Robert Rose's Recent LinkedIn Posts

I talk a lot about Brand Storytelling - and getting to a distinctive story.... And, admittedly, it gets really esoteric at times... It can be really hard to see how all the pieces fit together... But - look out... Anthropic is pulling off perhaps the greatest brand story pivot in recent history? And we can watch this in real time.... As of this morning, Claude is the #1 free app on the U.S. App Store, officially dethroning ChatGPT. And it's down - which is frustrating and making the news... But the reason is because of "unprecedented demand". If you're wondering how to create differentiation in a "red ocean" of competition, Anthropic is showing how to do it: 1. The Power Hires: About three months ago, they stopped acting like a research lab. Bringing in Sasha de Marigny to run communications and high-level D.C. policy expert Maxwell Young. They (and I'm sure an entire team) have masterfully pivoted the story being told. Both with the "anti-ad-ads" taking shots at OpenAI, as well as leaning into safety and "fixing" Dario's executive communications. 2. The Pentagon Stand: Last week’s refusal to strip guardrails for the DoD - while others signed on - was a policy narrative masterstroke. They turned a potential government "blacklist" into the ultimate badge of trust for enterprise and consumer users alike. 3. Even the disappointing "we're going to loosen safety" in order to compete works in the context of the above because it's being perceived as a necessary means in order to get to a "safety *when we lead* story". 4. Revenue Velocity: Marketing is matching the math. Anthropic is reportedly growing at 10x per year since hitting the $1B mark. Arguably a lot of this was in place with their product dev... But by avoiding the "ad-supported" race to the bottom, they’ve built a brand people are proud to pay for. Don't ever let anyone tell you that Brand doesn't have a direct correlation to revenue ever again. In a world of "move fast and break things," Anthropic is demonstrating that Trust is the ultimate product feature. They've built a more defensible story by leaning into the friction that defines them. We are watching a master class in PR, Comms and branding happen in real-time. I have more on this coming in my LENS newsletter coming later today.

Okay so, yeah, like you I took the time to read the thing Matt Shumer wrote... And despite its earnestness (which I will grant some grace over) it's just yet another illogical focus on the FUD of AI... The premise for these things is always the same breathless panic: “I’ve been an insider for years. The new models are scary good. I don’t do technical work anymore; the AI does it better than I can. You need to immerse yourself in AI immediately or you will be left behind.” It's the moral equivalent of a gangster sliding up next to you and saying, "Hey, nice career you got there... be a shame if something happened to it because you didn't pay for my 'protection'." It's all just so wrong. The author boasts: "I am no longer needed for the actual technical work of my job... I tell the AI what I want... and it’s done better than I would have done it myself." Okay, but how do you know the AI is doing it "better"? Unless, of course, you are claiming to be good enough to set the standard of excellence for a skill you just admitted you no longer need to perform. You can't have it both ways. You can't be obsolete and an expert critic at the same time. Then there's the definition of "Good." The author marvels at "perfect" output. But in AI, "perfect" often just means "error-free." Any strong developer will tell you that just because it compiles, doesn't make it good. A song lyric can rhyme perfectly and be soulless. A strategy can be logical and fail to connect. If you lack the deep domain expertise - the taste - to distinguish between technical accuracy and meaningful insight, you aren't leveling up. You’re just automating mediocrity. Finally, there's the fragility of the operator. The article urges you to "get good at AI" to save your career. But if your primary skill is just operating the machine, you become the most replaceable person in the room. The moment the model gets an update that makes it easier to use, your "skill" evaporates. The true protection isn't learning AI (whatever that means); it's learning to think so deeply about your craft that the AI becomes a lever for your expertise, not a substitute for it. "Go get good at AI" is the 21st-century equivalent of telling a writer in the 19th century to "go get good at electricity." My advice is the opposite: Go get good at the thing you want to be good at. Study philosophy. Study brand strategy. Study music. Study the mechanics of writing. Develop your taste. Practice your craft. Sharpen your epistemology. And then, yes, see if AI helps you do the thing better, faster, or more deeply. Don't let the fear-mongering fool you. AI isn't a replacement for Wisdom (experience + expertise + empathy); it is a lever for it. But a lever requires a fulcrum. You are the fulcrum.

