S2 E1 Bri Godwin Huyke & Digital PR in the US

Louise Parker:
Hello and welcome to the Digital PR Podcast with me, Louise Parker, and my lovely co-host, Stephen Baker. Due to intense popular demand, we are back for a second season and we will be again chatting to some of the digital PR greats, discussing the ins and outs of our industry. This season, we’ll be touching on topics like crisis comms, freelancing, the great office debate, digital PR in America, and we’ll also be getting the perspectives of in-house clients and journalists on what they really think about digital PRs. Excitingly, this season we also have a sponsor! All six episodes are sponsored by our friends at Coveragebook. We all use Coveragebook in the Propellernet team and so do agencies and brands all over the world. It’s an amazing tool that creates PR reports in minutes, drastically reducing the time that would typically be spent on reporting. Steve, would you like to know a fun fact?

Stephen Baker:
Yes, please.

Louise Parker:
One agency team saved $2,000 of PR budget every month when they switched to using the tool. Pretty good. What we love about it is that it gives you realistic, industry-leading metrics that you don’t need to have a data science degree to understand. It does all the clippings for you, so no more boring copying and pasting, and it just looks super snazzy, so you don’t have to be a designer to showcase your coverage like a pro. You can visit coveragebook.com and sign up for a free trial to see why some of the best digital PR practitioners in the world depend on Coveragebook. All right, on to our episode.

Stephen Baker:
Our guest today comes all the way from sunny Florida to speak to us about digital PR in the USA. Bri Godwin-Huyke is a digital PR manager at Journey Further, who she joined in May of this year, to continue to cultivate the growth of digital PR in the US. An absolute master of creating headline-worthy stories, Bri regularly lands coverage at high authority publications such as the New York Times, CNBC, USA Today, Fox and Business Insider. So we’re very excited to get her thoughts on how the digital PR industry is developing in the US and how it differs from the UK. Bri, welcome. Thanks so much for joining us.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yeah, thanks for having me.

Stephen Baker:
So as a starting point, I’ve obviously given a very brief overview of your expertise and kind of where you’re at the moment, but could you give our listeners an overview of your career so far? Like what have you been up to? What are you doing now?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yeah, definitely. So you did a great job covering it. I couldn’t beat that. But yeah, so I have been in digital PR for six years, I kind of stumbled into it. I think a lot of us do. I wanted to work in PR, I was working in traditional marketing for a year, but I was really interested in doing stuff with PR and with the media. And I started working at an excellent digital PR and link building firm called fractal, who kind of taught me a lot of most of what I know about digital PR, and they’re really excellent in the space. So I started learning about creating content for publishers and getting those links and things like that, and worked my way up to be a manager. And now I work at Journey Further as a digital PR manager, not just creating campaigns, but also training up the future of digital PR, especially here in the US, where it is, I think, maybe a little behind compared to the UK.

Stephen Baker:
And then obviously you’ve joined Journey further and I’m right in saying that was May of this year. Congratulations. How’s it been going? You’ve not been there a long time, but obviously been getting stuck in and doing a lot.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yes, it has been amazing. I absolutely love the Dirty Fritter team. I absolutely love Beth Nunnington, who is just a digital PR genius. It’s been a learning experience, I guess you could say, because I do work with the UK team as well. And this is where I’m really starting to notice those differences, as you mentioned, and learn a lot about how it’s kind of done over here and seeing how we can adopt it over in the US as well. So lots of learnings back and forth to really make sure that we’re continuing to grow and cultivate digital PR in the US. with all of the different ways that you can get links and get coverage.

Louise Parker:
That brings me nicely onto my first question for you, which is, so currently at the moment in the US, what is digital PR like?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Great question, yes. I would say it’s a little behind. I think compared to the UK, I feel like it’s a little bit more popular and growing kind of in the UK from what I’ve seen. And I think maybe clients or potential clients from what I’ve seen, correct me if I’m wrong, come to you guys already kind of knowing what it is and wanting it, having like a baseline understanding. We’re here in the US, it’s not really as mature. So we’re kind of having to start from ground zero sometimes in terms of telling clients even what it is and why it’s beneficial. And then I would say, There’s quite a few or not quite a few. There’s a few. agencies that are doing link building, I think really doing it correctly, in my opinion, like Journey Further, of course, and then Fractal, and there’s a few others. But there is still kind of a popularity of maybe old school link building tactics, like buying links, or making irrelevant content, or even kind of using like guest posting or things like that. Also, maybe taking a passive approach to link building rather than having like a full build out department specifically around PR and link building and making sure that it’s an integral part of a of a client’s repertoire. So, a little behind, but we are growing and we will continue to grow for sure.

Stephen Baker:
So, I’m really interested, why do you think the US is sort of slightly less mature or behind the UK? I’ve always been quite fascinated by that because that’s certainly the impression I got from what I read online. But yeah, why do you think that is?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Oh, that’s such a great question. I’m not even sure I have the answer. I just know that when I speak to SEO professionals, and when I speak to SEO professionals in the US, it’s a lot of focus on like creating content, category pages, keyword pages, even technical SEO, making sure page speed and all of that is up to speed. When it comes to link building, it kind of just seems like an afterthought after those two original items that I just mentioned. Then when I speak to PR professionals, it’s traditional, traditional PR kind of more just supersedes digital in what I’ve seen. So marrying the two, I don’t know if I can tell you exactly why. I think most of the time SEOs have just kind of stayed in their lane and traditional PRs have stayed in theirs and there hasn’t quite been that overlap of the two as much as there’s been in the UK.

