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In this episode, Chip and Gini discuss the common practice of providing free proposals and baseline ideas to clients. They argue that professional service providers should charge for these services as doing so adds value and ensures a thorough diagnosis before providing solutions. They share personal experiences and compare the situation to doctors who would never prescribe treatment without proper tests. They emphasize the importance of understanding a client’s business through a paid discovery phase and making adjustments along the way to deliver effective results. Additionally, they discuss the risks of providing overly detailed plans in early stages, the benefits of quarterly assessments, and the importance of maintaining clear communication and trust with clients. [read the transcript] The post ALP 282: Stop providing solutions before understanding your client’s challenges appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

GEO – generative engine optimisation – is suddenly everywhere. Is it the new SEO, a passing fad, or simply good communication practice in disguise? In this FIR Interview, Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson talk with Stephanie Grober, Marketing & PR Director at Horowitz Agency in New York, about why GEO matters, the competing narratives surrounding it, and how communicators should prepare for the impact of generative search. What we discussed What GEO actually is – and how it differs from (or builds on) SEO The hype versus the reality: is GEO a genuine discipline or simply “snake oil”? The importance of authority, credibility, and tier 1 media coverage in shaping generative search results Why trade and niche publications are still crucial for visibility Practical steps for PR and comms professionals to get ahead, from media training to message consistency The evolving role of content marketing, press releases, and multimedia in a GEO-driven environment How law firms and professional services balance credibility with regulatory and compliance requirements Where GEO may be heading over the next 12 months About our Conversation Partner Stephanie Grober is the Marketing & Public Relations Director at Horowitz Agency, an integrated marketing and public relations agency with offices in Los Angeles, New York City, and Vancouver (B.C.). Her team works with law firm clients ranging from BigLaw to boutiques, designing and executing content and communications strategies that generate bottom-line growth in measurable ways. Leveraging deep relationships with the press, she delivers high-quality earned media placements for clients and utilizes her extensive marketing background to amplify these results through a multi-channel approach. Stephanie joined Horowitz Agency in 2021 after serving as Marketing and Communications Manager for a Top 50 accounting firm in New York City. Follow Stephanie on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephaniegrober/ Relevant Links https://searchengineland.com/what-is-generative-engine-optimization-geo-444418 https://www.geekytech.co.uk/what-is-generative-engine-optimisation/ https://www.reddit.com/r/seogrowth/comments/1m6k4gx/is_anyone_actually_doing_generative_engine/ https://zapier.com/blog/generative-engine-optimization/ https://a16z.com/geo-over-seo/ https://www.searchenginejournal.com/stop-trying-to-make-geo-happen/554629/ Audio Transcript Shel Holtz (00:01.989) Welcome everybody to a For Immediate Release interview. I’m Shel Holtz. I’m here with Neville Hobson and our guest today, Stephanie Grober, who is marketing and public relations director at Horowitz Agency. Stephanie, it is terrific to join you today. Stephanie Grober (00:19.33) Thank you guys very much for having me very excited to be here and chat a little bit about what we are calling GEO. Shel Holtz (00:27.471) We are, even though some people are disputing that particular moniker. But before we jump into this, Stephanie, I think our listeners would appreciate knowing something about your background. Stephanie Grober (00:40.748) Absolutely. So at Horowitz Agency, we specialize in working with law firms and select individuals. So very much rooted in legal marketing. I’ve been in professional services marketing for about six years now, and I’ve been a marketer for my entire career across several different industries. So I was fortunate to be able to continue honing my craft, focusing on communications and now communications, marketing, NPR for law firms and leading attorneys. Shel Holtz (01:13.837) And what got you into studying this field of AI and generative engine optimization? Stephanie Grober (01:22.7) Well, it’s a very exciting time for public relations professionals. When you are talking about AI and generative engine optimization, you’re going to hear the words authority and credibility, right? And authority and credibility are core principles of public relations. So that right there should signal, wow, this, this sounds like a PR play. And so as research has come out and we’re learning more about generative engine optimization and essentially the AI overviews that are populated when somebody puts a search term into a search engine, we’re finding that the AI is creating a brief summary using sources from the internet. And what are those sources? Well, a lot of them are authoritative sources from top publications where you may have a PR professional working with you to get you quoted. So it all circles back to PR, makes it a very exciting time for PR professionals. Those who have already engaged the services of PR consultants or may have PR services happening in-house are a little bit ahead of the curve right now because they’re already going to be appearing in the authoritative sources that AI likes. @nevillehobson (02:50.272) Great. That’s a very good overview. We talked about this topic, actually, as you know, Stephanie, in the regular episode of this po

In this episode, Chip and Gini discuss how agency owners should handle employees with physical and mental health concerns. They cover the increased openness around mental health and self-care, sharing personal experiences and business challenges. They highlight the importance of individualized management approaches, legal considerations, and quick professional advice. The hosts also emphasize compassionate handling of employee health issues, the need for flexible scheduling, and the impact on small businesses. Gini shares insights on providing support for team members and owners, such as disability insurance, to cover long-term absences. They conclude by underlining the importance of empathetic leadership and offering flexibility. [read the transcript] The post ALP 281: Supporting team members with mental and physical health challenges appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

In this reflective follow-up to our FIR Interview in July with Monsignor Paul Tighe of the Vatican, Neville and guest co-host Silvia Cambié revisit some of the key themes that resonated deeply from that conversation. With a particular focus on the wisdom of the heart – a phrase coined by the Vatican to contrast with the logic of machines – Neville and Silvia explore the ethical responsibilities communicators face in the age of artificial intelligence. The discussion ranges from the dignity of work and the overlooked realities of outsourced labour, to the limitations of technical expertise when values and human well-being are at stake. Silvia expands on her Strategic article focusing on precarious workers, while Neville revisits ideas shared on his blog about the Church’s unique role in advocating for inclusive, human-centred dialogue around AI. Above all, this episode highlights how communicators are uniquely positioned to help organisations navigate the moral and societal questions AI presents – and why they must bring emotional intelligence, narrative skill, and ethical awareness to the forefront of this global conversation. Topics Covered The idea of wisdom of the heart vs logic of the machine Redefining human intelligence in the AI era The Vatican’s call for a global, inclusive debate Dignity of work and the reality of outsourced labour What ethical AI really means – beyond compliance Why communicators must be part of the AI conversation Links from this episode: FIR Interview: Monsignor Paul Tighe on AI, Ethics, and the Role of Humanity ANTIQUA ET NOVA: Note on the Relationship Between Artificial Intelligence and Human Intelligence Speaking for Humanity: The Wisdom of the Heart in the Age of AI A View from The Vatican: AI, Ethics and the “Dignity of Work” We must build AI for people; not to be a person What Does It Mean to Stay Human in the Age of AI? The Rise of Culturally Grounded AI The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, September 29. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on [Neville’s blog](https://www.nevillehobson.io/) and [Shel’s blog](https://holtz.com/blog/). Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Transcript (from video, edited for clarity): @nevillehobson (00:03) Hello everyone and welcome to episode 480 of For Immediate Release. I’m Neville Hobson in the UK. Shel’s away on holiday, but I’m delighted to be joined by Silvia Cambié as guest co-host for this episode. Welcome Silvia. Silvia Cambie (00:17) Thank you Neville, delighted to be here today. @nevillehobson (00:21) Excellent. Glad you said that. So in this short form episode, we’re going to spend time on an interview we did in late July that you, Shel and I did for an FIR interviews episode. We interviewed Monsignor Paul Tighe from the Vatican. He played a central role in shaping the church’s thinking on artificial intelligence and its broader societal impact. He was instrumental in the development of Antiqua et Nova, the Vatican’s note on the relationship between artificial intelligence and human intelligence published in January 2025. In our interview, Monsignor Tighe offered a powerful reflection on how AI challenges us not only technically, but also morally and spiritually. He urged us to consider what makes us human in an age of machines, calling for a global conversation grounded in dignity. agency and what the Vatican calls the wisdom of the heart. So in this episode, Silvia and I want to share what resonated most for us from that conversation and why we believe communicators have a vital role to play in shaping this future. I mentioned this before during the interview, Silvia, that you were instrumental in securing that interview. So tell our listeners, how did it come about? Silvia Cambie (01:38) Yes, indeed Neville. So you and I were talking in the spring when Pope Leo XIV was elected and we were talking about his background in math and science. And so on top of that, the Vatican has been contributing their views to a lot of papers like Antiqua et Nova to the Minerva Dialogue, which is a forum that basically collects views about the human the interaction between humans and AI and the dignity of work. So we were thinking of bringing these voices to the forefront and in particular in relation to your listeners, your listeners and Shel’s listeners who work in comms and work in change management and are often confronted with the moral aspects, value

In this episode, Chip and Gini discuss how to manage situations where clients want to terminate contracts early. Gini emphasizes the importance of having a strong contract with clear termination clauses, which can serve as leverage in negotiations. They share experiences and strategies for recovering outstanding invoices, including offering concessions and being flexible with payment arrangements. The duo also cautions against aggressive tactics like public shaming for non-payment and stresses the importance of maintaining professionalism to avoid burning bridges. They conclude with practical advice on managing accounts receivable and resolving disputes amicably. [read the transcript] The post ALP 280: Handling early client contract terminations with finesse appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Posts and videos featuring Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) hacks and formulas are flooding the web. We reported recently on one such hack focusing on press releases. But when you consider the kind of content on which the AI models rely for their answers, it may be more efficient to revert to good, old-fashioned PR and marketing. Links from this episode: 2025 Report Reveals Average B2B Content Volume Triples: Budgets Barely Budge ChatGPT is sending less traffic to websites – down 52% in a month How a content brand became a trusted resource for LLMs Networks, Not AI or Search, Are the #1 Trusted Source Amid Information Overload Many are sharing charts about Reddit and Wikipedia dominating AI search mentions, desperately trying to crack the code AI-Powered Search: Adapting Your SEO Strategy How AI is reshaping SEO: Challenges, opportunities, and brand strategies for 2025 2025 AI SERP Changes: New Strategies To Gain Local Search Visibility Google users are less likely to click on links when an AI summary appears in the results AI Mode in Search gets new agentic features and expands globally The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, September 29. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: Hi everyone, and welcome to For Immediate Release. This is episode 479. I’m Neville Hobson. And I’m Shel Holtz on Thursday Neville, you and I are going to interview Stephanie Grover, who is the marketing and PR director at Horowitz Agency. This is a marketing agency that works with law firms, production companies, and other professional service providers in the US and Canada. And we’re going to talk, be talking about GEO generative. Optimization, generative engine optimization. I’m not altogether sure, but it’s a hot topic and I thought I would take today’s episode to set the stage for that because we’ve all seen the headlines recently. Chat, GPT, traffic referrals to websites plummeted more than 50% in a single month. This summer, and that’s not a blip. It’s a structural change in how these large language models are surfacing content. [00:01:00] OpenAI tweaked its ranking and suddenly chat GPT Beca became began citing fewer sources, leaning more heavily on places like Wikipedia and Reddit. Useful for users. Yeah. But if you’re a brand counting on visibility, it’s a gut punch. And meanwhile, the volume of content keeps exploding. A new B2B study found content production has tripled year over year, which could be partly attributable marketers flooding the zone with content in the hopes. LLMs will hoover it up and they’ll show up in AI search results. Interestingly, that tripling of content volume has not been accompanied by commensurate budget increases. Mm-hmm. But we’re producing more content than ever but it’s not necessarily better content or content that LLMs are actually going to use. So no surprise that there’s a scramble for the supposed hack that will unlock, sorry. Unlock. Okay. Unlock [00:02:00] rhymes with hack. What can I say? So no surprise that there’s a scramble for the supposed hack that will unlock generative engine optimization. GEO. Some companies are starting to figure out that it’s not about gaming the algorithm, though. It’s about trust. Sylvia la this chief marketing officer at Kenji shared a fascinating case study on LinkedIn. Her team created the sequence, it’s a standalone content brand with its own domain separate from the corporate site. The idea was simple. Create a community driven media hub. Human high quality, free of fluff. The unexpected bonus that came from this is that LLM started treating the sequence as an external authority. When asked about can g chat, GPT doesn’t just reference the company, it references the sequence. In other words, by building a trusted resource that stands on its own apart from the central [00:03:00] brand site, they built credibility, not just with their human audience. But with the algorithms too that aligns perfectly with something else I saw from Liza Adams, another CMO. Who pointed out that the reason Wikipedia and Reddit dominate AI citations isn’t mysterious, it’s because they directly answer real questions using the same plain language. Real people use Adams contrasts two types of marketing teams, the ones wh

