I recently had the pleasure of joining my dear friend Justin Obey on his podcast, Return on Reputation, for a conversation that felt both timely and full circle. Justin and I go back to the early days of his first company, Social Boston Sports, when I was helping him think through PR, media outreach, and
AI is not just changing search. It is changing how brands are discovered, evaluated, and recommended. We are moving from a world of search results to a world of synthesized answers. Instead of competing for attention among ten blue links, brands are now competing to be included in a single AI-generated response. For marketing leaders,
A scratch-and-sniff armpit billboard. A Bluetooth-enabled chocolate bar that cries for help. And a tech giant reversing course on the death of third-party cookies. This is The Marketer’s Storybook, where brand storytelling gets stranger, sharper and more strategic by the week. This week’s lineup includes: Let’s dive in.
Today is World Book Day and Copyright Day in the UK, and I have to admit – this one hits close to home. Ever since I was a kid, I’ve been obsessed with stories. I used to say, “One day I’ll be an author.” To have done it twice still feels surreal – and with
This week, brands are getting cheeky, chaotic, and surprisingly clever. From Duolingo’s banana-peel facials to Estée Lauder duping sleep itself, marketers embraced the weird, the wild, and the wonderfully strategic. April Fools’ Day saw brands go all-in with pranks so good, some became real products (Duolingo cruise, anyone?). Meanwhile, Eventbrite is making search ads on