Quick housekeeping before we get into it: This is the part where I tell you about something that's been happening on my end and then we’ll get back to your regularly scheduled Reddit content next week. PROMISE.

When I launched this newsletter, I told you it was going to be a Reddit-focused education space. That part hasn’t changed (and won’t!).

But the consultancy behind it has.

I'm officially rebranding to Fan Out and expanding from Reddit-only services into strategy for the full reputation layer of AEO. (withfanout.com, if you want to take a peek 👀)

*Fan Out was originally gonna be Search Party as mentioned in a previous newsletter, but someone snagged that name before I could launch. Anywayyyy. 😅

Whether you realize it or not, you all have played a huge role in giving me the confidence to do something I’ve always wanted to do: build my own business. Through writing this newsletter, I’ve made friends (some of which have turned into clients!), and I've heard more about what you’re interested in, excited about, and struggling with as marketers in [gestures wildly] this current landscape.

Talking with you all has made me want to really invest more in my marketing community by upping my game in education and support, both informally (i.e. lots of free content and resources) and formally (i.e. partnering with your team).

And, yes, my Reddit consultancy was always a business, but I’ve always dreamt of building what I like to call a digital “Shop Around the Corner” kind of business and team (any other You’ve Got Mail fans out there?).

To me, my “Shop Around the Corner” kind of business (even digitally) would be warm and cozy to my audience, like you can pull up to my corner of the internet and feel like you’re talking to a friend about the latest insane things happening at work over coffee. It would see clients not as Clients™️ but as “neighborhood regulars” who I get to hang with and invest in every day. It would give any future teammates I have a soft place to land, somewhere they can be free to do really cool work for really cool clients and be excited about the opportunity we have ahead of us (without grinding ourselves into the ground). It would be a business that isn’t focused on dominating the world a la Fox Books, but instead focused on carving out our small, cozy corner of the world and stewarding it really fucking well. 🤌

(I realize in the movie she has to actually CLOSE her shop, but don’t worry, digital means less overhead 😎😂)

Anyway, I just wanted to say thank you all for reading this newsletter and being part of the journey. I hope it’s been helpful so far, and I only plan to make it more helpful from here! ❤️

Stay with me for a second, because this is actually useful context for everything we talk about in this newsletter.

Like I mentioned when I launched this newsletter, AI answer engines (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and the rest) don't just pull from your website when they decide how to represent your brand. They pull from everywhere. And the signals that seem to carry the most weight aren't always your homepage copy or your blog. They're often third-party: places where other people, platforms, and publications are talking about your brand without you in the room.

That's the reputation layer. (Also called the off-site layer, the third-party layer, the authority layer depending on who you're talking to and how much jargon they've absorbed this week.)

Reddit is one of the most powerful signals in this layer right now, which is exactly why we talk about it so much here. But the layer itself is bigger: it also includes other community, social, or review spaces like Quora, YouTube, LinkedIn, G2, etc — basically anywhere an AI engine might look to understand whether your brand is trustworthy, relevant, and worth recommending.

Most brands are just letting this layer happen to them without any real strategy. Fan Out is how I help them get intentional about it. I focus on the off site layer you don’t own, so you can focus the on site layer you do own. 🤝

Feel free to book a call if you are curious about my new offerings (or my existing Reddit services). I’m currently offering pilot partner rates to any clients who sign up for the new third-party offering during the month of April (and those pilot rates last the entire duration of your contract 🫶).

This newsletter stays exactly what it's always been: Reddit marketing education, all the time. The Warmups is still your weekly warmup for thinking about Reddit responsibly — strategy, tactics, real talk, all of it. And I have more fun resources planned for you in Q2 🤌

The only thing that's different is that Fan Out is now the name on the door.

More at withfanout.com. And as always, if you want to talk through what's happening with your brand specifically, just reply. I read every one.

Talk soon,

KD

P.S. Back to our regularly scheduled programming next week with a breakdown on how to measure and track success on Reddit 🫶