For a while, businesses were flexing their social responsibility muscles, weighing in on public policy matters that affected them or their stakeholders. These days, not so much, with leaders fearing reprisal for speaking out. But silence can have its own consequences. Also in this episode: The gap between AI expectations and reality; rent-a-mob services damage the fragile reputation of the public relations profession; too many people think AI is conscious, so we have to devise ways to reinforce among users that it’s not; Denmark is dealing with deepfakes by assigning citizens the copyright to their own likenesses; crediting photographers for the work you copied from the web won’t protect you from lawsuits for unauthorized use. In Dan York’s Tech Report, Dan shares updates on Mastodon’ (at last) introducing quote posts, and Bluesky’s response to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling upholding Mississippi’s law making full access to Bluesky (and other services) contingent upon an age check. Links from this episode: So far, AI Isn’t Taking Jobs or Generating Profit Companies Are Pouring Billions Into A.I. It Has Yet to Pay Off. Seizing the agentic AI advantage Not today, AI: Despite corporate hype, few signs that the tech is taking jobs — yet 1 in 6 workers pretend to use AI amid workplace pressures, survey finds We must build AI for people; not to be a person FIR Interview: Monsignor Paul Tighe on AI and Humanity The Wisdom of the Heart (Neville’s post on Monsignor Tighe’s remarks) As Rent-A-Mob “Protests” Rage, PRSA’s “Ethics” Board is AWOL Boom times for rent-a-mobs Fox News’ Lawrence Jones Presses Rent-A-Mob Company CEO Over Protests Denmark Aims to Use Copyright Law to Protect People From Deepfakes Denmark to tackle deepfakes by giving people copyright to their own features When Does Corporate Silence Backfire? Home Depot keeps quiet on immigration raids outside its doors Facebook post on crediting photographers when you don’t have permission to use their content Unmasking the Copyright Traip: The Dark Side of AI Bots Links from Dan York’s Tech Report: Quote Posts Coming to Mastodon Our Response to Mississippi’s Age Assurance Law – Bluesky The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, September 29. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: @nevillehobson (00:02) Hello everyone and welcome to Four Immediate Release. This is episode 478, the monthly long-form edition for August 2025. I’m Neville Hobson. Shel Holtz (00:14) And I’m Shel Holtz, and we have six reports for you today. Hope you find them illuminating. And if you find any of them worthy of comment, I would hope that you would comment on them. There are a number of ways to comment on the content that you hear on for immediate release. You can send us an email to fircomments at gmail.com and attach an audio file if you like. You can record that audio file. On the FIR website, there’s a tab on the right-hand corner. It says record voicemail and you can record up to 90 seconds. You can record more than one. We know how to edit those things together. So send us your audio comments, but you can also leave comments on the show notes at FIRpodcastnetwork.com. on the posts we make at LinkedIn and Facebook and threads and blue sky and mastodon. You can comment on the FIR community on Facebook. There are lots of ways that you can share your opinion with us so that we can bake those into the show. And we also appreciate your ratings and reviews. So with those comment mechanisms out of the way Neville, let’s. hear about the episodes that we have recorded since our last monthly episode. @nevillehobson (01:33) We did five since then. Actually, it was four plus the last monthly. So we’ll start with that one. It’s episode four, 74 for July, the long-form episode. That one ran one hour, 33 minutes. So a bit shorter than we usually do for the month, which is about hefty, hefty but good, as Donna would say. Yeah, exactly. Shel Holtz (01:52) We were terse. @nevillehobson (01:55) So we covered a number of topics related to AI, was how we titled the episode Show Notes. AI is redefining public relations, driving a change in the way we craft press releases, PR is at the heart of AI optimization and more. Good discussion. had lots of topics. The links are b

With numerous competing business priorities demanding attention, and government policy decisions often pushing sustainability to the back of the agenda, organizational communication professionals play a critical role in keeping sustainability front and center. We are uniquely positioned to connect sustainability to the organization’s purpose, values, and long-term success, ensuring it is viewed not as an isolated initiative but as an integral part of the company’s identity. Through strategic messaging, storytelling, and the consistent integration of sustainability into internal and external narratives, communicators can make environmental goals relevant to every employee’s role and decision-making process. We can spotlight progress, celebrate champions, and translate complex sustainability metrics into compelling, human-centered stories that inspire action. By making sustainability a visible, shared priority across all levels of the organization, communication professionals can help ensure it not only survives but also thrives, despite shifting external pressures. Four Fellows of the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) gathered on August 21, 2025, to share their expertise and experience communicating sustainability during these fraught times. The international panel featured Zora Artis, Brent Carey, Bonnie Caver, and Martha Muzychka, with Shel Holtz serving as moderator. About the panel: Although Zora Artis began her career outside the communications field, she has had an outsize impact on the profession since entering it more than 20 years ago to as an account director and then strategic planner with branding and integrated marcomms agencies. Since then, she has led her own brand and communications consultancy and served as CEO of a 20-person creative, digital, and strategic communication firm. In 2019, formed her current management consulting practice bringing together strategic alignment, brand, and communication expertise. She has received five Gold Quill awards. Her significant contributions to the profession and the body of knowledge include her original research with IABC colleague, Wayne Aspland, on strategic alignment, the role of communications and leadership – the first substantial research effort for the reconfigured IABC Foundation – and co-authoring a subsequent white paper, “The Road to Alignment,” supported by 27 senior communicators from five continents. Zora has also researched the correlation between strategic alignment and experiences and the impact on stakeholder value and brand. This has led her to develop her own proprietary Alignment Experience Framework. She has also examined gender equity, perceptions, and bias in organizations, and wrote a chapter on this topic for the Quadriga University e-reader, Women in PR. Since joining IABC a decade ago, she has impacted IABC as a volunteer, including roles as chair of the IABC Asia Pacific Region and IEB director; she served as the chair of the 2022 World Conference Program Advisory Committee. A certified company director, as chair of the IABC Audit and Risk Committee she introduced proper risk oversight to the board’s processes. Zora has been honored with the 2021 and the 2015 IABC Chair’s Award for Leadership and was named IABC’s 2020 Regional Leader of the Year. She is also a Strategic Communication Management Professional, Fellow of the Australian Marketing Institute, and Certified Practicing Marketer. Bonnie Caver, SCMP, is the Founder and CEO of Reputation Lighthouse, a global change management and reputation consultancy with offices in Denver, Colorado, and Austin, Texas. The firm, which is 20 years old, focuses on leading companies to create, accelerate, and protect their corporate value. She has achieved the highest professional certification for a communication professional, the Strategic Communication Management Professional (SCMP), a distinction at the ANSI/ISO level. She is also a certified strategic change management professional (Kellogg School of Management), a certified crisis manager (Institute of Crisis Management). She holds an advanced certification for reputation through the Reputation Institute (now the RepTrak Company). She is a past chair of the global executive board for the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC). She currently serves on the board of directors for the Global Alliance for Public Relations and Communication Management, where she leads the North American Regional Council and is the New Technology Responsibility/AI Director. Caver is the Vice Chair for the Global Communication Certification Council (GCCC) and leads the IABC Change Management Special Interest Group, which has more than 1,300 members. In addition, she is heavily involved in the global conversation around ethical and responsible AI implementation and led the Global Alliance’s efforts in creating Ethical and Responsible AI Guidelines for the global profession. Brent Carey is an award-winning commu

User-generated content is at a turning point. With generative AI models cranking out tons of slop, content repositories are being polluted with low-quality, often useless material. No website is more vulnerable than Wikipedia, the open-source reference site populated entirely with articles created (and revised) by users. How Wikipedia is handling the issue — in light of its strict governance policies — is worth watching, especially for organizations that also rely on user-generated content. Links from this episode: Wikipedia Editors Adopt ‘Speedy Deletion’ Policy for AI Slop Articles How Wikipedia is fighting AI slop content From the technology community on Reddit: Volunteers fight to keep ‘AI slop’ off Wikipedia Wikipedia:WikiProject AI Cleanup Wikipedia loses challenge against Online Safety Act verification rules Wikipedia can challenge Online Safety Act if strictest rules apply to it, says judge The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, August 25. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: Shel Holtz (00:00) Hi everybody, and welcome to episode number 477 of For Immediate Release. I’m Shel Holtz. @nevillehobson (00:08) And I’m Neville Hobson. Wikipedia has long been held up as one of the internet success stories, a vast collaborative knowledge project that has largely resisted the decline and disorder we’ve seen on so many other platforms. But it’s now facing a new kind of threat, the flood of AI generated content. Editors have a name for it, not just editors by the way, we do as well. It’s called AI slop. And it’s becoming harder to manage as large language models make it easy. to churn out articles that look convincing on the surface, but are riddled with fabricated citations, clumsy phrasing, or even remnants of chat bot prompts like as a large language model. Until now, the process of removing bad articles from Wikipedia has relied on long discussions within the volunteer editor community to build consensus, sometimes lasting weeks or more. That pace is no match for the volume of junk AI can generate. So Wikipedia has now introduced a new defense, a speedy deletion policy that lets administrators immediately remove articles if they clearly bear the hallmarks of AI generation and contain bogus references. It’s a pragmatic fix, they say, not perfect, but enough to stem the tide and signal that unreviewed AI content has no place in an encyclopedia built on human verification and trust. This development is more than just an internal housekeeping matter. It highlights the broader challenge of how open platforms can adapt to the scale and speed of generative AI without losing their integrity. And it comes at a moment when Wikipedia is under pressure from another front, regulation. Just this month, it lost a legal challenge to the UK’s online Safety Act, a ruling that raises concerns about whether its volunteer editors could be exposed to identity checks or new liabilities. The court left some doors open for future challenges, but the signal is clear. the rights and responsibilities of platforms like Wikipedia are being redrawn in real time. Put together these two stories, the fight against AI slop and the battle with regulators shows us that even the most resilient online communities are entering a period of profound change. And that makes Wikipedia a fascinating case study for what lies ahead for all digital knowledge platforms. For communicators, these developments at Wikipedia matter deeply. They touch on questions of credibility. how we can trust the information we rely on and share, and on the growing role of regulation in shaping how online platforms operate. And there are other implications too, from reputation risks when organizations are misrepresented, to the lessons in governance that communicators can draw from how Wikipedia responds. So, Shail, there’s a lot here for communicators to grapple with. What do you see as the most pressing for communicators right now? Shel Holtz (02:52) Well, I think the most pressing is being able to trust the content that you see is accurate and authentic and able to be used in whatever project you’re using it for. And Wikipedia, we know based on how it’s configured, has always been a good source for accurate information because it is community edited, errors are usually

Swarms of consultants descend on companies that have engaged their firms, racking up billable hours and cranking out PowerPoint presentations that summarize the data they’ve analyzed. That business model is at risk, given the amount of that work that AI can now handle. Recognizing the threat, some consulting firms are actively reengineering their businesses, with McKinsey out in front. In this short midweek episode, Shel and Neville review the actions of several firms and agencies, and discuss what might come next for consultants. Links from this episode: AI Is Coming for the Consultants. Inside McKinsey, ‘This Is Existential.’ The AI Revolution in PR: A Wake-Up Call for PR Agencies Inside the AI boom that’s transforming how consultants work at McKinsey, BCG, and Deloitte EY CEO says AI won’t decrease its 400,000-person workforce — but it might help it double in size PwC is training junior accountants to be like managers, because AI is going to be doing the entry-level work How AI is Redefining Strategy Consulting: Insights from McKinsey, BCG, and Bain Will AI Empower the PR Industry or Create Endless Seas of Spam? How AI Agents Benefit PR Agencies Study reveals rising application of AI across communications by the public relations industry Adapting to Change: The Key Trends Redefining Public Relations Firms July layoffs up 140% from last year The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, August 25. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: @nevillehobson (00:02) Hi everyone and welcome to Four immediate release. This is episode 476. I’m Neville Hobson. Shel Holtz (00:08) And I’m Shell Holtz. If you’ve been following the consulting industry lately, or maybe you’re part of it, you’re aware that AI is all the buzz. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that McKinsey & Company, the gold standard in management consulting, is deep in an existential transformation. And if you weren’t watching the video, you didn’t see me make air quotes around existential transformation. It’s their words. ⁓ AI is the catalyst for that transformation and the realization that it can do a lot of what McKinsey’s highly paid human consultants do faster, cheaper, and sometimes just as well. For nearly a century, McKinsey has built into business on armies of bright young consultants, fresh from top universities, synthesizing vast amounts of complex information and advising C-suites on what they ought to do next. But now, instead of a small battalion of analysts, a project might require just two or three people, along with an assortment of AI agents, tools that write in the classic McKinsey tone, check the logic of arguments, summarize interviews, and crank out PowerPoint decks. McKinsey has rolled out, are you sitting down, 12,000 of these AI agents, and its CEO predicts a not too distant future with one AI agent for every human employee. And they’re not alone. Boston Consulting Group has Dexter for presentation building in Gene, a conversational assistant. Deloitte has Sidekick and Zora AI. PwC, KPMG, EY, they all have their own fleets of AI helpers. At McKinsey, over 70 % of employees are already using a tool called Lili, which taps into a century’s worth of the firm’s knowledge. EY is using AI with 80,000 of its tax professionals, and rather than seeing that as a job killer, its CEO says it could actually help them double the firm’s size. And that’s an important point. While AI is eliminating some roles, particularly entry-level repetitive work, it’s also changing the skill mix. For consultants, that means fewer suits with PowerPoints and more partners in the trenches. co-creating solutions with clients and helping organizations implement change. As one Oliver Wyman executive put it, the age of arrogance of the management consultant is over. Clients don’t want abstract strategy anymore, they want execution, training and transformation. Now for those of us in organizational communication, there’s a clear parallel. AI is already reshaping our own work in much the same way, handling… media monitoring, sentiment analysis, and first draft content creation. In public relations, agencies like Edelman and Golan are using AI to track reputation, analyze audience sentiment, and even test campaign i

