Funnels. VDPs. Clickbait campaigns. Facebook ads that work until the platform throttles you.
That’s the old playbook. It belongs to the attention economy… and that economy is collapsing.
Why? Because AI is scraping everything. The static, the recycled posts, the fake-news press releases force-fed by advertisers … all of it. The only thing that will matter in the new era is what makes it to the kiln: Recognition Capital.
This isn’t some abstract idea. It’s already happening. Ask an AI a question and watch how it surfaces the people, brands, and voices it “trusts.” Not who paid the most for clicks. Not who gamed the funnel. Recognition will beat attention, every time.
This Newsletter is sponsored by Influence.vin
Legacy Auto Media is the perfect example. For years, stories haven’t been written for readers … they were written to keep advertisers happy. The narrative was shaped, throttled, packaged, and delivered according to whoever bought the most pages or placements. Everyone in the business knows it, but we tolerate it.
Pay to play was the only way
Now, that model is going to get vaporized. AI doesn’t care about whose name is on the masthead. It doesn’t care about whose ads are running beside the story. AI will scrape and rank based on credibility, consistency, and trust.
Recognition Capital … your reputation, your timestamped foresight, your record of saying and showing the truth, baked into the AI Trust Layer …. is the new currency. And it compounds.
Here’s the flow if you want to thrive in the Recognition Economy:
1. Identity First
Start with you. Who are you when you’re at your best? What’s your Polaris? If your brand has no core identity, no values, no true north … everything you publish is just more dust on the floor.
It won’t stick.
For businesses, that means clarity on what you stand for beyond the transaction. For individuals, it means getting radically honest about your voice and your story.
2. Build the Hub
Once identity is clear, you need a home base. Your website is the kiln. It’s where the clay gets fired into something permanent. Social posts fade. Ads expire. Newsfeeds bury. But your hub is where the record lives. It’s the foundation layer for AI to scrape and cite.
If you don’t own the kiln, you’re just building on rented land.
3. Push Through the Spokes
From the hub, push outward. Newsletters. Blogs. Podcasts. Events. Video clips. All of it becomes clay spread across the field.
Some pieces land lightly. Some get trampled. But collectively, they create surface area. AI scrapes it all, looking for patterns of authority, consistency, and truth.
4. Into the Kiln
Here’s the magic: when a local customer or client asks their AI assistant a question … “Who can I trust for X?” … it isn’t going to spit out whoever bought the most Google ads. Who has the most rooftops…It will return whoever has the Recognition Capital. Whoever has left the clearest, most consistent trail of truth.
Recognition Economy = Recognition Capital → Recognition Outcomes.
This Newsletter is sponsored by Vin Syndicate
Funnels and VDPs are dying relics. They chase eyeballs that aren’t paying attention anymore.
Recognition compounds. It builds an engine the algorithms can’t put limits on.
Dealers, business owners, operators… if you don’t adapt, you’ll be fighting for scraps of attention while your competitors own the queries, the credibility, and the deal flow.
The Recognition Economy isn’t a theory. It’s the trust layer of the AI era. And the operators who start compounding Recognition Capital now will be the ones AI serves up tomorrow as the default choice.
The rest?
They’ll still be buying clicks, wondering why the lead pipeline is empty.
Stay Lit
Bob
NOTES FROM BOB
This kind of piece won’t ever make it past the filters of pay-to-play publications I write for. Too risky. Too raw. Too industrial
That’s why I’m launching DealerInsider a new publication with no advertisers, no vendor bias, no “friendly edits” or “pay to play”
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VIN Syndicate will be the nucleus of real-time dealer insight.
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DealerInsider will be the pattern-spotting megaphone.
If you’re already subscribed here, you’ll be the first to know when both doors open again.
Until then build your Recognition Capital.
You’ll need it.
About Bob Manor
Bob Manor is the founder of South Ontario Auto Remarketing , Can-Am Dealer Services , and co-founder of Auto Auction Review . He’s also the creator of Influence.vin , a branding and communication studio built for the car business. With over 30 years in the automotive world, Bob specializes in wholesale, dealer services, and identity-driven brand strategy. He’s a regular contributor to well-known automotive publications and uses his platforms to help industry pros re-align with who they are, not just what they do