So - remember those old TomTom ads? “You are not stuck in traffic. You ARE the traffic.” Yeah, well the same applies to the sea of beige B2B content we’re all drowning in. If you’re complaining about "slop" while hitting ‘send’ on another committee-approved, polished-to-death PDF that says the same thing to a CFO as it does to a DevOps engineer... well, I have some bad news. In Part One last week I talked about how B2B Branding - the "Monolith Brand" is dead. Your audience isn’t sitting around waiting for your megaphone - they’re actively guarding the doors to their private Slacks and Subreddits, ready to anyone who sprays the Fabreze of thought leadership into the room... You gotta lean into the weird... So - now in this Part Two.... I'm thinking about how, in 2026, we gotta realize that we can't win with Reach. We win with Gravity. In this week's post I mention how brands like E.L.F. BEAUTY and Snowflake move through the world without getting "rejected" by the communities they enter. It requires What I'm calling a "Plural Brand" approach: The Core: Your non-negotiable "passport" (values, what your brand stands for). The Rooms: Stop targeting demographics; start reading cultures. The Music: Learning to code-switch without losing your brand's soul. The Closer: If your brand sounds the same in a boardroom as it does on the Discord server, you're gonna have a bad time in one of those rooms... Here's the post... https://lnkd.in/gnBbuakD

In this special episode, Joe and Robert answer all the questions from the This Old Marketing audience. How do backlink strategies (SEO) and citations (AEO) work together, and what unified content strategy can help brands earn both? In the age of GEO, how should membership organizations decide what content to keep free versus behind a paywall, especially when balancing search visibility with exclusive expert value? As AI takes over more execution, will small businesses and solopreneurs still need and pay for human marketing strategy, and how can independent consultants differentiate and stay relevant in an AI-first world? Did the Netflix series about the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders measurably impact the team’s brand or game viewership, and is it a model for how entertainment content can elevate a sports franchise’s marketing? Should marketers clearly separate “content marketing” (audience-building) from “sales enablement content” (purchase support), and does lumping them together lead to bad strategy and wrong KPIs? If you were starting from zero today, with AI flooding every channel, what would you build first to create real audience trust and attention over the next five years, and what would you completely ignore that most marketers are still chasing? Thanks to all of you for your questions and support. Subscribe and Follow: Follow Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose on LinkedIn for insights, hot takes, and weekly updates from the world of content and marketing.

This week on This Old Marketing, Joe and Robert unpack a trio of headlines that perfectly capture the optimism and overconfidence of the AI era. First, Apple and Google announce a multi-year partnership on AI. Two of the most powerful companies on the planet, joining forces to shape the future of intelligence. What could possibly go wrong? Then OpenAI confirms that advertising is coming to ChatGPT later this year. The honeymoon phase of AI is officially over, and the business model phase has arrived. Joe and Robert explore what ads inside conversational interfaces really mean for brands, creators, and trust. Finally, Salesforce steps up to answer MrBeast’s call for the “most amazing Super Bowl ad ever” for Super Bowl 2026. When enterprise software meets YouTube spectacle, expectations get set very high. And history suggests that rarely ends quietly. Marketing Winners: Dos Equis, for proving that great brand storytelling and humor still cut through, even in an AI-flooded content world. Breeze Airways, for smart positioning and customer-centric marketing in an industry that desperately needs both. Rants and Raves: The continued rise of AI-generated music hitting the charts, raising uncomfortable questions about creativity, authorship, and what “human” even means in popular culture. A rave for Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning, and why its lessons about purpose, suffering, and responsibility feel more relevant now than ever in a world optimized for convenience and automation. As always, the episode ends where This Old Marketing lives best, at the intersection of technology, media, and the timeless human need for meaning, trust, and something real to hold onto. Subscribe and Follow: Follow Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose on LinkedIn for insights, hot takes, and weekly updates from the world of content and marketing.

It’s the episode you’ve been waiting for. Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose bring together their favorite rants and raves in one fast-moving supercut that tackles the biggest questions facing marketers and creators right now. Is print really making a comeback, or are we just nostalgic for a slower, more thoughtful era of media? Why does everyone seem so certain in a world that’s becoming more complex by the day? And is “thoughtful marketing” finally ready for its return after years of hacks, shortcuts, and algorithm chasing? The guys also dig into a question every content team should be asking: Is content actually broken, or is the real problem your org chart? Along the way, Joe and Robert explore what might be the next great opportunity for marketers and content entrepreneurs who are willing to zig while everyone else zags. Big ideas. Sharp opinions. A few laughs. And plenty to argue about on your next walk or commute. You don’t want to miss this one. Subscribe and Follow: Follow Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose on LinkedIn for insights, hot takes, and weekly updates from the world of content and marketing.

