PR News | Telling the New VC Story

Todd Barrish

As the expertise sector’s earnings have surged throughout the COVID-19 pandemic economic system and the tempo of deal-making has quickened, enterprise capital corporations with the strongest model consciousness amongst founders typically have the edge in getting their foot in the door first.
Many of those most profitable enterprise capitalists are undoubtedly already leveraging PR to face out from the competitors and utilizing content material advertising and marketing to push their public profiles to new heights. So, how does a agency stand out when lots of the high gamers have already opened up the content material firehose and stepped up their public relations efforts?
PR and content material advertising and marketing can and needs to be conscious of the information and tendencies of the second, however each PR transfer and piece of content material ought to play into the lengthy sport of constructing model consciousness round what a VC agency stands for and the way they may also help advance their portfolio firms—or founder—mission. Regardless of whether or not the pandemic-fueled tech bubble bursts quickly or dramatically reshapes the VC panorama in the long term, a enterprise capital agency that invests in the PR and content material advertising and marketing essential to bolster its model can depend on seeding its status far and broad inside the minds of founders lengthy earlier than that first assembly.

This article is featured in O’Dwyer’s Aug. ’21 Financial PR/IR & Professional Services PR Magazine(view PDF model)

Smart content material improvement
Never lose sight of how content material can affect your model in the long term, particularly when a VC agency’s story is often only a Google search away or a fast scroll by the social media feeds. You wish to take into consideration content material past simply capturing an remoted success story or information occasion, as a result of it additionally represents a part of the newest chapter in your agency’s unfolding story.
Each piece of content material ought to ideally have a protracted shelf life and usefulness effectively past its preliminary publication. Longer content material reminiscent of thought management articles can yield smaller, snackable content material bites that may be distributed as weblog posts or social media snippets in a while.
A content material sequence also can extra intentionally signify a VC agency’s story over time. Your agency can showcase associate expertise and experience by podcasts centered on classes discovered from previous and ongoing investments, or create a sequence of movies with founders about find out how to put collectively compelling pitch decks.
As at all times, knowledge insights are key to gauging whether or not or not your content material creation efforts are reaching the proper audiences and having the desired affect. This not solely helps with choices relating to the general strategic course of a PR and content material advertising and marketing marketing campaign, but additionally gives extra suggestions that may inform the subsequent piece of content material.
Cultivating your folks’s voices
Beyond having a file of funding success, a VC agency’s model is about its folks and their tales. This is extra essential than ever at a time when many startups have their choose of doable traders. Many founders wish to join with a community of mentors and enterprise companions who share an identical imaginative and prescient of what the future may be and in addition present the assist crucial to assist them obtain that future.
A constant PR technique and thoroughly curated content material can broadcast what VC corporations have to supply past simply buckets of cash when it comes to considering and sources. Each weblog submit, podcast and video needs to be a possibility to showcase your folks’s voices in ways in which strengthen the success narrative round your agency’s model. Partners and portfolio firm founders can act as each thought leaders and cultural ambassadors in broadcasting your model’s achievements and mission to the world.
Any agency that has companions or founders who may be normal bearers for elevated variety in the VC world can also get pleasure from extra media alternatives to place the highlight on the group’s general model. A 2020 research by Women in VC discovered that just below 5 % of all U.S.-based VC companions are girls and that simply 33 % of these are girls of shade. At the identical time, Crunchbase discovered that the quantity of funding going to feminine founders dropped from 2.8 % in 2019 to 2.3 % in 2020.
Strategic media relations for VCs
VC corporations needs to be executing a strategic media relations marketing campaign round their model, and they need to be serving to safe PR for his or her portfolio firms as effectively. There are quite a few methods to advance a media marketing campaign by thought management, commenting on information of the day and pitching with an eye fixed on trade tendencies.
This essentially requires constructing and sustaining stable working relationships with journalists and information organizations, together with understanding find out how to work with the fashionable media narratives of the day. But there’s additionally a rising array of alternatives to attach with influencers on varied social media platforms to broaden your attain and inform your story. After all, many VC corporations have already acknowledged the energy of those new personalities and storytellers by investing straight in the rising creator and influencer economic system.
There might even be an opportunity for some corporations to create their very own media platforms. Andreessen Horowitz has launched a media web site known as Future that options tech trade views for an viewers of tech insiders. The agency plans to construct up Future’s personal distinctive model to distinguish it from that of Andreessen Horowitz.
Most corporations are unlikely to match Andreessen Horowitz’s media funding. The agency has about 25 staff in advertising and marketing who work on content material and PR for the agency, in addition to for the a whole lot of firms it has invested in. Smaller however equally celebrated corporations reminiscent of Benchmark have managed to compete alongside Andreesen Horowitz based mostly on the power of their manufacturers and associate networks. But each single VC agency is dealing with extra direct competitors from swarms of recent traders who’re prepared and desperate to make offers as quick as doable.
Every seasoned enterprise capitalist is aware of it’s finally as much as them to shut the cope with their startup of alternative. In the fast-moving and extremely aggressive marketplace for tech traders, intelligent PR strikes and neatly curated content material have turn into very important in telling the story of your agency’s previous successes and future trajectory—and promoting founders on the imaginative and prescient and alternatives that your group has to supply.
Three key takeaways:
Take management of your story. Everything searchable on-line or in a social media feed can turn into a part of your story. Own that story with a constant content material technique.
Know your voice. Every individual talking to your agency must amplify your model. Let particular person views and tales shine whereas weaving them into the bigger narrative of the group.
Explore storytelling alternatives. A coordinated media marketing campaign can enhance your model and the related manufacturers of portfolio firms. But don’t cease there; join with new storytellers or develop your individual storytelling platforms.
***
Todd Barrish is President and Founder of Indicate Media.

You May Also Like

About the Author: Amanda