Building an Unshakable Online Presence with Jason Barnard
Ever wonder what happens when a potential client Googles your name after a meeting? The truth might shock you. In this eye-opening conversation with Jason Barnard, CEO of KaliCube and digital brand intelligence expert, we discover why your digital footprint matters more than ever in the age of AI.
Jason reveals his unconventional path from street musician to cartoon creator to digital marketing authority, showing how he’s consistently seized and created opportunities throughout his career. But the most valuable insights come when he explains the fundamental shift happening in how people research businesses and individuals online. As Jason puts it, “Your brand is not what people say about you when you’re not in the room—it’s what Google and ChatGPT say about you when you’re not in the room.”
Through practical examples and memorable analogies, we learn how to build what Jason calls an “entity home”—a central hub for your digital brand that helps machines understand exactly who you are and why you matter. This hub-and-spoke model creates a cohesive digital ecosystem that works across all AI platforms, allowing you to control your brand narrative regardless of which technology dominates the landscape
The stakes couldn’t be higher. With conversion rates from AI recommendations potentially 100 times higher than traditional search results, mastering your digital brand isn’t just about reputation—it’s about business survival. Jason demonstrates how even small businesses can compete with industry giants by optimizing for the right audience and leveraging AI’s increasing influence on buying decisions.
Ready to take control of your digital brand? Listen now to discover practical steps for managing how search engines and AI platforms represent you when you’re not in the room. Your future opportunities may depend on it.
Video by: Firing The Man Podcast. Host: David Schomer. Guest: Jason Barnard. April 01, 2025.
An Introduction to GETIDA
[00:00:00] David Schomer: Real quick before we get into the show, I wanted to share a new service called Getida that Ken and I have been using that has made us over $10,000 in Amazon reimbursements. The service requires no monthly subscription, and Getida collects a small percentage of the money they recover for you. It takes less than five minutes to set up and works on all Amazon marketplaces.
[00:00:22] David Schomer: Go to getida.com, G-E-T-I-D-A, and enter promo code FTM400. That’s FTM for Firing The Man 400 to get your first $400 in reimbursements commission free. How much money does Amazon owe you?
Explore How Jason Barnard Built Industry-Leading Brands and Took Charge of His Entrepreneurial Journey
[00:00:41] Narrator: Welcome everyone to the Firing The Man Podcast, a show for anyone who wants to be their own boss. If you sit in a cubicle every day and know you are capable of more, then join us.
[00:00:52] Narrator: This show will help you build a business and grow your passive income streams in just a few short hours per day. And now your host serial entrepreneurs, David Schomer and Ken Wilson.
[00:01:06] David Schomer: Welcome everyone to the Firing The Man Podcast, where we explore the journeys of entrepreneurs who have fired their bosses to take control of their destinies.
[00:01:15] David Schomer: Today’s guest is Jason Barnard, a serial entrepreneur, bestselling author, keynote speaker, and CEO of Kalicube, a digital branding consultancy. For over 20 years in digital marketing, Jason has built successful companies in entertainment, music, and tech. He’s a sought after speaker on Brand Management, AI-driven Search, and Knowledge Panel Optimization.
[00:01:41] David Schomer: He also hosts Fastlane Founders and Legacy, a podcast on balancing rapid growth with lasting success. Join us as we dive into Jason’s journey and insights on Personal Brand Intelligence and Digital Branding. Jason, really excited to have you as part of the show today. Welcome.
[00:01:58] Jason Barnard: Thank you so much, David.
[00:01:59] Jason Barnard: Absolutely brilliant. I love the introduction, but I think we wrote it, so obviously I would.
Jason Barnard Launches His Entrepreneurial Journey Through Music and Business
[00:02:04] David Schomer: Yeah. Very good. Well, to start things off, can you share a little bit about your entrepreneurial journey and, how you in touch on your, your early music career?
[00:02:17] Jason Barnard: Right. Okay. Brilliant. Yeah. This is my third company, Kalicube, K-A-L-I-C-U-B-E, and my first company was WTPL Music.
[00:02:27] Jason Barnard: Back in 1991 last century, which sounds kind of slightly scary, and it was a record company and music publisher. And the reason I created that company was because I really wanted to be a musician, and the company was there to allow me to fulfill that dream with my band. And it turned out to be a profitable company.
[00:02:51] Jason Barnard: We signed some great bands alongside my own band and signed deals with EMI and Warner Chapel and some other big, music industry titans. And then I exited that, sold it to my business partner at the time, and moved on to entertainment. Cartoons for children.
[00:03:12] David Schomer: Okay.
Building a Hit Cartoon Brand from Scratch and Passion
[00:03:13] David Schomer: And what, what was that? Tell, tell us about that part of your life.
[00:03:17] Jason Barnard: I founded that company to make cartoons because myself and my ex-wife Veronique decided that we would make cartoons ’cause we thought it would be fun. The internet was really just getting going in 1998 and we were hugely successful very quickly. So we created a company and made a TV series with ITV International.
[00:03:38] Jason Barnard: It was on Playhouse Disney. Our website got a billion page views in 2007. Another hugely successful, profitable company built from my passion and my desire to do something specific. The first was being a band and play music in front of big audiences. The second was to make cartoons. Games and songs for kids and I exited that company in 2011.
[00:04:07] Jason Barnard: It’s still going. It’s still profitable. My ex-business partner has that. They’re doing what they want with it and I segued into Kalicube.
Kalicube Empowers Entrepreneurs to Control What AI and Google Say About Them
[00:04:16] David Schomer: Alright, and tell us a little bit about Kalicube.
[00:04:19] Jason Barnard: Kalicube is a company that manages Personal Brand and Corporate Brand in Search and AI. We optimize it and make sure that what Google and ChatGPT say about you when you’re not in the room is what you want them to say about you when you’re not in the room.