Louise Parker:
Yeah, I mean, everything you described about like the current situation with it is basically the UK, what, maybe like 10 years ago, maybe, like maybe even slightly more recently, because I certainly remember when I started out in digital PR, which was about seven or eight years ago, there were most of the clients who knew that they needed links, but you did have to definitely convince them and educate them about how we went about getting links, which was through digital PR. Whereas now, like you correctly said, I think every client who comes to us just understands that digital PR is just how you get links, particularly with working with us. And I guess it’s just time. And, you know, that’s a matter of years. So, like, it takes a long time to get people confident and, I guess, seeing enough case studies and seeing enough examples of their competitors doing it and things like that, but it takes a lot of time. But, yeah, it definitely sounds like, especially with a lot of the UK agencies moving to the US or having like a kind of presence there, that it will definitely start ramping up as well as having people like Fractal who have been doing it for a long time.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Definitely. I think it is a combination of the two and you’re totally right that when they see the case studies and when they see that the improvements maybe competitors have had because of doing digital PR for links and things like that it will continue to increase. So it’s definitely I think a market to watch over the next few years hopefully as we continue to grow.

Stephen Baker:
Sure, and you’re going to be a big part of that. So it’s such an exciting time because you’re, you know, training up the next generation as well as educating, which, as you said, Lou, like we were sort of doing, yeah, maybe like five to 10 years ago with a lot of clients here. And it was exciting. I mean, frustrating at times when you couldn’t quite get your voice heard or like it felt like you almost re-explaining the same thing. But yeah, it must be an exciting time for you, which is great. I mean, in your average SEO agency in the US, So you’re saying that a lot of the link building or some of the link building you see is still sort of some old school tactics? Like if you could almost describe an average SEO agency in the US, how are they doing it? Obviously, you’re trying to change it, but how are they doing it, do you think?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yeah, I see some clients come to us and maybe they’re working with an SEO agency, or they have an internal person who’s kind of supposed to do all SEO, which is another common thing that I see, too. God bless that person. You know, so they’re, they’re kind of doing maybe buying links to something that I’ve seen, I’ve also seen, like technical link building, just looking for maybe redirects, or just text attributions and saying, Hey, you know, can you can Can you convert these to a link or something like that? I consider that to be like a little bit more passive as opposed to, you know, creating full pieces of content for links or things like that. I’ve also seen clients or agencies use those PR tools like Haro or something equivalent to that, just looking for low hanging through opportunities to get their client or to get their organization or their business in the news with a link. Again, kind of in a more passive way, or I’ve also seen guest posts where they’re just writing a piece of content to guest post on to maybe a trade or industry publication, rather than doing, like I said, like creating a piece of content or doing like a PR led strategy. Yeah, I think that’s going to be mostly those topics. Yeah.

Louise Parker:
Are there any… I mean, I’m going to assume you don’t endorse paying for links, but are there any things in there which you’re like, no, that’s a fair enough way of gaining links? Or are they all, to your opinion, not worth pursuing?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
I definitely think you can do the technical link building, you know, like fixing redirects and the text attributions and things like that. I think that that’s one piece of the puzzle. But making that your full strategy, you’re missing out on a lot, of course, in my opinion. So they’re not necessarily on the wrong track there. I don’t think, but again, they are missing out on a lot. Guest posting too. I’ve seen some clients who are guest posting, like I said, in industry and trade publications. So it’s right up their alley in terms of what they have the authority to speak on and where their customer base might be. So I don’t think that that’s necessarily bad, but it doesn’t really give that authority like it does when it comes from a complete third party, like from a journalist getting that really nice earned media. So maybe they’re on the right track, but I would still obviously, of course, recommend a really full, thought out PR strategy instead.

Louise Parker:
Yeah, that’s fair enough. From your American clients, when you’re talking to them about gaining links, do you ever get any clients who are like, I don’t understand why you would want to get a link from anywhere other than the US? Obviously, this question assumes that you think that there is benefit from getting links outside the US, which I guess is another part of the question. But it’s something that me and Steve as British digital PRs, we do outreach to the US and we get that comment from British clients. So I was intrigued to know whether it’s something that you experience on the other side of the pond.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yes, it definitely is. And I think maybe it kind of depends on their like, you know, business model. But for the most part, I’ve kind of agreed with them in terms of making sure first and foremost, they’re getting links where it’s relevant to them and their customer base and that and you know, that kind of thing. Relevance is really like a big focus of digital PR, especially here, where I work at attorney further, like making sure more than anything that we’re creating content and getting links with relevance in mind in terms of is it relevant to the client? And is it where their customers are? to make sure that we’re getting the most out of the links that we’re getting. So I think it is case by case, but for the most part, I do have US clients who are like, why would I get, you know, a UK link and things like that, or we only want to focus on US links. Maybe they’re really wanting to hone in on their target audience or their potential target audience in the US. And for the most part, I have agreed, I haven’t had to push back, you know, not not really. Sometimes there are clients who kind of do have a more wider potential audience where I think it might be beneficial to to look at the UK publications or things like that. But for the most part, I’ve kind of understood where they’re coming from.

