Google is Dead. Long Live Google.

The Social Commerce Revolution

THE SOCIAL COMMERCE REVOLUTION Rev & Reach from PopSpeed Digital [https://revandreach.popspeeddigital.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Rev-and-Reach-Logo.jpg] In this episode of Rev & Reach, Lori Jo breaks down the rapid rise of social commerce and why brands can no longer rely on websites alone to drive sales. She explains how platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube are evolving into full storefronts, where customers can discover and purchase products without ever leaving the app. Lori shares why creator-led selling is outperforming traditional ads, how short-form video fuels impulse buying, and what businesses need to do to stay competitive. From building community to tracking real conversions, this episode offers a practical roadmap for turning social content into revenue. THEMES DISCUSSED IN THIS EPISODE: * The rise of social commerce and in-platform purchasing * Creator-led selling vs. traditional brand advertising * The role of short-form video in impulse buying behavior * Why community matters more than algorithm reach * How to measure success with click-to-purchase tracking EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS 00:41 — Lori introduces the concept of social commerce and explains how platforms are evolving into full storefronts where customers can purchase without leaving the app. 02:44 — A breakdown of key platforms like TikTok Shop, Instagram Checkout, and YouTube Shopping, and how short-form video is driving impulse purchases. 03:36 — Why creator-led selling outperforms traditional ads, and how authentic voices convert better than polished brand messaging. 06:18 — Why relying on the algorithm is no longer enough, and how building a strong, engaged community is critical for driving sales. 08:22 — The biggest pitfalls of social commerce, including inconsistent content, poor tracking, and failing to analyze what actually drives purchases. TOP QUOTES 00:41 — “What if your Instagram scroll was also your checkout lane?” 04:15 — “A spokesperson that you hire that’s really polished is not going to be seen as credible compared to the grandma using your skin cream that’s really excited about it.” 06:29 — “You cannot rely on algorithm reach to drive commerce. You can’t do it. You need to build community.” 08:27 — “So social commerce is not a set it and forget it. It is going to require active, ongoing content production.” Episode Transcript - Click to Open REV & REACH EPISODE 27 TRANSCRIPT THE SOCIAL COMMERCE REVOLUTION 00:00 Hello, I’m Lori Jo Vest, thank you so much for joining me for this episode of Rev & Reach where PopSpeed Digital Marketing LLC, the agency I run, we pull the curtain back and tell you how we’re doing what we do, give you great advice on digital marketing and help you keep abreast of trends and what’s happening in the world of digital marketing, to help you get more ROI from your digital marketing efforts. So today we are going to talk about Add to Cart. No website required, the social commerce revolution. 00:41 What if your Instagram scroll was also your checkout lane? This is just so cool. Social media driven sales in the US are projected to surpass $100 billion in 2026 and globally, social commerce revenues should surpass $1 trillion by 2028. That’s crazy. So here’s what we’re going to cover today, and here’s why, if you have a product and you are not selling on social media, you’re missing out. There are so many opportunities out there right now. So what is social commerce, and why is it having a moment? Just like everything else, social platforms are evolving, and they’re evolving into full storefronts, not just discovery tools. And that’s really cool, because what shoppable media does is turn online content, social posts, videos, digital display messages into interactive points of purchase, so the customer can buy products directly from inside the channel. Hit that buy button and keep scrolling. 01:48 And I remember hearing back decades ago that someday we’d be able to stop our television commercial that was playing and hit a shop button and buy the shirt that the woman in the car was wearing. We are not far from that. We are really not far from that. Actually, I saw an interview on television the other day, and this woman had on the most beautiful patterned silk blouse. It was gorgeous. And my husband said, why don’t you see where you can get it, you know, see if you can identify it. Pulled it up, put it in one of my tools, and it pulled up the exact blouse at Nordstrom for $325. That’s beyond my budget, but it was beautiful. Now I know why it was so beautiful. And I mean, it was just so easy, and I could have just bought it right then. So we’re not far from that on our real TVs with smart TVs, but social commerce gives you so many opportunities. 02:44 So the key platforms that you want to watch are TikTok Shop, Instagram Checkout, Pinterest Shopping and YouTube Shopping. And what’s happening is the convergence — they’re calling it convergence — of short form video and impulse buyer behavior. If you sell a product that’s got a low, maybe under $100 price point, think about how often you’ve been scrolling and saw some really cute earrings that were $40 and you wish you could have bought them. Now you can, right? So shoppable video is what’s leading this charge. That means the products are featured with embedded links so they can click right then, learn more and purchase all without leaving the video, which really makes it so much easier to do those impulse buys. 03:36 Creator-led selling is another thing that’s really cool. Instead of brand-led selling, you’ve got creators that are putting together storefronts that when they do a video, you can immediately go buy those items, and then they get the credit. If you are a brand selling products, creators and your everyday social media content creator is a much better, more authentic and more credible salesperson than your ads. It’s just the way things are right now — they convert better. A spokesperson that you hire that’s really polished is not going to be seen as credible compared to the grandma using your skin cream that’s really excited about it and uses her own language and reaches a very specific audience. So think about it in terms of that. With AI-generated media just taking over, brands are focusing heavily on using creators because the AI stuff is just not cutting it. Consumers know it’s AI. They don’t believe it. And if you are selling a product, you don’t want your audience disbelieving the claims you’re making simply because of your images and the tools you’re using to create your content. 