[00:04:35] Jason Barnard: Jeff Bezos said your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room, but he’s wrong or partially wrong. It’s what Google and AI say about you when you’re not in the room. So we manage that. We can get Google and ChatGPT and Perplexity to say exactly what we want. So we help entrepreneurs in particular manage their brand narrative and amplify their Authority and increase their visibility in Google, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Siri, Alexa, Copilot, Deep Seek, and any of the, any of the other machines that come out.
[00:05:12] Jason Barnard: It works every time.
Jason Barnard Reflects on His Unique Path to Independence
[00:05:13] David Schomer: Outstanding and I, I’m really excited to get into the discussion on AI with you. It seems to be more and more present every day. But before we do that, I want to talk about your Firing The Man moment. When, when was, what did that look like for you?
[00:05:33] Jason Barnard: Well, I never had that moment.
[00:05:35] David Schomer: Okay.
[00:05:36] Jason Barnard: I left school and became unemployed in Leeds in the North England.
[00:05:44] David Schomer: Okay.
[00:05:44] Jason Barnard: Got a job selling computers door to door on commission only. Gave that up because I wasn’t making any money and I would’ve made more money on unemployment benefit. Decided that actually working was a really bad thing to be doing, so I went back to university, so I didn’t have a boss then either.
[00:06:05] Jason Barnard: I just kind of hung around in Liverpool. Played in the Cabin Club. I was in a blues band, and we played in the Cabin Club where the Beatles famously, famously played and then left for Paris for love. I fell in love with a French woman and turned up in Paris, and I was hoping that love would blossom in the city of love in Paris.
[00:06:27] Jason Barnard: And of course it all went horribly wrong. She had a boyfriend, she didn’t want anything to do with me. I was a complete mistake and I pitched around for work and got part-time work as an English teacher. Once again, no full-time job, no full-time boss. And then some friends of mine said, do you wanna join our band and play in the street?
[00:06:48] Jason Barnard: Do you want to busk? And I said, oh, all right then. Yeah. Brilliant, wonderful great. I’m a singer cause I’ve been a singer in the band in Liverpool and they said, oh, we don’t need a singer. And I said, well, I play a bit the guitar. And they said, we don’t need a guitar player. We need a double bass player.
[00:07:04] Jason Barnard: If you can learn to play the double bass in 30 days, you were in the band. So I brought a double bass, learn to play It, got in the band. Busked in the street to make a living and then turned that band into a professional band. We recorded four albums, played 660 gigs. We supported Bob Dylan amongst others, and it was a career that made decent money for everybody, and I created very profitable company out of it.
[00:07:31] Jason Barnard: And that was the first time I had a proper structure around any kind of job but I’ve never had a proper boss.
Creating and Seizing Opportunities Throughout One’s Career
[00:07:39] David Schomer: Okay. Okay. I like it. I, I really liked it. And that is a really, a really unique story. It seems like there were a lot of different points in your life where you said yes to the opportunity ahead of you, which I think is, is really, really neat.
[00:07:53] Jason Barnard: I’m, I think it, it, it’s a little bit more than that is that the opportunity wasn’t there a lot of the time and I created the opportunity. So the, the band existed and they said, do you wanna join our band? So that was an opportunity I seized and I was willing to put my last sense into buying a double bass that I couldn’t play.
[00:08:15] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:08:16] Jason Barnard: And I learned, and I was, I was not very good, but I was good enough to play in the street with this band. And then I created the opportunity of turning professional. I created the opportunity to release records and then for the cartoon characters, I created the opportunity by being very insistent on creating a website and building out from there.
[00:08:39] Jason Barnard: And it turned out to be very successful and built a company around the website that was then able to do the TV series once again with Disney and ITV International and Radio Canada.
[00:08:53] David Schomer: Wow.
[00:08:53] Jason Barnard: And add in 25 countries. So I would say my career is a lot of creating opportunities that I then seize. And when people say to me, oh, aren’t you lucky to have been a musician professionally to have made cartoons for kids, been a voiceover artist, written songs for kids, and now mastering Google and AI algorithms in terms of how they understand and represent people so that they say the right thing about the people in the corporations when they’re not in the room.
[00:09:21] Jason Barnard: I’m not lucky. I’ve seized the opportunities and I’ve paid the price and I’ve suffered and I’ve worked and I’ve struggled like everybody else. And I think the, the one thing running through it all is I never give up.
Building a Foundation for AI’s Impact on Digital Marketing
[00:09:36] David Schomer: Absolutely. Absolutely. No, that definitely is a story of resilience and, uh, yeah, really, really a neat story.
[00:09:44] David Schomer: So let’s, let’s get into AI and, and may, maybe, maybe let’s build a foundation for this conversation. When, when did you first start becoming aware of AI and really feel the effect of, oh, it’s here and it’s here to stay?
[00:10:06] Jason Barnard: Well, I think like everybody else kind of, I was aware of it and it kind of leaked out at me, when ChaTGPT suddenly hit the world in 2023. But what, what I find really interesting is I was actually already ready for AI in 2015. And I didn’t know it. And it’s one of these things where you look back and you think, well if, if AI had come onto the scene and this whole thing had been happened in 2015, I was already ready.
[00:10:38] Jason Barnard: Because the process we use at Kalicube and the system that I created was already the foundation of what we’re doing today, and it, it isn’t significantly different today than it was in 2015. And the reason I, I started Kalicube, the reason I invented this whole process of controlling your Brand Narrative in Google and now AI is because when I pivoted from cartoons and being the voiceover artist for a cartoon blue dog to digital marketing, I would go into meetings with potential clients and I would say, oh, look, I can do your digital marketing. I’ve had all this success with Boowa Kwala, Uptoten, my company had a billion paid views in 2007. I can do the same for you. And they would go, brilliant. Yeah, we’re on board. Absolutely no problem. You are obviously a great digital market.