Stephen Baker:
Yeah, that makes sense. And interesting, I just wanted to pick up on something you said about the relevance, because we know it’s super important and we see the work that goes in your side at Journey Further as well. It’s talked about a lot by you guys as an agency. But do you have any clients or have you spoke to any prospective clients where it’s like, I don’t really care so much about the relevance. I just want to go big for the numbers game. I just want quantity. Because we, being honest, we still get new business prospects, et cetera. I don’t really care where you’re getting the links. I just care that we’re getting the links, so then we talk to them about relevance. But how do you find that? Is it a bit of a mixed bag?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
I wouldn’t say it’s very common, because like I said, a lot of US clients don’t even really know what digital PR and link building is. So sometimes I’m really starting from scratch in terms of education where I can really let them know, yes, you want backlinks, but you don’t want them from just anywhere, you want them from really relevant publications and things like that. Here and there, I’ve had clients who care more about volume than anything, and I have had to kind of educate, okay, I can get you a volume of links, but are they actually really gonna heLouise Parker in terms of moving the needle of your business in your bottom line? So I wouldn’t say it happens all the time because we are kind of educating more than anything, but it is a conversation that is to be had and letting the clients know more than anything, we wanna focus on relevant publications that are actually gonna heLouise Parker move the needle for you and for your business instead of just spraying it all over the internet because that’s not necessarily heLouise Parkerful in the long run.

Stephen Baker:
Yeah very true and it’s changed quite a lot like when I started in in digital PR it was all about the quantity like or not not quite all about but like 90% of it was about quantity and was like hey we just got to get the links in and now it’s so refreshing and better even though there’s an education piece as well it’s like no it’s not really about quantity, it’s about quality and relevance. So that’s interesting to hear that you’re doing a lot of that education in the U.S. as well. And following on from that, really, really interested in the differences between pitching to U.S. journalists versus U.K. journalists. You obviously have experience in both. Asda, me and Lou, and we know that even though we share a common language, there are some pretty dramatic differences between the two. Could you give us, I guess, your three biggest differences, the three biggest things you notice from pitching on both sides?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yes, definitely. I’m interested to hear you guys’ opinions on this too. I love comparing notes with my UK team members and stuff. I think one big difference is the US publishers and journalists tend to be kind of more, just give me exactly what you’re working with. Maybe if I’m pitching them a stat or if I’m pitching them a story, they just want sometimes I’ll literally put if I have like a finding that I think is really interesting or if I have like a infographic that has like a map or something like this the subject line will be like infographic of XYZ or something like that and it’s interesting and maybe they’ll want to click on it but the subject line is kind of more just telling them exactly what it is whereas if I’m pitching a UK publisher I see that headlines or it might be a little bit more like exciting and kind of have some like I don’t know, fun, more exciting language of like, more adjectives, I guess you could say, like, exciting infographic shows, like something like that, where I just feel like US publishers would be like, or journalists wouldn’t even click on that. Or maybe they would think, oh, like, this is ridiculous, kind of thing. I don’t know. Sometimes they’re just much more to the point, which I think it’s more fun sometimes to pitch UK publishers, because I can be a little bit more like, I can play it up and be a little bit more fun where the US is like, just please get to the point. which, you know, it’s your opinion, I guess you could say, but that is a difference that I’ve seen. I’ve also noticed that US journalists really, really want personalization. And they want like a one on one pitch. And they really want you to talk to them about like their article or maybe like their Beat or something like that and acknowledge that when you’re pitching them That’s a big thing that we practice here at journey further when we pitch and something that I’ve noticed that US journalists really like so I’ve Perfected the art and taught it to my team of like make sure of course that you’re sending this to a journalist that it’s relevant for but also like acknowledge that you’ve read some pieces of theirs and tell them why what you’re pitching them and is perfectly on par with what they write about or maybe a recent piece that they wrote about or something like that. And in terms of like maybe sending one pitch to a bunch of journalists, that doesn’t work as much in the US where it has worked for me in the UK. And then I’ve gotten feedback from US journalists, thank you so much for this personalization, like I really appreciate it. I’m so glad you read my piece, things like that. definitely takes more time. And it’s not a quick, you know, strategy, but it does pay off in the long run when you have a journalist who’s, you know, flatter than they’re happy that you actually read their piece and things like that. And then you can kind of start to create a relationship with them. And then I would say the third thing, maybe the most frustrating thing is the time to actually getting the placement from the time you send the pitch is, I think, much longer in the US than it is in the UK. It’s Maybe a few weeks is kind of the average. We actually I had a piece of coverage go live last week on Cosmopolitan, which was great. And I looked at when the pitch was set, and it was it was sent to like three weeks before. Yeah, and it’s like, it’s not fun. And I feel like I see UK coverage kind of come in a little bit quicker. I think maybe there’s more, there’s more writers in the UK. I’m not sure the exact stat, but my colleague, Dominika, she did a seminar with BuzzSumo, where she actually mentioned that there’s like quite a bit of writers in the UK compared to the size. And there’s also like, maybe they’re pumping out articles a little bit more often, whereas a lot of US journalists maybe do like one or two a week. So the time to placement is just a little bit slower.