In an age of endless AI slop, the most powerful thing you can do is tell deeply human stories that break through the sea of AI slop and communicate your new PoV with the world. My friend Joe Lazer has a new book out to help you do that—Super Skill: Why Storytelling Is the Superpower of the AI Age. Joe shared an early copy of this book with me, and it's a funny, insightful, neuroscience-backed guide to telling stories that break through. My friend Joe Pulizzi called it "a story of hope and how we can find the best in ourselves, for our heart and our pocketbook, in the age of AI." https://lnkd.in/gdgR6ZQg

It was a wild week in artificial intelligence. Joe and Robert break down a surprising stumble from OpenAI and the aggressive counter-moves coming from Anthropic. The hosts unpack what these developments signal for the broader AI landscape and why the growing concentration of power among a small number of platforms should concern marketers and creators alike. If a handful of companies ultimately control how AI works and how it distributes information, that likely tells us exactly where marketing is headed as well. Along the way, Joe and Robert offer a few friendly suggestions to Sam Altman on how he might rethink his public communication strategy during moments of controversy and rapid change. Next, the show shifts to a supposed social media “problem” involving the CEO of McDonald's on Instagram. Except… it wasn’t really a problem at all. Joe and Robert argue the episode was actually a major brand win. The bigger lesson? Companies should stop hiding their quirky, weird, and interesting employees. Celebrating authentic personalities inside organizations may be one of the most underused marketing advantages available today. The conversation then moves into the exploding trend of 90-second serialized dramas dominating short-form video platforms. What started as a niche format is quickly becoming a global phenomenon, reshaping storytelling and opening the door to entirely new forms of brand entertainment. Winners and Losers Joe highlights the creative marketing moves coming from Staples and why the brand may be onto something smart in a crowded retail environment. Robert, meanwhile, calls out what he believes was a strategic misstep from global advertising giant WPP. Rants and Raves Joe raves about a growing opportunity inspired by a recent article in The Wall Street Journal on the rise of subscription mail products and why creators should pay close attention to physical experiences in a digital world. And in a rare twist, Robert offers praise for the research and insights coming from Gartner… something listeners may not have expected. As always, Joe and Robert break down what it all means for marketers trying to build sustainable media brands in a world increasingly shaped by platforms, AI, and shifting audience behavior. Subscribe and Follow: Follow Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose on LinkedIn for insights, hot takes, and weekly updates from the world of content and marketing.

Today our analytics can tell - to the decimal point - how many people clicked a button, scrolled past a paragraph, or rage-quit a landing page after 4.3 seconds. We can track everything. And yet most of us have absolutely no idea whether anyone actually trusts us. Soooo.. this is Part 3 of my content marketing measurement framework series... Kinda like Indiana Jones said "I'm making this up as I go along"... And working it all out in real time... But anyway - this is the episode where we stop talking theory and start actually scoring. I'm basically going through what I'm calling the "signal clusters" behind each side of the Trust Lattice model — expressed sentiment, resonance depth, citation rates, promise-to-delivery ratios, and the "Loud Clues" that traditional analytics completely miss Then for fun, stay for the part where I built a little AI Agent and ran the lattice on my own personal brand for the story around "content marketing measurement"... Not to get too meta - but spoiler alert: I got work to do. Anyway - as George Box once said all models are wrong - but some are useful. Hopefully this starts to make some sense for your work. I will say, the light pressure test I gave it, provided some real insight. Full post here: https://lnkd.in/gppuVPkR

