

You

Dr. Sabrina Starling (22:24.971)

If you love podcasts, check out the Profit by Design podcast.

John Jantsch (22:28.366)

Well, again, it was great seeing you. Hopefully we'll run into you one of these days soon out there on the road.

Dr. Sabrina Starling (22:34.862)

Yes, thank you, John.

Scroll back to top

Sign up to receive email updates

Enter your name and email address below and I'll send you periodic updates about the podcast.

powered by

from Duct Tape Marketing https://ift.tt/F8y3VuH
via IFTTT

Why Thought Leadership is the New PR

Why Thought Leadership is the New PR written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

Listen to the full episode:
 

Overview

On this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, John Jantsch interviews Amy Rosenberg—seasoned PR strategist, agency founder, and author of “A Practical Guide to Public Relations for Businesses, Nonprofits, and PR Leaders.” Amy demystifies today’s PR landscape, explains why digital PR is now vital for Google and AI visibility, and shares her practical approach to integrating thought leadership, content, and social media into campaigns that actually move the needle for brands of any size.

About the Guest

Amy Rosenberg is a veteran PR strategist and agency founder with decades of experience helping organizations of all sizes build visibility, credibility, and real-world results. She is the author of two books about PR, and a go-to resource for business owners and PR professionals seeking honest, actionable guidance in a rapidly changing media landscape.

• Website: amyrosenberg.com
• LinkedIn: Amy Rosenberg
• Resources & Blog: PR Marketplace
• Book: “A Practical Guide to Public Relations for Businesses, Nonprofits, and PR Leaders”

Actionable Insights

• You don’t always need PR—start by building a solid online presence and content base before layering in media outreach.
• Modern PR is more than press releases; it’s about thought leadership, digital media coverage, and leveraging those wins for SEO and AI search visibility.
• High domain authority media links are essential—these are trusted by both Google and AI and provide lasting credibility.
• Thought leadership is not just for CEOs—start with strong blog content, pitch expert articles, and build step by step.
• Podcasts are a powerful and efficient PR channel that drive backlinks, content, and allow leaders to practice their message.
• Social media should be systematized—pick your platforms, create rules for content sharing, and always tag media and partners.
• PR impact can be measured: use tools like Muckrack to connect coverage with Google Analytics and tie PR wins to business goals.
• If you’re starting from zero, a monthly blogging program is the best place to begin—then layer in PR as your strategy and resources grow.

Great Moments (with Timestamps)

• 00:55 – Do You Really Need PR?
  Amy explains why sometimes it’s best to start with your online presence before pursuing PR.
• 01:51 – PR and AI Search
  Why digital PR and authentic media coverage are now crucial for Google and AI visibility.
• 03:40 – What is PR in 2025?
  Amy demystifies modern PR—from media relations to crisis comms and strategy.
• 05:46 – PR and SEO
  How high authority media coverage drives both search and credibility.
• 07:16 – Thought Leadership for All
  Practical steps for building authority, even if you’re not a well-known CEO.
• 10:29 – The Power of Podcasts
  Why podcast guesting is a high-ROI PR move for content and reputation.
• 12:49 – Social Media Systems
  How to systematize content, media tagging, and reputation management.
• 14:29 – Measuring PR
  How to connect PR wins with analytics and business outcomes.
• 17:39 – The Best First Step
  Amy’s advice: Start with monthly blogging, then layer in PR and keep your marketing calendar organized.

Insights

“You don’t always need PR—focus on building a solid online presence and content before going after media.”

“Authentic media coverage and thought leadership now drive both SEO and AI search visibility.”

“Podcasts are high-authority PR: great for backlinks, content, and practicing your message.”

“Systematizing your social media is key—pick platforms, create rules, and make your media wins visible.”

“You can measure PR’s impact: connect wins to real business results with analytics and clear goals.”

Sponsored by:

 

Morningmate is the all-in-one work management platform for client-facing teams.

Manage projects, chat, and files in one place—simple to use and scalable as you grow.

Get a 30-day free trial today

 

Duct Tape Transcript

Email Download New Tab

John Jantsch (00:01.496)

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch. My guest today is Amy Rosenberg. She's a seasoned PR strategist, agency founder and author with deep expertise in building visibility and credibility for organizations of all sizes. We are going to talk about her latest book, A Practical Guide to Public Relations for Businesses, Nonprofits and PR Leaders. So Amy, welcome to the show.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (00:28.578)

Hi, thanks for having me.

