Shelley E. Kohan (00:04)
Hi everybody and thanks for joining our weekly podcast. I’m Shelley Kohan and I’m very excited to welcome Heather Home. She’s founder of Publicity for Good. So welcome Heather. And maybe you can tell our listeners a little bit about your company and why you founded your company.

Heather – Publicity For Good (00:20)
Yeah, so I’m Heather, the founder of Publicity for Good. We work with purpose driven CPG brands that really want everyone to know ⁓ about their product. I’m also mom for under four, so if you hear kids that’s the truth of it and I do have a nanny here, but just being transparent. But again, I think food is something that connects all of us at the table and ⁓ it’s something that we take very seriously, you know, so really creative publicity for good to

Highlight incredible companies and brands.

Shelley E. Kohan (00:52)
That’s great. And ⁓ so I have to also say that you recently wrote a book, which is really interesting. We’re actually gonna get to that a little bit later, but I’m gonna kind of tease up our audience about it because I think it’s really relevant, especially right now, and that is seen by AI and found by customers. And it’s all about the importance of that AI search. So I think over the past year it’s kind of been evolving more important, more important. But in the last three months, wow, retails are really trying to figure out.

you know, what they have to pivot to in order to be relevant during this time where a lot of consumers are really looking for AI for literally all the answers. And as we lead up into holiday, I can’t believe it’s the middle of summer and we’re talking about, you know, holiday already, but we will talk about that ⁓ in a minute. So let’s start by just give us your view on why AI search matters so much today.

Heather – Publicity For Good (01:46)
So there’s a couple different things. There’s higher purchase intent. So when someone is, you know, searching on Google or Chat GPT or any of those functions, I am looking for the best healthy snacks for my kids. All the information that gets pulled in is from being in the media, being featured on different websites, all of those things. Literally, it pulls links to show brands that are, you know, credible. So

That’s really the first thing is that if your company is not in the media, then you’re not going to show up when people are searching for you.

The other component, too, is ChatGPT example has a shop function. So literally you can buy products, you know, link to your website on Shopify to buy your product. So there’s a shop function and there’s higher purchase

when people are doing this type of search as well.

But you need to think in terms of what is your ideal customer or consumer searching for, right? Like you need to reverse engineer that to ensure that you are coming up when people are searching for that.

Shelley E. Kohan (02:58)
It’s interesting. So some of the statistics that I read were like AI search is up over three hundred percent, while our traditional kind of Google search ⁓ is now declining. And it’s kind of funny because, you know, Google’s now in the dictionary, right? Googling something. so it’ll be interesting to see what’s gonna happen with the AI search on that. The other thing that’s interesting is what you said that if you are going to

artificial intelligence and you’re using agentic commerce to make a purchase. So consumers go to AI, they ask for the best, you know, baby food or they ask for what’s the best sweater or the best handbag. they’re bypassing the website of a lot of retailers. So before we would go to, you know, what’s the best, you know, sweater, and we go to four different websites and we’d look ourselves. But now we’re kind of bypassing that. So that has to have a big impact on both retailers and brands.

Heather – Publicity For Good (03:53)
It makes a huge impact, but it creates a level playing field. So brands that get ahead of it now will absolutely get ahead of it, right? You’re gonna get more customers, more people knowing about your brand, and it’s definitely a level playing field.

Shelley E. Kohan (04:07)
And what’s interesting, the other interesting thing you said, which I’m not sure a lot of retail and and brands are thinking about it this way, which is why it’s great having you on the podcast, is so I believe it’s north of ninety percent of the AI is getting information from earned media, not ads. Is that can you talk a little bit about that?

Heather – Publicity For Good (04:28)
Yeah, that is absolutely true. And the great thing about it is you need to there’s more responsibility. You can’t just buy your way to the top. So you absolutely need to have a good product, good packaging, good story, all those things. Like I don’t think money can truly buy the endorsement that you get from an incredible media story.

