In this episode of In-Ear Insights, the Trust Insights podcast, Katie and Chris discuss how the nonstop AI hype has buried crucial marketing updates and what you can do about it. You’ll learn why even Google quietly launched a powerful free tool that almost no one noticed. You’ll discover how much of your analytics data is silently vanishing every day. You’ll see why press releases and algorithms no longer reach anyone—and what actually works instead. You’ll find out how to build a human network that keeps you ahead of the noise. Watch the episode now to reclaim your edge.
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Machine-Generated Transcript
What follows is an AI-generated transcript. The transcript may contain errors and is not a substitute for listening to the episode.
Christopher S. Penn – 00:00
In this week’s In Ear Insights, it feels like it’s all AI, all the time, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. And it’s felt that way really since January of 2023, when ChatGPT and GPT-4 came out and everybody kind of just lost it in terms of what a big deal it was.
This came up recently because Google—this was documented in last week’s Trust Insights newsletter, which you can get over at trustinsights.ai/newsletter—Google released a feature in Google Tag Manager called Google Tag Gateway, which alleviates the pain of setting up server-side tracking if you want better analytics and you don’t want to go through the fun of setting up lots of servers. This came out in late May of this year and none of us heard about it.
I only found out about it because I was poking around in our settings, as I do from time to time, and I was like, “What is this? Where did it come from?” And once I saw what it was I was like, “I’m setting that up right now.” We missed it. Everybody missed it. In our Slack groups, on LinkedIn, everyone’s like, “What? This thing exists and it’s free?” Like, yeah.
So Katie, in the—I would say almost obsessive—24/7 news cycle about AI, what do you make of the fact that everybody, I think including most of Google, missed this fairly big deal in terms of improving your data quality?
Katie Robbert – 01:28
I think if you are someone or a company trying to talk about anything other than AI right now, you’re probably having a really hard time. When we look at what’s dominating the news professionally, it’s AI. Outside of that, there are other things dominating news cycles right now that feel nonstop, and other information is not getting shared.
That’s very much the world we’re in right now. All it takes is one thing for people to latch onto and that becomes the cycle. Unfortunately for us in the professional world, AI has been dominating the news for two-plus years and it’s made everything else take a back seat.
We’ve talked about how to not get overwhelmed with all the AI news—where to focus—because there’s so much going on. This is a different version of that because it’s not that you can just ignore what’s happening in the AI space, but you can’t get so caught up in it that you’re missing critical updates that have nothing to do with AI.
Part of the responsibility is on the companies that are releasing these things—or have something noteworthy to share—and partly on the end user who needs to figure out where my priorities are. Am I just chasing the shiny object and trying to keep up with what everyone’s talking about so I can have a conversation? Or is my focus really on what’s going on with server-side tagging and my data quality?
If that’s the case, it can’t be all AI because there’s a lot more to data quality than just what’s going on with AI.
Chris, as someone who consumes a lot of this news and information and distills it down for the company, for communities—how are you feeling about that? You rarely miss things.
Christopher S. Penn – 03:48
I think in this particular instance we did. I spend most of my time reading up and keeping up with what’s going on in the AI space. I have not paid a ton of attention to the analytics world, particularly Google Analytics, in some time—partly because some of our biggest customers now use Adobe Analytics. In fact, we did a data project recently where we saw that for mid-market enterprise customers Adobe Analytics is now the preferred system of record.
Since 2020, when Google Analytics 4 came out, there have not been substantial improvements in the software. Some people argue it’s kind of regressed even more.
As our customers and our client base have pivoted to saying, “We need to do something about this AI thing,” we all have said, “Yeah, okay, analytics are good and you still need that data.” But what our customers are willing to pay us for is not that. What our customers are willing to pay us for is advice and strategy—and even implementation—on AI.
So in some ways I feel like the missing of this fairly useful technical thing is appropriate given where our customers have gone. On another angle, we still need to have systems in place to catch this stuff. One of the things on my to-do list is to build a system to do that because we can’t be everywhere, but we can have monitors set up in places to at least catch feature announcements.
