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Joining host Shel Holtz in conversation this week are tech journalist David Strom on organizational integrity, Gartner analyst Augie Ray on whether IHOP’s marketing stung was brilliant or a betrayal of consumer trust, and Sprinklr’s Marshall Kirkpatrick and Jen Valdez on the benefits of establishing long-term relationships with influencers. Also in this week’s episode:

• Domino’s is repairing potholes. Is this a brilliant example of corporate social responsibility or a prelude to our dystopian future?
• Heineken has done away with taglines
• People are using Facebook less and less to get news, but where some of them are going instead may surprise you
• Mozilla is building a voice-controlled web browser
• You can now share your Alexa Skill Blueprints with friends and family
• Mastercard wants to let you buy things with your voice
• Microsoft’s next-generation HoloLens is due in Q1 next year
• You’ll remember more of what you learned wearing a VR headset than looking at a 2D computer monitor
• Dan York reports on WordCamp Europe from Belgrade, Serbia

Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music.

You can find the stories from which FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog.

About our guests

After a successful career blazing trails in new media as one of the top tech bloggers in the world (first-hired writer at TechCrunch, co-editor of ReadWriteWeb), Marshall Kirkpatrick led the Little Bird team building software for enterprise marketers to do research, real-time market intelligence and marketing amplification. The tool for influencer marketing, content marketing, and research was recently by Sprinklr, the full-service social media management system, where Marshall now serves as product director for Influencer Marketing and Research.

Augie Ray is a Research Director covering customer experience for marketing leaders at Gartner. He has had a diverse career, including leading a digital experiential agency, directing social business at USAA and managing a global customer experience team at American Express. In his present role, Augie researches and advises clients on topics such as Voice of Customer, customer journey mapping, customer experience strategy and virtual reality.

David Strom is a leading expert on network and Internet technologies and has written and spoken extensively on topics such as VOIP, convergence, email, cloud computing, network management, Internet applications, wireless and Web services for more than 30 years. He is also the creator of an innovative series of video screencast product reviews of enterprise IT products that can be found on Webinformant.tv and syndicated to various other Web sites.David was editor-in-chief of Network Computing print and currently edits the Inside Security newsletter and writes for IBM’s SecurityIntelligence.com, TechTarget’s SearchSecurity.com, and Network World.

Jen Valdez is a Bronx-native who not only has a knack for poetry and salsa dancing but also for advising brands on how to leverage the digital transformation of our times to better connect with you. She began her career as an expert on Brand Advocacy and has expanded to include Content Marketing and Influencer Marketing as part of her role at Sprinklr, a leader in the Customer Experience management space. Doesn’t matter whether agency, startup, publisher, or Fortune 500, Jen is committed to connecting to the biggest problems and adapting solutions for the ever-changing ways we connect with each other and brands with us.

Links from this week’s show

• Domino’s is repairing roads, and some people say it reveals a ‘dystopian’ truth about America
• Domino’s Will Now Repair America’s Crumbling Infrastructure
• Latest string of brand apologies confirms it—corporate integrity is dying
• Are taglines still relevant? Heineken says no
• ‘We had to crack the code by being disruptive’: Behind the IHOb ‘rebranding’
• Has IHOP flipped its lid? Eatery gets grilled over rebrand
• IHOP, #IHOb, And Lying To Your Fans As A Marketing Strategy
• Facebook used less for news as youngsters turn to WhatsApp: Reuters Institute
• How beauty brands have evolved their influencer marketing
• Firefox makers working on voice-controlled web browser called Scout
• Amazon lets you share Alexa Skill Blueprints with other users
• Amazon’s Alexa is still the preferred voice assistant among consumers — but overall voice app adoption is rising across brands and media
• MasterCard is moving into voice assistants
• Microsoft’s Next-Gen HoloLens is Codenamed Sydney; Arrives Q1, 2019
• VR helps us remember

Links from Dan York’s Tech Report

• Interactive presentation software that includes real-time voting and questions
• Serverless-Static WordPress Hosting
• WP Rig: My Love Letter to the WordPress Community
• The Progressive WordPress Theme Rig
• WordPress US (December 7-9, 2018)
• WordCamp US 2018 on Twitter
• WordCamp US 2018 Call for Speakers (open until July 1)
• WordCamp Europe 2019 (June 20-22, Berlin, Germany)

About Shel Holtz

Shel Holtz, ABC (Accredited Business Communicator), is director of Internal Communications at Webcor, a commercial general contractor headquartered in San Francisco. Before joining Webcor, Shel spent 21 years as principal of Holtz Communication + Technology. In addition to integrating technology into communications strategies, his expertise includes strategic communications planning, change management, organizational culture, business initiatives and communications research. Full bio