In this episode, Chip and Gini explore the impact of AI on client expectations. They discuss how AI is perceived to speed up work, leading clients to have unrealistic expectations regarding turnaround times and pricing. The duo emphasizes the need for agencies to set realistic boundaries and manage expectations from the outset. They share stories about AI’s inconsistency, particularly in generating imagery and written content, and stress the importance of educating clients on the limitations and potential of AI. Ultimately, they advocate for leveraging AI’s efficiencies while maintaining transparency and setting clear guidelines with clients to avoid morale and operational issues within your agency. [read the transcript] The post ALP 279: Setting client expectations in the AI era appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

It has been 12 years since Google shut down Google Reader, its popular RSS news reader. The rise of social media newsfeeds had rendered RSS useless for many people, and declining usage led Google to sunset it. But RSS feeds never went away. Many websites still make them available; they’re baked into most blogging utilities; and podcasting relies heavily on RSS feeds for distribution of audio and video files. As algorithms determine what you see in social networks, and newsletter subscriptions require visits to your inbox, where your newsletters are mixed in with all your other emails, RSS news readers are making a comeback. New news readers are emerging, and older ones are making improvements with a range of features, including the incorporation of AI to assist with sorting and other tasks. In this short midweek FIR episode, Neville and Shel explore the benefits of RSS, examine some of the features of the latest crop of readers, and discuss how an RSS resurgence can benefit communicators. Links from this episode: Curate your own newspaper with RSS Reddit RSS discussion Why RSS Feeds Are Still Relevant in 2025 The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, August 25. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: Shel Holtz (00:01) Hi everybody and welcome to episode number 475 of Four Immediate Release. I’m Shel Holtz. @nevillehobson (00:09) and I’m Neville Hobson. At the dawn of blogging 25 years ago, RSS was a quiet revolution. It let anyone subscribe to a blog or a podcast and receive updates instantly. No gatekeepers, no ads, no algorithms deciding what you should see. Just a simple feed, delivering content directly to your reader of choice. Fast forward to today and the digital landscape could hardly be more different. Our online experiences are now shaped by social media algorithms. filtered through engagement metrics and interrupted by endless distractions. Many people have never even heard of RSS and those who do often assume it’s long gone. But here’s the twist, it never went away. And according to writer and technologist Molly White, best known for her clear-eyed critiques of Web3 and crypto hype, RSS may be due for a comeback. We’ll take a look at this right after this message. In a recent long form post titled Curate Your Own Newspaper with RSS, Molly makes the case for reclaiming this overlooked piece of internet plumbing. It’s part how-to guide, part manifesto. She walks through setting up a modern feed reader, finding hidden RSS feeds, and building a curated stream of blogs, news and newsletters that reflect your actual interests, not what some platform thinks will keep you scrolling. She even shares how she structures her own reading habits. offering a kind of digital self-care routine for anyone feeling overwhelmed by the flood of content today. Reading it, I was struck by how radical RSS now feels, not because it’s new, but because it puts the user back in charge. It reminded me of the early blogosphere when independent voices flourished and content was shared freely through syndication. That original spirit of openness and autonomy is still there, waiting to be rediscovered. People are talking about an RSS comeback. driven by digital fatigue and a yearning for direct ad-free content. The Reddit RSS subreddit remains active, with users debating RSS’s survival and sharing workarounds where publishers drop support. Worries persist, though, especially about publishers de-prioritizing RSS or hiding feeds. And tech ecosystems like podcasting and the Fediverse continue to depend on feed standards. In a world increasingly centralized, RSS is decentralized. In a world designed to grab attention, it respects your time. And in the world of world gardens, keeps the door open. And here’s a great comment on Hacker News. We’ve been fed algorithmic garbage for so long, people are rediscovering how good a hand-picked feed of trusted sources can feel. So here’s a question for us to explore. What role could RSS play in communication today? Could it help rebuild trust in a media environment dominated by algorithms? Could communicators use it to deliver information more transparently or to reconnect with audiences looking for more intentional, less manipulative content? And for internal communication, other ways to syndicate updat

In this episode, Chip and Gini focus on the issue of employees over-servicing clients. They discuss the reasons behind over-servicing, including fear of client dissatisfaction and insufficient initial project scopes. The hosts emphasize the importance of educating employees on the long-term negative impacts, both on agency profitability and client relationships. They advocate for involving employees in strategic planning and scoping processes to ensure accurate budgeting and foster accountability. Chip and Gini also highlight the benefits of regular communication and collaboration with team members to prevent recurring problems and enhance overall agency efficiency. [read the transcript] The post ALP 278: What to do when agency employees continue to over-service clients appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

In this episode, host Chip speaks with Emily Allard, the founder of 24 Sports Marketing. Emily shares her journey from being a professional softball player to starting her own sports marketing agency focused on women’s athletics. She discusses the challenges and opportunities in promoting women’s sports, emphasizing the importance of storytelling and education in digital marketing. They also delve into the growth of women’s sports, the impact of key personalities, and the need for strategic and integrity-driven business practices. Emily offers insights for aspiring agency owners and highlights the potential future directions for her business. [read the transcript] The post CWC 112: Building a Passion-Driven Agency (featuring Emily Allard) appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

“Artificial intelligence will not save us. But it might help us understand who we are.” – Monsignor Paul Tighe In one of our most thought-provoking FIR Interviews to date, we speak with Monsignor Paul Tighe, Secretary of the Section of Culture of the Dicastery for Culture and Education at The Vatican, about the ethical dimensions of artificial intelligence and the role of the Church in shaping global conversations around technology. As AI continues its rapid development and deployment across all sectors of society, the question of how we use it – and why – has never been more important. From concerns about algorithmic dehumanisation to the challenge of building ethical cultures inside corporations, Msgr. Tighe brings a unique voice of moral clarity and practical insight to the discussion. In this wide-ranging conversation with FIR co-hosts Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson, and guest co-host Silvia Cambié, Msgr. Tighe addresses: Why the Vatican published Antiqua et Nova, a foundational text on the relationship between AI and human intelligence, in January 2025. How AI challenges our definitions of intelligence, decision-making, and moral responsibility. The dignity of work in an age of automation and algorithmic management. How corporate communicators can foster trust, transparency, and ethical accountability in their organisations. The moral obligations of companies developing AI, and the limitations of relying solely on regulation or benevolence. Why global conversations on AI ethics must include voices beyond technologists and ethicists – including religious, cultural, and social communities. From practical reflections on professional identity and solidarity to broader insights on how we can avoid becoming de-skilled or ethically numb in a machine-paced world, Msgr Tighe offers a balanced view: not alarmist, but clear-eyed about both risks and opportunities. He reminds us that technology reflects the mindset of its makers – and that responsibility must remain human. “We must not become blindly dependent on technology. We must cultivate the wisdom of the heart.” Why This Matters For communicators, business leaders, technologists, and policymakers alike, this interview is a compelling call to think more deeply – and act more responsibly – in shaping the future of AI. The conversation offers rare insight into how values like dignity, trust, and ethical discernment can and must coexist with innovation. Whether you’re navigating the rollout of AI in your organisation or simply grappling with its broader societal implications, this is a conversation worth hearing – and sharing. Listen now, read the transcript (below) or watch the video version, and be part of a vital global dialogue. About Our Conversation Partner A native of Navan, County Meath in the Republic of Ireland, Monsignor Paul Tighe was ordained a priest of the Dublin Diocese in 1983. After post-graduate studies in Rome, he was appointed as a lecturer in Moral Theology in the Mater Dei Institute in Dublin, where he was appointed head of the Theology department in 2000. In 2007, he was appointed as Secretary of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications. In that capacity, he was involved in promoting Church reflection on the importance of digital culture and in the launch of some of the social media initiatives of the Holy See. In 2015, he was nominated to the Pontifical Council for Culture and as titular Bishop of Drivastum. At the Council, he followed questions related to digital culture and technology. In October 2022, he was appointed as Secretary of the newly established Dicastery for Culture and Education, where he has particular responsibility for the Culture section. In January 2025, that Dicastery, together with the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, published ‘ANTIQUA ET NOVA: Note on the Relationship Between Artificial Intelligence and Human Intelligence.’ Paul Tighe Wikipedia entry Links from this Interview: Dicastery for Culture and Education at The Vatican Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith ANTIQUA ET NOVA: Note on the Relationship Between Artificial Intelligence and Human Intelligence Transcript of the Audio Podcast Based on the audio recording of the FIR Interview recorded on 22 July 2025. Lightly edited for clarity and syntax, and formatted for the reader experience. Neville Hobson As artificial intelligence transforms society, who speaks for humanity? In this FIR interview, The Vatican’s Monsignor Paul Tighe shares why the Church is stepping forward in the global tech debate, exploring how dignity and ethical responsibility must lead the way. V/o and intro music This is For Immediate Release, the podcast for communicators. Shel Holtz Welcome everyone to a For Immediate Release interview. I’m Shel Holtz in the US and I’m joined today by my co-host Neville Hobson in the UK and our guest co-host Silvia Cambié in Italy. And I’m very pleased to welcome our interview guest Monsignor Paul Ti

In multiple ways, Artificial Intelligence is redefining the role of the public relations professional. Some of that change is the result of new tools that automate processes that once consumed copious amounts of time. One such tool reviews services that solicit expert commentary at journalists’ requests, then crafts responses. The marketing of this tool, dubbed Synapse by its Lithuanian founders, has sparked a considerable amount of controversy over ethical considerations. Neville and Shel discuss the pros and cons in this long-form FIR episode for July 2025. Communicators are now also supposed to be able to detect phishing attacks disguised as media inquiries, to abandon age-old metrics in favor of meaningful outcomes, and overcome old tropes, like one wheeled out by former communicator Melinda French Gates, who claimed without evidence that tech executives like Mark Zuckerberg have aligned themselves with the Donald Trump Administration only at the behest of their communication teams. Also in this episode: AI is driving a change in the way we craft press releases, drawing the Social Media Press Release to mind. PR is at the heart of AI optimization, since third-party sources are a vital factor in determining what finds its way into AI answers. Social media has transformed from a means of connecting with others to a platform for streaming entertainment. What are the implications for brands? More and more brands are launching Substack newsletters as a way to control the message and engage directly with customers. In his Tech Report, Dan York reports on media companies erecting paywalls to prevent AI models from harvesting their content. The consequences could be enormous. Links from this episode: PR agency sells AI tool which sends out automated expert comment to journalists HOLY MOLY: a PR firm just introduced an AI tool which sends out automated expert comments to journalist requests. Wellstone Public Relations PR pros face new wave of phishing attacks from fake journalists No, Modern PR Does NOT demand another metric Melinda French Gates says some tech titans siding with Trump are doing ‘what some comms person’ tells them instead of living by their values Sarah Evans on the New Way to Write Press Releases in the Generative AI Age What is a social media press release and why should you use it (a bit of nostalgia) Why PR is becoming more essential for AI search visibility How You Can Track Brand Authority For AI Search In the Age of AI Search, PR Holds the Keys to Visibility AI search is upending the PR industry—how brands and agencies need to adapt How AI Is Reshaping SEO: Insights from Search Engine Land and Fractl Why PR Is Your Brand’s Best Defense in the AI Search Era How to Optimize Your Press Releases for AI Search What’s Really Changing with Social Media? Start with These 10 Trends Social Media is Dead. Here’s What’s Next: Mark Zuckerberg Unleases His Vision for the Future of Human Connection Online Welcome to the brand newsletter era Why More Brands Should Bet on Substack 5+ Best Practices for Award-Winning Brand Newsletters Extra! Extra! Brand Newsletters Educate and Entertain Links from Dan York’s Tech Report How Google’s A.I. Search May Kill News Dead AI is killing the web. Can anything save it? What happens to the news business when people stop clicking? The Age-Checked Internet Has Arrived Tea App Hacked: 13,000 photos leaked after 4chan call to action Archive Today The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, August 25. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: Shel Holtz (00:02) Hi everybody, and welcome to episode number 474 of For Immediate Release. This is our long-form monthly episode. For July 2025, I’m Shel Holtz in Concord, California. @nevillehobson (00:15) and I’m Neville Hobson at Somerset in England. Shel Holtz (00:19) And as always, we have six really fascinating reports for you addressing the intersection of communication and technology. Dan York is here with a terrific report on the growing number of paywalls and what the impact of that will be on news on the internet. And before we get to all of that, as always, we do have some housekeeping to take care of. Starting with a review of the episodes since our last monthly. Neville, you want to give us that rundown? @nevillehobson (00:50) Yeah. Yeah. So starting with the las