John Jantsch (00:30.912)

So you cover a lot of ground on the book. mean, it's something that's called a practical guide is usually pretty broad. I mean, traditional media relations, obviously SEOs in there, AIs in there. What are the most common misconceptions basically when it comes to PR that you see businesses still having in 2025?

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (00:55.96)

Well, I'm gonna laugh. If people still think that we need to do press releases, that's like an old misconception that like people should actually be over that by now. But mainly, this is gonna be funny. You don't always need PR. That's kind of the thing. So here's the thing. And that's the whole book title, practical. We need to be practical about things. We don't need to do everything. And sometimes we can do PR. Sometimes we can do a press release, but.

We need to kind of like think about it first and get things organized first. And actually, we need to have ideally a nice online presence first. And then we can go and do some PR. And right now, PR is actually helping with AI search. So showing up in AI. So the old story used to be, PR helps with SEO, which is showing up in Google.

John Jantsch (01:43.47)

Mm-hmm.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (01:51.544)

But now, well, we still want to show up high in Google. And we can do that through digital PR. And I can talk about how. But now, apparently, PR is very important for AI search. But of course, I'm going to have to dig into that because nobody is using that AI.

John Jantsch (02:08.066)

Well, I think there's no question that the AI crawlers, if we're going to call them that, are really looking at trusted media sources to get a lot of their information. there's no mystery, I think, in why that's become more important.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (02:26.284)

Yeah, and so it's always been a mystery to talk about PR because it, well, it's PR people actually like to make it very mysterious. So what I tried to do with my first book and then also now my second is to demystify it. So the first book is for PR people because I started to see a lot of them actually weren't trained and there's kind of a right way and a wrong way to do things. And oftentimes when we have rules,

that kind of helps us in a hard field and it kind of gives us some guidelines to stick by. But as I finished that book, I was thinking, well, this book is really possibly not helpful for business owners because, well, I'm giving a little bit too many examples that the PR people need. And so this book, like five years later, six years later, is much more streamlined, stripped down on the media relations tactics.

really actually leads with thought leadership and how thought leadership, it's always been a part of PR, but now thought leadership is really the key to getting up higher on Google and AI.

John Jantsch (03:40.366)

All right, I want to come back to that. But I think part of the confusion is, you know, in the old days, before we had all these digital platforms, it was really more of a, it was very much a relationship game. was, know, who you knew at the publications because they were very gated. You know, how you could spin a story in a way that was meaningful to a journalist. You those were the real skills. But then all of sudden, you know,

We've got Facebook, or we've got blogs, and we've got Reddit, and we've got all these other things that essentially can be lumped into PR. I mean, how do you help people kind of say what PR actually is?

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (04:19.138)

Well, good question. And I love that because it's I do. Honestly, I kind of do want a little bit of silo or separation. We can take a PR campaign and we can transform it into content to anything. Right. But PR typically is like you're saying the media relations aspect. But also there's a lot of more sometimes some strategy in there.

some crisis comms, some crisis prep. So sometimes we'll know we can pick out our negative aspects and get organized around those and then actually not necessarily spin it, but kind of look at the positive side of our negative aspects and put the stories around those.

John Jantsch (05:09.422)

So you already mentioned SEO and I'm seeing a lot of SEO folks, know, it used to just be, we could get keyword rankings by doing X, Y, and Z all day long. That's how it worked. And I've seen certainly a lot of them say that's not working so well anymore. And I see a lot of SEO people talking more about PR, not as a siloed practice, but as a part of SEO now. And then you make that case certainly in the book.

Do you have an example of where integrating SEO or really thinking like PR as a core component of SEO made a measurable difference?

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (05:46.788)

Well, I feel like right now I'm the worst salesperson ever and I'm the one that will never tout my profession too much because it's a little salesy. But a lot of SEO people have been saying that PR is the actual driver of authentic links. So here's the thing, Google knows when you're buying links, sometimes. So you can kind of like forget,

John Jantsch (06:06.222)

Yeah, totally.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (06:16.792)

sponsored articles sometimes, depending. And then we just need to get our clients, if we can, ourselves on high domain authority websites. And the media actually has a higher domain authority than other websites. So not only are they more credible, well, some media, more credible in the public's eye.

they're more credible in Google's eyes. So if you're showing up in Google, then ideally you would show up in an AI chat box as well. But I mean, that to me is a little nebulous. I feel like more research needs to be done on that. you don't get, anyway, you don't get all of those links that you don't get to review in AI. So it's just gonna get really much more strategic and thoughtful. And that is...

really what PR people are good at.