Katie Robbert – 05:31
I’m going to respectfully disagree with you that it was an appropriate miss. When I look at what we do as a whole, a lot of what we do is foundational. Sure, AI—you can layer on top of it—but you wouldn’t jump directly to AI without making sure that your foundation and your house are in order.
I feel like it was a big miss from our side because we don’t have people banging down the door anymore asking to help get their Google Analytics 4 set up correctly. But we do have people looking to make sense of the data that they’re collecting, which includes making sure that things like Google Analytics 4 are set up correctly.
I’m curious to learn more about a system that you’re looking to set up. My first question is: a lot of companies are just using standard tracking software like Brand24, or Google Alerts, for example.
So there’s two sides to that question. One, how can companies make sure that their news is getting into those systems? And two, are those systems still good enough to capture what you’re looking for?
Christopher S. Penn – 07:04
That speaks to a very big question: what is the state of your data quality? All the systems we have access to are losing data rapidly.
No one’s ever really had LinkedIn data to begin with. Twitter—or X—has announced a major price increase on their APIs. Our friends at AgoraPulse said, “As of this date in August, we’re going to have to start charging you X dollars just to use Twitter data in your software,” because Twitter passed on this huge price increase.
The new AI systems—AI Overviews, AI Mode in Search, Perplexity, ChatGPT—pass no data whatsoever, even though people are using these tools at a minimum of 10% of the time (Google I/O), if not more. Google’s goal is to get it to be 50%, and they give no data back to marketers.
This puts data-minded and fact-minded marketers in a deep bind: we have less information and less reliable information than ever before. Combine that with privacy blockers of every stripe. We did an assessment recently for a client: 60% of their web data is just not in their analytics. It’s not there because their number-one customer uses iPhones, and iPhones pass none of that data. They actively block it through private proxying and services.
For data-minded marketers and the systems they have access to, we have less to work with than ever. That goes back to your point: try to make the systems you do have access to as good as they can be. But the scope of what you will have access to keeps narrowing down to the hardware and software under your control.
Someone can set up a privacy blocker saying, “I’m not going to give you any referring data,” but they can’t block your physical server from saying, “Someone’s on this web page and I’m serving up this webpage to somebody. I don’t know who it is, but I’m giving it to you.” That first-party data is likely all we’re going to have left.
Katie Robbert – 09:36
Perhaps I didn’t phrase the question correctly. I understand that a lot of the third-party software systems we rely on have switched over to AI black-box whatever-it-is. Can we reconfigure—at a very basic level—our query strings to capture analytics announcements, data-quality announcements, server-side tracking announcements? Do those things still work? Is that something I would still be able to see in, say, AgoraPulse or Brand24 provided I have a good query?
And the other side of that question: are these companies announcing things correctly or timely so that the end user even knows that it happened?
Christopher S. Penn – 10:43
So the first part is: can you use media-monitoring systems to find these announcements? Are they even being made?
Yes—with a big asterisk. The monitoring systems themselves have to be able to detect it.
We did a test recently—this was when we found Google Tag Gateway—and we used search agents based on systems like Talkwalker, Brand24, Google, you name it. What came back, even for searches about just stuff like Google Analytics, was all AI stuff. It was so bad that I did a second follow-up using a deep-research agent and said, “Give me all the non-AI marketing news in the last month.” It came back and said, “There wasn’t any. I couldn’t find any.”
Literally it’s getting harder to find because there’s so much noise about AI that it’s drowning everything else out. It’s like there’s an entire orchestra blasting away and you’re trying to find the one cricket in the room.
On the side of how companies are doing announcements: this is one of the most challenging things for companies. If you want to announce something and it’s not AI, good luck. Scroll through LinkedIn, search for other hashtags that have nothing to do with AI—guess what? It’s still about AI.
Katie Robbert – 12:21
It’s interesting that you immediately went to social media, LinkedIn for example, because I feel like—more ill than good—this is where people are getting their information. They’re not getting the headlines from news sites necessarily; they’re reliant on those news sites to post their headlines on social media. Social media is becoming, or is, the thing that people check first.