04:53 So there’s a lot of things that are happening out there. Live shopping is getting really interesting. It’s still very niche here. We don’t see it quite as often. It’s very big in Asian countries, but right now in the US, what we’re seeing is here and there. You’ll see social media — I’ve seen a lot of Facebook Live events where people are selling things. And there are things like that that happen, but it’s going to get bigger. So if you have the ability to create a live feed that allows your customers to shop, consider that. Give it a try. It might work. And think about this — have you ever bought something directly from a social post? What made you do it? I buy skincare stuff. I have bought clothing. Sometimes it’s disappointing. I have purchased supplements, hair care products, hair dyes, things like that. It is something that people are looking to do. It’s one of those things that helps the consumer see what your product is like when it’s in use, how other people feel about it. It’s a stellar pathway. If you’re selling a product under $100. The one thing you do have to consider with social commerce is that in 2026 users can actually customize their feeds to hide entire categories of content that they don’t want to see. 06:18 Instagram has this thing called Tune Your Algorithm, which allows people to suppress entire industries, topics, types of creators, all kinds of things. What that means is you cannot rely on algorithm reach to drive commerce. You can’t do it. You need to build community. You need to create content that really resonates with your people so that they want to follow you, that they engage with you. Community is so much bigger than just reaching a huge number of people. It’s so much more important. The more competitive the digital space gets, the more important it is that you are actually reaching out to your consumers with things that they want to see and experience. 07:00 The other thing that’s happening, which is kind of cool, is that Threads is emerging as a commerce platform. We had not spent a lot of time on Threads, but it’s actually now a viable platform, cementing its role as a real-time information hub. More people are going there, and the NBA is one of the major brands playing there. So that’s kind of interesting to see who the audience is for the NBA. It’s very wide, very broad. They also have a lot of money. So if they’re posting on Threads and doing some sponsorship on Threads, you can pretty much assume that they have done the research to show that it’s a viable channel. So I would recommend you get more into Threads at least. Add that to your mix of social channels that you play in so that you can see if it’s viable for you and your audience. 08:22 So here are the pitfalls. There’s always going to be the things that don’t work. So social commerce is not a set it and forget it. It is going to require active, ongoing content production. So you can’t do one post a week. You can’t just put something up when, oh, we have a new product, let’s put it up. You’ve got to be creating the community, and you do that by regularly producing content that your audience loves. It takes time, and it takes work. Attribution headaches — you have to be really careful in setting everything up to make sure that you’re actually measuring what drove the purchase, what post or what live led people to go and buy. If you had 16 posts that were selling social commerce posts last month, at the end of the month, you should be looking at that content and analyzing what performed, and then do more of that and less of the things that don’t perform. You’d be surprised how many people keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect different results. It’s not how it works. 09:26 So the other thing is authenticity versus advertorial. If it feels like an ad, it will fail. And you may have heard me say this before if you’ve listened to this podcast, but I would advise you to go look at Scrub Daddy on TikTok if you’re wondering, oh my God, how can I do something authentic, entertaining with something that’s just like a little sponge or whatever your product is. Go to TikTok. Look at what the brands are doing. That’s where you’re going to see the best of the best when it comes to social commerce. I hear it everywhere with a lot of influencers. Oh, I bought this because I saw it on TikTok Shop. It’s where I think it started, and it’s a really great place to go and look and consider what you should be doing to get into social commerce if you’re not there already. 10:15 So the other thing that’s coming up, which is really interesting, is that vague, sweeping corporate sustainability pledges are no longer considered worth the paper they’re printed on. Consumers are actually looking for measurable product benefits that make them feel better about sustainable products that they’re purchasing. So you’ll want to look at that. You’ll want to be specific. If your product is made with all natural ingredients, include that. If your product does not test on animals, include that. If it’s vegetarian or vegan, if it’s a food product, if there’s anything you can say — made in the USA or made in your state — things like that that make not just a broad, sweeping “we believe in sustainability,” but put it into your product information so that people can feel that halo effect. If I buy this product, I’m contributing to a better world. So that’s just a little thing to drop in at the end of this one, because I think you may want to consider that if you’re selling a product that has some kind of a sustainability benefit. 11:21 So last but not least, here’s what I’d like you to do. If you have a product that might be a good possibility for social commerce, audit your current social presence first. Go through all the channels and go, hmm, is there one that I might have made, you know, put a link in and made it shoppable? Is there one post that might have worked? Go back and repost that with the shopping feature in it and see what happens. 11:49 Next thing you can do, another action item, identify a few creators in your niche for a potential collaboration and consider micro influencers. I talked about micro influencers in the last episode and how valuable they are for creating UGC and great content and also spreading the word about your organization. Some of the micro influencers, you get five or six of those in a community and you can get some real traction. So identify two or three of those that you could do a social shopping collaboration with and consider doing that, and then make sure that you’re tracking click to purchase, not just engagement. So make sure that whatever you’re setting up, you’re tracking click to purchase, and you’ve done it in a way that includes the right kinds of links and everything that allows you to do that. 12:37 So I hope this has been helpful. It’s one of those topics that’s just so hot right now that social commerce is taking over, and we all want to buy when we get that urge. And if you’re a seller, you want to be on the other side of that happy, engaged buyer. So that’s all I’ve got for you. I hope you have enjoyed listening to this episode, and we will be back in just a few weeks with another episode to help you get more ROI from your digital marketing efforts. If you are watching this on YouTube, please do me a favor and subscribe to the channel and maybe share the content or give us a comment. We would love to hear from you. We have a website, revandreach.popspeeddigital.com. We would love to hear from you there. You can also reach out to me on LinkedIn. I’m an open networker. Just let me know that you were listening to Rev & Reach. Please give me topics you’d like me to talk about. It’s hard for me from this side to know what questions you might have, so I’d love to hear from you. And with that, I will sign off and we’ll see you again in a few weeks.

Google is Dead. Long Live Google.