Louise Parker:
Did you see a tweet by an American journalist where she was talking about a salary and saying that it was actually quite low considering they had to publish 10 stories a week or something like that? And then you had all these British journalists coming back being like, 10 stories a week? I have to do like 15 a day. And she was getting quite like antsy with him because her point was like, just because it’s bad where you are doesn’t mean this isn’t also bad. But yeah, I guess that that would play a big part. Like if an American journalist does have the benefit of extra time to be writing things up and things like that, you’re not going to publish it within two hours, which is sometimes what can happen in the UK. Because they’ve probably got these crazy targets that they’ve got to hit.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yeah, and I think that’s what it is. I’ve seen it with like Daily Mail and Metro, like some of them are really, they’re, they’re working over there, like pumping out article after article, so many a day. And most US journalists, it’s just a few a week, like you said, and so that that difference does kind of impact the time to placement from the time you send the pitch to when you actually get the coverage.

Louise Parker:
I wonder if, because the Express has gone to the US, the Mirror’s now got a US site, I would imagine they’re going to bring their expectations of popping out stories. I wonder if it’s going to be the beginning of a change for maybe America. I don’t know, maybe I’m overestimating how influential those publications might be, but they are big, big companies. Maybe it will change.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
It’s a good thought. We’ve definitely been looking at them and trying to see kind of how exactly they’re laying out their coverage and things like that. But it’ll be interesting to see maybe how they decide to, I don’t know, change to US standards or keep it at UK standards.

Stephen Baker:
Yeah. Coming back to the personalization thing as well that you mentioned, because that really, really intrigues me. So there was actually, I think, something on Twitter yesterday where there was debate. And it feels like every journalist has a slightly different like or dislike on this. So most, it seems like, I think you’re absolutely right by that, it seems like most UK journalists just kind of just want a, you know, high name, here’s the story, like let’s crack on and you’re right, I think you can use some sort of, we love a pun in the UK and sort of like fun headlines and all of that, so that’s all good. Are you saying in the US that you kind of because personalization obviously comes in the form of prospecting so like making sure you’re targeting the right publications and the right journalists at those publications but in the US you’re saying that actually that little bit extra of making sure you’ve read their articles and referenced them in in the pitch like kind of goes the extra mile because yeah that’s something that we do but probably being completely honest probably not as much as as we could do like that’s fascinating

Louise Parker:
being completely honest, I literally tweeted this the other day, so I have to be really honest about it, I am trying to do this more for American pictures, but it really pains me. And not because I’m not interested in what they’re doing, because I generally am, but I’m like, to me, because I’m so used to the British way of doing things, which is like, send them a relevant story that I think they’re going to really like. And, you know, that’s kind of it with their name and all that kind of stuff. And so I find it a real struggle because I’m like, I don’t want to come across as like disingenuous. Like, yeah, it’s a learning curve. I think that’s a big cultural change.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
And you know, there is a way I think you could be like, maybe coming off disingenuous. So you want to make sure you really hire like, you know, a recent story, like really doing your research to make sure you know, you’re actually giving them a personalization that’s not just like blowing smoke up there. Yeah, exactly. But in, in most cases, you know, if you’re pitching something that should be kind of relevant, and You’re like, hey, you know, I read your last piece, or I read a piece that you did last week about, you know, Barbie, I actually have more information about Barbie, if you’re interested or something like that, like, for the most part, I’ve gotten like, thank you so much for reading my pieces. And I think a lot of that comes from irrelevant pitches being sent to them. And that is like a number one. you know, complaint from, I think, from US journalists, but I think journalists across the board of receiving irrelevant things, irrelevant pitches. So when they get a pitch that not only is relevant, but the person actually read their story and took the time to like, hey, you know, I saw that you, you wrote this, I have something to add to that conversation, or you have something I think you might be interested in, they really appreciate it.

Stephen Baker:
Yeah. I would love to see a journalist inbox. I’d actually probably pay good money to see a range of journalist inboxes because it feels like the agencies or the PR people who go and take the time to really think about who they’re pitching to, the publications they pitch to, the story, and being completely transparent. I think occasionally a mistake is made and a journalist added to a media list and you send them an irrelevant pitch or they’ve moved and you haven’t noticed, of course. But there’s obviously a lot of agencies and PR people who are just using that scattergun approach where they’re like right we got a story it’s sort of vaguely of interest to like motoring finance and new and they’re just pumping it out there without any thought so i’m just fascinated in where personalization is going because it feels like it’s swung both ways in the UK. Like when I started, it was very much similar to how you’re describing the US. You would reference pieces and then it almost became the norm not to do that because it was sort of a bit annoying. But like, yeah, very interesting. I think it’s a really interesting point for our listeners and for me as well, just to consider.

