Lesson 4 of 5 · 3 clips · 15 min
Off-site authority: PR, podcasts and video
Why does what others publish about you count for more than what you publish yourself?
Nearly every guest in this course arrives at the same place: coverage you did not write carries more weight than copy you did. These three clips are about earning that coverage on purpose.
Clip 1: A press release taught ChatGPT about a new channel
Who is speaking: Solomon Thimothy until about 1:49, Matt Bertram until about 5:05, then Solomon.
Solomon Thimothy's example: a client launched a YouTube channel that ChatGPT knew nothing about, and after a press release about the channel it did. His team now works outreach, press mentions and podcast interviews because those change what the engines know about a brand. Matt sees share of voice in media as the key, and YouTube as the easiest route to it for most brands. Solomon closes on the buyer: customers do not care how you got into the answer, so solve for the customer.
Where our evidence differs: Both speakers treat schema markup as part of the foundation here. The best controlled test we know of found that adding structured data did not raise AI citations, which is a narrower finding than schema being useless. SEO 101, lesson 4: what actually moves the needle.
Clip 2: Google used a third party to say who you are
Who is speaking: Matt Bertram until about 3:11, then Austin Holmes.
Matt describes a property he manages where Google relied on a third-party site, not the brand's own pages, to establish who the brand is. Austin Holmes of Publicity For Good builds on it: reviews, Reddit, Quora and above all the press carry a trust the engines guard, because losing their users' trust costs them users. With no page two in an AI answer, he says, the aim is to be the one recommendation, and for most companies the practical route is getting the name out the traditional way.
Clip 3: Treat every press placement as an SEO asset
Who is speaking: Geoff Campbell (guest host) asks; Jackie Zukerman Delory from about 4:14; Geoff again from about 7:50.
Guest host Geoff Campbell asks how deliberately PR and SEO now work together. Jackie Zukerman Delory tells every client to optimize their press placements: link them from the website, email signatures, anywhere a link fits, because she now sees AI tools treat people quoted in credible outlets as the go-to names in their field. Geoff puts the thesis plainly, that AI trusts third-party coverage more than anything a brand says about itself, and adds the condition worth keeping: coverage works best when the core information on your own site is structured correctly.
Try this before the next lesson: List the last five places someone else mentioned your brand: articles, podcasts, directories, reviews. Check that each one names you the way your own site does and links where it can. Then pick one show or publication your buyers follow and pitch it something only your team can say.
All 5 lessons · SEO 101, the companion course for business owners