It has been more than 60 years since Marshall McLuhan told us that the medium is the message. The decades that have passed since then have done nothing to diminish the truth of McLuhan’s prescient statement. For today’s employees, the medium for most information is the digital interfaces the company provides. There’s an interface for the intranet, for email, for internal social networking and collaboration, for emergency alerts, for calendaring, and for all manner of resources employees need to get their work done. What message do these interfaces send to employees? If they’re unified, consumer-grade, and make it easy to do the job, the message is one of caring. If they’re confusing, difficult to navigate, and result in frustration, employees can perceive that message as one of dismissal or even contempt. It certainly signals that the company doesn’t care. Who should own the digital employee experience (DEX)? A number of recent commentaries have argued that internal communication should be at the helm, which may be counterintuitive in many organizations where anything digital is IT’s responsibility. We explore the case for internal communication’s DEX role in this short midweek episode. Links from this episode From Baby Bottles to Employee Portals: Catching Up on the Internal Comms Shift Toward DEX ‘Employees feel capable and connected’: the vital role played by good technology in job satisfaction Digital employee experience: why internal communications should care Driving Employee Experience: The critical role of internal communications 5 Core Components of a Stellar Digital Employee Experience (DEX) How to Build a Winning Digital Employee Experience (DEX) Strategy 7 Steps to Improve Your Digital Employee Experience (DEX) A Blueprint That Binds: The First Principle of Digital Employee Experience The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, July 28. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: @nevillehobson (00:00) Hi everyone and welcome to Four Immediate Release. This is episode 473. I’m Neville Hobson. Shel Holtz (00:07) And I’m Shell Holtz. In the mid-90s, when intranets were still a novelty, I remember being asked by clients, shouldn’t IT own the intranet? I mean, it’s the technology. It’s sitting on servers, right? And my answer then is the same I’d give today if someone asked whether IT should own the digital employee experience. No, it shouldn’t. And here’s why. Digital experience, DEX, isn’t a text function. It’s a people function. And that makes it a communication function. And I’ll explain in more detail right after this. So what do we mean by DEX exactly? The folks at Step 2 define it as the sum total of digital interactions within an employee’s work environment. That includes the tools they use, the systems they navigate, and the way those tools make them feel. Frustrated, empowered, ignored, engaged. The emotional response to the digital workplace matters. A report from the Guardians Digital Workspace Reimagined series points to research showing that when technology works seamlessly, employees feel more capable, more connected, and more engaged. But when it doesn’t, when systems are confusing, slow, or fragmented, it undermines productivity, it increases burnout, and erodes trust. In other words, all that stuff internal communicators are supposed to be helping to prevent. For years, we’ve treated tech as the exclusive domain of IT and experience as the domain of HR. DEX occupies a space that’s weirdly in between, but the tools themselves don’t create the experience. It’s the communication that does. As NextThink notes in its blueprint for DEX strategy, digital friction is often the result of inconsistent onboarding, poor internal messaging, or an absence of user feedback. you know, things that communicators deal with all the time. Let’s consider just a few of the moments internal communicators already touch. Tool rollouts, you teams migration drama, that was all on us, right? Crisis response platforms, knowledge hubs, portals, intranets, resource centers, company-wide surveys, training and onboarding flows, and every digital touch point where an employee needs to find, understand, and act on information. Those aren’t IT p

In this episode, Chip and Gini discuss the importance of having a clear vision for where an agency is headed while also acknowledging the need for strong operational skills. They explore different types of agency owners, from visionaries to those who excel in operational management, and emphasize the necessity of balancing these roles within a team. The duo highlights the importance of complementing one’s weaknesses by hiring the right people, whether it involves bringing in operational expertise or visionary ideas. They also share personal anecdotes and practical advice on maintaining this balance for the long-term success of an agency. [read the transcript] The post ALP 277: You don’t need to be a visionary, but it helps to have a vision for your agency appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Communication leadership takes many forms, each requiring its own set of skills and vision. At its core, it involves leading a communication team—setting direction, fostering talent, and ensuring excellence in execution. On a broader scale, communication leaders play a critical role in guiding the entire organization’s messaging, advising executives, and shaping the narrative both internally and externally. Beyond the organization, communication professionals often step into industry leadership, setting standards, sharing best practices, and elevating the profession as a whole. Whether managing teams, advising the C-suite, or championing industry progress, communication leaders are essential in building trust, driving alignment, and advancing both organizational and professional goals. Four Fellows of the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) discussed the qualities of communication leadership during the most recent Circle of Fellows panel. During the hourlong conversation, you’ll discover how communication experts drive alignment, build trust, and shape culture from the inside out. You’ll gain practical strategies and fresh insights from industry leaders, equipping you to influence decisions at the highest levels and make a measurable impact on your organization’s success. About the panel: Russell Grossman, DipPR, ABC, FRSA, FCIPR, FCIM, IABC Fellow, has been a communications practitioner for nearly 40 years and a UK Senior Civil Servant since 2006. He recently stepped down from his position as the Director of Communications at the UK Rail Regulator, the Office of Rail and Road, and head of the Government Communication Service (GCS) internal communications profession. He’s a non-executive director of the “Engage for Success ” movement, which aims to advance employee engagement, and a sponsor for both the GCS Fast Stream and GCS Talent. Russell and his long-suffering wife of 38 years are blessed with four children (one of whom also works within GCS) and five grandchildren. Sue Heuman, ABC, MC, IABC Fellow, based in Edmonton, Canada, is an award-winning, accredited authority on organizational communications with more than 40 years of experience. Since co-founding Focus Communications in 2002, Sue has worked with clients to define, understand, and achieve their communications objectives. Sue is a highly sought-after executive advisor, specializing in leading communication audits and strategies for clients across all three sectors. Much of her practice involves a strategic review of the communications function within an organization, analyzing channels and audiences. She creates strategic communication plans and provides expertise to enable their execution. Sue has been a member of the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) since 1984, which enables her to both stay current with and contribute to the field of communications practices. In 2016, Sue received the prestigious Rae Hamlin Award from IABC in recognition of her work to promote Global Standards for communication. She was also named 2016 IABC Edmonton Chapter Communicator of the Year. In 2018, IABC named Sue a Master Communicator, the Association’s highest honor in Canada. Sue earned the IABC Fellow designation in 2022. Mike Klein is a communication leader with experience spanning corporate, political, and NGO communication, focusing on internal communication and the social dynamics of organizations and societies. Mike is the founder of #WeLeadComms, the world’s largest recognition program for communication leaders, a former IABC EMENA Regional Chair, and the author of “From Lincoln to LinkedIn”, a guide to understanding and influencing social communication in enterprises and communities. He is based in Reykjavik, Iceland, and has lived in seven countries. He has driven communication programs in major organizations, including Shell, Maersk, and Cargill, and holds an MBA from the London Business School. Robin McCasland, IABC Fellow, SCMP, is Senior Director of Corporate Communications for Health Care Service Corporation (HCSC). She leads the company’s communications team and the employee listening program, demonstrating to senior leaders how employee and executive communication add value to the business’s bottom line. Previously, Robin excelled in leadership roles in communication for Texas Instruments, Dell, Tenet Healthcare, and Burlington Northern Santa Fe. She has also worked for large and boutique HR consulting firms, leading major communication initiatives for various well-known companies. Robin is a past IABC chairman and has served in numerous association leadership roles for over 30 years. She was honored in 2023 and 2021 by Ragan/PR Daily as one of the Top Women Leaders in Communication. She’s also received IABC Southern Region and IABC Dallas Communicator of the Year honors. Robin is a graduate of The University of Texas at Austin and a Leadership Texas alumnus. Her own podcast, Torpid Liver (and

New research reveals that B2B decision-makers have increasingly recognized the importance of trust. The study also showed that companies that measure trust as a board-level KPI are over three times more likely to report more substantial profits than those that don’t, yet only 22% of companies state that trust is a board-level KPI. In this brief midweek episode, Neville and Shel analyze the data and explore opportunities for communicators to enhance organizational trust. Links from this episode: IPA | New IPA/FT global study reveals trust is a powerful business driver 2025 Edelman Trust Barometer The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, July 28. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: Shel Holtz (00:01) Hi everybody and welcome to episode number 472 of Four Immediate Release. I’m Shel Holtz. @nevillehobson (00:08) And I’m Neville Hobson. A new study from the Financial Times and the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising, the IPA, explores trust, not as a vague ideal, but as a measurable strategic asset. And their findings are quite compelling. Trust, the report shows, is now one of the most powerful drivers of profit, customer acquisition, brand strength, second only to product or service quality. But alongside this, the research highlights a growing trust gap. the space between what customers, clients and partners expect from brands and what those businesses are actually delivering. That gap has real commercial consequences, reduced loyalty, slower growth, weaker brand equity and ultimately lost revenue. So what can businesses do about it? The report outlines five key pillars of trust, competence, reliability, integrity, intent and communication, all of which can be measured and managed. It encourages businesses to treat trust as a board level priority, not an afterthought. What’s interesting is that these pillars combine both rational and emotional dimensions. Trust, after all, is as much about how people feel as it is about what they know. And in B2B settings, where buying decisions are complex, involve multiple stakeholders, and carry career level risk, trust becomes a critical shortcut to action. There are clear parallels here with Edelman’s 2025 trust barometer. which painted a similarly stark picture of declining institutional trust, anxiety about misinformation and widespread concern over AI. In fact, Edelman reported that 85 % of respondents to their survey worry about losing their jobs to AI. The FT and IPA report picks up that thread and takes it further, showing that while many companies are adopting AI, very few business decision makers actually trust the content it generates. Just 9 % of those surveyed said they trusted generative AI. And 92 % said that if a company misuses AI, would have a profound negative impact on their trust. What emerges is a strong case of putting trust back at the center of how we plan, communicate, and lead. For communicators, that means treating trust not as a reputational buffer, but as a long-term asset, something to measure, manage, and embed across every part of the brand experience. When I first looked at this report’s findings, I thought that surely there cannot still be such a trust gap as we’ve been talking about trust gaps for years. Clearly there’s still work to do and questions to answer. Here are two. What role should communicators and marketers play in closing the trust gap? And how can we align intent and action in a way that actually strengthens trust rather than erodes it? Shell, thoughts? Shel Holtz (02:57) tons of them. First, I’m just stunned that we’re still talking about this. We’ve been talking about this on the show for as long as we’ve been doing the show, but it predates that. I I remember when the IEBC Research Foundation produced one of those academic level studies on trust. And that was supposed to be a catalyst for everybody to be able to resolve all of this in their organizations. And here we are. @nevillehobson (03:06) Yeah. Shel Holtz (03:22) Yeah, there are certainly a lot of reasons that trust remains an issue. think people don’t trust each other if they are on opposite sides of a polarized political equation, for example. I think, as you mentioned, not being able to trust the authenticity of content that you see or even people that you see

In this episode, Chip and Gini discuss the frequent occurrence of receiving offers to buy agencies and how to handle these communications. They share their own experiences of receiving such emails, including the prevalence of fraudulent or unserious offers. Gini describes her method of vetting these emails, such as examining URLs and LinkedIn profiles, and emphasizes the importance of legitimate connections within the industry. Chip provides further insights into the credibility of business brokers and the typical behaviors to watch out for. Both caution against making emotional decisions and underscore the necessity of due diligence, patient decision-making, and listening to one’s gut feelings. They conclude by highlighting the importance of proper advice and support for making sound decisions in the agency selling process. [read the transcript] The post ALP 276: How to handle unsolicited agency acquisition emails appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