I know personally I’m guilty of this. I’ve found the Threads site helpful at least to understand what’s going on politically. Is it the most comprehensive and well-rounded? No, but it gives me a starting point because people tend to be very loud and opinionated on both sides. Then it gives me a starting point to say, “Let me go find out more about whatever that person is yelling about.”
I would like to think people see a headline and go do more research, but I know that’s absolutely not true. What you’re saying is interesting: companies are making announcements; they’re putting them on something like LinkedIn. They’re reliant on
1. having the right followers who care about that company,
2. the algorithm to serve it up to people who maybe don’t follow the company, and
3. even the algorithm to serve it up to people who do follow the company—because that doesn’t always happen.
Christopher S. Penn – 14:06
One thing our friend Ashley Zeckman talks about is that companies need to look at what kinds of individual people have the community that you need to reach. If you’re trying to get news out about your thing—whatever your thing is—who are the people that have that audience?
Social media is the channel, but we have in all areas of media become incredibly personality-driven—probably to the detriment of our civilization. Take the big names: Heather Cox Richardson, Joe Rogan. What do they do? They start their own media properties. Jon Stewart has “The Weekly Show”—it’s not a Comedy Central publication; it’s Jon Stewart on Substack or Spotify.
For us trying to reach our audience, we have to ask, “Where do these people go for their information?” If you are a brand and you want to get news out and you do not have that audience, you’re in a lot of trouble. Part of the reason we do a weekly email newsletter, have a Slack community, have my newsletter, is because we need reliable reach into our audience.
If we don’t have that, then if we make an announcement no one will hear it—even if it’s AI-related—because you’re competing with so much other AI noise. No one’s going to hear it unless we have our audience and our evangelists within that audience to help us spread the word.
Katie Robbert – 16:11
What about the idea of a press release? Not that long ago you were talking about how you need to write a press release for the machines. We know, based on that—go listen to our podcast or watch the live stream; we did an episode about it at trustinsights.ai/youtube in the So What playlist—you want to create a version of your press release specifically for the machines to pick up so it reads less coherently. Is there still a version of a press release for the humans?
Christopher S. Penn – 16:56
There is. I don’t know that anyone reads it, but there is. When I look at the number of clicks on our newswire releases, it’s like two.
Katie Robbert – 17:12
Money well spent.
Christopher S. Penn – 17:14
Again, it’s not for humans—it’s for the machines. If you want to get news out, a press release is probably not the right vehicle. The right vehicle is news in some form, but you go straight to your evangelists and say, “Please help me spread the word about this. I’ve got this new AI-ready Marketing Strategy course. I need to let people know.”
You can have all that data collected in something that’s press-release-shaped, but there’s a very good chance you’re going to be working with a person individually—saying, “Hey J. Bear, hey Kathy McPhillips, I’ve got this new thing. Can you help me share it?”
The key takeaway for marketers is: what relationships do we have professionally with people who have the audience we might not have, and how do we collaborate with them to get our news shared—and what news of theirs do we share in return?
Katie Robbert – 18:28
I find it ironic that we’re even more reliant on our relationships and other humans to break through the noise that AI has caused. You have people who fall into one of two camps: “AI everything, I’m just going to use AI to do things,” and the people who say, “No, humans are even more important than ever.” I’m a little surprised you’re saying humans are even more important than ever.
It touches all aspects of your marketing. You have public relations where you rely on other people to get the message out; your announcements; your content marketing—which may fall under PR depending on your org. If you write a great piece of content and just stick it up on social media, it’s not going to go anywhere unless you’ve cultivated that community and those relationships.
I now work with a group of women: anytime one of us posts something significant, we send an email to everyone saying, “Hey, I just did this thing. Could you like it, share it, comment on it?” Because we know people need to engage with it for the content to be served up. You need to rely on those relationships. It’s easy—just like, comment, share. The big lift is maintaining those relationships and making sure they’re two-way and not just you always asking someone for a favor and never giving anything in return.
Christopher S. Penn – 20:38
When you look in your own inbox, how many pitches are there? How much noise? How many newsletters? What do you pay attention to when you see a name next to an email—like “Oh, I got an email from Brook Sellas, from Ashley Zeckman, from Ann Handley”? I’ll read that because I know that person is emotionally important to me. I’ll read it over some rando saying, “Hey Christopher Penn, this would be a great guest on Marketing Over Coffee.” I get literally 80 of those a day and they all go straight into the recycling bin.
Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn, said years ago: “Anytime you’re looking for an opportunity, you’re really looking for a person.” Opportunities don’t exist in a vacuum; they’re always tied to a person.
In the age of AI—when we’re using machines to create content and our audience is using machines to summarize content because they don’t have time to read it all—the only way you break through that noise is with the human relationships you’ve forged that trigger that emotional response: “I know this person, I like this person, I want to hear what they have to say.”
Katie Robbert – 21:58
Going back to where we started: AI has made our space really noisy. How do you cut through it to make your announcement, to find out what’s going on? It’s communities and personal relationships. It’s asking questions, but also giving information, and also sharing other people’s things.
If we’re concerned about missing the latest Google Analytics information or Google Marketing Platform information, we need to look at who in our networks are focused on those things and say, “Hey, is there anything new you want to talk about? Maybe I can give you a platform so I can stay informed.” There are people in the spaces who know what’s happening. They may not think to share it because nobody’s asked, or they have shared it and nobody cared.
Christopher S. Penn – 23:15
Everybody we knew on the Google Analytics team is no longer at Google. Tiffany’s moved on; Adam’s moved on; Louis has moved on. They’ve all scattered to the winds. A lot of them left Google entirely. There’s no one that we have relationships with knocking on the door saying, “Hey, by the way, did you know we released this?”
There’s probably a Google mailing list saying, “This month’s latest features…” Those go straight to the recycling bin because they’re just more noise. There’s not a person attached to them.
Katie Robbert – 24:06
In the age of AI—worst phrase to start with, because that’s how AI starts every day—if you’re feeling overwhelmed with the amount of AI information, you’re not alone. If you feel like you’re missing things not related to AI, you are. That’s a reality.
But there are ways to stay on top: tap into your networks. Don’t just check social media to see if something accidentally gets served up. Really look at who you’re connected to and broker new relationships for the things you care about.
If you care about horse dancing—Olympic sport, Chris—start following people who are experts in horse dancing. Don’t just hope the latest horse-dance moves show up in your feed, because they might not.
Christopher S. Penn – 25:34
Going back to your point about what public-relations professionals do these days, it’s 100% about building relationships with the people who have your audience. If you don’t have that and you’re relying on news wires and cold pitching, you’re not being heard. Someone’s inbox AI is just filtering you straight out. There’s no way to break through unless you get another person to care about you enough to read your emails or messages.
If you’ve got thoughts about how things are being drowned out with AI or how to reach people in an age of perpetual AI noise, pop over to our free Slack group: trustinsights.ai/analyticsformarketers. Over 4,200 other marketers are asking and answering questions every day.
Wherever you watch or listen, if there’s a channel you’d rather have it on, go to trustinsights.ai/tipodcast. Thanks for tuning in. We’ll talk to you next time.
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Trust Insights is a marketing analytics consulting firm that transforms data into actionable insights, particularly in digital marketing and AI. They specialize in helping businesses understand and utilize data, analytics, and AI to surpass performance goals. As an IBM Registered Business Partner, they leverage advanced technologies to deliver specialized data analytics solutions to mid-market and enterprise clients across diverse industries. Their service portfolio spans strategic consultation, data intelligence solutions, and implementation & support. Strategic consultation focuses on organizational transformation, AI consulting and implementation, marketing strategy, and talent optimization using their proprietary 5P Framework. Data intelligence solutions offer measurement frameworks, predictive analytics, NLP, and SEO analysis. Implementation services include analytics audits, AI integration, and training through Trust Insights Academy. Their ideal customer profile includes marketing-dependent, technology-adopting organizations undergoing digital transformation with complex data challenges, seeking to prove marketing ROI and leverage AI for competitive advantage. Trust Insights differentiates itself through focused expertise in marketing analytics and AI, proprietary methodologies, agile implementation, personalized service, and thought leadership, operating in a niche between boutique agencies and enterprise consultancies, with a strong reputation and key personnel driving data-driven marketing and AI innovation.
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