It might be time to officially F$*ck with your brand story? Seriously. Because right now, B2B marketing is hitting a "beige wall" of AI-generated competence. This is part three of my four part series this month on B2B Branding - what I'm calling a Plural Brand Strategy.... And this week I'm talking about how we might put an indelible humanity into our content... We’ve spent a decade kneeling at the altar of the "Hero’s Journey"..... Sooooo many slides of our brand as Yoda and the Customer as Luke Skywalker... And it's not that storytelling is somehow now bad... It's just.... well... expected. When "perfectly structured" becomes a commodity, it also becomes invisible. This leads to a counterintuitive reality researchers call the Verisimilitude Paradox: AI has become so good at simulating professionally structured confidence that our brains begin to stop fact-checking. Its syntax is so flawless that we struggle to tell whether the output is true or merely *sounds* true. And Oooof? More and more people no longer care to investigate the difference. So if AI can simulate well structured competence, then competence is no longer a proxy for being "human." Both human and AI content now face the same wall of skepticism. If you write a perfectly polished, legally scrubbed, committee-approved white paper, the reader’s brain may flag it as synthetic - even if a human spent forty hours on it. And... yeah... also vice versa. This leads us to a difficult conclusion for those of us in marketing: We have to give up the obsession with whether content was written by a human or a machine. It soon just won't matter. Maaaaybe the remaining way to demonstrate your content didn’t come from a prompt is to leave the rough edges in. We have to introduce something an algorithm can’t simulate: the weird, the unexpected, or the risky mistake. In my very sciencey voice - I'm calling them the brand's "Pointy Bits." Quick side note: I wanted to know how I should spell "sciencey" - so I asked the Goog... It came back and corrected it to "science" of course - and when I said "no, I really meant 'sciencey'" - it threw up in its mouth a little and said it had, literally, nothing to show me... Aaaaand scene. In my latest article, I call this approach The Pratfall Protocol. It’s the art of using vulnerability as a "costly signal" to prove you have skin in the game - something an LLM will never have. And that's what I'm tackling this week. See the link to the full article here https://lnkd.in/gV43PF3C

I'm thrilled to share that I’m working with Big Valley Marketing as a Fractional Senior Content Strategy Consultant - meaning I can help them by getting to do the work I love most — advising, architecting, and helping brands build content programs that actually work — in close partnership with an already-exceptional team. Big Valley has built something rare: a firm with serious strategic depth *and* real execution muscle. They already have talented content strategists in-house. I'm not replacing anything - I'm adding a particular skill set to a roster that's clearly being built with intention. I'm especially looking forward to working alongside my longtime collaborator and fellow SoCal neighbor Michael Weiss, who leads their Content Marketing and Digital & Social practices. We have a shared language around this work, which means we can skip the orientation and get straight to the good stuff. My advisory practice at Seventh Bear and Content Marketing Institute continues as always. More ways to do work that matters, with people worth doing it with. That's the whole story.

Hello friends. Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Usually, this is when we share quotes about the Dream. But this year, I’ve been thinking more about the reality Dr. King worked within — an era of deep fracture, instability, and moral uncertainty. There was no “safe” ground. No consensus. And no clear signal telling him it was okay to move. That feels familiar. Right now, many of us responsible for brands and communication feel stuck in a similar place. Every message feels loaded. Every move feels like it could age badly. So the instinct isn’t to lead — it’s to wait. To be safe. Beige. Careful. In this week’s Lens Newsletter, I explore why that instinct is understandable — but dangerous. And why, in moments like this, clarity isn’t a risk to avoid. It’s the only one worth taking.

You’re not suffering from incompetence. We're drowning in the opposite. Welcome to the Beige Wall - B2B marketing in 2026. Look around. Everything is now polished. Everything is articulate. Everything is grammatically perfect. A two-person startup in a garage now sounds exactly like a Fortune 100. Which is ironic, because they are trying to sound exactly like us: the scrappy two-person startup. The generative AI revolution has democratized competence This is part one of my four-part February series on B2B Brand Marketing in 2026. Thanks to the generative AI revolution, the cost of "professionalism" has dropped to zero. But when everyone sounds intelligent and articulate, "competence" stops being a differentiator. And it's worse than even bad content. It's neutral. Background noise. Beige. If your 2026 brand content strategy is to “answer customer questions professionally,” congratulations: You are officially camouflage. And the biggest challenge I see that most B2B Brands have right now is that their "beige wall" is one, big "value proposition". We won the battle to get "alignment" and the "one GTM message" out the door. But now - well that one big, aligned, consistent message is now drowning in a sea of polished sameness. In this part one - I’m declaring the demise of the "Monolith" B2B brand strategy and introducing (IMHO) a way out of the sea of sameness: The Plural Brand & The Weirdness Imperative. We need to stat building brands that can hold contradictory ideas, embrace the weird, and actually feel human in a synthetic world. Read the full breakdown of how to build a Plural Brand here:https://lnkd.in/gfEhcFVK

This line in Carneys speech at Davos is so good and not just meant for countries… it’s for companies here in the US as well… woe to us if we wait for the platform companies to do something. They won’t. They thrive on not taking a position. “The middle powers must act together because if you are not at the table, we’re on the menu.” Let’s start using these platforms - all of these platforms - for what they are: simply plumbing. We are the water.