Louise Parker:
Yeah, for sure. On a similar note, in terms of differences, are there any particular styles of stories that you think work well in the US?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yes. In terms of styles of stories, I’ve seen data-led pieces really kind of be the holy grail in terms of getting coverage from digital PR to U.S. journalists. So having maybe an on-site piece with a data-backed ranking or a map or something like that, a lot of times these publications have editorial standards, they have to be held to. I’ve even had a publisher tell me like, if it’s a survey, it has to be 2000 respondents, or our publication actually won’t cover it at all. And those are always, I think, kind of changing and being refined. So it’s something we have to stay on top of. If we have like a data set, making sure that we tell them all of like, where all this data has come from, and And that kind of thing that these rigorous data standards that were held to make it to where or that they’re held to make it to where the content that we give them is, as if it is a data piece with all of that, and it checks all the boxes, it usually does pretty well, I would say reactives are kind of less, I don’t want to say less popular, but like, they Maybe don’t do as well if you have like a reactive on like a quick, you know Trending story and you maybe have like some Google Trends or like a quote from a client That’s you know in relation to this trending story or something like that Those definitely do well, but they really like to see data and maybe even some type of like a visual versus just a quick like off the cuff reactive or something like that kind of depends on the journalist as well and it kind of depends on the vertical. So this isn’t like a end all be all, you know, for all us journalists, but overall data pieces are, are really big and have done pretty well across several different verticals that I’ve worked on.

Louise Parker:
That’s interesting about the reactive things. Again, I wonder if the fact that if you’ve got a UK journalist who has to do 10 stories, maybe they’re okay with being like, oh, pink things are more popular now because of Barbie. Here’s a percentage and a quote, and that’s a story, you know, that’s an article out. Whereas, yeah, if an American’s journalist mindset is a little bit more maybe rigorous, maybe have like a bit fuller, then, yeah, that would kind of stack up, I guess, that they’re like, actually, I would like to see the full data and I would like a little bit more. So that’s a really good tip around data. Do you think there’s anything that, well, actually, you’ve said that Reactive doesn’t work as well, but is there anything that actually goes down really well in the UK, which, in the US, you’re like, this is going to be a tough sell?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
I don’t know. I’m not going to have a pitch to UK media in a while because I’m so focused on the US. So maybe I’m out of the loop. Um, the biggest thing is just like, I think the way that if we’re doing even if I’m doing a reactive, like you said, like you guys love a pun or maybe like, a fun like subject line that’s kind of like witty or something like that. And it’s kind of like fun to pitch UK stuff because I can like really play up the story and like, that kind of thing. And it just doesn’t work in the US. They’re kind of just like, please get to the point. Which is funny, because it’s opposite for personalization. It’s seeming like for UK publishers, they don’t care about personalization. In the US, they do. But when it’s actually getting to the meat of the story, I feel like I can have a little bit more fun with the UK ones versus the US.

Stephen Baker:
In terms of cutting stories, so a pretty common tactic is to have like, let’s say it’s a data story with a map and what have you, so you do like one global story and you sort of take, you know, a bit of a cut of that country’s data and outreach it to other countries. You’ve kind of hinted at this already and obviously the US is a huge country, so it kind of, you know, it’s going to vary from state to state, but like what do you think about kind of cutting that one big story or do you really need to think about creating bespoke stories for the US market and for individual states?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yeah, I am kind of team bespoke to the U.S. and individual states. I’ve seen some pieces that are global and kind of cover like global cities and including some U.S. cities and I’ve seen them kind of do well. I think it really depends on the topic. You have to have kind of a topic that resonates, you know, globally, which can be kind of difficult, I think, especially for people in the U.S. because Overall, the US is kind of insular. Like, not kind of, I think they’re very insular. Like, a lot of US people don’t have passports, they don’t really travel globally. So for a story to resonate on something globally, it has to kind of be a topic that maybe is really popular or something that would really resonate with someone in the US to actually really think on a global scale, because it’s so big, the market is so big. And so many, like I said, people in the US don’t have a passport, maybe they haven’t traveled internationally, or they don’t very often. it can be kind of hard to get them to think on a global scale and I think publishers know that and publishers want to make sure that they’re appealing to the readers and kind of maybe what they’re going to see. I would say state-based like data or something like that does much more it probably does better in terms of like engagements and things like that because we really do I think you can almost say like each state is like its own little country and everyone kind of has like their opinion of this state or this state, you know, and, and we all kind of think maybe our state is the best or something like that. And that’s kind of how I think we view things. And that’s how stories are run. So if you do it on a state based level, there’s definitely potential there. And then of course, you have those local publishers who only cover news in that state, or maybe they only cover news in one city in one state. So it gets really like hyper regional. So if you’re doing something on a U.S., just a U.S. base level, comparing the states to each other, there’s a lot of potential there and there’s a lot of, like, conversation that they want that could happen around it because of, like I said, the, like, competition or, like, you know, the friendly competition that the states have with each other.