Shelley E. Kohan (04:52)
That’s interesting. So I am not a technological person at all. ⁓ and I don’t know if you know this or not, but I’m gonna ask you anyway. So when you talk about earned media, how does AI recognize earned media versus paid media? Like how is it understanding the difference between the two and how is it prioritizing earned media over ⁓ paid media or ads?

Heather – Publicity For Good (05:17)
So it will pull so the LLMs will pull in high domain ranking websites, it will pull in directory listings, it will pull in reviews, all those things. So reviews also play a part in that as well. LinkedIn ⁓ gets pulled in too. So all those components are high domain authority websites that get pulled into the LLMs, even putting something on a news wire too.

Shelley E. Kohan (05:48)
That’s interesting. So when you talk about reviews getting pulled in, are you talking about reviews on websites?

Heather – Publicity For Good (05:53)
Reviews on websites, reviews on Amazon, all those things because those are trust signals. Trust signals from third party people outside of yourself.

Shelley E. Kohan (06:05)
Interesting. And can it pull from like Instagram and TikTok too?

Heather – Publicity For Good (06:09)
⁓ Instagram will too. And what’s interesting is if you go to Google and type your company or type in a competitor or type in I’m looking for the the best granola bar, you can reverse engineer to see what are the top links coming up for that query. Even so you can literally search for competitor and then go back and reach out to where they’ve been featured. The other thing too that’s important is to make sure the content is consistent.

So what I mean by that is if you search on Google, you’re gonna wanna see what information comes up on like a Gemini. And if it’s not updated, you’re gonna wanna go back and reach out to those outlets to have them update the messaging to where your company is today.

Shelley E. Kohan (06:52)
That’s interesting. And can retailers actually go into Gemini or Claude and actually train the AIs more about their company? Like for example, can a can a retailer or brand go to Claude, upload all the earned media that’s ever been written about them, ⁓ to kind of train the system to learn about the company?

Heather – Publicity For Good (07:14)
You absolutely can ⁓ do that. But the other thing too is that that’s the component of training AI about your company so that you can internally use that for marketing initiatives, social media copy and all those things. And then there’s external things that you do to rank in the LLMs, which would be media ⁓ exposure, ⁓ making sure your name address, phone number is updated, all of those things and

There’s updates you need to do on your website as well. Right? FAQs, long form content, all of those things help with ranking the L L Ms as well. And that it really wants long form content and FAQs are extremely matter and you need to make sure that you’re leading with the key questions that people are asking as well.

Shelley E. Kohan (07:53)
that’s great.

that’s fascinating. I love that. And I’m sure I know you work with a ton of small businesses, ⁓ but I’m sure both large and small businesses really kind of have to reset the mindset about this.

Heather – Publicity For Good (08:18)
It you ha it you have to reset the mindset and you have to add it into your process and system too, if that makes sense as well. ⁓ and that there’s two components. There’s how you as a business use chat GPT and you teach it to then help you create content systems, etcetera. And the other side is how are you showing up in the L L L Ms, how are you showing up in Chat GPT when people are searching?

Shelley E. Kohan (08:26)
Absolutely.

This this what you’re describing right now sounds like a whole new marketing job for a lot of companies where you really have to have dedicated resources that are focused just on AI search, reverse engineering, and really making the brand kind of stand out in these searches.

Heather – Publicity For Good (08:48)
Yeah.

For sure.

Shelley E. Kohan (09:02)
So ⁓ I just heard recently that Amazon’s gonna

make holiday even earlier. When I say holiday any even earlier, I mean Prime Day is moving up. It’s going like third week of June now. And so yeah, so ⁓ and I know they’ll be very focused on value and pricing because of the consumer sentiment right now. But ⁓ I do want to talk a minute about holiday because it is just around the corner. It does start now in June. I used to say July but now I guess I’m gonna have to say June. And people start getting very you know when you talk about shopping lists and

Heather – Publicity For Good (09:14)
Interesting.

huh.