[00:11:28] Jason Barnard: Know what you’re talking about, and you’ve mastered Google. Brilliant. Walked out the room, leave them. My business card, don’t sign the deal, because they Googled me as soon as I walked out the door and my business card was thrown in the bin. The result on Google said, Jason Barnard is a cartoon bloom dog, voiceover artist.
[00:11:48] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:11:49] Jason Barnard: And I thought, oh, I have to change that because that’s gonna stop me losing all these hundreds of thousands of dollars in deals that I’m leaving on the table. And so it took me about a year to figure it all out. Got it all changed. And of course, now all the people sign the deals, they search my name and I look like an incredibly impressive entrepreneur, digital marketer, World Authority in Digital Brand Intelligence and all the rest of it because I’ve manipulated Google…
[00:12:15] David Schomer: okay.
[00:12:15] Jason Barnard: …and AI to say what I want it to say and to focus on what I want it to focus on, which is Jason Barnard is the World Authority on Digital Brand Intelligence and a, and, and an entrepreneur.
Understanding the Impact of Online Research on Business Opportunities
[00:12:28] David Schomer: I, I can speak to this firsthand as that was prepping for this interview. The, when I search your name, you are an authority in the space and, and so what you’re, you’re doing is working.
[00:12:41] David Schomer: What is, what are some things that you think business owners don’t think about as when it comes to this topic as their.
[00:12:54] Jason Barnard: There are lots of things I don’t think about number one, they don’t think, oh, as soon as I walk out this room or on this zoom call, that person’s Googling my name or asking chatGPT.
[00:13:04] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:13:05] Jason Barnard: I was talking to somebody who does due diligence in the financial sector and they said, well, low level, surface level due diligence. Yes, we look at Google. Yes, we look at ChatGPT, then we dig deep. But if you don’t pass that first surface test, you don’t even get into the game and people don’t think about that.
[00:13:23] Jason Barnard: If I’m thinking about doing business with you, I will research you. How I research you is my own affair. But most people will look at Google, they’ll look at LinkedIn. They may be asked ChatGPT.
[00:13:34] David Schomer: Okay. Okay.
[00:13:35] Jason Barnard: If I’m looking for potential partners or speakers for a conference, who are the best speakers in the world about Knowledge Panels?
[00:13:42] Jason Barnard: Compiler list, please ChatGPT. That’s a reasonable thing that people are starting to do. Maybe not extensively, but certainly more or more because it saves them the research and that’s the point.
[00:13:54] David Schomer: Yes.
[00:13:54] Jason Barnard: Google Search is all about search. I know what I’m looking for and I can sort through the results.
[00:14:00] Jason Barnard: ChatGPT, Google, Gemini, Copilot, Perplexity is research where we’re saying to them, go and make the search. Then summarize what you found so that I don’t have to bother, saves me a lot of time. So research versus search is the, is the big key difference there that people don’t really think about. And so they don’t think my partners or my business partners and prospects are Googling my name before they do business with me.
[00:14:25] Jason Barnard: They don’t think people are researching using these machines, and I need to be present when somebody’s researching my niche topic and they don’t think I can control that.
Proactively Shaping Your Brand’s Presence in Search and AI Results
[00:14:39] David Schomer: Yeah. Yeah. I, as you’ve been talking about this, I’ve been thinking of some of my own personal chatGPT searches recently, and they have been compiled a top 10 list of companies who insert whatever I’m looking for and, and so, so how can companies control that?
[00:14:59] Jason Barnard: Oh, well, we do that at Kalicube. It’s our specialist, superpower.
[00:15:03] David Schomer: Okay.
[00:15:03] Jason Barnard: But one of the things I have a troubled with is I talk to people and I say, have you thought about people Googling your name or researching on ChatGPT, or compiling lists of top 10 companies or people to work with.
[00:15:13] Jason Barnard: And they go, oh no, I haven’t. Oh yeah. Oh, you’re right.
[00:15:16] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:15:16] Jason Barnard: And then I say, have you thought about whether or not you can control it? And they go, well, no, I can’t because Google and ChatGPT figure it out. You’re saying? Well, yes, but why don’t you proactively get involved to increase your chances of being included in those lists and to make sure they’re giving your Brand Narrative when somebody’s researching you, so that what you are saying to them in the room is the same thing that ChatGPT and Google is saying to them when you’re not in the room.
[00:15:44] Jason Barnard: And it blows people’s minds to the extent that they can’t even get their head around the idea that they might wanna pay me or my company to help them with that.
[00:15:53] David Schomer: Okay.
[00:15:53] Jason Barnard: So the, the funnel is, is, is top to bottom of funnel is very quick because I’m presenting a problem to people that they haven’t even thought about and a solution that they didn’t even begin to imagine existed.
[00:16:07] Jason Barnard: The sale at the bottom of the funnel is very difficult.
[00:16:10] David Schomer: Yeah, that’s, I’m having one of those aha! moments as I talk to you is if you.
[00:16:14] Jason Barnard: I get it all the time and then I say, do you wanna buy my serve? I go, no, it’s too early. My head’s, my head’s hurting.
Influencing Online Presence and Brand Recognition
[00:16:20] David Schomer: Yeah. I, if you Google my name, I think my LinkedIn page comes up and maybe some old newspaper articles, but I’ve never felt like there was something that I could do to influence.
[00:16:32] Jason Barnard: Yep.
[00:16:32] David Schomer: What that result is and, and yeah, that’s, that’s really good. And, and definitely on branding too.
[00:16:38] Jason Barnard: Yeah. No, for, for corporate brands it’s less of a problem because names aren’t so ambiguous, but corporate names.
[00:16:45] Jason Barnard: Especially in GL regions. But I’ll give you an example, my, my name Jason Barnard is relatively not too common, but there are 3000 Jason Barnards in the world competing with me for that top spot and all the other spots.
[00:16:58] Jason Barnard: You search my name on Google, Jason Barnard. J-A-S-O-N-B-A-R-N-A-R-D. I’m the only one in the world who exists as far as Google is concerned. Will only see me, that’s because I’ve intentionally made that happen. If you ask ChatGPT who, who is Jason Barnard. It won’t say, well, which one are you talking about?