Hey folks... Pay attention! This is an awesome gig and an awesome person to work with... So..... do it... do it... do it....

That feeling when New York Magazine runs a smart piece on “Friction Maxxing” …and uh... you remember you wrote a book last year called Valuable Friction. (valuablefriction.com) No conspiracy theories here. Not a complaint. Honestly, it’s reassuring. Just one of those moments that reminds you ideas tend to show up when the culture is ready, not when any one person is.

“Is this really agentic?” What I keep finding is that this debate that I'm hearing in marketing teams isn’t ethical. It’s not technical. And it’s definitely not philosophical. It’s semantic. Marketing teams, vendors, and even the companies building these tools are arguing over how autonomous something needs to be before it earns the label - while quietly ignoring the much more interesting question of what expectations we’re baking into the work itself. One camp frames agentic AI as a highly capable co-pilot. Powerful, yes - but with a human still at the wheel. Another frames it as autonomous operations - systems designed to run on their own, optimized for speed, scale, and efficiency. Same car. Very different assumptions about who’s driving… and whether anyone’s awake. Which is how we end up with proposed use cases in marketing like AI attending meetings on our behalf, summarizing them, and assigning action items we now have to review later. At which point it’s worth asking isn't that the literal definition of "this meeting should have been an email." But there is a real challenge with the semantic argument — and it’s not about settling a bar bet over definitions. It’s that leadership is often expecting one kind of value from these agentic AI use cases — usually efficiency, speed, or headcount reduction — while practitioners are experiencing something else entirely. Different benefits. Different tradeoffs. Different forms of progress. That mismatch is a big reason so many companies are “doing AI” but struggling to realize anything resembling meaningful ROI. In Part Two of my agentic AI series, I dig into that gap — why it exists, why it keeps widening, and humbly propose how we might evaluate agentic AI based on the value it actually creates, not the label it’s given. Oh PS> Enjoy the new "David Fincher" look that I accidentally got in my video. #WhatsInTheBox Check out the article here... https://lnkd.in/gDARtmm2

The Great AI Democratization (Just Kidding, It’s Still Big Consulting) So, yeah, OpenAI just announced their "Frontier Alliances," and - prepare to be shocked - the keys to the "democratized" future of Agentic AI have been handed directly to the usual suspects: McKinsey, BCG, Accenture, and Capgemini. If you were hoping for a revolution in your enterprise Agentic Workflow approach, I hope you like seven-figure retainers and PowerPoint decks that cost more than your house. The irony from OpenAI is almost too rich to chew. We've been told AI is this great modern equalizer - the tool that would level the playing field for every business. Now, we’re witnessing the construction of an enterprise "Frontier" gated community for those that want to, you know, actually succeed... By creating an "official" alliance, OpenAI has basically told the enterprise world that if you want "Agentic AI" that actually works, you need THE most expensive chaperones to hold your hand. It’s a classic pay-to-play industrial complex. It's, quite literally, out of the old Oracle, SAP, and others "Partner Center of Expertiese" playbook of twenty years ago... With this, they aren’t just selling software; they’re selling an insurance policy against the fear of being left behind. These kinds of agreements are world-class at "wiring the systems," but they are often illiterate when it comes to the soul of an organization. They become obsessed with building faster treadmills. And now they will now be so busy building the faster treadmill, they will forget to teach the runners where they’re supposed to go - or if they should even be running in the first place.

So - continuing my monthly series - and this Month of March I'm taking on B2B Content Marketing Measurement... I actually spent the holidays trying to come up with a new, practical framework for marketers to apply Content Marketing Measurement and I think I got something - at least...well... it's not about clicks... So we’ve spent the last decade "measuring intent" as if we’re tracking migratory birds. But sadly what we've failed to recognize is that it's just as hard for buyers as it is for us as marketers... Modern B2B buyers are operating in a polar vortex of fear and regret. Gartner sez: 59% of businesses regret a major purchase they made in the last 18 months. 63% say that impact was "monumental." In a world where AI can spit out a content marketing white paper in 4 seconds, buyers don’t need more information. They need to know you aren’t going to ruin their career. Our job as content marketers have moved... It's about managing the emotional climate... This is Part 1 of my new 4-part series on something I'm calling the Audience Trust Index (ATI) (it's not nearly as lofty as that might sound but ya know you gotta give it that consulting-vibe acronym or nobody takes it seriously LOL... Anyway I found a measurement framework I adapted from clinical psychiatry to help you measure the emotional climate of your audience. Maybe - just maybe I got somethin.... Anyway - the next four weeks will be about that... Here's the link if you're interested...