GOOGLE IS DEAD. LONG LIVE GOOGLE. Rev & Reach from PopSpeed Digital [https://revandreach.popspeeddigital.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/cropped-Rev-and-Reach-Logo.jpg] In this episode of Rev & Reach, Lori Jo Vest breaks down how AI is fundamentally changing the way people search — and why traditional SEO alone is no longer enough. She explains the rise of generative engine optimization (GEO), how AI-powered search results are reshaping visibility and website traffic, and what small and mid-sized businesses need to do right now to stay competitive. From creating “top 10” style content to showing up across multiple platforms, Lori shares practical, actionable strategies to help businesses get found, build credibility, and drive ROI in this new AI-driven search landscape. THEMES DISCUSSED IN THIS EPISODE: * The shift from traditional SEO to AI-driven search (GEO) * Why users no longer need to click websites to make decisions * How AI selects and cites sources in search results * The importance of content freshness and direct-answer content * Building credibility across multiple platforms (not just your website) EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS 00:15 — Lori explains how users can now Google a question and walk into a sales conversation fully informed — without ever visiting a website. 01:48 — A real example of businesses appearing in AI results by creating “top 10” lists that include competitors to build credibility. 03:00 — Lori breaks down the shift from SEO to GEO and why being quoted by AI matters more than being clicked. 07:11 — A practical walkthrough of how to audit your AI presence and understand what content is driving visibility. 12:29 — Why small businesses that adapt quickly to AI search can gain a major advantage over larger, slower-moving brands. TOP QUOTES 00:41 — “Let’s say one of your potential customers Googles a question. They may never click on a single website, but they could still walk into a sales meeting knowing exactly who you are, what you do and what you charge.” 03:10 — “So what they say is SEO gets you clicked, GEO gets you quoted.” 04:24 — “Your website is no longer the first stop, and in many cases, it might not even be a stop at all.” 11:02 — “If your brand shows up in multiple places, the AI tool sees you as being more valuable.” Episode Transcript - Click to Open REV & REACH EPISODE 26 TRANSCRIPT GOOGLE IS DEAD. LONG LIVE GOOGLE. 00:11 Hello, I’m Lori Jo Vest and welcome to this episode of Rev & Reach where PopSpeed Digital Marketing opens up the doors and shows you what we do behind the scenes, what’s important to us right now, what we’re sharing with our clients, how we’re working in the digital marketing space so that you can use what we’ve learned to grow your social media and digital marketing ROI. So today’s subject is Google is dead, long live Google. And it’s an interesting topic because basically, let’s say one of your potential customers Googles a question. They may never click on a single website, but they could still walk into a sales meeting knowing exactly who you are, what you do and what you charge. That’s not the future. That’s what’s happening right now. 01:00 Welcome to the new reality for search. It’s very different than it used to be. And I’ll give you an example. I just did a quick search for a particular type of business in my own community. And I looked for this type of category of businesses and watched what came up. And I looked at the businesses that were shown under the AI tool were not necessarily the same businesses that were shown under a basic search. So Google AI is really impacting Google SEO. So what I noticed was three of those agencies that had been quoted in the AI response to the question that I asked had actually created lists on their own websites of the top 10 businesses in their industry and of course put themselves at the top. 01:48 And so when I opened up the AI tool, there was the response. Here’s these different types of companies that do what you’re asking about. And over here on the side were three articles from three of those businesses that said the top 10 types of companies that do this. And three of them were in that. So I’m like, okay, that’s a learning. Obviously, Google search, when you ask for the best type of business in this area, is looking for those articles, top 10 types of business in this area. So right away, we all need to run out and do a quick article that says that. And if it mentions your competitors, no problem. AI doesn’t care. AI sees you as a good source for information because you listed those other organizations. Now, you don’t have any links on any of their information. The only links are in your listing in that article. But you mention everybody and talk about them, and that gives the AI tool something to look at. 03:00 So I was really surprised by that because while I know how it’s changing, it’s changing faster than I’d anticipated. So what they say is SEO gets you clicked, GEO gets you quoted. And what GEO is generative engine optimization, and that means when the Google AI overview shows up in those searches, you want to be in there, you want to be included in that listing that the AI tool is giving. So looking at some statistics here, Google AI overviews now appear in roughly 25% of all Google searches, which is double the rate from just a few months ago. So if you’re a house painter, you want to have a website that has an article that says the 10 best house painters in southeast Michigan, or in rural Virginia, or whatever it is, so that you show up in those Google searches that are AI driven. So 80% of search users now rely on AI generated summaries for at least 40% of their searches, which is contributing to a 15% drop in traditional SEO website traffic. So think about that. Your website traffic from Google is going down. So all the things that we knew about SEO — it’s all changed. 04:24 Your website is no longer the first stop. And in many cases, it might not even be a stop at all. AI assistance may move your consumer from the question to the comparison to the recommendation without them ever opening another tab. So think about that. It’s really going to be important that we ensure that we show up in AI searches. So what is actually being referenced in a GEO search, which again is generative engine optimization? So it’s basically AI optimization. It’s just a fun, jargony way to say it. So if traditional SEO is about earning a top spot among the top links, GEO is about earning a place among the top two to seven sources that AI platforms cite in a response. When an AI engine names your brand in its answer, it’s actually delivering an implicit endorsement that a simple search engine listing could not do. The AI tool is given more credibility than a search that’s just based on keywords. So I find that really interesting. 