[00:17:16] Jason Barnard: It will say, here’s Jason Barnard, world leading expert in Digital Brand Management, blah, blah, blah, and give you an 800 words, word essay. And that is both understanding and dominance in terms of probability that somebody’s looking for me. I’ve convinced these machines that I am the most famous Jason Barnard in the world, and that’s actually not true.
Competing with Larger Brands: Focus on Building a Strong Brand Presence
[00:17:38] David Schomer: Interesting. Very interesting. So what would be some ways, you know, I, there’s a lot of small business owners listening. What would be some ways that, you know, small businesses could compete with some of these larger brands that seemingly have a much larger presence online?
[00:18:00] Jason Barnard: Brand. Brand. Brand. You’re not gonna compete in terms of getting your brand in front of everybody in the entire universe because the big brands have already done that.
[00:18:10] Jason Barnard: What you can do is compete by identifying the people who are gonna be interested in working with you, who have got the mindset to work with a smaller company rather than a bigger company. Get your brand in front of them. Make sure that your brand pops up everywhere they are hanging out online naturally to the point to which they then Google or ChatGPT your brand name and make sure that brand narrative absolutely nails it. Because the moment they search your brand name on Google or ChatGPT, they’re basically asking ChatGPT and Google. Do you recommend this supplier?
[00:18:50] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:18:51] Jason Barnard: And if they say, in my case, Jason Barnard is a world renowned expert in Digital Brand Management, or Kalicube is a premium digital marketing consultancy for entrepreneurs and their corporations. That’s a recommendation and it’s the tipping point.
[00:19:09] David Schomer: Yeah. Yeah. If you think of it through the lens of like conversion rate optimization for, you know, a physical products brand on, you know, if you’re wanting to do speaking or wanting to really do anything, establish yourself as an authority.
[00:19:25] David Schomer: That’s your conversion, like the last part, until you convert a sale.
[00:19:30] Jason Barnard: Yeah. And I find that the vocabulary that ChatGPT, Google, Gemini, Google Learn About if you’ve tried it, is brilliant. It’s the ChatGPT killer. If you haven’t tried it, try it, google Learn About. The trick that we managed to pull off that nobody else in the world can pull off, in an intentional manner that we do is to get the machines to use superlatives when they’re talking about you. World recognized expert,
[00:20:03] David Schomer: Okay.
[00:20:04] Jason Barnard: visionary, innovator. One of the things you left out of my bio at the beginning, I’m a, a serial entrepreneur, bestselling author, a renowned speaker and innovator. Award-winning innovator.
[00:20:28] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:20:28] Jason Barnard: And if you ask these machines who I am, it will use award-winning. It will use sir, it will, it will use best selling because I have educated it to use those words, both through my own words, but also by insisting that. People who welcome me on my podcast, for example, use those words too, because that’s third party corroboration.
[00:20:52] Jason Barnard: And I said jokingly, I like that because I wrote it. But if I can get you to say it, you are vouching for it, you are confirming it, and you are independent of me. Therefore, that’s a huge positive signal for Google.
[00:21:07] David Schomer: That’s interesting. Yeah.
[00:21:09] Jason Barnard: It’s cool, isn’t it?
[00:21:10] David Schomer: I’ve literally experienced this first person as I was writing the intro.
[00:21:15] David Schomer: And so that’s very neat. That’s very neat.
[00:21:19] Jason Barnard: It, it’s actually creating your own truth. Obviously if, if you’re lying, it’s gonna be really difficult to do. But if you are telling the truth and you can back it up, that repetition is super important. And the award-winning innovator is, is an interesting one because I won two Davey Awards.
[00:21:39] Jason Barnard: Which are web awards for the innovative website I built in 2007. The second one is actually for songwriting, but that doesn’t matter. I got two debut awards and I’m an, I’m an innovator. Put the two together, award-winning innovator. Bob’s your uncle.
[00:22:01] David Schomer: Yeah. So, so what are your, what are your thoughts on the future, um, of business and AI?
[00:22:08] David Schomer: There are, there seems to be two camps of people. There seem to be a camp of people that are pretty nervous about it.
[00:22:14] Jason Barnard: Yep.
Embracing AI’s Role in Shaping the Future of Business
[00:22:14] David Schomer: And there are seem to be a group of entrepreneurs that are very excited about it and can’t stop talking about it. Have you, have you witnessed, before we get into the future, have you witnessed kind of this, this division?
[00:22:27] Jason Barnard: Yeah. When I talk to prospects. There are two, as you said, camps, one of which is, I’ll kick that down the road because I don’t wanna look at it and it’s fear and it’s too much work and I don’t understand. And if I don’t look at it, it might go away. And for anybody who thinks that explicitly or implicitly, forget it, it’s not going away.
[00:22:53] Jason Barnard: It’s here to stay. And then the other camp is saying, I’m really interested. I can see that how I’m represented by AI,in, in the future is going to be a huge question that I need to answer and a problem I need to solve. Because how AI represents me as an entrepreneur is going to define how well I do business today as people research me in order to do business, doing the due diligence, for example. It will facilitate my career when I pivot because I’ll be more credible and I can take all of my Personal Brand credibility with me and it’s gonna define my legacy. I was talking to somebody who’s 80, who’s coming to the end of their career, and they were saying, well, actually the only part that I’m interested in is the legacy part, because I want my children and my grandchildren and my great-grandchildren to remember me fondly and everybody around them when they’re researching me to see a very positive message about me.
[00:23:51] Jason Barnard: So people who can, who accept that AI is here to stay, that it’s gonna get more and more powerful, and that what AI is saying about you when you’re not in the room is going to be an existential, fundamental, foundational question for all of us and an existential problem for all of us that we need to solve.