There’s a new brand of influencer. Faceless creators wield their influence while never appearing on camera, while VTubers — virtual YouTubers — employ AI-generated avatars instead of showing their faces. This is no flash-in-the-pan trend. One network of faceless creators grew from 5,000 to 21,000 creators in just three months, with some raking in as much as $40,000 per month from brands eager to add their content to the mix. There are numerous reasons this shift is happening, from social networks like TikTok elevating its algorithm over follower counts (enabling someone with few followers to see a post go viral) to the ability for brands to pay for performance instead of impressions. In this short midweek episode, Neville and Shel look at the pros and cons of faceless creators. Links from this episode: WTF is behind the explosion of faceless creators? Faceless creators and VTubers are reshaping influencer marketing There’s a Rise of Six-Figure Faceless Creators The Rise of Faceless Creators: How AI Avatars Are Redefining Digital Storytelling Faceless influencers are becoming famous online 10 Best Faceless YouTube Niches to Start in 2025 5X: The five seismic shifts that will reshape communications and marketing over the next five years Influencing Without the Influencers Liquid Death Commercial Made with AI The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, July 28. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: @nevillehobson (00:00) Hi everyone and welcome to For Immediate Release. This is episode 471. I’m Neville Hobson in the UK. Shel Holtz (00:07) And I’m Shel Holtz in the U.S. And there is something going on that’s quietly shifting how brands reach audiences. Faceless creators, social media influencers building massive reach without ever showing their faces. This isn’t just another social media trend. This is a fundamental change in content creation and monetization. And we’ll dig into it right after this. So let’s start with what we’re actually talking about. Faceless creators publish videos and clips without appearing on camera. Affiliate network grew from 5,000 to 21,000 faceless creators in just three months. Top performers are pulling in 30,000 to $40,000 a month from brand deals. Man, I’m in the wrong line of work. But here’s where it gets interesting. Many of these faceless creators are students or part-timers running multiple accounts, posting hundreds of pieces daily, some of them posting as many as a thousand posts per day. They’ve cracked the code, if you will, on algorithmic discovery, understanding that in the attention economy, volume and optimization often trump polish and personality. Three forces created this explosion. First, have platforms like TikTok that have deprioritized follower counts. Algorithmic feeds boost engaging content regardless of creator size. A faceless account with zero followers can reach millions of people. Second, AI democratized production. You can call it AI slop, but text to video bots, AI thumbnails, multilingual dubbing, mass content production is now scalable by one person who’s got the right tools. Third, performance-based compensation. Creators are getting paid on views and conversions, not flat fees. Brands can experiment at scale without upfront investment. VTubers, virtual YouTubers, use AI avatars and motion capture to create remarkably human personalities. Blue, and it’s spelled B-L-O-O, has millions of subscribers and seven-figure revenue. It editing, thumbnails, and multi-language dubbing. Brands aren’t just attracted to the novelty. They want autonomy, cost efficiency, and creative control. No scheduling conflicts, no scandals, no contract renegotiations, just consistent on-brand content at machine speed. This isn’t just about marketing. It’s also organizational communication. Scalability and ROI are becoming non-negotiable, but authenticity trade-offs are real. The lack of a human presence raises questions about trust in and alignment. Best practice is emerging though, and that’s to blend human content with virtual elements, have virtual influencers interact with real people, or introduce faithless content through recognizable human voices. The most successful organizations embrace new formats without abandoning the human el

How do we prove the real value of communication in an age of fragmented media, AI-driven analysis, and relentless demand for results? In this episode of FIR Interviews, we talk with Richard Bagnall, a Board director at AMEC, the International Association for the Measurement and Evaluation of Communication, and a global authority on comms measurement, about the newly released Barcelona Principles 4.0 – the most comprehensive update yet to the world’s leading framework for communication neasurement and evaluation. From embracing transparency, ethics, and impact, to the contentious advertising value equivalents (AVEs) metric, this conversation is a must-listen for anyone serious about elevating the role of communication in modern organisations. The conversation centres on Richard’s insights into the thinking behind the update, what has changed since version 3.0, and why these principles matter more than ever in a fast-evolving media and technology landscape. Among the key themes discussed: Why setting measurable objectives remains fundamental to meaningful evaluation. The shift toward understanding stakeholder audiences as active participants, not passive targets. The need for comprehensive measurement across all relevant channels – digital, offline, internal and external. Balancing quantitative data with qualitative insights to deliver context and meaning. AMEC’s strong and unambiguous stance against advertising value equivalents (AVEs) – and why they’re still showing up in client requests. The growing influence of AI tools, including how they support (and challenge) ethical and transparent measurement practices. How comms professionals and organisations can adopt the principles practically, regardless of size or budget. Richard also highlights AMEC’s tools and resources – including the Integrated Evaluation Framework and Measurement Maturity Mapper – to help organisations move from outdated metrics to strategic, outcomes-focused evaluation. Listen now to hear why Barcelona Principles 4.0 is not just an update, but a call to action for the global communications industry. About Our Conversation Partner Richard Bagnall is Co-Founder of CommsClarity Consulting Ltd, Board Director of AMEC, the global trade body for communications measurement, and a non-executive Director at Milk & Honey PR. He is a globally recognised expert in PR and communications measurement, planning, and research, with over 30 years’ experience. He has led several of the sector’s most respected media intelligence and evaluation firms, including Metrica, Gorkana, PRIME Research, and CARMA, and has advised many of the world’s top brands. He now applies this experience at CommsClarity Consulting, which he co-founded to support PR agencies, in-house teams, and media intelligence firms with strategy, best practice evaluation, insight generation, and business scaling. For the past decade, Richard has advised the UK Government’s Strategy & Evaluation Council and co-authored its Digital Communications Capabilities Review. A long-serving leader at AMEC, he chaired the organisation for six years and has been a driving force behind many of its best-known resources, including the Integrated Evaluation Framework, the revised Barcelona Principles, its PR Planning Guide, and Measurement Maturity Mapper. Richard is a Fellow of AMEC, the PRCA (Public Relations and Communications Association), and an Honorary Fellow of the CIPR (Chartered Institute of Public Relations). His lifetime commitment to improving communications evaluation has earned multiple accolades, including the CIPR President’s Medal, the SABRE Award for Outstanding Individual Achievement, AMEC’s Don Bartholomew Award, and induction into PR News’ PR Measurement Hall of Fame. Follow Richard Bagnall on Linkedin. Links from this Interview: Barcelona Principles v4.0 https://amecorg.com/resources/barcelona-principles-4-0/ The Definitive Guide: 22 Reasons to say No to AVES: https://bitly.com/saynotoaves AMEC Integrated Evaluation Framework: https://www.amecorg.com/amecframework AMEC PR Planning Guide: https://amecorg.com/amecframework/home/supporting-material/planning/ AMEC’s Measurement Maturity Mapper (M3): https://m3.amecorg.com/ All AMEC resources, including case studies: https://amecorg.com/resources/ AMEC Online College: https://amecorg.com/amec-college/ CommsClarity Consulting: https://www.commsclarity.com Video Version The post Richard Bagnall on the Barcelona Principles 4.0 appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Copyright challenges and intellectual property issues are consistently recognized as a serious, top-tier concern when it comes to Artificial Intelligence (AI). It may not be the top concern — that’s usually related to fake news and the trustworthiness of content, followed by privacy concerns — but many creators are upset and worried about the integrity of their work when it’s used as fodder for new training models. The courts will inevitably weigh in — in fact, one already has, with a federal court ruling in Anthropic’s favor, asserting that its use of authors’ books without compensation constitutes fair use due to the transformative nature of what Claude, Anthropic’s LLM, does with them. More lawsuits and more rulings are indeed coming, and legislation and regulation are also likely. However, Creative Commons has always preferred a voluntary compliance approach, grounded in a logical framework. In 2004, Creative Commons (under the guidance of Lawrence Lessig, a prominent American academic, attorney, and political activist known for his work on intellectual property law, campaign finance reform, and the social and legal implications of technology) developed such a framework that allowed people publishing on the web to designage how others could use their content. (This podcast is licensed under a Creative Commons attribution/share-alike license.) Now, Creative Commons is proposing a similar approach to AI, with a framework that would empower creators to signal their preferences for how their content is used and reused. The nascent framework is currently open for public comment. In this brief, midweek episode, Neville and Shel examine the proposal and the role communicators can play in shaping its final form. Links from this episode: CC Signals: A New Social Contract for the Age of AI – Creative Commons Introducing CC Signals: A New Social Contract for the Age of AI – Creative Commons Creative Commons debuts CC signals, a framework for an open AI ecosystem | TechCrunch CC Signals on GitHub The Venice Pledge from the Global Alliance for Public Relations and Communication Management “Human Authored Certification” from the Author’s Guild Copyright and Artificial Intelligence, from the U.S. Copyright Office Authors Call on Publishers to Limit Their Use of AI AI Watch: Global Regulatory Tracker The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, July 28. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: Shel Holtz (00:01) Hi everybody and welcome to episode number 470 of Four Immediate Release. I’m Shel Holtz. @nevillehobson (00:08) And I’m Neville Hobson. In this short form episode of For Immediate Release, we’re looking at a new development from Creative Commons that’s aimed squarely at the intersection of AI, copyright and open knowledge. It’s called CC Signals, and it could become a defining tool for how content is treated in the AI era. Creative Commons is the nonprofit behind the well-known Creative Commons copyright licenses. that enable creators to share their work and use that of others legally and openly. This new project is their response to the rise of AI and the vast amount of public web data being used to train AI models, often without clear rules or consent. We’ll explore CC signals in lay terms and what it means for communicators right after this. For more than 20 years, Creative Commons has enabled millions of creators to share their work while retaining rights through open licenses. But now with AI models scraping the internet at scale, there’s a new challenge. How can content owners set clear expectations for whether and how their work should be reused by algorithms training AI models? That’s where CC signals comes in. It’s a proposed framework that lets data set holders express preferences for how their content can be reused, for example, in training AI based on legal, technical, and ethical guidelines. In simple terms, dataset holders means any individual organization or platform that owns, manages, or has control over a collection of data that could be used to train AI models. Rather than locking everything down behind paywalls or blocking bots entirely, CC Signals offers a middle path, a way to sustain the open web by encouraging responsible AI use. It’s built on values li

In this episode, Chip and Gini discuss the challenges of dealing with team members who may not be enthusiastic about the clients or the work your agency is doing. They cover whether agency owners should be concerned if their employees dislike the job, the consequences of ignoring such issues, and the importance of alignment between client work and employee satisfaction. They also emphasize the need for transparency in the hiring process and preparing employees for potential pivots or shifts in the agency’s focus. Gini shares her personal experience with pivoting towards the PESO model, and both hosts advise on involving team members early in the process to avoid misunderstandings and to gather valuable feedback. The episode underscores common themes such as the significance of communication, transparency, and knowing your financials in successful agency management. [read the transcript] The post ALP 275: How to handle your team when they don’t love your clients appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

In this episode, Chip and Gini discuss how agency owners should handle situations when an employee resigns. They explore the emotional reactions owners might have, the importance of maintaining professionalism, and the need to gather more information from the departing employee. They emphasize the value of a cooling-off period to devise a rational plan and the potential for restructuring the team. Chip and Gini also talk about seeking feedback from remaining team members to ensure a smooth transition and mitigate the risk of more employees leaving. They stress seeing an employee’s resignation as an opportunity to learn and improve the business. [read the transcript] The post ALP 274: Turning employee departures into opportunities appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