This week, Joe and Robert dig into fascinating new research from Anthropic that reveals how large language models are already capable of executing many traditional marketing tasks. The conversation quickly turns into a deeper question. Is the real disruption AI itself, or the fact that many leaders in mid-size and enterprise organizations never truly valued marketing in the first place? If machines can now execute the tactics, what happens to marketing teams that were already fighting for credibility inside their organizations? The discussion explores what the research means for the future of marketing roles, how AI will reshape tactical execution, and whether strategy, creativity, and trust-building become the true competitive advantages. As usual, Joe and Robert have plenty of opinions and a few laughs along the way. In other news, Meta makes another big move by acquiring Moltbook. Is this a calculated, low-risk gamble from the tech giant, or does the move signal growing pressure in the AI platform race? Meanwhile, LinkedIn content is increasingly appearing in responses from AI chatbots and generative search tools. Joe and Robert discuss what this shift means for marketers and content creators trying to remain visible as discovery moves away from traditional search engines. Winners and Losers Winner #1: Tecovas: A clever follow-up short film connected to a Super Bowl ad campaign shows how brands can extend the life of expensive tentpole advertising. Winner #2: Coinbase launches its new “NPC Break-Free” campaign that will run during the Academy Awards, taking a bold creative swing at culture, conformity, and crypto skepticism. Rants and Raves Robert dives into BlackRock and the fallout surrounding its private credit strategy, raising questions about risk and transparency. Joe closes the show with a rant about a stunning operational blunder by United States national baseball team during the World Baseball Classic. Subscribe and Follow: Follow Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose on LinkedIn for insights, hot takes, and weekly updates from the world of content and marketing.

A new piece from the Wall Street Journal introduces the idea of being “alternatively influential”…people who drive real impact without massive follower counts. Joe and Robert break it down: Is this just a rebrand of “niche creator” or “thought leader”? Or is it actually the future of influence in an AI-saturated world? And most importantly…does audience size matter less than trust, proximity, and credibility? The bigger question: Are we entering an era where being known by the right people beats being known by everyone? AI Isn’t Just Helping…It Might Be Hurting A new Morning Brew piece highlights research showing that AI can actually decrease focus and increase mental fatigue when overused. Key findings: Productivity rises with 1–3 AI tools…then drops off after that Workers report “mental overload” and decision fatigue Time saved gets filled with more work, not better work Joe and Robert’s take: This isn’t really about AI It’s about multitasking overload AI just accelerates a problem we already had Bottom line: More tools ≠ better thinking Focus is still the competitive advantage Substack Goes Full Stack (Again) Substack continues expanding its platform, now rolling out a recording studio feature to support video and podcast creation. The discussion: Substack is no longer “just newsletters” It’s becoming a complete creator operating system Email platforms, podcast hosts, and even YouTube should be paying attention The real question: Does Substack become the home base for creators…or just another tool in the stack? Winners and Losers Marketing Winner: Calvin Klein Dakota Johnson’s new campaign hits the mark Clean, simple, effective brand storytelling that cuts through the noise Marketing Loser: The Oscars Still struggling to stay culturally relevant A branding problem, not just a ratings problem Marketing Loser (Joe): World Baseball Classic Timing Great product…questionable timing Hard to build momentum when the schedule works against you Rants and Raves Joe’s Rant: Why Team USA Lost to Venezuela Joe’s hot take: It wasn’t about effort It was about constraints Team USA had: Contracts Pitch limits Usage concerns Calls from MLB teams Meanwhile, Venezuela had: Fewer restrictions More freedom to just play The lesson: The team with less to manage often performs better Robert’s Rave: Where AI Actually Gets Its Content Robert highlights a new piece on AI sourcing: AI doesn’t create from nothing It builds on existing human work The real leverage is still in original thinking and creation Subscribe and Follow: Follow Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose on LinkedIn for insights, hot takes, and weekly updates from the world of content and marketing.

Yeah... Road Trip!! I'm headed to SXSW EDU to speak next week... Lemme know if you're going...