[00:24:16] Jason Barnard: They’re exactly the people we can talk to and we can help. So from what I’ve learned is I, I used to try to convince everybody. Now I’ve stopped. If, if you think AI is going away or you think you can kick this, can down the road, go ahead. If you can see that today, it’s already making a difference and tomorrow that difference is simply going to be exaggerated and amplified.
[00:24:43] Jason Barnard: Come and work with us because we are the only company in the world who has the experience, the knowledge, the tech and the data to control these machines in terms of what they’re saying about you.
Build Your Personal Brand with a Central Online Hub
[00:24:55] David Schomer: Very interesting. As we’ve been talking, one thing that has come up is I, so I own physical product brands and have been very focused on building those brands, which I someday hope to sell.
[00:25:10] David Schomer: And probably neglecting the personal brand side of things. And, and so, you know, beyond a LinkedIn page, and I guess I have a podcast, but is what are some ways that if people listening are thinking, yeah, I’ve, I’m also probably neglecting my personal brand. Where are a couple ways people can step up their game in that department?
[00:25:36] Jason Barnard: Well, the first thing is build your own website.
[00:25:38] David Schomer: Okay.
[00:25:39] Jason Barnard: It can be two pages. It can be one page for that matter. It doesn’t matter. But all of these machines are looking for what John Muller from Google calls the point of reconciliation. I call it the Entity Home. It’s where does this person live online that they control, that I can look to or look at for their version of the facts and their version of their brand narrative.
[00:26:05] Jason Barnard: If I can find that as a machine algorithm, I then got the foundational story in one piece that I can then analyze and understand. Then I can go around the web and I can check that it’s all true because what you write you have right now is a broken plate, I use that analogy a lot, is you don’t have that central hub, your website, the point of reconciliation, your story is fragmented all around the web and the the machine is trying to pull all these pieces together and turn it into the completed puzzle, but it doesn’t have anything to compare it to.
[00:26:38] Jason Barnard: So it’s explicitly looking for that website that gives it the completed puzzle, and then it can say, okay, well all these pieces together mean that that puzzle that he’s completed for me on the Entity Home, point of reconciliation is true, and I can believe it. What then happens is the longer you have that website in place, the longer you prove yourself to be honest about your representation of yourself. And the more you get that corroboration to support what you’re saying on your own website, support your Brand Narrative, your story, your credibility, your authority, your expression of who you are and why you are important or why you are trustworthy. The longer you can keep that all in place in a very, very, very firm, puzzle piece as it were, the more it will believe anything you tell it.
Tips for Choosing the Right Domain and Building Your Online Presence
[00:27:30] David Schomer: Interesting. That’s very interesting. I, I’ve, yeah, through, I had people on the podcast who’ve had their own websites. First name, last name.com. One. So I have actually looked for davidschomer.com and it’s taken. Any, any pro tips on that, that first, you know, taking that first step with a domain?
[00:27:53] Jason Barnard: Yeah, the.com doesn’t really matter. You can use a, a different one. Don’t link it to your job. So don’t take, Jason Barnard dot marketing, because I might pivot my career. That would be a pity, but doT info is fine, dot org is fine, dot net is fine, dot xyz is fine.. If you can’t find any of those, you can always add your middle initial. Jason M. Barnard dot com would be good. Jason Martin Barnard, my middle name is fine. So all of those are good.
[00:28:27] David Schomer: Okay. Very good.
[00:28:28] Jason Barnard: I, one really smart piece of advice, don’t use a hyphen.
[00:28:35] David Schomer: Okay. I Agree. But can you explain why?
[00:28:39] Jason Barnard: Because it confuses the machine. Okay. And it’s also difficult to type on a, on a mobile device. It..
[00:28:46] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:28:46] Jason Barnard: Pain in the ass.
[00:28:48] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:28:49] Jason Barnard: So from a human practical perspective, it’s a pain. And for the machine it creates confusion.
[00:28:56] David Schomer: That’s very interesting. Okay. Well, this has been really insightful and probably, I would imagine there’s a lot of listeners that are having the same aha! moment as I had.
[00:29:08] Jason Barnard: Yeah. Isn’t it on,
[00:29:10] David Schomer: On this, any other other things you think are worth discussing on this topic?
[00:29:16] Jason Barnard: Well, taking control of your personal brand or your corporate brand or even your product you were mentioning products, it all, this works for all of them. It doesn’t matter what you’re talking about. Google and AI want to understand the whole world.
[00:29:29] Jason Barnard: They wanna understand everything. And if you look at Wikipedia, you think, okay, Wikipedia, it uses Wikipedia, which is fine. 6 million articles, so 6 million things. Google’s Knowledge Graph has 54 billion things in it, so it’s well over 10,000 times bigger. Wikipedia doesn’t matter. Wikipedia was used to train the machine 10 years ago.
[00:29:53] Jason Barnard: When you’ve got 6 million versus 54 billion, you can see that the machine is well beyond Wikipedia. So don’t worry about Wikipedia, don’t worry about being famous. Everybody can do this. You can do this at home, as they say on the TV, on kids shows, and I advise you to do it. And it’s all about the very, very simple Entity Home.
[00:30:16] Jason Barnard: We can use a hub spoken wheel model explanation. The Entity Home is the hub. It’s the control hub for your personal brand or your corporate brand. The wheel is all of the information about you around the web and the spokes are the links between the two. So you create your Hub, you tell your story, you tell all of the details, all of your story and your authority on why you should be trusted on your own website.
[00:30:43] Jason Barnard: You big yourself up. You make sure that all of the information around the web in that wheel corroborates what you’re saying as much as possible from third party sources like yourself, for me, but also my own website, my own social media profiles, my own medium channel, my own YouTube channel, my own Forbes profile.
[00:31:03] Jason Barnard: And then link from the Entity Home, the hub, the point of reconciliation out to all of these different resources that support what you’re saying and back when you can from those resources to the Entity Home and wait.
[00:31:16] David Schomer: Interesting.