A growing body of research suggests employees are more disconnected than ever. What are internal communication teams getting wrong? Also in this long-form monthly episode for June 2025: Buzzstream interviewed over 150 digital PR pros to assess the state of digital PR. It looks a lot like it did five years ago. Social media has overtaken television as Americans’ primary source of news. Chief Communication Officers are in a precarious position, expected to anticipate and address political and societal upheaval, often sharing information executives don’t want to hear. Pope Leo XIV has called for an ethical AI framework in a message to tech execs gathering at the Vatican. In his Tech Report, Dan York looks at Mastodon’s updated terms prohibiting AI model training, announcements from TwitchCon, and the impact of Texas’s mandatory age verification law on Internet privacy and security. Links from this episode: State of Digital PR Report (2025) Social media overtakes TV as main source of news in US, analysis finds Study: CCOs Take On Growing Political Risk Pope Leo calls for an ethical AI framework in a message to tech execs gathering at the Vatican Pope Leo Takes on AI: Communicators Should Pay Attention Pope Leo Takes On AI as a Potential Threat to Humanity Employees lose over a month each year dealing with ineffective internal communication Frontline workers feel so disconnected, nearly half don’t know who their CEO is Gen Z is killing office small talk— with 74% of employees struggling to speak to coworkers Work Schedules Fail Millions of U.S. Employees Breaking Down the Infinite Workday Creators Turn to Agentic AI to Manage Fan Engagement Links from Dan York’s Tech Report: Mastodon updates its terms to prohibit AI model training | TechCrunch Ten Years of TwitchCon: Here’s What We Announced in Rotterdam Age Verification Law Weakens Internet Privacy and Security The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, July 28. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: @nevillehobson (00:02) Hi everyone and welcome to episode 469 of Four Immediate Release, the monthly long form episode for June 2025. I’m Neville Hobson in the UK. Shel Holtz (00:13) I’m Shel Holtz in Concord, California in the U.S. We’re very happy that you have joined us for our monthly review of what’s going on in the communications slash technology space. And there is always a lot going on, always. And I heard about a lot of it recently. I was at the IABC World Conference in Vancouver, small conference, only about 600 people, I think. There are… Definitely some challenges facing the world of associations in general and IABC in particular. But as usual, the content at the conference was excellent. There were some really good sessions on things like driving AI adoption in the organization presented by ProSci, the change management research organization with some really revealing data, some very interesting stuff. For example, Neville, the number one driver of adoption of AI in an organization is the very visible and vocal support from the most senior leadership of the organization. That’s the top factor. And in a lot of organizations, those guys don’t have a clue what this is or how it @nevillehobson (01:18) big surprise there. Opportunity for communicators, would say that signifies Shell. Shel Holtz (01:29) It absolutely is. So we have these topics that we are going to jump into here shortly, but Neville, first, why don’t you remind everybody what we have already posted since our last monthly episode. @nevillehobson (01:43) Indeed, some good discussion we had on a handful of topics since the last month of show that was 466 on published on May the 26th. And we led in that one gain AI features. No surprise to anyone, I suppose, in every single episode we’ve been doing throughout this year, I think really. But we started with the topic on AI. Not only are AI chatbots still hallucinating, we said by some accounts it’s getting worse. And we had a conversation about LLMs and hallucinating and so forth also in that episode. A handful of other topics too, including one I’ve been reading even a more about in the past week or so. So Google’s new tool for making AI videos with sound following the one with text, that’s VO3. these seem to be c

In this episode, Chip speaks with Ken Jacobs, principal of Jacobs Consulting and Executive Coaching, about providing constructive feedback to team members. They discuss the importance of leadership coaching in the PR and communication space and the challenges of becoming a good leader without formal training. Ken emphasizes the necessity of providing constructive feedback that builds trust and respect, as well as the importance of listening and asking open-ended questions. Chip and Ken also highlight the continuous process of coaching and the significance of maintaining open communication with team members to encourage their growth and success. [read the transcript] The post CWC 111: Providing your team with constructive feedback (featuring Ken Jacobs) appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

While a company’s reputation doesn’t appear as a line item on a profit and loss statement or a balance sheet, it is nevertheless a critical intangible asset that significantly influences financial performance and long-term success. A strong positive reputation fosters trust among consumers and B2B customers, leading to increased customer loyalty, premium pricing power, and greater resilience in times of crisis. It also makes the company more attractive to top talent, reducing recruitment costs and improving employee retention. A favorable reputation can also enhance relationships with investors and partners, providing better access to capital and more advantageous business opportunities. The public relations profession is in the reputation business. Yet there are new threats to reputations that aren’t yet on most practitioners’ radars — and if they are, they haven’t found their way into plans and strategies. For example, companies that succumbed to political pressure to back away from their DEI commitments have suffered reputational damage, while those that stood by them have seen their reputation scores increase. That may have something to do with general support for DEI, but research found that customers crave consistency from the companies they do business with, and the sudden U-turn away from DEI commitments leadership previously touted was viewed as a failure of integrity. Add to that the surge of disinformation and job loss AI is already bringing to the business world, and it’s clear we’re facing a new world of reputation management. In this short midweek episode, Neville and Shel look at some recent research and reports to zero in on the newest reputation challenges and how communicators should face them. Links from this episode: Culture wars and scandals drag down corporate reputations Companies that kept DEI commitments saw higher reputation scores in 2025 New York State Updates WARN Notices to Identify Layoffs Tied to AI Is AI Damaging Your Professional Image? Musk and AI among biggest threats to brand reputation, global survey shows The disinformation storm is now hitting companies harder M&S is taking reputational damage from cyberattack: research The Reputational Risk Index The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, June 23. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: @nevillehobson (00:02) Hello everyone and welcome to for immediate release. This is episode 468. I’m Neville Hobson. Shel Holtz (00:08) And I’m Shel Holtz. We talk a lot on this show about brand and reputation, how to build it, how to protect it, how to recover when things go sideways. Reputation matters. A lot of brands make knee-jerk decisions based on short-term objectives, only to suffer reputationally as a result. Reputation isn’t fluff, it isn’t vanity. A good reputation builds resilience. It buys you the benefit of a doubt, ⁓ a bank of goodwill for when things go wrong. It attracts talent, it boosts your stock price, it shapes policy outcomes and partnership opportunities. And increasingly, it reflects how well your organization aligns with societal values, not just what you say, but what you do. Lately, the rules for reputational risk have been changing. Traditional threats are still around, scandals, product failures, bad leadership decisions. But now we’re seeing new ones emerge, many of them tied to technology and politics in ways that communicators may not be fully pro- prepared for, but can’t afford to ignore. Let’s start with the latest Axios-Harris poll on corporate reputation, because the shakeups there are dramatic. Tesla, which once topped the list of most admired companies, has fallen all the way to 60th. Boeing, with its safety mishaps and culture issues, and now the crash of an Air India 787 Dreamliner, well, Boeing sits near the bottom of the list. And what’s especially interesting here is how much of this decline has to do with cultural alignment or misalignment with public sentiment. Axios points to companies being dragged into culture wars, and it’s not hard to see why. The Trump administration’s ongoing pushback against DEI efforts is having a reputational ripple effect. Companies that backtracked on their DEI commitments or tried to stay neutral are paying a price. Patagonia, Mic

In this episode, Chip and Gini highlight the challenges and potential pitfalls of over-relying on AI for content creation in PR and marketing. They discuss instances of AI-generated content gone wrong, such as the fake book list published by the Chicago Sun-Times and poorly crafted AI-generated pitches. The hosts emphasize the importance of human oversight, individuality, and storytelling in maintaining quality and building relationships with the audience. They also delve into Google’s EEAT guidelines and how PR professionals can leverage their expertise to stand out in search rankings. Finally, they discuss practical ways to efficiently use AI while ensuring the content remains authentic and relatable. [read the transcript] The post ALP 273: Ensuring AI is an asset — not a liability — for your agency appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Episode 117 is the first-ever live webcast of the monthly IABC Circle of Fellows. IABC Fellows Shel Holtz and Brad Whitworth moderated the session, an interactive conversation with a panel of nearly a dozen Fellows from around the globe, including members of the 2025 Class of Fellows. The discussion was wide-ranging, covering topics including top communication challenges for the rest of the 20202s, AI, disinformation, and much more. The Fellows panel – collectively representing hundreds of years of communication expertise – will also take questions from the audience, both in-person and online. Here’s your chance to pick the brains of some of the world’s brightest and most experienced communication leaders during this lively, informative, fun, and fast-paced webcast. The Fellow is the highest honor IABC bestows on members who have had a significant impact not only on their organizations and IABC but also on the communication profession. Just over 100 IABC members have earned this designation since its inception in 1970. About the panel: In addition to eight Fellows in the audience who contributed answers to audience questions, three of the five new Fellows were on stage. They included… Bonnie Caver, SCMP, is the Founder and CEO of Reputation Lighthouse, a global change management and reputation consultancy with offices in Denver, Colorado, and Austin, Texas. The firm, which is 20 years old, focuses on leading companies to create, accelerate, and protect their corporate value. She has achieved the highest professional certification for a communication professional, the Strategic Communication Management Professional (SCMP), a distinction at the ANSI/ISO level. She is also a certified strategic change management professional (Kellogg School of Management), a certified crisis manager (Institute of Crisis Management). She holds an advanced certification for reputation through the Reputation Institute (now the RepTrak Company). She is a past chair of the global executive board for the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC). She currently serves on the board of directors for the Global Alliance for Public Relations and Communication Management, where she leads the North American Regional Council and is the New Technology Responsibility/AI Director. Caver is the Vice Chair for the Global Communication Certification Council (GCCC) and leads the IABC Change Management Special Interest Group, which has more than 1,300 members. In addition, she is heavily involved in the global conversation around ethical and responsible AI implementation and led the Global Alliance’s efforts in creating Ethical and Responsible AI Guidelines for the global profession. Laurie Dawkins, ABC, MC, SCMP, Fellow, is vice president of Communications & Engagement with the Provincial Health Services Authority (PHSA), one of the largest public sector health-care organizations in western Canada. She leads a team of close to 50 communication professionals in delivering timely, strategic and meaningful internal and external communications, media relations, crisis communications and C-suite counsel to meet the needs of more than 29,000 employees and 5.5 million citizens who turn to PHSA for specialized health-care services provided by BC Children’s Hospital, BC Cancer, BC Emergency Health Services, the BC Centre for Disease Control, and more. Laurie has more than 25 years’ experience in the communications industry, and holds the professional designations of Accredited Business Communicator (ABC) and Strategic Communications Management Professional (SCMP). In 2017, she was delighted to be named a Master Communicator of Canada (MC) by the IABC-Canada. She has hands-on experience in partnering with First Nations and Indigenous leaders to co-create communication strategies that are foundational to PHSA’s organizational vision to “Boldly create an equitable, anti-racist and culturally safe health care system where everyone thrives.” Mike Klein is the Editor-in-Chief of Strategic Magazine, Founder of #WeLeadComms, and a communication consultant specializing in internal and social communication based in Reykjavik, Iceland. A former US political consultant, Mike shifted direction toward internal communication while pursuing his MBA at London Business School. Since then, Mike has been one of the leading voices for empowering communication professionals, and advocating a focus on internal influence and social connection as drivers of communication, integration and performance. His 2011 book, From Lincoln to LinkedIn remains relevant as organizations recognize that personal credibility and connection are critical to communication success in a world where content volumes are increasing and instability flourishes. Raised in Chicago, Mike has lived and worked in seven different countries, and is also a Fellow of the Centre for Strategic Communication Excellence and the Institute of Internal Communication. The post Circle of Fellows #1

In this episode of FIR Interviews, we welcome back a long-time friend of the podcast, award-winning journalist and media researcher Craig Silverman, for his third appearance – this time to talk about his new venture, Indicator. Craig is best known for his work on media accuracy, verification, and exposing digital misinformation, including reporting at ProPublica and BuzzFeed News, and as founder and editor of “Regret The Error” and its subsequent book. Now, with co-founder Alexios Mantzarlis, he has launched Indicator, a subscription-based site and newsletter focused on reporting, resources, and training that help professionals understand and investigate digital deception. In this wide-ranging conversation, Craig explains how Indicator came to be, the challenges of launching a media startup, and what kind of impact he hopes to achieve. He also shares practical insights for communication professionals facing the growing threat of coordinated inauthentic behaviour, fake reviews, and AI-generated disinformation. Discussion Highlights What Indicator is: More than just a newsletter, it’s a professional toolkit, offering original investigations, guides, academic research summaries, and monthly workshops. Who it’s for: Investigators, journalists, trust and safety professionals, and communications professionals who “care about the information environment.” OSINT for PR: Craig walks through an example recipe using the “ABC method” (Actor-Behaviour-Content) for identifying coordinated attacks and monitoring threats. Startup hurdles: An early launch hiccup led to a week of unplanned exposure – and a valuable lesson in being ready for anything. AI’s double-edged sword: The rise of generative video tools like Veo 3 brings powerful capabilities but equally powerful risks of abuse and deception. Free resources: Craig recommends two freely available books as starting points – The Psychology of Intelligence Analysis and the Verification Handbook for Disinformation and Media Manipulation (which he edited). Vision for 2025: Plans include deeper collaborations, expert-led investigations, and possibly an event that brings together journalists, academics, and trust & safety leaders to tackle ethical challenges head-on. About Our Conversation Partner Craig Silverman is an award-winning journalist and author, and one of the world’s leading experts on online disinformation and digital investigations. He is the co-founder of Indicator, a newsletter and website dedicated to exposing digital deception and equipping professionals with the knowledge and skills to help them investigate it. Follow Craig Silverman on LinkedIn Visit Indicator Mentioned in this Interview FIR archive episodes featuring Craig’s previous interviews on FIR. Book: The Psychology of Intelligence Analysis. Book: Verification Handbook for Disinformation and Media Manipulation. The post Craig Silverman on Fighting Digital Deception with Indicator appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