Stephen Baker:
This is a bit of a throwaway question, but I’m just going to ask it anyway, because what you said is fascinating, but are there any states that are harder or easier than others to gain coveraging? So I’ve pitched to a lot of states and some of them seem like a really tough sell, like honest, like zero responses or interest. And then others are like, Hey, this is great. Keep the stories coming. Like what’s, what’s your experience.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yeah, that’s a great question. I say there’s some states that are, you know, bigger, have more heavily populated, so more is going on, so you have more noise to cut through. The big ones being like New York, Florida, Texas, California, those four are very heavily populated, very like big bustling cities, you know, within those states. So cutting through noise might be kind of difficult. Whereas if you pitch to a less populated state, or a state where not, you know, not as many big cities or something like that, they probably don’t get pitched as often. So they’re really excited to get a pitch from you, especially if it paints their state in a good light. And they’re excited to show it off, you know, something like, Montana or Nebraska, like things like that, they, you know, might be more excited. So, but I also think it kind of depends, right? So I mentioned Texas being a busy state with a lot going on. But people from Texas are, Texas is one of the biggest states in the US and people are very proud to be from Texas, it’s just a state that comes with a lot of pride. So if you have a, you know, a story really painting Texas in a good light, they’re probably going to run it because they’re just so excited to like, you know, show off how great Texas is, you know, so it also just kind of depends on those like nuances as well.

Stephen Baker:
That makes sense.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
And I love Texas. I have family in Texas. I’m not talking bad about Texas.

Stephen Baker:
We’ll make sure we keep that clarity in the final edit.

Louise Parker:
I was trying to think who’s the UK Texas? Who’s the one that loves to hear about themselves?

Stephen Baker:
Well, it’s difficult to compare country for country, but Cornwall is very, like, Cornish pride. Cornwall is a very proud… I mean, it’s entirely different to Texas, obviously. I don’t feel like I need to clarify that. But in terms of pride, it seems like there’s a lot of pride there about where they’re from.

Louise Parker:
What media database do you use for US contacts to get those precious emails?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Great question. So we use almost everything because we want to make sure that we are really increasing the potential for contacts. So we do build each of our media lists for each campaign by hand. So I think that’s another thing that goes into personalization is making sure each media list for every campaign that we’re doing is every contact is kind of vetted to make sure that it’s a good fit. I love, personally, I love Muckrack. It’s big here in the US for pitching. And they have a really sophisticated way of searching for contacts that is like you can refine your search and you can really get down to like the nitty gritty of what you’re looking for, which I love. We also use Buzzsumo, love Buzzsumo as well. Love their like content analyzer, keeping on track with like trending news and things like that. I think they do a really good job of heLouise Parkering me identify trending news and then identify the writers talking about it. We also use OnePitch and then of course Google just like refine, you know, using Google modifiers to really refine your search as well to make sure that you’re looking for stories or potential writers that would be a good fit for your campaign as well. So a little bit of everything really.

Louise Parker:
Nice. Do you only use Muckrack as your only like media database? Like for like the world or is it a different one for like UK and Europe or you’re not sure?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
They do. No, you can find UK publications on MuckRack. Again, I haven’t pitched UK media lately. Yeah, sorry, I realized I keep on asking you questions, which maybe are right, but… I’m not sure how updated it is, to be honest, in terms of like their media, their UK media database, but you can find UK publications on there and in their like their search

Louise Parker:
you know console or whatever you look it up you can specify the the country to make sure that you’re looking for maybe us or uk yeah we’re so we’re currently having a lose on a personal crusade to find the perfect i should add i i’m coming to the slow realization that i think to be able to outreach to the world, which is a big ask, that I think there’s not one that is… I think, personally, you need to have more than one. And I’m starting to think that Nutcracker seems to be the best one for the US. But our finance people aren’t going to like that news because it’s extremely expensive. And then it’s like, and we also want another one for Europe and the UK. But yes, I’m always intrigued. But it does seem very good. But they don’t do free trials, which is mad to me.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Oh, interesting. I remember talking to the Muckrack rep earlier in the year, and she told me that they were… I can’t remember exactly what she said, but she said that they were, like, introducing their capabilities in the UK, and it was, like, not great, but it was getting better. So I’m hoping maybe that, yeah, I do remember her telling me that.

Stephen Baker:
Also, interesting tactic there from Lou to sort of almost pitch for the budget for Muckrack. Yeah.

Louise Parker:
Can you say on the record how vital it is for any digital PR, and then we can get it signed off?

Stephen Baker:
Staying with contacts or publications, so interested to hear like if there are or what would be your kind of golden publications that are kind of seen as the holy grail of coverage in the US. Because obviously in the UK, you know, BBC is always a standard. We actually got some coverage on the BBC recently and obviously get shared around quite a lot. It’s like, this is amazing, like absolutely, it’s like the best of the best. But what are the equivalents in the US?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yes, congratulations on the BBC coverage. That was awesome. It wasn’t me. I should stay.

Stephen Baker:
It was neither of us. It was one of our wonderful team members. But yeah, sorry, carry on.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
No, that’s still awesome. That is definitely worth celebrating. I would say One of the biggest Holy Grail publications is the New York Times, which is why I include it in my bio, because I have one placement under my belt at the New York Times. It was a career high that I will never forget. I will tell my children and my grandchildren about it. I’m so excited. It’s just such a high tier, probably one of the most high tier publications here in the US. It’s a really, really big deal. Another one that I really love is USA Today. They are a pretty like reputable, you know, high tier publication here in the US and their syndication network is, in my opinion, one of the best they have their main site, of course, USA Today, and then they have a bunch of talk about, you know, local and regional media, they have a bunch of those publications across a lot of major US cities across the country. So not only will you get the coverage on USA Today, but you’ll also get all of those syndication coverage as well. And it’ll be high tier followed links. It’s not syndicating to like, you know, low tier low domain authority sites, it’s syndicating to some pretty high tier sites that actually have really good readership. So you’re getting the USA Today, like readership potential, and then the the syndication across the country, which I love, I would say the same for CNBC, or NBC, they’re owned by the same They are great and they have great syndications as well. Washington Post is another good one too. Guardian, even the Guardian US is another good one too. So those are some like pretty generic, I think like, you know, multi vertical publications that are just, you know, holy grail, holy grail for us.