John Jantsch (07:16.28)

So talk a little bit more about the, the idea of thought leadership. put, know, certainly there's, there's certain types of businesses, certain types of industries. makes a ton of sense, know, nonprofits. certainly makes a ton of sense. Do you feel like that, that needs to be, a strategic component of just about every business? mean, not just that person that's like, I'm, know, I'm this well-known CEO with a book and blah, blah, but just like every business almost has to have like.

their version of an influencer that is, you know, that's seen in the media.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (07:51.788)

Yeah, it would be great if they could. let me just back up a little bit. So thought leadership, so B2B media or thought leadership type of media, that's an easier way to do PR. It's easier to get results for that. So often we are not looking at relationships. We are looking at streamlining. want, because we can't make relationships with everybody. So we need to have good ways to scale our PR campaigns.

John Jantsch (08:02.926)

Mm-hmm.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (08:18.07)

And so when we're doing thought leadership, that's positioning a person, whether it's an article or on the stage, we are streamlining everything because you're getting a lot more value actually in Google's eyes because it all ties back to, I don't know if you know the acronym EAT, I'm gonna mess about, but that's what thought leadership is, is EAT, which is the

John Jantsch (08:41.08)

Sure, of course.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (08:47.46)

what Google looks for. have human reviewers and they're looking for anyone that's writing on a topic to have experience, authority, trust, and there was another one. don't remember. Two T's.

John Jantsch (09:00.406)

It's the other E, the other E they add is expertise. So it's experience, expertise, authority, and trust. And so that's where obviously the media plays a big role, but also being able to say, I did this thing rather than telling somebody how to do it. Case studies, things of that nature have become really.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (09:04.06)

thank you.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (09:20.374)

Yeah, and I just want to add that we don't, we need to kind of start somewhere, right? We don't need to start. A lot of people get really tripped up over thought leadership because first of all, I mentioned this stage. Well, a lot of my clients are shy and they are running companies, they're CEOs and they're busy. know, who really has time to go out and do a lot of speaking engagements, right? So sometimes we will do that, but often we start, you got to start somewhere again. So we start with

content and this is where we're doing great blogs from the CEO and then we're taking that and turning it into a press article and then the press Article can run ideally on a high domain authority website and then our CEO doesn't have to go anywhere like for us We're really all about efficiencies, too. So and I feel like my clients they don't Maybe they don't have time to to get on a stage or

or they don't want to. So that's where this kind of like practical approach to public relations comes in.

John Jantsch (10:29.518)

How do you, I'm going to go through a couple of categories or a couple of platforms, should say, or channels, maybe is a better word, and relate them to PR. You know, I, I, you know, we're on a podcast today, recording this. I happen to think podcasts is amazing channel for thought leadership, for exposure, for backlinks, for content creation that really is not a huge lift for a lot of people, you know, to come and do those. How do you work podcasts or being a guest?

more specifically on a podcast into your overall PR world.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (11:03.46)

Good question. So first of all, they are huge for building domain authority or for getting SEO because, know, so often what we will do is podcasts are part of the whole thing. So we really get detailed with our media lists and this is where we have all of our lists, but we do outline DA. So to tell you the truth, before I decided to do, well, thank you for having me on the podcast.

John Jantsch (11:30.294)

Yeah.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (11:31.34)

I looked and you have a good DA, you have a really good like 54, which for my agency, I'm at like 20 something and I'm a small agency. So you are great. And then the media, they're around 80 to 100. so we look at that and then for some clients, again, they don't wanna be too, they're busy, we don't wanna bug them. And so we will vet.

John Jantsch (11:45.582)

in 70s, 80s, yeah.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (12:00.258)

where we replace them, and then we will also think about it as a way to practice our talking points. So this is where, again, starting somewhere. So if we do wanna go and do a speaking engagement, we do need a little visibility first to get our client accepted. So we start with podcasts, actually. And then sometimes, again, podcasts are more efficient to just keep doing those.

John Jantsch (12:07.597)

Yeah.

John Jantsch (12:23.052)

Mm-hmm.

John Jantsch (12:30.168)

Yeah. Yeah. So, so let's jump to another one. Social media. think for a lot of PR people, it's kind of a double-edged sword from a reputation standpoint. how do you view or how do you advise clients to, work social media into their overall marketing slash PR type of plans?