05:37 So for example, if you were to search ‘best art studio in Troy, Michigan’, and you’re an art studio, how does that referencing actually happen? Well, it happens across AI assistants, social feeds, marketplaces, podcasts, because most podcasts have transcripts. So AI tools can pick those up, and video, not just Google. So it’s a wider net that they’re throwing out there. And AI engines actually love Reddit. So if you’re not on Reddit, join. Participate in the forums and the discussions that are related to your brand, because your brand’s presence in those Reddit conversations will contribute to you being found in AI search. So something to think about that we’re all going to have to spend a little bit more time out there in those types of platforms to help the AI tool find us. Right? 07:11 So as a small business or midsize business marketing person, what can you do to get yourself in those AI searches? First things first, audit your current AI presence right now. I need to go on there and say, okay, what questions do my clients have? So, for example, I could say, how could you solve not getting ROI from social media? How can you get more clicks on your social links? How can you get more email signups? I could ask those questions in two or three of the AI tools. See what comes back. And again, look at those companies that are referenced. Click through to that content and see what is it. Audit it so that I can understand what is actually gaining the attention in my business category. Doesn’t cost anything. Takes you about 20 minutes. Well worth the effort to do that. I would also encourage people to go to your AI tool and say, tell me about — and put your business name in there. Tell me about PopSpeed Digital Marketing. And then see what it says and how it answers that question and work backwards. So if it’s not answering the question in the way you want it to, click that link and find out where it’s getting that information so that you can learn from that audit. Right? 08:55 So the other thing you can do to help AI see your information is keep your content fresh. We hear from people that don’t understand exactly how SEO and GEO work. And they say, well, we have a blog. We don’t really need to put much content up on it. Right? Because it covers the basic topics maybe once a month. Once a month is okay. Once a month is not great. An article that was published in, say, second quarter of 2025 is not going to be seen by the AI tool as having as much value as a newer article with similar information that was published in Q1 of 2026. So keeping fresh content on your site is going to be really, really important. Make sure your cornerstone content is regularly updated. Your basic information about your organization, how can you amp it up? How can you rewrite it? Maybe quarterly so that what’s there is continually being refreshed, so it’s updated and new, because AI tools love that. 10:00 Create content that answers questions directly. Actually create articles that answer the question. For example, we could do this for PopSpeed: how do you get more ROI out of social media? And that would be the title of the article, would be referred to throughout the article, and really give great information for people who are asking that question. Structured pages and blog posts around the actual questions that your customers ask, not just keywords. The AI tools actually pull from content that gives clean, direct answers. Make sure your content does that. So the next piece of advice: show up in more places than just your website. Your website is great, and you need to be on LinkedIn. You need to be in industry directories. You need to have articles that you’ve written or contributed to. You need to be involved in forum discussions. If your brand shows up in multiple places, the AI tool sees you as being more valuable. If you’re just on your website, meh. But if you’re all over the place, you’re given more credibility by the tool. So make sure that you appear in more places than just your website. 10:41 Next piece of advice is don’t abandon SEO. Layer GEO on top of it. Traditional search rankings still matter. Maybe not as much, but a lot of times the AI tool will pull from the top ranking Google results for the responses. So you’re not starting over. You’ve done a lot of work on SEO already. Maybe you’ve paid attention and made sure that everything is optimized. Don’t stop doing that. Keep doing that. But now add to it this other layer of the generative AI search results that you want to be in. So closing this up, the counterintuitive truth about this is big brands are slower to adapt. Visibility no longer depends on posting several times a day. It depends on being credible, useful, understandable, clear. And small businesses that adapt to this reality will gain a serious advantage that you might not even get from advertising. 12:29 It is really important that you look at the progress of AI, even if it’s something that you are not interested in. Get interested in it if you are doing marketing. Because it’s become a really important part of consumer behavior when it comes to search, finding new vendors, finding new products and new services. So basically, Google isn’t gone. Google has evolved. And we have a lot more Googles out there now. Sure, people use the Google AI tool, but they also use Claude, Perplexity, ChatGPT. So you can’t just focus on Google for search anymore. You’ve got to spread that out. Follow the advice that I’ve given in this podcast and make sure that you are evolving your strategy for the new reality of AI. It’s really, really important. 13:18 So that’s what I’ve got for you today. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Rev & Reach. I’m Lori Jo Vest, the founder and partner of PopSpeed Digital Marketing, LLC in Birmingham, Michigan. And we would love to hear from you. If you have a subject you’d like us to discuss or a guest you’d like us to have on, please let us know. You can reach out to me on LinkedIn. I’m an open networker there at Lori Jo Vest. I would love to hear from you. If you’re watching this on YouTube, do me a favor. Please subscribe and hit that like button. We’re hoping to reach more people with this helpful, useful information about how to get more ROI from your digital marketing efforts. Signing off, we’ll see you again soon.

How Tiny Influencers Beat Big Ad Budgets