Stephen Baker:
Well, congratulations to you for getting the placement on the New York Times. Can you tell us a little bit more about that? Because obviously we do what we do to have impact for clients, to earn money, all that kind of stuff. But for me, I’ve worked in PR for years and you can’t beat that feeling of when you just get a placement on a publication you’ve been trying to get on for ages and it’s amazing and it’s like, I did that. That’s great. So how did you get on the New York Times?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Great question. So going back to what I was talking about earlier, data, data, data. So it was a campaign. And again, I really can’t take credit off my own. I had a production team heLouise Parker me make the campaign, and I heLouise Parkered make the campaign. And then I had a team member who was heLouise Parkering me pitch it. So it really was a group effort. But the piece was a data-led piece about the rent here in the United States, which is astronomical and has just continued to climb. So rent prices are crazy. I can’t remember the exact piece, but it was some sort of multi-data meta-ranking of multiple different data points being looked at across all 50 states to analyze rent prices across the country. Very, very thorough, like I said, multi-data meta-ranking. different data sets included in the piece. And then it was very topical, because it rent prices have just been climbing. And like I said, haven’t stopped. So I think it was that perfect formula of very thorough data piece with a map. So there was a visual on top of being extremely topical. And it was like, I think the perfect formula with a personalized pitch to the writer who was writing about all of those kind of like, Inflation, finance issues, very topical here in the U.S. at the moment and it was just that perfect formula to get the placement.

Stephen Baker:
Amazing, amazing. I’m going to seek that out because I love that when you just hit it perfectly, like at the right time, with the right story, in the right way, so very nice.

Louise Parker:
We’ve spoken a lot about American press but we’d be intrigued to hear about American clients and what’s the differences between American clients and British clients?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yes. So, you know, quite a few differences. I love my, my British clients, they remind me of so I’m from the American South, where we kind of have Southern hospitality, not sure if you’ve ever heard of that. And when I talked to my, my Brit, my British co workers, it’s very familiar to me that kind of like politeness and hospitality, right. So I feel Like, it’s kind of similar. So when I’m talking to British clients, they’re like, you know, they want to talk and chat maybe the first five minutes of the call. How was your weekend? You know, how’s your day? What do you have going on? And they tell me about it, their day, you know, that kind of stuff. And like I said, it’s really familiar to me feels kind of like Southern hospitality in a way. When I talk to my US clients, it’s just seems like they’re busy and want to get to the point very much like US publishers. And they’re just, you know, I can tell that they have a lot kind of a lot going on. And I can almost kind of sometimes tell that they have like, they’re getting the information that they of course then need to relate maybe to their supervisor and their boss. So it’s more of like just passing of information rather than like, you know, let’s get to know each other kind of thing. Again, like I mentioned earlier in the call, the education is just kind of low with US clients. So I’m really starting from scratch if I if I sign a US client, in terms of like, this is what we’re doing, you know, this is why we’re doing it, I just really have to do a lot of that education up front. Not necessarily something I have to do with UK clients who, like I mentioned, are already kind of familiar with digital PR and the importance of links and using a PR strategy for it. So yeah, I would say those are like the two biggest differences.

Louise Parker:
When you are getting the kind of, not pushback, I guess, but the clients who have to educate a little bit more because they might not know about digital PR as much. what are their kind of reservations about doing it? Because from our experience, one of the big things, you know, a good couple of years ago when people were like, Oh, I’m not sure it was like, you know, we already have a PR team. So why would we use this and things like that? Are those the kind of things that come up in the conversations as well? You’re nodding?

Stephen Baker:
Yes.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yes, we already have a PR team. What are you talking about? Like talk to our comms team, that kind of thing. And then really having to like explain those differences is huge. And seeking even with their PR teams talking with their PR team and kind of just like they’re working on a company announcement or quarterly earnings Like, you know very traditional PR ask while we’re working on more content creation things like that big big difference I would say another kind of like question that comes up is if I’m doing maybe a content piece or even a reactive or something like that like I think that they think to advertorial. I think a lot of clients do, but they’re kind of just like, you know, why isn’t this whole pitch or this whole campaign idea or whatever specifically about us and our products? And I’m like, that’s not what the journalists want. Like they’re going to tell me to go buy an ad. You know, they want a story around what their coverage kind of entails that they can then pitch to their editor. So you’re in here, but like, there’s also a greater story to be told as well. And that’s what journalists want. And that’s how you get earned media. So having to kind of explain to them, that way of thinking in terms of PRs is another thing as well.

