For the third of my series of vodcast interviews with the bosses of high ranking B2B and corporate PR agencies and Digital Marketing agencies, I decided to interview another PR veteran of more than 30 years who is now the partner of global corporate and public affairs agency BOLDT , Steve Earl.

The focus of our conversation was on the increasing value of Earned Media. Steve helps to define Earned Media much more expansively than just ediotrial media coverage. He also helps to articulate why Earned Media is potentially the most powerful part of any Comms Strategy and Comms Delivery Plan. He also emphasises the importance of fully integrating Paid, Owned and Earned comms to make sure key stakeholders gain a consistent as well as accurate pcture of the business, as well as allowing to tailoring of messaging to meet the needs of different influencer groups and decision makers. This was a truly fascinating half hour discussion with an old peer. Thank you again for your time Steve. You can view our discussion here.

Earned Media offers route into more expansive Third Party Advocacy work for PR practitioners who have the right skills and thinking.

My premise for this vodcast sereis was to ask PR and Digital Marketing Agency bosses what changes they were already seeing as a reuslt of the rise of the use of Generative AI for business research and procurement decision-making. At least this is where the discussion started with the interviews I've carried out over the last two to three months.

However, what also happened is I was able to zero in on different areas of specialism for each of the agency executives I've interviewed. For Graham Reed of Ice Blue Sky we focused on the role of content as well as Gen AI platforms in Account Based Marketing (ABM) and Sales Enablement. With Sarah Lafferty of Round Earth Consulting we focused on the importance of Customer Advocacy in building brand and the increasing importance of customer and/or partner advocacy content as part of effective comms plans.

And in this third inteview or vodcast with Steve Earl of BOLDT BPI we focused on the widening and deepening role of PR in measuring the effectiveness of communications activity in a much more granular way than was possible in the past. Steve also highlighted the power of Earned Media if we broaden our thinking around 'Earned' to emcompass comms with all manner of stakeholders and influencers which are key to enabling brands to build their reputations, get their message out there, and ultimately thrive.

I hope you enjoy this conversation with Steve as much as I did.

Steve Earl of BOLDT BPI was in conversation with Miles Clayton about the power of Earned Media