In this episode, Chip and Gini delve into the challenge of agencies being brought in late on client projects. They discuss the common scenario where clients give last-minute requests and share strategies for becoming part of the planning process earlier. Key recommendations include integrating into internal communications, attending more meetings, and maintaining a mindset of curiosity to stay updated. They also cover how to handle situations when timely inclusion isn’t possible, such as negotiating new timelines or additional costs for urgent work. The conversation emphasizes the importance of proactive client communication to prevent unrealistic expectations and to potentially increase scope and revenue. [read the transcript] The post ALP 272: Why agencies get brought in too late by clients — and what to do about it appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Pick a superlative, and it probably applies to Mary Meeker, the venture capitalist and former Wall Street securities analyst best known for her annual Internet Trends Reports. These reports, released in the form of presentation decks, were the culmination of deep research Meeker conducted. Her last report was published June 12, 2019 at Recode’s Code Conference, but she just released a new one dedicated entirely to AI. With credibility as strong as hers, it’s likely that this report will become the defining source of truth about the state of AI. In this short midweek FIR episode, Neville and Shel break down the report to focus on elements that are meaningful to professional communicators. Links from this episode: Mary Meeker’s 2025 AI Trends Report Tech prophet Mary Meeker just dropped a massive report on AI trends – here’s your TL;DR It’s not your imagination: AI is speeding up the pace of change Q&A with Mary Meeker on the AI revolution Mary Meeker’s AI Trends Report | LinkedIn Reframing the 2025 AI Trends Report for Business Leaders | Neville’s blog David Armano’s GPT, “2025 Meeker AI Report GPT’D The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, June 23. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: Shel Holtz (00:10) Hi everybody and welcome to episode number 467 of For Immediate Release. I’m Shel Holtz. @nevillehobson (00:17) And I’m Neville Hobson. It’s been six years since Mary Meeker last published one of her legendary internet trends reports. And now she’s back with a 340 slide deep dive focused entirely on artificial intelligence. It’s a massive document, rich in data, charts and insight, but very much aimed at a Silicon Valley audience, investors, platform builders and technologists. And while it’s fascinating, it’s also dense. If you’re not steeped in the language of model training, deployment, and what it actually costs to run AI at scale, it can feel like stepping into someone else’s board meeting. So I decided to reinterpret it, not to dumb it down, but to make it readable and useful for business communicators, strategists, and leaders who need to understand what’s coming and why it matters. In today’s short form episode, we’re going to unpack what’s in the MECA report, some of the big themes, why they’re significant. and how communicators in particular might think about sharing this kind of insight within their organizations in plain English, right after this message. Let me start with one insight that really sets the scene for everything else. AI adoption is moving faster than the internet or mobile did, and there’s no waiting this one out. For business leaders, this means constant adaptation. You can’t rely on annual strategy cycles when AI tools are evolving weekly. Businesses need to become more agile, not just in tech, but in how they communicate, train and respond to change internally. So the question is, how do organizations keep up with something that doesn’t just disrupt industries? It rewrites the rule book as it goes. Shell, when you saw the scale and scope of this report, what stood out to you? And how do you think people outside the tech investor bubble should engage with this sea change? Shel Holtz (02:06) When I first started looking through this report, the first thing that struck me was that the word unprecedented seemed to be on every slide. In fact, an analysis I did using AI said that unprecedented appears more than 50 times in the report. And Mary Meeker does not tend to be hyperbolic. So when she says something is unprecedented, you can take it on faith that it… @nevillehobson (02:26) Hmm. Shel Holtz (02:32) probably is unprecedented. She talked about ChatGPT growing to 800 million weekly users in 17 months. That’s the fastest user ramp up in history. She called that a milestone. It took the internet 23 years to achieve global distribution. ChatGPT amassed about 365 billion annual searches. It took Google 11 years to do that. So what struck me from this whole unprecedented adoption and scale section of her report is the need for communicators to understand that the people in your audience are using this. It doesn’t matter whether it’s internal or it’s external. So that wa

Not only are AI chatbots still hallucinating; by some accounts, it’s getting worse. Moreover, despite abundant coverage of the tendency of LLMs to make stuff up, people are still not fact-checking, leading to some embarrassing consequences. Even the legal team from Anthropic (the company behind the Claude frontier LLM) got caught. Also in this episode: Google has a new tool just for making AI videos with sound: what could possibly go wrong? Lack of strategic leadership and failure to communicate about AI’s ethical use are two findings from a new Global Alliance report People still matter. Some overly exuberant CEOs are walking back their AI-first proclamations Google AI Overviews lead to a dramatic reduction in click-throughs Google is teaching American adults how to be adults. Should they be finding your content? In his tech report, Dan York looks at some services shutting down and others starting up. Links from this episode: Google has a new tool just for making AI videos Meet Flow: AI-powered filmmaking with Veo 3 Google’s Veo 3 marks the end of AI video’s ‘silent era’ Google announces new video and image generation models Veo 3 and Imagen 4, alongside a new AI filmmaking tool Flow and expanded access to Lyria 2 Ethan Mollick (@emollick) on X Veo 3 News Anchor Clips Google has a new tool just for making AI videos Chicago Sun-Times publishes made-up books and fake experts in AI debacle How an AI-generated summer reading list got published in major newspapers Chicago Sun-Times publishes made-up books and fake experts in AI debacle Anthropic’s lawyer was forced to apologize after Claude hallucinated a legal citation Chicago Sun-Times Faces Backlash After Promoting Fake Books In AI-Generated Summer Reading List Yes, Chicago Sun-Times published AI-generated ‘summer reading list’ with books that don’t exist Groundbreaking Report on AI in PR and Communication Management Comms failing to provide leadership for AI Perplexity Response to Query about Failure to Implement AI Strategically Embracing the Unknown: How Leaders Engage with Generative AI in the Face of Uncertainty Google is Teaching American Adults How to Be Adults Google AI Overviews leads to dramatic reduction in clickthroughs for Mail Online Shocking 56% CTR drop: AI Overviews gut MailOnline’s search traffic Google AI Overviews decrease CTRs by 34.5%, per new study The Google Exodus: Why 46% of Gen Z Has Abandoned Traditional Search Company Regrets Replacing All Those Pesky Human Workers With AI, Just Wants Its Humans Back How Investors Feel About Corporate Actions and Causes Links from Dan York’s Tech Report Skype shuts down for good on Monday: NPR Glitch is basically shutting down Investing in what moves the internet forward Bluesky: “We’re testing a new feature! Starting this week, select accounts can add a livestream link to sites like YouTube or Twitch, and their Bluesky profile will show they’re live now.” Bridgy Fed Fedi Forum Take It Down Act 2025 (USA) Mike Macgirvin The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, June 23. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript Shel Holtz (00:01) Hi everybody and welcome to episode number 466 of Four Immediate Release. I’m Shel Holtz in Concord, California. @nevillehobson (00:10) and I’m Neville Hobson in the UK. Shel Holtz (00:13) And this is our monthly long form episode for May 2025. We have six reports to share with you. Five of them are directly related to the topic du jour of generative artificial intelligence. And we will get to those shortly. But first, Neville, why don’t you tell us what we talked about in our ⁓ short form midweek episodes since You know, my memory’s failing and I don’t remember. @nevillehobson (00:44) ⁓ Yeah, some interesting topics we’ve had a handful of short form episodes, 20 minutes more or less, since the last monthly, which we published on 28th of April. And I’ll start with that one because that takes us forward. That was an interesting one with a number of topics. The headline topic was cheaters never prosper, said, unless you pay for what you create. And that was related to a university student who was expelled for developing an AI driven tool to help applicants to software coding jobs cheat on the tests employers require them to take. And it had mix

One of many career paths in the field of professional communication leads to colleges and universities: It is not uncommon for communication practitioners to move from the conference room to the classroom, where they help mold the next generation of communicators. All of the panelists participating in episode 116 of “Circle of Fellows” have chosen that path and will discuss the various dimensions of teaching — including making the transition from the business world to the hallowed halls of academia. The session was recorded on Thursday, May 22, 2025, with John Clemons, Cindy Schmieg, Marck Schumann, and Jennifer Wah. Shel Holtz moderated. About the panel: John G. Clemons, ABC, APR, IABC Fellow, an independent communications consultant based in North Carolina, has held senior executive and consultant roles over the course of his career in corporate and organizational communications. He has special expertise in providing strategic counsel and support for top executives and corporate offices of Fortune 500 companies. John has served as chair of IABC and holds accreditations from both IABC and PRSA. John has worked with Walmart, Raytheon, and Marriott (among others). John has been an adjunct instructor for six years at the University of North Carolina Charlotte and Loyola University in New Orleans. Cindy Schmieg is an award-winning strategic communicator. Her 30+ years of corporate, agency, and consulting experience focuses on making the communications function strategic within an organization. Cindy now teaches online in the Communications Master Degree program at Southern New Hampshire. She has served in many IABC leadership roles and is today a member of the IABC Audit/Risk Committee and Pacific Plains Region Silver Quill Award Committee, as well as assisting on the IABC Minnesota Annual Convergence Summit. Mark Schumann, PCC, ABC, IABC Fellow, is a certified executive coach who teaches in the NYU Master’s program in executive coaching and organizational consulting. He is the co-author of Brand from the Inside and Brand for Talent. Mark has served as VP Culture for Sabre, Director of Graduate Communication Studies at the Zicklin School of Business at Baruch College in New York City, and as a managing principal and global communication practice leader at Towers Perrin. He was IABC’s chair in 2009-2010 and won 17 Gold Quill awards. Jennifer Wah, MC, ABC, has worked with clients to deliver ideas, plans, words and results since she founded her storytelling and communications firm, Forwords Communication Inc., in 1997. With more than two dozen awards for strategic communications, writing and consulting, Jennifer is recognized as a storyteller and strategist. She has worked in industries from healthcare and academia to financial services and the resource sector, and is passionate about the strategic use of storytelling to support business outcomes. Although she has delivered workshops and training throughout her career, Jennifer formally added teaching to her experience in 2013, first with Royal Roads University and more recently as an adjunct professor of business communications with the UBC Sauder School of Business, where she now works part-time to imprint crucial communication skills on the next generation of business leaders. When she is not working, Jennifer spends her time cooking, walking her dog Orion, or talking food, hockey, or music with her husband and two young adult children in North Vancouver, Canada. The post Circle of Fellows #116: Molding Young Communicators — Teaching as a Communication Career Path appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Seemingly unrelated trends paint a clear picture for PR practitioners accustomed to achieving their goals through press release distribution and media pitching. The trends: People trust each other less than ever; people define what news is based on its impact on them, becoming their own gatekeepers; and video podcasts have become so popular that media outlets are including them in their upfronts. In this short midweek FIR episode, Neville and Shel find the common thread among these trends and outline how communicators can adjust their efforts to make sure their news is received and believed. Links from this episode: What Is News? (Pew Research Center) Americans’ Trust in One Another (Pew Research Center) Video podcasts are the next big pitch at media Upfronts News Consumption in the UK: 2024 The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, May 26. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript @nevillehobson (00:01) Hi everyone and welcome to Four Immediate Releases. This is episode 465. I’m Neville Hobson in the UK. Shel Holtz (00:09) And I’m Shel Holtz in the U.S. And if you work in communication, it’s time to tweak your media playbook. If you still treat a press release and a reporter pitch as the center of the universe, it’s time to reconsider things. We’ll talk about why and how right after this. Let’s start with the human glue that holds any message together, that being trust. Pew released a survey on May 8th that tells us only 34 % of Americans now believe that most people can be trusted. In the Watergate era, that number was 46%. In the mid-50s, it was closer to 70%. This is a crater, not a dip. Low social trust bleeds into institutional trust. So your brand news starts with a skepticism handicap. Now, later on this, Pew’s other study also released in May that asked what is news, and the picture starts to come into sharper focus. Americans still want information that’s factual and important, but they apply those labels through a personal filter. Does it touch my wallet, my neighborhood, my values? If yes, it’s news. If not, it’s just clutter. That’s why an election gets an automatic news stamp and a blockbuster earnings release doesn’t. The gatekeeping power has moved from editors to individual, and each individual is now effectively their own assignment editor. Enter into this mix the video podcast boom. CNBC’s upfronts coverage reads like a love letter to long-form host-driven shows. New Heights with the Kelsey brothers, Alex Cooper’s Call Her Daddy, LeBron and Steve Nash breaking down hoops for Amazon, These aren’t side hustles, they’re front row inventory next to NFL rights. The numbers explain why. New Heights pulls 2.6 million YouTube subscribers. Joe Rogan’s sit down with Donald Trump chalked up 58 million views. Multiples of top 10 broadcast hits, but on demand clipped and reshared endlessly. So here’s the tripod we’re standing on. Low interpersonal trust. a personalized definition of news, and an audience migration to host-driven video-forward channels. Shake those three together and the argument that will blast a release, cross our fingers, and call it a day feels about as modern as a fax machine. People trust people, and even though they trust people less than they used to, they do trust peers, subject matter experts, or charismatic hosts who are already populating their feeds. That means the old CEO quote and boilerplate formula is just table stakes at best. Yes, there are still good reasons to send out a press release, but not in a vacuum. We have to surface frontline engineers, project superintendents, patient advocates, whoever the listener already sees as one of them. We also have to pitch the host and not the masthead. Video podcast bookers don’t really care about breaking the news. It’s more about a conversation that keeps their community engaged through next week’s and the show’s next month. Study the arc of the show. Offer stories that fit that arc and bring props. If you can’t show it, demo it, or screen share it live, probably isn’t a great video podcast pitch. You need to build a video-first asset bundle. Think 16-9 aspect ratio and 9-16 b-roll. Cut down clips ready for shorts, lower third ready stats graphics, even physical