Stephen Baker:
Yeah, that makes perfect sense. And yeah, kind of gave me a little bit of a shiver then because it feels like PRs need a support group for that kind of discussion because it’s like I’ve had it so often. It’s like, well, we can’t just write about, I don’t know, a pair of shoes you manufacture or a holiday that you do because that’s like an ad. You can do that on your social channels, but we need to create a story here. That makes perfect sense. Bri, we’ve just got two more questions for you. One is we’re going to finish up with a question that we ask all of our guests, but before that, I just wanted your views on what you think UK digital PR pros are doing better than those in the US and kind of vice versa, because you’ve had experience of both and yeah, really intrigued to sort of basically just have a bit of fun with it. Like what are we doing better in the UK? What are you doing better in the US basically?

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Great question. So I do think I kind of mentioned it, but the UK, you guys just do reactive so well. And I think that you guys, I just see my UK like coworkers and things just always talking about the news, keeping an eye on the news. I don’t know how all these people do it. Like they’re just like, so like focusing on the news and getting their work done and just like they’re everywhere at once. And I feel like that they just do such a good job of like, okay, this is trending in the news, boom, boom, boom, we can tie the client to it like this, you know, send and they’re just that kind of thought process. They do it so well, and then get the coverage on the back of it. I think for a long time, like I said, digital PR in the US has been like, I have a lot more experience with data pieces and like on on site pieces with like, you know, a map or some type of visual or something like that. So over the past few years, as reactive has really popped off, it’s something that us us digital PRs who are a little bit behind still kind of have to like train our brain to think that way. And I just see it executed so flawlessly in the UK. And it’s something that I’m just learning more and more about every single day. So I think maybe the opposite is some of those like more data pieces like data heavy pieces I see in the US, I mean, I’m not gonna lie, I haven’t seen a lot in the UK, so I’m not saying maybe you guys don’t do them as good, but I do know that the digital PR and link building agencies who are doing it correctly in the US have really perfected that art of here’s like a content piece with all of the data, here’s the perfect way to visualize it, this is exactly what we wanna see, like the publishers wanna see, and that is really something that has been perfected here in the US. So, you know, like I said, I don’t know if maybe the UK is doing it better, but I do know that that is what the US is doing extremely well.

Louise Parker:
Our final question for you is, what do you think the future of digital PR is? Just a small question, just a little thing. Obviously, if you want to talk about, you know, what’s it going to be like in the next month, fine. But if you want to think big and go for the next 10 or 20 years, also fine. Great question.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Let me just pull out my crystal ball. It is a tricky question. Things have changed so much. I’ve watched in my six years, I have seen things change so drastically just in like six years. I can’t even really put my finger I think on what’s to come. I do know that Even though digital PR is kind of newer in the US, I’ve seen a lot of journalists kind of catch on to it. And they just kind of know, like, you know, what we’re doing. And they just really want a story that really resonates with them, like I’ve talked about. So I think relevance is important, obviously, for our clients, because they need to be in their, like, relevant verticals, like I said, in front of potential consumers and things like that. It’s also relevant for Google’s algorithm. But, like, really making sure that we’re creating relevant content that publishers want to see as well is extremely important because they just really don’t like, like I said, irrelevant pitches or anything like that. So relevance across the board has got to be something that I think we’ll have to focus on a lot in the U.S. over the next few years to make sure that we’re really continuing to get coverage for our clients. And then another thing I think, too, that we’re all having, we all got to keep our eye on, I have no idea where this is going to go. But TikTok is very much becoming a search engine. And I don’t know what that’s going to look like over the next few years, in terms of our careers and its competition with Google. But I see so many Gen Zers choosing to search on TikTok instead of Google. So we got to keep our eye on it and see how we can maybe, what’s the word I’m looking for, conform or just adapt quickly to this ever-changing market that we’re in.

Louise Parker:
Yeah, totally. Two very, very good points. I thought you were going to say AI for that last one.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Oh, yeah, it’s coming too, for sure.

Louise Parker:
That’s the thing that’s coming, it might take our jobs.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Yet another thing we have to, you know, adopt too quickly or we’re going to get left behind. You know, and it is something I see so many people who are against it and are like, no, or whatever. But I just think that tastefully, of course, I don’t want, you know, AI to completely replace us in terms of writing or anything like that. I don’t think it’s going to be able to. But seeing how we can implement it into our workday and into our workflow and things like that, I think it’s worth all of us keeping an eye on and seeing what we can do or we will get left behind as well. So it’s just a matter of doing it, I think, tastefully and correctly.

Stephen Baker:
I totally agree. Brie, you’ve been absolutely brilliant. We really, really appreciate your time. It’s been an absolute pleasure talking to you and I made a lot of notes. I’m basically going to steal your thoughts and pass them off as my own at a later date. I’m not going to do that. But if people want to kind of get in touch, follow you, learn from you, like I assume follow you on Twitter, that’s brieheykay? Yes. Yeah, at brieheykay on Twitter. At brieheykay.

Bri Godwin Huyke:
Or LinkedIn. Yes, Bree Huyke. It’s spelled H-U-Y-K-E. Doesn’t look like how it’s pronounced.

Stephen Baker:
It does not, because I found that to my cost in the original introduction to this podcast. So thank you for clarifying. So do go and follow Bree. She shares lots of brilliant information that we’ll add to what she shared on this podcast. But thank you again, Bree. It’s been a pleasure. And thank you, everyone, for listening.

Louise Parker:
Thanks so much. Thanks.