[00:31:17] Jason Barnard: And the machine will go to your Entity Home. Out to the resource, back, out to the resource, back, out to the resource.
[00:31:24] Jason Barnard: And that repetition will get it to understand. It takes time. Machines don’t digest immediately. So you need to be patient. And as your Digital Ecosystem changes and your life changes, you need to update everything all the time because if you lacked, for example, somebody published a book, they didn’t tell us.
[00:31:47] Jason Barnard: And so they published the book over here, but they didn’t, we didn’t tell Google and AI that they published the book, so Google and AI just thought it was a different person. So they created another person in their little brain. So all of the equity that the person was hoping to get outta the book was lost because it was applied to another person with that same name in the, in the, in the in the machine’s brain.
[00:32:10] Jason Barnard: So what they actually did was split their equity. You’ve gotta be really careful about that. You have to make sure that the machines understand that all these glorious things that you’ve done are indeed you.
[00:32:21] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:32:22] Jason Barnard: And so you need to keep a handle on it over time. And that’s what people forget or don’t want to look at.
[00:32:27] Jason Barnard: And it takes a lot of effort and a lot of time, a lot of resources, and most of all consistency, which is something that most human beings are very bad at. So we built Kalicube Pro, the machine, and my team are absolutely perfect at consistency, maintaining this overtime and updating every time anything changes.
[00:32:46] Jason Barnard: So the machines are never in any doubt because as soon as they have doubt, they freak out and they go, oh, I’m not sure. And they don’t say anything if they’re sure. That’s why I dominate Jason Barnard as a search result because they’re so sure about me that they’re super confident, and they go, this is Jason Barnard.
[00:33:06] Jason Barnard: Isn’t he wonderful? All the other Jason Barnard in the world get, forget, forgotten. Because the machines are so confident in what they’ve got to say about me, and I’ve convinced them that I am incredibly authoritative, credible, and indeed famous without actually being famous. I am authoritative and credible within my niche, but I’ve convinced them that I’m much more famous than I truly am.
[00:33:30] Jason Barnard: We, we have an AI analysis of how a personal brand is perceived by AI that we do at Kalicube if you want one. Come along to the kalicube.com, K-A-L-I-C-U-B-E.com website and ask for one. And the benchmarks we use are myself and Richard Branson.
[00:33:49] David Schomer: Okay.
[00:33:50] Jason Barnard: And I’m surprisingly close to Richard Branson in terms of how these machines understand and appreciate my famousness and my credibility.
[00:34:01] David Schomer: Wow.
[00:34:03] Jason Barnard: Because I’m actually making an effort and I’ve been making an effort for 12 years. So I’ve managed to push myself up to not quite the same level as Richard Branson, but not very far away.
[00:34:12] David Schomer: Sure.
[00:34:13] Jason Barnard: And obviously I’m not at his level. Absolutely. I don’t pretend that I am, but the machines are happy.
Mastering Your Digital Footprint for Consistent Success Across Platforms
[00:34:19] David Schomer: Yeah. Yeah. Well, that’s, that’s a really, really interesting thing to think about. One thing that you’ve mentioned is consistency. And do you mean, word for word or do you mean the same general themes?
[00:34:37] Jason Barnard: That’s a great question because it used to be word for word when I started this. It was repetition and the SEO’s in the world would get really annoyed with me ’cause I was repeating the same thing.
[00:34:46] Jason Barnard: I go, oh, duplicate content, duplicate content. And I, I, I, it’s really difficult when everybody’s telling you, you’re being stupid to sit there and think, well actually no, I’m being smart. It’s just not what you expect, and it’s not what makes sense to you. And I agree, duplicate content in SEO is a problem, but it’s not when you’re trying to educate a machine.
[00:35:07] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:35:08] Jason Barnard: And so duplicate content saying the same thing, exactly the same thing across your entire digital footprint does work. But now the machines are smarter, so you don’t need to, which means you can adapt your message to the audience on Twitter, on LinkedIn, on YouTube, on Medium or Forbes. Because that’s what those platforms demand, and at the end of the day, we’re still trying to convince people so the machines are smart enough and you need to just focus on the things that are important to you and are relevant to the people on that platform, and then join the pieces together on your central website hub.
[00:35:43] Jason Barnard: That’s how you make sense of it to the machine. If you do that intelligently, you win.
[00:35:49] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:35:51] Jason Barnard: And I’d love to tell you one more thing. Whatever happens next, doesn’t matter. This system will work. And an example would be Deep Seek came out. First thing I did was download it. Say, who is Jason Barnard. It answered perfect.
[00:36:08] Jason Barnard: I hadn’t explicitly worked on Deep Seek, but it already answered perfectly. ChatGPT, as soon as it came out. Asked it, who is Jason Barnard, what is Kalicube, answered perfectly. Copilot, same. Gemini, same. Google Learn About, same. Perplexity, same. It works every time because all of these machines use the same data source, the web.
[00:36:33] Jason Barnard: They’re all looking to understand the world and find the best solution to the problem that they user is expressing. And they’re all based on three technologies, large language model chatbots like ChatGPT was at the start, Search Results and Knowledge Graphs. So the large language model chatbot is what drives ChatGPT but they’ve now added Search Results, but they don’t have a Knowledge Graph.
[00:37:02] Jason Barnard: Google Gemini is a large language model chatbot with some search results, but not as many as ChatGPT. Perplexity is a large language model with a lot of search results, and that’s why Perplexity is so good in real time. Google Learn About is a large language model chatbot, search results, and a Knowledge Graph, which is a machine readable Encyclopedia like Wikipedia, but 10,000 times bigger, all mixed together.
[00:37:30] Jason Barnard: And that is the ChatGPT killer because it uses all three technologies. It says I can converse with the person I’m talking to, using the LLM chatbot. I can give them real time information using the search results, and I can fact check. Using my Knowledge Graph, my Encyclopedia. That is where we’re going.
