FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Farmingdale, NY – February 19, 2026 – MAXPlaces Marketing Digital Marketing Director Brian Winum recently appeared as a featured guest on the E-Coffee with Experts podcast, hosted by Digital Web Solutions, where he shared enterprise SEO strategies, AI optimization insights, and lessons learned from nearly two decades in digital marketing. The episode, titled SEO Isn't Dead — You're Doing It Wrong, offers digital marketing professionals a candid look at what is actually moving the needle in search visibility today.
During the episode, Winum drew on his experience building and scaling MAXPlaces Marketing and sister agency Max Burst Web Design to address the evolving relationship between traditional SEO and artificial intelligence. He argued that spammy tactics and broad-targeting approaches have lost their effectiveness, while strategies rooted in expertise, experience, authority, and trust continue to deliver results across both Google Search and AI-powered platforms.
Winum offered a detailed breakdown of his tiered link-building framework, explaining how consistent entity relationships across tier one, tier two, and tier three content help search engines and AI bots more easily understand a brand's relevance and audience. He also discussed his approach to custom LLMs.txt files, noting that injecting structured authority signals and off-page trust indicators into these files has produced measurable crawl activity from AI bots in his server logs.
The conversation also covered the content types Winum has found most effective for off-page brand building in 2026, including third-party listicles, interview-style articles, expert roundups, and industry research reports. He emphasized that press release syndication remains a key component of maintaining consistent brand messaging across the web.
Winum noted that niching down to industries where an agency can genuinely communicate and deliver has been one of the most impactful business decisions of his career, a lesson he learned after initially trying to serve too broad an audience when transitioning from the insurance industry into digital marketing.
About MAXPlaces Marketing: MAXPlaces Marketing is a Farmingdale, NY-based enterprise digital marketing agency specializing in SEO, PPC, and web design for manufacturing, aerospace engineering, and multilocation businesses. Operating alongside sister brand Max Burst Web Design, MAXPlaces has served enterprise clients for more than 20 years, with a focus on building lasting authority and trust through data-driven, entity-based optimization strategies.
About E-Coffee with Experts: E-Coffee with Experts is a podcast produced by Digital Web Solutions where top digital marketers, entrepreneurs, and industry leaders share insider strategies, real-world experiences, and expert insights over a virtual coffee. The show dives deep into SEO, digital marketing, and business growth, delivering actionable advice without the fluff.
For more information about MAXPlaces Marketing and its services, please contact:
Brian Winum
Digital Marketing Director
MAXPlaces Marketing
Email: hello@maxplaces.com
Website: www.maxplaces.com
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