The Complete Guide to PR for Startups: Proven Strategies for Success

Do you want to promote your startup effectively? The answer is a solid public relations (PR) strategy. A consistent and well-structured PR campaign is the lifeblood of many successful businesses, as public relations convert potential clients into actual customers.

A well-planned PR strategy can facilitate the customer journey and increase conversions. But that’s not all. When people speak positively about your startup, it gives you credibility, sparks interest, and makes people more likely to discover your company. However, effective PR for startups doesn’t happen by accident. It’s no coincidence that today’s trendiest startups are making headlines. It’s the result of a well-oiled PR machine. All these brands offer excellent services, but that’s not what attracts the media’s attention.

Behind every great brand story you see in the media is a solid public relations strategy, and with the right approach, you can turn your business into newsworthy material. This advanced guide will show you how to use public relations to boost your startup’s visibility and acquire more clients at a crucial stage of your development.

Mastering Your Story for the Media: 3 Essential Tips

A good story taps into our human experience and can move people and motivate them to take action. Maybe that’s why 88% of PR specialists say digital storytelling is the future. However, creating a great story isn’t easy. As detailed below, there are several components to consider in order to make your startup’s story worthy of media attention.

Follow the 3 Ps of PR Storytelling: Product, Purpose, and Passion

You should build your media story on three core elements: your product, the purpose, and the passion. Using this framework allows you to shine a light on the big-picture aspects of your startup:

Product: define exactly what your product or service is and/or does, and where its niche offering fits within the existing industry landscape. To truly define your product, conduct a competitor analysis very early on, if you haven’t already.

Purpose: identify the “Why?” of your company. What’s its purpose? What problem does your product or service solve, and for whom? You exist because of your target customer, so you need to understand who they are and what they care about.

Passion: use an enthusiastic and authentic tone that captures the passion, vision, and culture of your startup. You need to make your story and company human and engaging, so use real people and events to shape your narrative. Honesty and vulnerability are highly valued.

Once you have a deep understanding of the 3 Ps philosophy, you will have completed a critical stage in developing your startup by articulating how your product or service aligns with the real needs of your market. Take Buffer, the social media management app, as an example. Like many early-stage startups, founders Joel Gascoigne and Leo Widrich started out working in a basement. Now Buffer generates millions in annual revenue with over 2 million users.

How did these founders start telling their story?

First of all, Buffer aimed to address the real problem of its customers: people were wasting valuable time manually posting on social media. Once Buffer established a minimum viable product that met this need, they also started the BufferSocial blog to write content about social media topics that interested their target customers. After 10 months of blogging, they had 100,000 users.

By mastering the 3 Ps, developing a working product, knowing their customer pain points, and writing passionately for their audience, Buffer acquired thousands of clients and established itself as an authority on all things social media.

Think Like a Journalist to Catch Their Attention

Developing your 3P story allows you to position your startup clearly and concisely. However, no matter how exciting you think your 3P story is, a journalist won’t find it interesting unless you give them a reason to. If you start thinking like a journalist, you will drastically increase your chances of success. That means making your story newsworthy.

Here are some key elements of newsworthiness to keep in mind:

Timeliness: news is about “new” information. Think of ways to contribute to cutting-edge discussions in your industry.

Relevance: keep yourself up-to-date on the latest articles from journalists in your field. Do a thorough analysis of popular posts and see how you can connect them to your story.

Novelty: consider how your particular angle or argument is unique. If you’re saying the same thing as everyone else, you’re not making a strong case for being featured.

When you live and breathe your startup, it can be hard to admit that your product may not be inherently interesting to someone else. However, it’s absolutely essential to develop a strong filter for what is newsworthy in order to get coverage. Let’s use Renters Warehouse, a professional property management company, as a case study.

Real estate isn’t interesting to anyone who isn’t already profiting from it. That leaves you with a problem. How can you connect with journalists who can put you in front of tens of thousands of potential real estate investors?