HOW TINY INFLUENCERS BEAT BIG AD BUDGETS Rev & Reach from PopSpeed Digital [https://revandreach.popspeeddigital.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/cropped-Rev-and-Reach-Logo.jpg] In this episode of Rev & Reach, Lori Jo Vest explains why micro influencers are becoming one of the most effective marketing tools for small businesses in 2026. Instead of focusing on celebrity influencers with massive followings, Lori breaks down why smaller creators with highly engaged audiences can deliver stronger results, more authentic promotion, and better ROI. She walks through common mistakes businesses make with influencer partnerships, explains how to test campaigns strategically, and shares practical ways to start working with local creators, even with a very small budget. THEMES DISCUSSED IN THIS EPISODE: * Why micro influencers are becoming a powerful marketing strategy for small businesses * The difference between follower count and true audience engagement * Common mistakes businesses make when working with influencers * How to run a small influencer pilot campaign and measure ROI * Why trust and authenticity outperform reach in modern digital marketing EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS 00:07 — Lori introduces the concept that your best salespeople may actually be your customers or local influencers, not employees on your payroll. 02:16 — Explanation of what micro influencers are and why their engagement rates often outperform larger creators. 03:05 — Why businesses should focus on audience fit and engagement rather than follower count when choosing influencers. 04:05 — Lori explains why a single influencer post rarely produces results and why consistent exposure matters. 09:03 — A real-world example from Olipop shows how a creator program generated a 982% ROI using small incentives and performance-based commissions. TOP QUOTES 01:13 — “What if your best marketing asset is one of your customers that has 4,000 Instagram followers and she just loves you to pieces? She could be your best sales rep.” 03:51 — “I would take someone who had 4,000 really engaged followers over someone who had 25,000 that were not so engaged.” 04:55 — “So when you say ‘I did one post and it didn’t work,’ you’re right. If you do one post, it won’t work.” 12:26 — “Trust sells better than reach ever will.” Episode Transcript - Click to Open REV & REACH EPISODE 25 TRANSCRIPT HOW TINY INFLUENCERS BEAT BIG AD BUDGETS 00:07 Hello. I’m Lori Jo Vest, and thank you so much for joining me for this episode of Rev & Reach from PopSpeed Digital Marketing LLC. We create this podcast to share behind the curtain what we do as a digital marketing agency to help our clients get ROI out of their social media, websites, emails and social advertising. So today what I want to talk about is your best sales people aren’t on your payroll: The Small Business Guide to Micro Influencers. If you are a small business, you need to know about micro influencers, and that’s where serious marketing dollars are moving in 2026, and here’s why. Because micro influencers are in your community. They’re in your neighborhood. Everybody knows them. They are affordable as far as influencers go, and they can really make a difference in your bottom line and bring you new customers. 01:10 So I would ask you, what if your best marketing asset is one of your customers that has 4,000 Instagram followers and she just loves you to pieces? She could be your best sales rep. And I tell you, I don’t know about you, but I buy things online all the time. I cook from things that I see on reels. I’ll see something on reels and go that looks really good, and I’ll start writing down what they’re doing so I can make it for dinner that night. A lot of us are influenced by the things we see online. In particular, our local influencers often tell us about our local businesses. They’ll go to a restaurant and eat everything there, or they’ll go to a really small antique store, or they’ll go to the pet store. So they’re out in your community engaging with your customers, and they have an audience that you can buy access to. That’s basically what you’re doing. You’re buying access to that influencer’s audience. So forget what you think influencer marketing is. It’s not the Kardashians. It doesn’t have to cost $50,000. 02:16 But micro influencers — and they define a micro influencer as someone who has a following of between 1,000 and 100,000 people — they often have super engaged communities, and their recommendations feel like they’re coming from a trusted friend, so people believe them. So the engagement math on that is micro influencers see engagement rates of five to ten percent. Creators, larger creators, their engagement may only be one to two percent, like the Kardashian people, the people that are really expensive. So if you’re paying, you’re paying for attention. You want to pay the micro influencers in your community to deliver that high engagement and that really nice authentic connection. 03:05 So here’s what small businesses sometimes get wrong in working with influencers. A lot of times a small business coming into a relationship will have their own preconceived ideas about what that means, and they will look at the big follower counts. “Well, you only have 4,000 followers. You only have 5,000 followers.” Instead of looking at the fact that that young woman that runs all over town and you know her people, her tribe, follows her as she lives her life and goes to restaurants and goes shopping and dances with her grandmother, is a perfect fit for your audience. It’s really more important that that influencer fits your audience than it is that they have huge follower counts. Because I got to tell you, the follower counts are great, but I would take someone who had 4,000 really engaged followers over someone who had 25,000 that were not so engaged. So the micro influencers are really something to consider. 04:05 A lot of times small businesses will use an influencer and then say, “Well, that didn’t work.” The influencer’s audience may need to see you more than one time to actually create results. They used to say in television advertising that your audience would need to see your commercial five times before they would even remember it. Now social media is different. It’s a lot more personal, and we don’t get up and go get our drinks and go to the bathroom when the commercials are being shown. We’re usually scrolling by. But if you don’t do more than one post, then you don’t know if it’s going to work. You have to do something strategic. You have to do something that is an investment that is going to be more than just a one hit wonder, because it won’t work. I mean, I can just tell you that right now. So when you say “I did one post and it didn’t work,” you’re right. If you do one post, it won’t work. 05:00 So the other thing is, a lot of businesses think that the influencer is working for them, and that they can tell the influencer what to say and how to say it. Well, they can’t. If you truly want to get the best results from an influencer, you’ll pick somebody who is in your community, your company will do its best providing the service, and then you’ll let them tell the truth. If you don’t let them tell the truth, it won’t be authentic, it won’t be effective, and most influencers won’t bother because they don’t want to be told by everybody that they work with exactly how to do what they do, because that really degrades their credibility. They should tell you the good, the good, the bad and the ugly. Make sure your business is able to handle business from influencers before you hire one. If you’ve got weak points with your staff, you’ve got people that aren’t going to be able to perform at a level that the influencer will be able to talk positively about, don’t get the influencer on payroll until you have all those bugs worked out. 07:00 Your employees and loyal customers bring an unmatched level of authenticity. They know your company, their experiences are firsthand, and they are genuinely advocating for your organization. So it looks a lot less like a sponsored promotion, and it’s a lot more like something that’s authentically true from a neighbor you know, somebody in