Shelley E. Kohan (09:37)
and creating these ⁓ you know, idea, gift ideas and that type of thing. I can imagine that this ⁓ holiday season, AI Search is going to explode.

Heather – Publicity For Good (09:50)
For sure. And that’s why you need to get ahead of it now. Are you gonna be running any discounts? Do you have an affiliate program? All those things. I mean, even on the publication side, all the major outlets wanna have an affiliate link. So if I write for Women’s Health and I’m doing a story of ten of the best coffee brands, eight out of the ten need to have an affiliate link. That all plays into it. So yes, everything starts sooner.

Shelley E. Kohan (10:16)
And do you think now, ’cause you know, we are halfway through the year, can brands r either can large brands make an impact now on AI search for fall? Can small brands do it, small businesses? Is it too late or can can things be done now to really help holiday?

Heather – Publicity For Good (10:34)
Things can be done now, but like when we work with brands, we have this like AEO Flywheel program where essentially we figure out what’s the one topic that we want to rank for in the LLMs, right? We then have s a founder record a key video because it’s not just about the video, it’s about saying key things. ⁓ and then from that essentially we will create content for social media, Reddit, LinkedIn, long form, blog, ⁓ as well.

But it takes time. So I’d say it really takes 90 days to see the changes. And then of course you need to add the component of getting in the media as well. And that’s the third-party high domain ranking websites, calendar listings, directories, etc. that help you rank in the LLMs, even optimizing your Google business profile, getting reviews, making sure there’s photos there.

making sure all of your products are listed, making sure you have Amazon reviews, all those things really ⁓ play in together being trust signals.

Shelley E. Kohan (11:39)
The the other thing that kind of comes to mind is that so if if ⁓ Fortune or Forbes or the Radman Report any if there’s like a trusted website ⁓ n ⁓ journal if if a lot of companies are being written about by these trusted journalists, does that then count in the earned media that AI is picking up on?

Heather – Publicity For Good (12:07)
Correct, correct. So the Rob Report, high domain ranking, trusted, incredible media publication, many unique visitors per month, higher domain authority ranking, that totally plays into it.

Shelley E. Kohan (12:21)
So another another challenge based on that that I’m seeing is that a lot of publications are not wanting to report like press releases or holiday shopping guides, that type of thing. I mean, there’s some ⁓ publications that do that should just that and and the Robin Report specifically, you know, they’re all about high level ⁓ thought leadership.

you know, as opposed to reporting things. But there’s a lot of other publications that have really moved away from reporting on press releases from companies. So how can companies make their way into some of these publications so they are written about in a favorable way ⁓ without it being, you know, paid media?

Heather – Publicity For Good (13:05)
Well, there’s a couple of different strategies. From a news release perspective, there’s things you that are in your control to help get placement and rank when people are searching. So that would be a newswire, which a newswire is more valuable now because it ranks on Google, right? And it’s syndicated to all these different websites. The other is adding it as a blog on your website. The other is doing a LinkedIn article and posting on your company page and sharing it as well.

Because LinkedIn again, as well as Instagram, are things that really help with the LLMs. So that’s what’s in your control. The second side of the piece is if you do a news release, you need to make sure you’re connecting what you’re talking about to a study or a stat or a trend or something that’s happening in the news to show problem solutions. So it should never just be a news release that’s about, you know, new packaging, new SKU, new distribution. There needs to be

more data to support that news release. And another trick that we do is we time ⁓ launches with moments andor awareness days and months, right? So National Sandwich Month, ⁓ snack food awareness month is in February. So a lot of times we’ll look at launching a new product and looking for a connection to different moments and awareness days to add more relevancy to the news angle.