You tell the story of your young and inspired founder, Brenton Hayden, who retired at 27. The booming rental market (in a slow sellers’ market) was at the forefront. Success (and failure) stories from Generation Y were incredibly relevant at that time. Plus, what’s newer than retiring at 27?

Brenton’s story quickly spread from Entrepreneur to Yahoo! Finance to Steve Harvey. The result? Over 82,000 page views in 24 hours on the Renters Warehouse website (which even crashed due to the traffic spike) and 576 solid leads in less than two weeks. Not bad, and all because his story showcased his 3 Ps and was told with journalists in mind.

Find the Right Angle: Customize Your Story for Each Journalist

If you’ve developed a genuine story that’s newsworthy, you’re halfway there. The next challenge is figuring out how to customize that story for each journalist. What actually “hooks” the journalist is highly subjective. That’s why it’s vital to establish your startup PR strategy, identify your target journalists well in advance, and do the proper research to find the right angle. Here’s an overview of how to identify your targets and customize your story:

Identify the Right Journalists: choose three to five journalists and make sure they meet the following criteria:

• Relevant industry
• Topic
• Publication

This won’t leave you with a ton of options, but that’s the point: research shows that 20% of your outreach will produce 80% of your results. Tip: Target smaller publications that cover your relevant niche. You’re much more likely to get traction if you focus on similar interests instead of aiming for the biggest media outlet. Target where your key audience is. That’s how you get the most engagement. You can further pinpoint your target journalists by:

Researching Your Targets: by subscribing to the social feeds and publications of your target journalists, you can get a sense of their style, sense of humor, and what they’re passionate about. This helps you tailor your story to their interests and write to them more personally.

Tip: You should also research the audience of your target journalists. There should be some overlap with yours, but there are completely new elements to consider. For example, journalists are loyal to their editors, publications, and readerships, so your research should cover those bases as well.

Establishing Your Newsworthy Hook: in order for your story to capture a journalist’s attention, you have to give them a reason to care. Use all the research at your disposal to create your hook. Tip: Find a way to connect your story to the topics your target journalists are interested in. Ask yourself: What issues do they often cover and what are their most popular articles? Cold calls and canned emails annoy journalists and can easily land you on their blacklist. However, if you put in the preliminary work to personalize your outreach, you’re more likely to get something in return.

Building relationships in the startup PR world

At the heart of any successful PR strategy is the ability to create and build relationships. Follow these tips to maximize your outreach efforts and get journalists interested in your business.

Focus on ‘Human Relationships’ for long-term success

Targeting the right journalists is crucial to your success. However, if you’re not developing relationships with these journalists, you’re just a stranger in the crowd. Imagine how much easier it would be to send your story to someone you built a relationship with a year ago.

A good relationship can make all the difference to your startup’s PR efforts. However, the idea isn’t to go out and start bothering journalists in the hope that they’ll become “useful contacts.” Instead, take a proactive approach to community building.

Follow the PR Golden Rule: make friends before you need them

Invest in relationships from the very beginning by offering something valuable before you ask for anything in return.

If you’re wondering how to approach journalists and industry experts without seeming forced or selfish, look for natural opportunities to chat about topics you both care about and where you can add value. You can do this by:

• Joining relevant groups
• Replying to posts and group forums
• Taking part in social media discussions
• Being introduced by a mutual friend
• Sharing interesting work across your networks
• Attending industry events

However, don’t post promotional content when you’re engaged in these discussions. Instead, focus on offering industry expertise and experience. Successful PR is altruistic because it focuses on creating mutually beneficial relationships.

You have to make a consistent effort. You only get results when you deserve them.

Connecting with a journalist: 5 key tactics to follow

Once you’ve started building connections and providing valuable contributions to your industry, you can approach your target journalists.