[00:37:50] Jason Barnard: And the only question now is what is the mix of those three technologies in any one of the assistive or answer engines somebody’s using? And all three technologies, all three of those platforms use the same data source, the web and the same system for collecting that information. The same system for passing that information.
[00:38:08] Jason Barnard: And if you can master your Digital Footprint, from A to Z using that central hub website. You’ve won the game and it doesn’t matter who wins.
[00:38:16] David Schomer: I love it. I love it. Curious, when you, which Search Engine or what AI tool do you use? Like what I, and obviously the business you’re in, you probably are on all of ’em, but what is your favorite currently?
[00:38:31] Jason Barnard: Right. Well, in Kalicube Pro, we’ve got 3 billion data points collected from Google and AI over the last 10 years. And so we obviously collect from Bing, we collect from Google, we collect from ChatGPT we collect from Claude, we collect from Perplexity and from Gemini. So we’re collecting from all of them because we need to understand all of them.
[00:38:51] Jason Barnard: I really like, Gemini 1.5 deep research.
[00:38:59] David Schomer: Okay.
[00:39:00] Jason Barnard: Which came out recently and I’ve started doing due, due diligence on people just for fun. And it’s, it’s basically, it, it’s almost a gentle, is it sets out its plan of how it’s going to do due diligence on somebody and then does it, and it researches like 50 websites and then spits out an answer using the Knowledge Graph, the websites, and a large language model and it’s beautiful. And I’ve also tried, you know, compile me a list of who I should invite to speak at my conference about Knowledge Panels.
[00:39:37] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:39:38] Jason Barnard: And of course, Jason Barnard comes out on top because that’s my specialist topic. Yeah. And it, it comes up with the plan. It says, here’s what I’m gonna do. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8.
[00:39:48] Jason Barnard: Do you agree? Yes, I agree. And then it does the research and it comes back with the list. And when you look at it, you think, okay, well in a year’s time, who’s gonna do the research themselves? I’m not.
[00:40:00] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:40:01] Jason Barnard: I wouldn’t bother. But then if, if, if I am hoping to speak at a conference about Knowledge Panels on Google, I have zero chance in a couple of years if I don’t know the organizer.
[00:40:15] David Schomer: Yeah, yeah.
[00:40:17] Jason Barnard: And the, it’s Google and AI who are going to decide whether or not I speak at these conferences, if, I don’t know the organizer. So human relationships remain incredibly important, but they may well be your only hope in the future.
[00:40:28] David Schomer: Yeah, that’s, wow, that is, I’ve never thought about that in, you’re absolutely right. Yeah.
[00:40:37] Jason Barnard: Well that goes for purchasing, that goes for B2B business. It goes for who should I invest in? I mean, I dunno how far it will go, how much people will trust these machines, but certainly what we’re doing with ChatGPT and what we trust ChatGPT to do for us today is significantly evolved from what we were messing around with at the start.
Leveraging AI Conversations to Expand Your Reach and Influence
[00:40:58] David Schomer: Yes, absolutely. And I think everyone’s usage of it has gone up. I know the number of times that I engage with ChatGPT every day has been like a, like a hockey stick recently. And, and I just keep finding more and more ways to, to use it and plug it into my life. And it’s, it’s outstanding.
[00:41:22] Jason Barnard: And if, if you look at that as well, you think about it ChatGPT is having a conversation with you.
[00:41:27] Jason Barnard: You are having a conversation with ChatGPT, and although you are the person driving the conversation, ChatGPT or Google Gemini participate in the way the conversation evolves because they offer you follow up questions. Google Learn About offers contacts. If you say, who is Jason Barnard, it will offer at the side, do you wanna look at Brand SERPs?
[00:41:48] Jason Barnard: Do you wanna look at Knowledge Panels? Do you wanna look at his career as an entrepreneur? Do you wanna look at Kalicube? It’s offering me different options that I might not have thought of. So it’s a conversation between me and the machine. And as a business or a business owner or an expert or somebody who wants to get out there with their personal brand, you want the machine to introduce you to the conversation spontaneously.
[00:42:13] Jason Barnard: ‘Cause that’s where you’re gonna hit your new market. That’s where you’re gonna hit people who didn’t know about you previously. And when they do introduce you, they’re implicitly recommending you.
[00:42:23] David Schomer: Wow. Wow. This is, this is.
[00:42:27] Jason Barnard: And they’re the biggest influences in the world.
[00:42:30] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:42:31] Jason Barnard: If I’m on YouTube and I’ve got a million followers, I’m peanuts compared to ChatGPT or Google who have billions of users asking trillions of questions to a machine that they trust to provide them with the solution to their problem every single day.
[00:42:48] David Schomer: You’re right. You’re right. That that totally changes the way. Yeah. Wow.
[00:42:56] Jason Barnard: Isn’t it cool? I I like you. You’re great. ’cause you keep going. Wow. Wow. You’re right.
Exploring the Impact of Search Engines and Assistive Tools on Conversion Rates
[00:43:00] David Schomer: I’m just thinking of there are, when you, when I, I’ll just share with you my experiences from this interview is when I have people on, on as, yes, there’s a lot of, general business advice where it’s like, oh, I’ve thought about that, but maybe not that angle.
[00:43:16] David Schomer: This introduces a completely different topic that I’ve never thought about and I’ve had about 10 aha! moments. And you’re like, yeah, to, to compare especially what you just said about like comparing a YouTuber with a million followers. I can tell you, in physical products that a YouTuber with, with a million followers can print money, based on their authority if they have a product that they’re selling.
[00:43:43] David Schomer: And, but I’ve never thought of it through the context of Search Engines and, and so yeah, this has been.
[00:43:50] Jason Barnard: Well, well, I think the thing about a Search Engine is, it’s not an influencer. It’s an answer of questions or a provider of possibilities. Whereas, a ChatGPT or Gemini, one of these Assistive or Answer Engines is actually guiding people down the funnel.