your community. So how do you actually start that engagement? First things first, find creators who are already talking about your niche or your neighborhood. Look for the quality of their comments. Look for a local audience. Watch 10 or 15 of their reels. See what happens. Does the audience engage with them? Do they have a lot of comments? Do they speak in a way that you would be happy to have your product in their feed? If so, great. And what I would do is when you do a pilot with three different creators, you’re going to see three different results. I would highly recommend it. Again, it’s an investment — three creators, 30 days. 08:17 You tell them what to deliver, whether it’s a post, two videos, three stories, and then you have to track it. You have to track what the influencer does. That could mean they get their own link for placing orders so that they can share that with their audience, and all the sales from that link you know came from them. It could be that it’s a coupon, and there’s three different coupons and each one gets their own coupon. And it’s not a big budget experience. It really doesn’t have to be a huge budget to make this happen. But watch what happens in those three creators, 30 days of posting, and you will learn so much. 09:03 And I’ll give you an example. There’s an organization called Olipop and they have a huge creator program. They started it with $36 product samples and a 10% performance commission for the influencers, and now that drives 12% of their total sales on an ongoing basis, and the campaign actually brought a 982% ROI. That is crazy. You can do it with a product sample that you send to that person, a free coupon, an offer to come in and have dinner, those kinds of things so that you get to know the influencers. 09:42 Invite them in for a free dinner. Just say, “I’d like to sit down with you, kind of learn what you do, take a look at your work, hear from you what you think you could do for us.” Do that with three different creators and then see what happens. Do a pilot and measure that ROI. You have to measure the ROI because you have to know if influencer campaigns are going to work for you. If you don’t measure it, you won’t know if it did or didn’t. But the upside of that too is you can actually negotiate part of the agreement that you get to take the creator content and share it on your social media and in your ads. So it gives you more of what we call UGC, user generated content, which looks like it’s created by a consumer, not the brand. And people love UGC. They love to see what other people are doing and think, “Oh look, she’s making her own bracelet at this really cool store downtown. Let’s go.” 10:54 So make sure this is something that’s on your marketing radar. I’ve got a challenge for you as we wrap up this episode. Identify one happy customer or one local creator influencer this week and send them a direct message or a free product and see what happens. Make it a cool coupon, put it in a fancy envelope, mail it off to your customer or that creator, or DM them a graphic that has that on there. That’s your pilot. Have them in. Just say you’d like to give them a free dinner and spend some time talking with them. Then watch what shows up on that influencer’s social feed related to your business. That will help you understand if they’re going to be a good fit. Some of them won’t be. I’m going to tell you right now some of them will not be good fits. 11:50 There are a lot of influencers out there right now that think you should pay them thousands and thousands of dollars, and a lot of them aren’t proven. So as you’re looking at who you’re going to hire, even a micro influencer, look for them to be paying attention to the data. Make sure what they give you isn’t just “look at my pretty content,” but “I did this for this restaurant and they got a 20% bump in sales.” So remember, trust sells better than reach ever will, and micro influencers are a really great way to build trust. So that’s what I’ve got for you today. Again I’m Lori Jo Vest with PopSpeed Digital Marketing LLC and you are listening to Rev & Reach. You can find us on all of your favorite podcast channels as well as YouTube. If you are watching on YouTube please subscribe, give us a like, and help us spread the word about how to get marketing ROI from your digital initiatives. Thanks so much, I’ll see you again soon.

Hallucinations: The Hidden Cost of AI Speed

HALLUCINATIONS: THE HIDDEN COST OF AI SPEED Rev & Reach from PopSpeed Digital [https://revandreach.popspeeddigital.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/cropped-Rev-and-Reach-Logo.jpg] In this episode of Rev & Reach, Lori Jo Vest discusses the hidden risks behind the speed and convenience of AI, focusing on the growing problem of AI hallucinations — when AI confidently generates false or fabricated information. While AI can be a powerful tool for marketers, Lori explains why relying on it without verification can lead to costly mistakes, poor decision-making, and reputational harm. Through real-world examples and practical guidance, she shares how marketers can use AI strategically while protecting their business by verifying sources, reviewing outputs carefully, and treating AI as a support tool rather than a final authority. THEMES DISCUSSED IN THIS EPISODE: * Why AI hallucinations happen and how they affect marketing decisions * The risks of trusting AI-generated analysis without verification * How hallucinations can increase over long conversations with AI tools * The potential financial, legal, and reputational consequences of bad AI data * When AI is most effective as a marketing tool — and when it isn’t * Why human review and oversight are essential when using AI for content and strategy EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS 00:00 — Introduction to AI hallucinations and why confidence in AI is rising 01:47 — A real-world example of executives making decisions based on hallucinated AI analysis 04:15 — Why hallucinations are systemic and why verification is no longer optional 05:10 — A firsthand example of AI overstating audience data by 100x 06:45 — The risks of relying on AI-generated copy and why human editing is essential 07:33 — How marketers should use AI safely as a support tool, not a decision-maker TOP QUOTES 01:14 — “And when it doesn’t know, it guesses plausibly.” 03:19 — “It’s just that when it can’t generate a concise, fluent answer over admitting uncertainty, it will choose guessing every time. So think about that. AI guesses.” 05:03 — “Verification is no longer optional.” 05:26 — “It actually overstated the specifics of an audience that were really interested by 100%. It said there were 4000 of these people in our list, when, in reality, there were only 40 confirmed.” 08:03 — “But when it comes to hard data and hard advice that you feel you should follow to be successful, always double-check it.” Episode Transcript - Click to Open REV & REACH EPISODE 24 TRANSCRIPT HALLUCINATIONS: THE HIDDEN COST OF AI SPEED 00:00 Hello and thank you for joining me for this episode of Rev & Reach, where PopSpeed Digital Marketing shares our secrets for getting ROI from digital marketing initiatives. I’m Lori Jo Vest, the co-founder of PopSpeed Digital, and I want to talk to you today about AI. There is so much conversation about AI going on right now. It’s February of 2026 when I’m recording this, and a lot of people are using AI with way too much confidence. 