The most important thing to keep in mind about your outreach is that it comes down to your initial interaction, and there are some key tactics that can greatly improve your chances of gaining traction:

Always ask for permission before pitching: don’t assume a journalist will automatically want to hear from you. You’re more likely to get a “yes” if you ask. Keep it brief but personal:

Hi, Congratulations on your new role with Business Insider.
A PR colleague told me it was a pleasure working with you at Forbes. I hope this new opportunity with BI is just as fantastic. I was wondering if it’s okay to share with you a few details about a company in the HR/Small Business sector that might interest your Careers readers. Just in case it fits something you’re working on or perhaps sparks an idea. Thanks in advance. Looking forward to hearing from you.

Focus on what’s in it for them: use a personalized approach that speaks to their professional interests and offers value:

Work on your headline: follow basic copywriting 101. If you can get them to click on the headline, you might get them to read your first line of text (and honestly, that’s the hardest part).

Back everything up with facts: use statistics, case studies, and relevant facts to show the impact of your organization. Did you help a client find success? Say it and show it.

Be ready to support your pitch: don’t wait for a “yes” before putting together the supporting materials that go with your story. Otherwise, you risk keeping a journalist waiting. Be prepared with your media kit before sending your pitch.

Follow up: no response from the journalist? That’s not unusual, since they’re busy people with lots of pitches coming in. Wait a week and follow up if you don’t get a reply. One of the most important things to remember is to treat a “no” as a future “yes.” When you get a no, take it as an opportunity to ask for feedback and suggestions. Never burn bridges and always thank journalists for their time.

How to Evolve Your PR Strategy

Building relationships with the media and securing the right press coverage is imperative for brand exposure, as earned media from trustworthy journalists carries significant weight in the eyes of your potential buyers. However, the way you “get in the media” has changed drastically in recent years. Today, it’s almost impossible not to adopt a hybrid PR approach to evolve your strategy. What does this mean for your startup? It means using a combination of tactics to ensure your brand gets consistent coverage.

Create valuable and consistent content

Infuse your brand story into every piece of content you create. This provides a unified and consistent voice across multiple digital platforms and enhances your credibility. That’s why many influential brands (think Red Bull) have become editorial powerhouses, creating social content, blogs, ebooks, infographics, events, and videos. They’re bringing the news directly to their customers.

Big names like Gatorade, Etsy, Dove, and Microsoft also benefit from branded content, such as building relationships with customers and engaging an audience. And millions of other brands recognize how vital content marketing is.

A brand that excels at this is Duolingo, which boasts an audience of over 5 million on TikTok.

How do they do it? By first laying the groundwork with A/B testing and social listening. They increase awareness on TikTok by creating content that resonates with their audience and attracts viewers.

Share your expertise on non-branded platforms

For example, Onboardly teamed up with Column Five to create an ebook and an accompanying infographic. As a result, many niche marketing publications featured our content. A great way to build credibility is to contribute content on industry topics to publications or companies.

This could take the form of a guest post or an opinion article on another company’s blog, or a joint webinar or podcast. Sharing your expertise on non-branded platforms allows you to gain third-party endorsements, build connections with industry thought leaders, and engage your audience in new and exciting ways.

Leverage your social channels

Social media and social bookmarking allow you to attract and engage niche communities in ways that were unthinkable until recently. Additionally, you can use these social channels as tools to mutually reinforce your PR efforts. Besides joining discussions on traditional social networks (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.), consider leveraging social bookmarking sites such as GrowthHackers, Reddit, and Mix (formerly StumbleUpon). These platforms offer startups a fantastic way to stay connected, create discussions, and amplify the reach of PR releases.

It’s essential to engage regularly because most content from major publications is picked up organically. So focus only on the relevant platforms and truly dive into those communities.

Use PR metrics to measure and improve

Do you want to maximize your startup’s PR efforts? Then you need to stop relying on guesses and start using metrics to measure and improve your results.

One of the main advantages of using PR metrics is that it helps identify what works and what doesn’t. By analyzing data such as media coverage, social media engagement, and website traffic, you can gain valuable insights into which aspects of your campaign resonate with your target audience.