This week, Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose tackle one of the boldest statements in recent marketing memory. The CEO of Unilever says big brand advertising is dead. Is he right? Or is this a Trojan horse for something much bigger? Big Brand Advertising: Dead or Disguised? When the head of one of the largest consumer goods companies in the world questions traditional brand advertising, it’s not a throwaway comment. Joe and Robert unpack what’s really happening: Are we witnessing the collapse of mass brand-building? Or is this a pivot toward creator-led, performance-driven, and retail media strategies? Is “brand is dead” just cover for short-term earnings pressure? Facebook’s Creator Monetization Shift Next, the hosts examine Facebook and its evolving creator monetization programs. Here’s the surprising part: most of the creators earning real money aren’t in the U.S. or Europe. What does that signal? Is Facebook optimizing for lower-cost content markets? Is this about global growth or cheaper engagement? Does this open the door to more synthetic and AI-generated content? Joe and Robert debate what this means for marketers investing in creator partnerships and for Western creators assuming they’re at the center of platform economics. AI Actors, Hollywood, and Trademarking Yourself A fascinating conversation between Matthew McConaughey and Timothée Chalamet sparks a larger discussion: what happens when AI enters the craft of acting? Will we eventually see: Best AI Actor? Best Synthetic Film? Or entirely new creative categories? Joe raises a bigger issue for marketers and creators: should you trademark your name, image, and likeness? As AI-generated replicas improve, protecting your identity may become a business necessity rather than a vanity move. Winners and Losers Winner: The Creator Betting on Landline Phones Joe highlights a surprising trend: a creator sells old-school landline phones. Marketing Loser: U.S. Men’s Hockey Robert explains why the United States men's national ice hockey team earns this week’s marketing “L.” Brand positioning, expectations, and execution all come under scrutiny. Rants, Raves, and Heated Debate Robert dives deep into Anthropic and its recent moves around AI safety. Is the company quietly shifting away from its core safety mission? Then things get heated. Joe and Robert spar over an article by Matt Shumer on the future of AI. Is exponential acceleration inevitable? Are we underestimating the timeline? Or overhyping the disruption? Subscribe and Follow: Follow Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose on LinkedIn for insights, hot takes, and weekly updates from the world of content and marketing.

NFL + Bad Bunny: A Strategic Win The NFL’s move to spotlight Bad Bunny wasn’t just a halftime performance decision. It was a strategic signal about where the league is headed as it expands globally and looks to connect with younger, more diverse audiences. Joe and Robert explore whether this marks a broader repositioning of the NFL brand and what marketers can learn from a legacy organization willing to evolve in public. This isn’t about one performance. It’s about how institutions modernize without losing their core. Super Bowl Ad Winners & Losers The guys break down the biggest hits and misses from this year’s Super Bowl ad lineup. Which brands actually created impact? Who played it too safe? Did AI-driven ads live up to the hype or feel automated and forgettable? Some advertisers made bold cultural bets. Others blended into the background. Spotify’s Big Earnings and the Hidden Opportunity Spotify’s latest earnings report might signal something bigger than a financial rebound. Joe sees a potential opportunity for creators and marketers who understand the long-term value of owned audio audiences. Is podcasting and direct subscription audio still undervalued? Are marketers overlooking one of the most durable attention platforms available today? If you care about building direct audience leverage, this segment matters. Winners and Losers Joe’s Winner: Markiplier’s Iron Lung Markiplier’s direct-to-theaters success with Iron Lung shows what creator-led distribution can look like without traditional Hollywood gatekeepers. Is this a preview of the next decade of media? Robert’s Loser: AI Ads at the Super Bowl AI promised scale and personalization. On the biggest stage in advertising, many of those spots felt soulless and generic. Scale without taste is not a strategy. Rants and Raves Joe’s Rant: TikTok Privacy Are creators and brands ignoring long-term privacy and platform risk for short-term reach? Robert’s Commentary: The Overblown SaaS Apocalypse Robert pushes back on the constant doom-and-gloom narrative around SaaS and tech. Is the so-called apocalypse real, or just another overreaction cycle? Big Takeaway Legacy institutions are adapting. Creators are bypassing gatekeepers. Platforms are redefining monetization. The question for marketers is simple: Are you reacting to change, or positioning yourself to benefit from it? Subscribe and Follow: Follow Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose on LinkedIn for insights, hot takes, and weekly updates from the world of content and marketing.