00:36 So what I want to talk about is AI and hallucinations. It’s really common, and it’s probably a lot more common than you think. So here’s what it is: a hallucination is when AI hallucinates and puts out confidently false and fabricated information, not because it’s doing it purposefully or there’s anyone out there trying to mess with your work, but because of how it’s built. They predict what comes next based on patterns. They use patterns in the training data, and so it’s not really using verified knowledge in a lot of cases. And when it doesn’t know, it guesses plausibly. That’s from an article from OpenAI — they literally will have the AI guess instead of saying, “I don’t know.” So I wanted to get into it a little bit, because I’ve seen so many people that are super excited about AI and marketing and how wonderful it is. Yeah, it is really, really wonderful. However, there are a lot of cases where people are overly confident in what it tells them, and when that’s the case, you could get yourself in some hot water. 01:47 My husband was reading something on Reddit this weekend about how a marketing team had been uploading their analytics into AI and asking it to summarize those analytics without going back and checking the AI’s findings against their original document. Well, guess what happened? For 90 days, the C-level executives at this company were making business decisions based on AI hallucinations, and this person had just discovered that it happened, and they were in the middle of this huge upset. It happens. And so what we tell people all the time is, when you do research using an AI tool, ask it to provide the source. And don’t just ask it to provide the source — go to the source and look at the source and make sure that the information that it’s pulled is accurate, because it won’t always be. It’s one of those cases where it’ll see some information in an article, assume it makes that conclusion that it’s telling you in the tool, and give you that link. So you’ve got to be really careful. 02:52 And the other thing that they found is that over long conversations, it tends to hallucinate more. So if you’re using your tool and you’ve got one long chat going on and you really think you’re doing great, you may be getting more and more bad data, bad  information, bad recommendations, so be careful about that. And the reason, again, it’s not malicious — it’s not anybody trying to do something negative to the world with AI tools. It’s just that when it can’t generate a concise, fluent answer, over admitting uncertainty, it will choose guessing every time. So think about that. AI guesses. And if you think that in your head when you’re using the tool, you’re much less likely to get caught in a bad situation from using it and having it give you bad data. 04:15 Here’s why this matters for marketers: because when you fabricate data and put it into a proposal or a document or research, or use it to inform your marketing decisions, you could not only lose money, but you could be subject to liability or reputational harm. Things can happen like that. It’s not wrong at random. It is consistently wrong. So it’s not wrong at random. They’re not anomalies. These hallucinations are not anomalies. They’re systemic outcomes of training incentives and the way that AI works with prediction mechanics. So it’s not wrong at random. It’s wrong a lot. Verification is no longer optional. You need to always go back and check what it’s telling you against your original data. 05:10 I was on a call with one of our clients a couple weeks ago, and I got — oh man — I could have gotten my butt handed to me. I had a database that I had downloaded, uploaded into my chat tool, and thought that it would give me accurate information on who was on that list. It actually overstated the specifics of an audience that were really interested by 100%. It said there were 4,000 of these people in our list, when in reality there were only 40 confirmed. And when I went back and asked it why, it said, “Oh well, the patterns — the emails. A lot of people use Gmail for mailing lists, so we assume that some of those are based on patterns.” And it didn’t make any sense. So I asked it to analyze it again, only with the exact data that was in the document, and what came back was completely different. So use the tool if you want to, but be really careful of double-checking your data. 06:09 So a couple things that have happened. Research shows that AI responses degrade, that they give bad, dangerous medical guidance. I would assume, based on that, that they probably give bad guidance on digital marketing as well. So if you’re using ChatGPT as your tool to tell you about Meta and their ad policies and how they’re impacting health-related organizations or something like that, double-check that, because it could give you completely wrong advice. So that’s one of those things that I really want people to understand. 06:45 The other thing people use it a lot for is copy. And what’s happening out there in the ether is people are starting to get really sick of AI copy. It’s very predictable. You can look at it and see the lists of three. It has a tendency to make these long social posts with just way too much information and flowery language. If you’re using AI for your copy, Google actually delists AI-generated copy. They have tools that can tell when it’s AI. Maybe that’ll change eventually, but for right now, if you use AI as a basis for an article, go back in and rewrite it as a human being, because that is what will get you web traffic. That is what will get you good, solid, relatable, authentic content. 07:33 So I guess what this episode is, is more of a warning that, you know, we love AI. We use it a lot for all kinds of things. It’s a great tool for outlining things like articles, podcasts, books. It’s really good for that — for titles, for social content ideas and concepts, for a different way of saying the same thing. One of the things in digital marketing that we all know is we have to learn how to say the exact same thing 27 different ways. AI is a great tool for that. But when it comes to hard data and hard advice that you feel you should follow to be successful, always double-check it. 08:09 So that’s my advice for you today. We’ll be back soon with another episode of Rev & Reach, where we pull back the curtain and show you how we get ROI for our digital marketing clients. Take care. Again, I’m Lori Jo Vest. If you are watching this on YouTube, please subscribe and give us a like. We’re really trying to share this great information about marketing with a much larger audience. We are free with the information. We’d love to hear from you, too. If you have a comment or a suggestion and you’d like to have us answer your question on this podcast, we’d love to hear from you. So take care. We’ll be back again soon.