Shelley E. Kohan (14:32)
That’s amazing. I love that. And I love the newswire tip too. I know a lot of our ⁓ brands and retailers that are listening, that’s a really good tip. Okay, so let’s move on. So you recently wrote a book called AI Found, Seen by Customers, The Purpose-Driven Brand Guides to Dominating the New Era of PR. So can you tell us a little bit about ⁓ what is the premise of the book, why you wrote it, and what you think retailers and brands can learn from it?

Heather – Publicity For Good (14:46)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, so it’s a very tactical book from being in the CPG product food retail space since twenty twelve. It’s a very tactical book for people to start taking action. It shows you how to search competitors, it gives you the framework to start ⁓ launching your your thought and process to rank in L L LMs, but I created this after doing so much research, creating a strategy and

And really realizing that we’re getting so many inbound leads and interest from people searching for a PR firm because of everything we’ve done ⁓ from getting in the media. So that was really the premise of it. But it’s very tactical and it will really help anyone who’s watching this or listening to this, you know, take an action plan and get, you know, start ranking. And if you’re not gonna do it and you hi wanna hire an expert or, you know, publicity for good, at least you have understanding.

Because you need to have understanding so that you’re asking the right questions to make sure it’s working for your business too.

Shelley E. Kohan (16:05)
That’s amazing. And I would imagine, I know you’re gonna laugh at this, but ⁓ I’m gonna say that a a a book like this would be great in college and universities too, because you have to you have to train the next gen to do these things, right?

Heather – Publicity For Good (16:18)
Yeah, that’s actually one of my dreams is to ⁓ teach at college campuses and really help people to think differently because it’s not just a media story or feature. It’s about how does it fit into the bigger strategy? How is it gonna help you rank in the LLMs? How is it going to help your brand stand out and reach more consumers, consumers that are absolutely wanting to buy your product. So

Shelley E. Kohan (16:42)
I love it. That’s a great goal to have. I love one of the things I do, as you may or may not know, is ⁓ I teach at FIT, Fashion Institute of Technology, and Syracuse University, and I teach marketing, and I love just like helping students understand the future landscape and really feel like they’re making a difference in the world. So that’s a great goal for you to have.

Heather – Publicity For Good (17:06)
I love that.

Shelley E. Kohan (17:08)
What other so before we close out our podcast, is there any other kind of ⁓ advice or tips or anything anything else that you want to add that you think retailers and brands should be thinking about either going into holiday or maybe even more long term into the next year?

Heather – Publicity For Good (17:21)
Okay.

For sure. So I would say do an audit to see where you rank in the LLMs. So do searches to see where you rank. Search for competitors to see where they rank. If you’re looking at Gemini, it’ll show you all the links of where they’re featured. The same thing on Chat GPT, like if you search for what’s the best protein bar for kids, you’ll see all the placements and features that are coming up and that whole process. So I would first start with

a baseline and then go from there. We s we create a software called Aisearchscan dot com. It’s free. So people can literally do an audit ⁓ for their brand. ⁓ and that is really insightful ⁓ as well. So I would do an audit and you just go to Aisearchscan.com.

Shelley E. Kohan (18:15)
That’s amazing. That’s great. So ⁓ first is understanding where you’re at. And then the next is kind of putting an active process behind that to help elevate a brand in the AI searches, right? Awesome. Well, thank you, Heather. Thanks for joining us today. We really appreciate it. And I really love the tips you gave our listeners. So thank you for that. And if they want to get the book, where might they find it?

Heather – Publicity For Good (18:28)
For sure.

Yeah, so it’s on Amazon. ⁓ and I have ⁓ some resources ⁓ that I can give you to put in the show notes. I’m gonna be doing a free webinar. So I’ll make sure you have all the links ⁓ to support you on this journey. But the point of it is is you as a company can get ahead if you’re intentional and you start a plan now, and I would really start with the audit ⁓ at ai search scan.com.

Shelley E. Kohan (19:09)
Great. Thank you, Heather.

Heather – Publicity For Good (19:11)
Thank you so much.