Everything Doug Soltys said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Soltys: Pitching journalists is fundamentally a form of inbound marketing
“You should not approach your marketing initiatives any differently from your PR initiatives, because the real truth of it is like pitching to journalists is a form of inbound marketing. You are trying to create interesting content that draws back people to you…”
Soltys: Startup traction comes from sales and product, not press attention
“Traction comes from a great product, comes from sales, It comes from customers that love your product. It does not necessarily come from media attention, and it certainly won't if you just assume that it will naturally come from that.”
Soltys: Seeking press coverage during startup distress accelerates business failure
“The problem with this is if you have real problems with your business, if you actually have problems with traction, if you are burning too hot, if your runway is short, If your board hates you, if your technical co-founder just left, not only will pursuing tha…”
Soltys: Niche community channels can drive business goals better than mainstream press
“Whereas depending upon your objectives for your company at stage, you're at a discord server, a slack channel, a newsletter, An in-person meetup could be way more impactful to actually, like, converting on your goals as a business.”
Soltys: Conversations with journalists are always interviews, never casual chats
“Conversations with journalists aren't conversations, they're interviews. You're kind of entering into the arena, and you have to be prepared for that”
Soltys: Business reporters prioritize enterprise metrics over consumer human-interest stories
“Business reporter at Bloomberg, Globe and Mail, BetaKit, TechCrunch, like what enterprise deals are you signing with specific industries? How many units are you moving? How much money you're making? Logistically, can you handle this stuff? Like that, that is t…”
Soltys: Journalists will help founders who show targeted pitching effort
“They're so inundated with people that are just like shotgun sending them pitches that aren't targeted to them at all. They are more than likely willing to take the time to help you triangulate or find the right place if you show any amount of effort.”
Soltys: Early startups should focus on a single story and channel
“At this stage, all you really need to do is take your best, most impactful story, your juiciest, lowest hanging fruit target audience, and the most, like, accessible channel to you, saturate the hell out of that, learn, and then iterate.”
Soltys: Startups can gain early media traction by piggybacking on larger narratives
“There are Larger narratives that are happening in the media environment that your company might be able to take advantage of before you're necessarily ready.”
Soltys: BetaKit hosts weekly open office hours for startup founders
“It's the reason why beta kit has office hours. We just give time away every week as an open door policy for like founders to come in and just hype check on stories.”
PRODUCT MARKET FITLEDGER