Evaluating PR metrics also helps you to:

• Understand your Return on Investment (ROI)
• Measure the effectiveness of different platforms/methods
• Position your brand to meet your customers’ expectations

Here are some PR metrics you should be tracking:

Mentions: By monitoring the number and quality of press mentions your brand receives across various publications, you can assess how well your message resonates with your target audience. This also allows you to track which messages or campaigns generate the best positive coverage, giving you valuable insights for future marketing strategies.

Web traffic: A spike in website visits following a particular event or campaign can indicate that potential customers are engaging with your campaigns.

Engagement: This refers to how much users interact with your content across various platforms, such as social media or websites. Measuring engagement helps you determine if your audience is interested in your messages and whether they are taking action based on what they see or read.

Impressions: This metric measures how many times people view your content. By tracking impressions, you can determine how effective your outreach efforts are at gaining exposure for your organization or client. For example, if a brand’s share of media on Instagram is significantly higher than its competitors, it may indicate that Instagram is an effective platform for reaching its target audience. You can then use this information to allocate more resources to creating Instagram content.

Sentiment: Understanding consumer sentiment is more important than ever in today’s fast-paced digital world, which bombards customers with countless advertising messages every day. By monitoring consumer sentiment, brands can adapt their PR and communication strategies to better resonate with their target audience. Measuring sentiment also provides insights into negative consumer opinions about your brand, allowing you to address any issues.

Earned backlinks: These are links from other websites that point to your site and are crucial for improving your SEO ranking. When other authoritative websites link to yours and mention your brand, it demonstrates to search engines that your startup is credible.

Improve your process and analysis with PR tools and services

There is no doubt that the way we consume news has changed drastically in recent years. Nowadays, a solid brand strategy alone is not enough. Instead, companies need an always-on approach to capture and keep consumers’ attention. So how do you maintain a consistent presence and stay top-of-mind with your customers? Through proper planning. In this way, you can ensure that there is always a piece of startup PR out there. To get started, follow these steps:

Step 1. Brainstorm ideas: Create a mind map of ideas for your product or service’s most newsworthy elements. Get input from every single member of your team—it’s not a “marketing-only” exercise. Every department should have valuable insights on how to address your customers’ needs.

Step 2. Identify emerging themes: consider the emerging themes from your brainstorming session and articulate how and why they engage your target audience. Again, apply your journalistic lens: what makes a journalist want to bite?Step 3. Map your themes onto your calendar: map your themes onto a 12-month calendar. Consider a campaign every 4-6 weeks.Step 4. Develop relevant campaigns: consider how social media content and outreach can support your PR outreach. Ask yourself which content fits each campaign. Then create content accordingly.Step 5. Invest in relationships: get to know your target journalists well before your pitch. With advanced planning, you can get into a rhythm where you are a cycle or campaign ahead of your outreach.Step 6. Track your outreach: record every correspondence you have with the media. Use tools like Hubspot’s Sales Hub or other email tracking software to understand if and when journalists open your emails.Step 7. Prepare for sprints: your team should be fully aware of campaign cycles and ready to participate, share, and engage customers during these “sprint” periods. The more activity you can leverage during these times, the greater the exposure with your customers.Step 8. Plan the downtime: don’t ignore the in-between moments to publish great content. Think white papers, ebooks, guest blogging, co-hosted webinars, or podcast discussions. Focus on content that will have the most impact and remember that less is more. Consider partnering with brands that have larger networks to create joint content and keep it consistent with your overall PR themes.Step 9. Test and reassess: analyze the value of each media placement. Were there issues your team had to solve? Schedule monthly department meetings to track your progress. Learn from any mistakes and refocus your energy to make sure you maximize your startup’s PR efforts.

Your entire team should know what’s happening in your campaign cycle, from development to marketing and sales. So keep communication lines open at all times and update campaigns accordingly.