In this episode, Chip speaks with agency advisor Tim Kilroy about the challenges and strategies for running a small agency. Tim shares his extensive experience in digital marketing and agency coaching, highlighting the importance of flexibility and adaptability in leadership. They discuss the notion of many agency owners being ‘accidental’ and the necessity of creative problem-solving and rigorous operational procedures in today’s tough economic and technological landscapes. The conversation emphasizes fostering a supportive and clear environment for agency teams, allowing for autonomy and decentralized decision-making to drive success. [read the transcript] The post CWC 110: Embracing change as an agency owner (featuring Tim Kilroy) appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

In this FIR Interview, Neville and Shel talk with author, investigative journalist, and New York SEO, Eric Schwartzman, about his Fast Company article, “Bot farms invade social media to hijack popular sentiment.” A consultant who specialises in SEO for financial services companies, Eric explains how coordinated networks of smartphones and AI-generated content are distorting public perception, manipulating virality, and reshaping what we trust online. Eric, a long-time friend of FIR and a former entertainment public relations correspondent for FIR, discusses how bot farms now outnumber real users on social networks, how profits drive PR ethics, and why Meta, TikTok, X, and even LinkedIn are complicit in enabling synthetic engagement at scale. Eric also previews his forthcoming book, Invasion of the Bot Farms, which explores this escalating threat through insider stories and case studies. Discussion Highlights What bot farms actually are: Thousands of smartphones, each controlled to simulate authentic user behaviour, operating at industrial scale to manipulate what trends. How bot activity manipulates algorithms: Early engagement patterns (likes, shares, comments, follows, and profile expands) are carefully coordinated to make content appear organically viral. State actors vs. commercial players: Governments use bot farms to divide and destabilise societies, while businesses use them for influence and promotion. The blurred line between PR and manipulation: Case studies like the Blake Lively incident show how synthetic engagement is being used as a reputational weapon. Why social platforms allow it: Fake engagement boosts ad revenue, so many platforms knowingly look the other way. The future of trust and truth: Eric argues that virality can be bought, engagement is no longer an indicator of credibility, and even AI models are being trained on misinformation. A glimpse at Eric’s new book: Invasion of the Bot Farms will expose the people and systems behind this digital arms race, told through real-world case studies and first-hand research. About Our Conversation Partner Eric Schwartzman is a digital PR and content marketing strategist, author, and award-winning podcaster specialising in organic media, SEO, and content marketing. With deep experience in both agency and client-side roles, he helps organisations boost visibility, web traffic, and conversions through strategic digital campaigns. As a freelance journalist, Eric has written for Fast Company, TechCrunch, VentureBeat, AdWeek, and others, and is the author of two best-selling books on SEO. His work bridges technical expertise and clear communication, making him a trusted voice in the evolving digital landscape. Follow Eric Schwartzman on LinkedIn Visit Eric’s website: Eric Schwartzman & Associates Mentioned in this Interview: Eric’s Fast Company article published in April 2025: Bot farms invade social media to hijack popular sentiment. Book in progress: Invasion of the Bot Farms (publishing date TBA). FIR archive episodes featuring Eric’s engagement with FIR, including his early podcast contributions. The post Eric Schwartzman on Bot Farms and Digital Deception appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

In this episode, Chip and Gini discuss whether or not employees can be encouraged to be “more strategic”. They explore the definition of being strategic, frequently misunderstood expectations, and the challenges of fostering strategic thinking among team members. Gini shares her personal experiences and frustrations from her early career, emphasizing the importance of proper coaching and mentoring. Chip and Gini conclude that agency owners should define their expectations clearly, consider the individual capabilities of their employees, and re-evaluate their own workload to potentially take on more strategic responsibilities themselves. [read the transcript] The post ALP 271: Can agency team members be more strategic? appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

In this episode, Chip talks with Melissa Vela-Williamson of MVW Communications about her unique journey in public relations and the importance of content creation. Melissa shares her background, highlighting her non-traditional path into PR and her passion for using public relations for social good. They discuss her focus on helping nonprofits and education clients, her role as a content creator, and her work as a columnist for the Public Relations Society of America. Melissa also delves into the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on her business and the strategic approaches she took to maintain client relationships and grow her firm. They explore the significance of writing books and producing various types of content, emphasizing the value of building relationships and demonstrating thought leadership in the communications industry. [read the transcript] The post CWC 109: Thought leadership for agency growth (featuring Melissa Vela-Williamson) appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Debate continues about when to disclose that you have used AI to create an output. Do you disclose any use at all? Do you confine disclosure to uses of AI that could lead people to feel deceived? Wherever you land on this question, it may not matter when it comes to building trust with your audience. According to a new study, audiences lose trust as soon as they see an AI disclosure. This doesn’t mean you should not disclose, however, since finding out that you used AI and didn’t disclose is even worse. That leaves little wiggle room for communicators taking advantage of AI and seeking to be as transparent as possible. In this short midweek FIR episode, Neville and Shel examine the research along with recommendations about how to be transparent while remaining trusted. Links from this episode: The transparency dilemma: How AI disclosure erodes trust The ‘Insights 2024: Attitudes toward AI’ Report Reveals Researchers and Clinicians Believe in AI’s Potential but Demand Transparency in Order to Trust Tools (press release) Insights 2024: Attitudes toward AI Being honest about using AI at work makes people trust you less, research finds Should Businesses Disclose Their AI Usage? Insights 2024: AI’ Report – Researchers and Clinicians Believe AI’s Potential but Need Transparency New research: When disclosing use of AI, be specific Demystifying Generative AI Disclosures The Janus Face of Artificial Intelligence Feedback: Deployment Versus Disclosure Effects on Employee Performance The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, May 26. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript Shel Holtz (00:05) Hi everybody and welcome to episode number 464 of 4 Immediate Release. I’m Shel Holtz. @nevillehobson (00:13) and I’m Neville Hobson. Let’s talk about something that might surprise you in this episode. It turns out that being honest about using AI at work, you know, doing the right thing by being transparent, might actually make people trust you less. That’s the headline finding from a new academic study published in April by Elsevier titled, The Transparency Dilemma, How AI Disclosure Erodes Trust. It’s a heavyweight piece of research. 13 experiments over 5,000 participants from students and hiring managers to legal analysts and investors. And the results are consistent across all groups, across all scenarios. People trust others less when they’re told that AI played a role in getting the work done. We’ll get into this right after this. So imagine this, you’re a job applicant who says you used AI to polish a CV, or a manager who mentions AI helped write performance reviews, or a professor who says grades were assessed using AI. In each case, just admitting you used AI is enough to make people view you as less trustworthy. Now this isn’t about AI doing the work alone. In fact, the study found that people trusted a fully autonomous AI more than they trusted a human. who disclosed they had help from an AI. That’s the paradox. So why does this happen? Well, the researchers say it comes down to legitimacy. We still operate with deep seated norms that say proper work should come from human judgment, effort and expertise. So when someone reveals they used AI, it triggers a reaction, a kind of social red flag. Even if AI helped only a little, even if the work is just a good. Changing how the disclosure is worded doesn’t help much. Whether you say, AI assisted me lightly, or I proofread the AI output, or I’m just being transparent, trust still drops. There’s one twist. If someone hides their AI use, and it’s later discovered by a third party, the trust hit is even worse. So you’re damned if you do, but potentially more damned if you don’t. Now here’s where it gets interesting. Just nine months earlier in July, 2024, Elsevier published a different report, Insights 2024 Attitudes Towards AI, based on a global survey of nearly 3,000 researchers and clinicians. That survey found most professionals are enthusiastic about AI’s potential, but they demand transparency to trust the tools. So on the one hand, we want transparency from AI systems. On the other hand, we penalize people who are transparent about using AI. It’s not a contradiction. It’s about who we’re trusti

In this episode, Chip and Gini delve into the topic of scope creep in agencies. They discuss the bell curve of profitability and the importance of setting clear expectations from the first client conversation. They highlight strategies like dividing projects into 90-day scopes to regularly reassess goals and deliverables. The duo emphasizes the significance of internal communication, developing a culture of transparency, and ensuring team members understand project scope and costs. They also stress the need to build flexibility and cushion into initial pricing to manage minor scope changes and avoid financial strain. Finally, they agree on mastering financial understanding and regular one-on-one meetings for smoother agency operation. [read the transcript] The post ALP 270: Limiting scope creep from the start appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Google’s first Chief Decision Scientist, Cassie Kozyrkov, wrote recently that “The biggest challenge of the generative AI age is leaders defining value for their organization.” Among leadership considerations, she says, is a mindset shift, one in which there are “endless right answers”. (“When I ask an AI assistant to generate an image for me, I get a fairly solid result. When I repeat the same prompt, I get a different perfectly adequate image. Both are right answers… but which one is right-er?”) Kozyrkov’s overarching conclusion is that confirming the business value of your genAI decisions will keep you on track. In this episode, Neville and Shel review Kozyrkov’s position, then look at several communication teams that have evolved their departmental use of AI based on the principles she promotes. Links from this episode: Endless Right Answers: Expnlaining the Generative AI Value Gap How Lockheed Martin Comms is working smarter with GenAI How AI Can Be a Game Changer for Marketing AI in 2025: 4 PR industry leaders discuss company policies, training, use cases and more The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, May 26. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email [email protected]. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript Hello everyone and welcome to four immediate release episode number 4 63. I’m Neville Hobson. And I’m Shell Holtz reports on how communication departments are moving from AI experiments to serious strategy driven deployment of Gen AI are proliferating. Although I’m still mostly hearing communicators talk about tactical uses of these tools. The fact is you need to start with strategy or don’t start at all. That’s the conclusion of Cassie. Kako, Google’s former chief decision scientist who warns leaders that Gen AI only pays off when you define why you’re using it and how you’ll measure value. She calls Gen AI automation for problems that have endless right answers. Now that. Warrants a little explanation. Traditional ai, she says, is for automating tasks where there’s one right answer using patterns and data. It’s gen AI that automates tasks where there are endless right [00:01:00] answers and each answer is right in its own way. This means old ROI, yardsticks won’t work. Leaders have to craft new metrics that link every Gen AI project to. Not just a cool demo. This framing is useful because it separates flashy outputs from real, genuine impact. With that in mind, we’re gonna look at a few comms teams that are building gen AI programs around a clear, measurable strategy right after this. Well, let’s start with Lockheed Martin’s Communications organizations, which set a top down mandate. Every team member is required to learn enough gen AI to be a strategic partner to the business. They hit a hundred percent training compliance early this year. They published an internal. AI Communications Playbook filled with do and don’t guidance Prompt templates, a shared prompt library, and monthly newsletters that surface new [00:02:00] wins. There are a few reasons that this is a worthy case study. First, the team generated savings. You can count, for example, a recent video storyboard project ran 30% under budget and cut 180 staff hours. The team has fostered a culture of experimentation. Uh, there’s a monthly AI art contest that they. Host inviting communicators to practice prompting in a low risk environment, helping them learn prompt craft before they touch billable projects. And the human in the loop discipline is built into the team’s processes. Gen AI delivers the first draft or first visual. Humans still own the final story. The takeaway, Lockheed shows that enterprise rollouts scale when you train first, codify governance. Next, then celebrate quick wins. Qualcomm corporate comms manager, Kristen Cochran Styles said Gen A is now in our DNA. Qualcomm’s comms team is leaning on edge based gen AI, running models on phones, [00:03:00] PCs, and even smart glasses to lighten workflows while respecting privacy and energy constraints. Uh, they have a device centric narrative. They don’t just talk about on debate on. Its comms group uses the same edge pipeline that it promotes publicly. They have faster iterations occurring in their processes, drafting reactive statements, tailoring

In this episode, Chip and Gini discuss the psychology of pricing within agencies. They cover topics such as the importance of being confident in your pricing, avoiding negotiating against oneself, and the benefits of premium pricing. Gini highlights her experiences with male and female negotiators, emphasizing how women often undervalue themselves. The duo debates the effectiveness of the ‘three pricing options’ strategy and its pitfalls. They also offer practical advice for owners to ensure their pricing sends the right message to clients and reflects the true value of their services. [read the transcript] The post ALP 269: Pricing psychology for agency clients appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.