Focus as a Growth Hack

FOCUS AS A GROWTH HACK Rev & Reach from PopSpeed Digital [https://revandreach.popspeeddigital.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/cropped-Rev-and-Reach-Logo.jpg] In this episode of Rev & Reach, Lori Jo Vest breaks down why focus is one of the most important — and most misunderstood — elements of successful digital marketing. Drawing from real client examples, Lori explains why trying to be everywhere at once dilutes your efforts, wastes budget, and hurts ROI, and how choosing the right channels, message, and success metric helps businesses get better results with less effort. THEMES DISCUSSED IN THIS EPISODE: * Why “being everywhere” is a myth that hurts marketing performance * How subjectivity and too many opinions derail effective strategy * Choosing the right platform based on audience behavior, not comfort * How focus, consistency, and optimization drive stronger ROI EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS 0:00 — Why focus matters more than being on every platform 2:24 — The danger of listening to too many voices in marketing 4:07 — A real-world example of channel focus driving better leads 7:20 — Why audience research and strategy must come before execution TOP QUOTES 04:11 — “The focus channel became Facebook, with Meta ads generating leads, because that’s what worked.” 05:45 — “So if you think that you need to be everywhere all at once, you just don’t, it’s just not something that that you need to do.” 06:49 — “Remember, attention is finite, execution energy is finite and budgets are finite.” 07:17 — “Focus doesn’t limit your growth. It accelerates it.” Episode Transcript - Click to Open REV & REACH EPISODE 23 – FOCUS AS A GROWTH HACK 00:00 Hello everybody. I’m Lori Jo Vest, here with another episode of Rev & Reach, where those of us here at PopSpeed Digital Marketing LLC give you a look behind the curtain at how we do digital marketing so that you can experience more success with your digital marketing efforts and get more ROI. So today I want to talk about focus. One of the things that we run into frequently is clients who think they have to be everywhere, all at once, all the time. Not true. We have had situations where a client is on one social channel and gets an incredible amount of leads in one month. We also have situations where clients are on all the channels and they just don’t get much. It’s a really interesting balance. But if you think you should be everywhere, you’re not right on that one. That is one of those things that people believe — that there may be an opportunity there, so they should make sure they’re there. And if you spread yourself too thin, you risk a couple of different things. You risk spending energy trying to reach your audience on a platform where they don’t play. Or maybe you’re on a channel where a certain type of content really performs well, but you don’t have the budget to create that kind of content, so that’s not what you’re sharing — and then you don’t get any results. And, you know, there are a lot of different people saying a lot of different things. 01:38 I always like to remind people that marketing is really subjective. A lot of times you’ve got somebody in the client seat who has some marketing experience, maybe they have no marketing experience, and you hire the experts so they can come in and do the job. Some things are subjective. If you have a request for your marketing team and they push back, give it some thought. Maybe they’re right, because subjectivity means you could be wrong. I’ve had clients come in — when I worked in video production — and say, “My wife doesn’t like the look of that graphic.” Really? Okay, so should we change it? And they will spend money making changes to things that their wife looked at. 02:24 So it takes all kinds. From the “we’re in the trenches every day” perspective, I will tell you that you can’t listen to everybody. You have to focus in on who you’re going to listen to, follow their advice, and get to the point where you’re succeeding with that advice and that formula — and then maybe add things onto it. But if you try to do everything all at once, you’re going to dilute your efforts, and it’s also going to make things much more difficult for you and a lot harder to get ROI. And I’ll give you an example. 03:01 We talk a lot about our dental practices because it’s one of the places where we’ve really had great success. And we have a practice that is really good at what they do. They’re not inexpensive. They are probably one of the higher-end practices, and they’re very open about that, because the way they do things is different. So we put them on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, and we really didn’t know where the magic was going to happen. Some of their patients are younger — in their 30s — maybe they had some kind of dental disease, or maybe they were in a car accident and need full dental replacements. Or, more likely, they’re in their 60s, 70s, maybe even 80s, and have lost their teeth and dentures are making them crazy. So you’ve got a really wide range of audiences. We thought maybe we’d pick some people up on Instagram, and we also prioritized Meta and Facebook because Facebook is a great place to reach an older audience. 04:07 Well, let me tell you — we got a lot of younger people there. It was really surprising. But the focus channel became Facebook, with Meta ads generating leads, because that’s what worked. And that was really pretty easy. We did a little on Instagram. Never really got us much by way of leads. The client was really excited and told us they wanted to try TikTok. They didn’t have a bigger budget, so they weren’t able to create custom content for TikTok, but we put them there. And basically, we got zero followers, zero views, zero likes. Nothing happened. And it was because their content wasn’t the right content for TikTok. TikTok likes educational, inspirational, hilarious, fun, entertaining content. Entertaining is the name of the game there if you really want to succeed. So what I really want to say is: pick three or four things and start with those three or four things and do them really well. 05:53 Maybe you’ve got a great website. You’ve got a great LinkedIn page. You’ve got your executives using LinkedIn. You’re doing some Instagram to reach younger business people who might not be on LinkedIn. And you’ve got some things going on YouTube. That’s a full plate. If you add three or four more channels, you’re going to dilute the effort. And if you even just do what I described — those particular channels — and focus on doing them really well, you would most likely see results. So if you think you need to be everywhere all at once, you just don’t. It’s not something you need to do. 07:20 Another piece of advice that fits in here is to figure out where your audience is before you do anything. Strategy is so important, and a lot of people don’t spend enough time researching the audience on these channels before they advertise. Maybe you’re really comfortable on Instagram, so that’s where you go. Well, if your product isn’t really reaching an audience on Instagram, just because you’re comfortable there doesn’t mean that’s where you should be. AI is your friend. ChatGPT is your friend. Google is your friend. Do the research. Where does your audience play? When I talked about dental practices earlier, we had an older audience — retired people, playing digital games, playing cards, happily retired. Those categories are so easy to reach on Meta and Facebook. Remember: attention is finite. Execution energy is finite. Budgets are finite. So where can you focus that attention to get the best ROI? The algorithms on all these social channels reward consistency, repeatability, and engagement — not just throwing things up once in a while, but being there consistently, three days a week, engaging with people, sharing other people’s things. Focus doesn’t limit your growth. It accelerates it. 08:50 If you focus and get really good at one channel, then move on to the next. Do your homework. You cannot be everywhere all at once. Your audience is not everywhere all at once. They are not on TikTok, LinkedIn, YouTube, Snapchat, Instagram, and Facebook — all at the same time. And if they are, they’re not spending much time on some of those. So pick one primary channel where you know your audience is already playing. Pick one core message. What problem do you solve best? And pick one success metric. Is it leads? Is it booked calls? Is it sales? Not likes. Not shares. Not followers. Focus, adjust, optimize. That’s how digital marketing works. 09:25 You do not have to do everything all at once. If you try to, you’ll fail. Start with one channel, one message, one metric. Be strategic. Pay attention. Check in every day. Engage. Measure what happens. Then move on. I’m an open networker on LinkedIn at Lori Jo Vest — I’d love to hear from you. Let me know that you listen to the podcast when you connect with me. We also have a website where we keep past episodes, transcripts, and show notes, and there’s a contact form there where you can let me know what topics you’d like us to cover on Rev & Reach. We’re here to help you get more ROI from your digital marketing. If you’re watching this on YouTube, please hit subscribe, give me a like, maybe even a share, and we’ll see you back in a few weeks with more information to help you get better results from your marketing. Take care.