Episode 16 | It’s Not a Pyramid Scheme, It’s A Marketing Strategy

Episode 16 | It’s Not a Pyramid Scheme, It’s A Marketing Strategy

This week on VelociTEA, Emily and Forrest break down their proprietary Influencer Activation Pyramid: a five-layer framework for B2B influencer content that moves from owned content at the base through sponsored, paid, earned, and organic at the top. They explain why you can't skip levels, why "paid is predictable," and what happens when brands mistake organic buzz for a birthright. Plus: why AI could never replace a great sales dinner, and the FTC disclosures your brand needs to be aware of.

Episode 15 | Why Your Influencer Strategy Isn’t Working

This week on VelociTEA, Emily and Forrest break down the most common mistakes they see on both sides of influencer marketing: the brands and the creators. They talk about why brands get into trouble when they over-control messaging, chase only “big names,” or try to hide sponsorships instead of owning them. On the creator side, they unpack the pitfalls of losing your voice, overpricing yourself out of your ROI, overloading your audience with sponsored content, and letting AI flatten the very credibility people follow you for in the first place. The throughline is simple: the best influencer marketing works when both sides know who they are, act like real partners, and don’t try to be sneaky.

Episode 14 | PR in the Influencer Era

Traditional PR is dead. Attention is the new currency.  In this episode of VelociTEA, Emily and Forrest talk about how PR teams are adapting to a world where content creators can function like journalists, analysts, or something entirely new. They discuss how brands should think about influencer relationships, why treating creators like traditional press often fails, and how PR, marketing, and influencer teams can collaborate.

Episode 13 | Content Sommeliers

In technical communities, trust is hard to earn and easy to lose. Developers have a nose for authenticity and credibility. In this episode of VelociTEA, Emily and Forrest talk about why the best tech content often looks a little imperfect. From avoiding “AI slop” to letting creators speak in their own voice, they break down the subtle signals that separate credible content from manufactured marketing. *No wine was harmed in the making of this episode.

Episode 12 | How Big Companies Lose (and Regain) Momentum

This week on Velocitea, Emily and Forrest break down the pendulum swing they’ve seen across marketing and engineering teams: fast, autonomous execution on one side and centralized, consensus-driven collaboration on the other. They explore why orgs drift toward process and visibility, what causes them to snap back toward small “special ops” teams, and how market pressure, redundancy, and leadership changes accelerate the swing. They also share practical advice for surviving (and influencing) the shift including why high-output teams often look “inefficient” on paper, how centralized teams can avoid becoming bottlenecks, and what to do when a new leader arrives and starts rewriting the rules.