[00:44:08] Jason Barnard: And that’s Fabrice Canale from Bing who told me that’s what they were doing with Copilot. The idea of Copilot is to guide somebody down the funnel for what they call the perfect click.
[00:44:19] David Schomer: Wow.
[00:44:19] Jason Barnard: Research, I ask for recommendations. I ask which one I should choose. I get the click. I buy.
[00:44:26] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:44:27] Jason Barnard: And the proof here is a client of ours told us that their conversion rate from Google search was 0.03%. Their conversion rate from ChatGPT is 3%.
[00:44:41] David Schomer: Wow.
[00:44:42] Jason Barnard: That’s the perfect click. Well, it’s not perfect ’cause it’s only 3%, but it’s much more perfect than the Google click.
Building Trust Through Consistent Engagement with ChatGPT
[00:44:48] David Schomer: Absolutely. Absolutely. And there’s an, there’s, I, I have noticed the more I engage with ChatGPT, the more I trust it.
[00:44:57] Jason Barnard: Yes.
[00:44:57] David Schomer: It’s like a buddy that never lets you down.
[00:45:00] David Schomer: And, and the more it doesn’t let you down, the more you trust it. And, and so whereas with the influencer, there are sometimes I will watch with a discerning eye.
[00:45:11] Jason Barnard: Yep.
[00:45:12] David Schomer: Where I may not agree with what they have to say or their opinion. But I do engage each. That could, right?
[00:45:19] Jason Barnard: Yeah. No, sorry. And And you just said the word opinion.
[00:45:22] David Schomer: Yeah.
[00:45:23] Jason Barnard: ChatgPT has an opinion, but we don’t think of it. But the opinion it has is what I put in its brain. It’s saying, Jason Barnard is a world renowned expert in Digital Brand Management, or the World Authority on Digital Brand Intelligence. Because I told it to say that. But it’s expressing as a human being.
[00:45:41] Jason Barnard: What we’re seeing is an opinion. I’m, I’m an expert and it believes me to be an expert. So although it doesn’t have an opinion, technically speaking, that’s what we perceive as human beings and it’s as good as.
[00:45:55] David Schomer: Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Well, this has been an outstanding interview, Jason.
[00:46:02] Jason Barnard: Yeah.
Entrepreneurs Succeed Through Determination, Enthusiasm, and Confidence
[00:46:02] David Schomer: Before we close out the show, we have something called the fire round. It’s 4 questions we ask the guest at the end of the show are, are you ready for the fire round?
[00:46:11] Jason Barnard: I am ready for the fire round.
[00:46:12] David Schomer: Alright. What, with your musical background, what’s your favorite record?
[00:46:17] Jason Barnard: The Clash, London calling.
[00:46:19] David Schomer: Very nice. What are your hobbies?
[00:46:23] Jason Barnard: Singing and playing double bass in the band in my local village. But it’s kind of a hobby but it’s actually a second job. Because we play professional gigs around here. I’ve actually got a jazz club opposite where I was playing two weeks ago.
[00:46:40] David Schomer: Cool. Very nice. What is one thing you do not miss about working for the man?
[00:46:46] Jason Barnard: I don’t know. Never what for the man.
[00:46:48] David Schomer: That’s right. That’s right. You, you’re a unicorn as you like to call ’em. So, very good. And, and final question, what do you think sets apart successful Entrepreneurs from those who give up, fail, or never get started?
[00:47:07] Jason Barnard: Determination is probably the one thing that I would I see in myself that has made all the difference in the world.
[00:47:13] Jason Barnard: My, the other thing that I found is when I’m doing something like the music company or the global edutainment company, I like saying that, or Kalicube, is when I go to bed in the evening, I’m like a small child. I can’t wait to wake up in the morning and start again and get going with that. So that enthusiasm with determination and confidence are the three things I think set people apart and or me at least that’s my experience.
How to Connect with Kalicube and Jason Barnard
[00:47:47] David Schomer: I, that’s a really good answer. Now Jason, if people are interested in getting in touch with you or working with Kalicube, what is the best way?
[00:47:57] Jason Barnard: Google me.
[00:47:58] David Schomer: Very nice. And for those tuning in on audio, he is holding up a, a QR code. And, for those of you tuning in on video, you can see that’s brilliant. I can tell you that this is episode 267.
[00:48:12] David Schomer: We’ve never had someone with their own QR code, so I absolutely love it.
[00:48:17] Jason Barnard: So you can Google me or you can ask ChatGPT. Where can I connect with Jason? What can he offer me? Where shall I follow him? Absolutely fine. You ask it whatever you want and it will answer. Oh, and I’ll give you one last thing that’s really cool.
[00:48:36] Jason Barnard: If you ask ChatGPT, tell me about Jason Barnard as a musician, it answers something quite unexpected. It says, Jason Barnard is principally known as a Digital Brand Expert. That’s what he does today with Kalicube. However, if you really want to know about his music career, here it is. So what it does is start by correcting you. That you are looking for the wrong aspect of me, according to my brand narrative today.
[00:49:07] David Schomer: That’s, wow. That is strong. That is strong. Well, I would encourage everybody either scan that QR Code or or, type in Jason’s name and into, into ChatGPT and see what you find. But Jason, this has been a, a great interview. Thank you for your time today and looking forward to staying in touch.
[00:49:28] Jason Barnard: Thank you. That was brilliant, David.
[00:49:29] Jason Barnard: I really enjoyed it.
[00:49:32] David Schomer: Before you go, we wanted to share a new service that Ken and I have been using called Getida that has made us over $10,000 in Amazon reimbursements. The service requires no monthly subscription, and gata collects a small percentage of the money they recover for you. It takes less than five minutes to set up and works on all Amazon marketplaces.
[00:49:52] David Schomer: Go to getida.com, G-E-T-I-D-A dot com and enter promo code FTM 400. That’s FTM for Firing The Man 400 to get your first $400 in reimbursements commission free. How much money does Amazon owe you?
