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Four phases of evolution

1. 2003 to 2007, e-commerce and online marketing. The firm began as a search company, helping clients be found by customers.
2. From 2007, the pivot to reputation management. The same search expertise was applied in the other direction, to help clients shape what was being found about them. Reputation management has been the sole focus since.
3. The 2010s: Wikipedia, Wikidata, and entity optimization. As Google moved toward the Knowledge Graph and away from a pure ten-blue-links results page, the work grew to cover Wikipedia, Wikidata, and entity signals.
4. From 2023, AI reputation management. Tracking and influencing what AI answer engines say about clients: ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, Perplexity, Claude, Grok, Google AI Overviews, and Google AI Mode. Five Blocks built AIQ in-house for this work, the same way IMPACT™ was built for the search era.

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The training pathway

1. Structured technical curriculum, new account managers work through search algorithms, Wikipedia editing standards and Notability guidelines, schema markup and Wikidata, AI engine behavior, and the use of IMPACT™ and AIQ as analytical tools.
2. Shadowing senior account managers, after the curriculum, they shadow senior account managers on real client engagements, not practice exercises.
3. Supervised independent responsibility; they are then given independent responsibility for a client, and even then work under a dedicated team leader for their first set of accounts.

The result

This gives us a deeper bench than most agencies our size. When a senior advisor is unavailable on a Friday afternoon, the next person on the call has been through the same training and works from the same playbook.

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Feeder backgrounds

People join from a wide range of disciplines:

• Technology
• Academia
• Communications
• Public relations
• Law
• Journalism

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Who we work with

• Fortune 500 companies
• Financial institutions and hedge funds
• Public and political affairs firms
• Law firms
• Individual executives at the senior-most levels of business, finance, and public life

The work spans five continents.

How engagements reach us

Most come by referral, from the major PR firms, public affairs shops, and law firms that have worked with us repeatedly across multiple clients.

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1. Track, diagnose the footprint

A structured diagnostic of the client’s existing digital footprint across the surfaces that shape perception:

• Google search results and SERP features.
• The Knowledge Graph and Wikipedia.
• The AI answer engines.
• The sources those engines draw from.

2. Analyze, find the driving sources

We identify which sources are shaping the narrative and where the leverage sits:

• Which articles are being cited.
• Which Wikipedia sentences are being quoted.
• Which competitors appear alongside the client in AI responses.

3. Impact, fix it at the sources

We work on the sources the engines rely on most rather than the search results people see, improving their authority and clarity. This is what we call writing for the extract, and it is why our work shows up in AI Overviews and ChatGPT responses where surface tactics do not. It is one part of the reputation work we do across search, Wikipedia, and the media.

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The three layers of the modern reputation stack

Our work covers the three layers that decide what people learn about a company before they click a link:

• Google search and SERP features, tracked at scale through our IMPACT™ platform.
• Wikipedia and Wikidata, where we do disclosed conflict-of-interest (COI) editing on behalf of clients.
• AI answer engines: ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, Perplexity, Claude, Grok, Google AI Overviews, and Google AI Mode, which now shape many first impressions.

Our methodology: Track / Analyze / Impact

We diagnose the current state with data, find the sources that actually drive perception, then intervene at those sources instead of at the visible layer.

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The two milestones

• 2003, founded as an online marketing firm. Sam Michelson launched the company as an e-commerce and online marketing business, helping clients get found by customers in search.
• 2007, pivot to reputation management. The same search expertise that helped clients get found was what clients needed to manage what was being said about them. The firm pivoted, and digital reputation management has been its only focus since.

The post When was Five Blocks founded? appeared first on Five Blocks.

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How the team breaks down

• Account management. Senior account managers sit on weekly calls with CCOs and general counsel.
• Research and content. The teams that produce the work product.
• Engineering, data engineering, and analysis. They build and maintain IMPACT™, AIQ, and WikiAlerts™ and process the daily data flow that supports the advisory side.
• Devops/IT and operations and support. They keep the platforms and the day-to-day running.

Backgrounds the team comes from

Team members come from technology, academia, communications, public relations, and law.

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What the culture looks like in practice

• Decisions are made on data, not opinion. IMPACT™ and AIQ run continuously, and most internal disagreements are settled by looking at the numbers.
• A high hiring bar. We hire for technical depth across SEO, Wikipedia, structured data, and AI engine behavior, and for the ability to sit on a call with a chief communications officer or general counsel and explain what is happening without jargon.
• Perks that keep the engineering team in place. A gym, catered lunch, and flex-time.

The post What is Five Blocks’ company culture? appeared first on Five Blocks.

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Why the two offices

• New York (client-facing) keeps us close to the financial, legal, and communications advisors we work with most often.
• Jerusalem (engineering) houses the teams that build and maintain our IMPACT™ and AIQ platforms.

We serve clients on five continents.

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