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (12:49.496)

Well, again, I don't want to say again because I've never said this before, but I noticed that you do a lot of systems work. so we can't busy people, especially myself. We can't do anything without systems. So and so it might not be quote unquote strategic, but we need to get things done. And we do need some visibility on some of the platforms, not all of them. So we'll look at a client will think, OK, on what platforms do you want to

should they be on and then we will create kind of rules around how often we will post about something and a rule would be for example three posts per blog post and then another rule in different writing right you have to write the post differently and then another rule would be at least one if not two posts per media hit and we have to do those because

we have to thank the media and tag them. So anyway, so we have those systems and oftentimes we were a PR firm. So a lot of PR people will say, well, you do social, that's your job. You shouldn't silo it. Well, okay, but here's the thing. Sometimes people just hire us for PR and then we notice they're not doing social and we might need them to because we're looking at a crisis down the road. So we need some positive social now.

John Jantsch (14:16.077)

Mm.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (14:18.252)

And so we will just kind of say, okay, here's our system. This is what we're doing around this social and kind of get it done.

John Jantsch (14:29.74)

So PR, I know you're going to have an answer for this, but I got to set it up this way. know, PR is often looked at as, you know, as a nice to have, you know, you can't measure it. doesn't, it doesn't drive sales necessarily. How do you get a client over that or how do you actually prove to them that the PR is valuable?

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (14:50.308)

Well, again, I just love your questions. Well, like I said, I'm the worst salesperson ever. So I don't. I don't fight people. don't have. Nobody has time for that also. And then also, in a way, they might be right. We have to look at the budget. It's all about your budget and your bandwidth. So some clients we can't we can't work with everybody. That's why we wrote. I wrote the book. But also we would like to work with.

And it doesn't matter what we want. It's who is ready for a PR and who's not. And it's gotta be somebody who you've gotta get your stuff together first, which is your base, which is content, I think, in this day and age. We've gotta have like a nice kind of streamlined thing going so that you're in the groove. We've gotta feed the beast. Then we can layer in some PR. And then we can put PR again on a program.

John Jantsch (15:31.821)

You

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (15:46.69)

where we can look at it like we have goals. They could be almost like sales quota goals, but for PR or content where we say, okay, we're gonna just, we're gonna do one campaign per quarter and that might just be enough. And we just have it all scheduled out so that we're not feeling like we're missing something. But we can't really, we're trying to measure our results, right?

So we do have a great database called Muckrack that is our software that connects with our clients' Google Analytics. And so we can track, like, hey, we have this online school. So we can track where our coverage landed in terms of the location. And we can track the enrollment for the school by location. So you can get really granular with that.

John Jantsch (16:19.681)

Mm-hmm.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (16:45.326)

But at the end of the day, we're all working together as a marketing team in-house, you know, marketing team. And we're not going to say it was from the PR.

John Jantsch (16:54.958)

Yeah, right. So, all right. People listening today, we've been kind of all over the place talking about PR, SEO, a little bit about AI, content, social. If somebody's out there and they're thinking, you know, I need to do more in this, I mean, is there a single most important thing they can focus on, say, the next six months in your view? If somebody said, hey, I want to get the most out of it. And again, I'm not saying, I mean, maybe the best thing they can do is hire you.

But, you know, short of that, are there things that you're telling people that, you need to either stop doing this and start doing this, you know, over the next six months that you think would move the needle the most?

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (17:39.204)

So if you're really just not doing anything, I would just say try and get yourself on a monthly blogging program for SEO. So then you might not consider that PR. But once you kind of get that going, then you can look at like the marketing calendar and kind of think about how when you can do some PR, when you can do some proactive PR. And if you look, I have a...

calendar on my website that is free. need to make sure that you can access the link, but it has, you could fill out your marketing calendar and I call it marketing, but a lot of it is PR. But to be clear, PR looks a little different these days. It's not a press release per se. It's an article or this, that, and the other. So if you're interested in learning more, there's a lot of great resources.

John Jantsch (18:28.354)

Yeah. Yeah.

John Jantsch (18:38.296)

Well, so where would you invite people to kind of find? I know we're going to have links. We have a link to your blog and PR resources. I see. So are there, is there anywhere you'd invite people to connect with you and find out more about the book itself?

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (18:52.196)

Well, I'd love if they would like to connect on LinkedIn. And I'm doing a lot of posts there about PR. And then, yeah, if they want to go to the resources section, and it might actually be under Marketplace on my website, you can buy books there. But also, we have other things there that are free, like a bunch of videos that can walk you through the process.

John Jantsch (19:21.196)

Awesome. Well, again, I appreciate you taking a moment to stop by the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast and hopefully we'll run into you one of these days soon out there on the road.

Amy Rosenberg (She/Her) (19:29.336)

Yay, thank you. Thanks for having me.

Scroll back to top

Sign up to receive email updates

Enter your name and email address below and I'll send you periodic updates about the podcast.

powered by

from Duct Tape Marketing https://ift.tt/gEob8mi
via IFTTT