By Mark Macias Founder of MACIAS PR | Former NBC Executive Producer
I hear a version of this question frequently from founders: Can a startup run an effective PR campaign on a startup budget? Of course it can.
MACIAS PR has launched media and branding campaigns for all kinds of startups. You can see those case studies here. But there is a fundamental relationship that frequently gets lost when founders start discussing budgets: the size of the PR campaign has to match the scope of work.
You can’t hire an agency for a limited startup campaign and then expect the resources of a national, full-scale media campaign. If you want more markets, more storylines, more reporters and more agency hours, that’s a different scope of work—and it requires a different budget. This isn’t unique to PR. It’s how professional services work.
By Mark Macias Founder of MACIAS PR | Former NBC Executive Producer
A CEO preparing for a live CNBC interview does not prepare the same way they would for a Wall Street Journal interview.
Both journalists may even be covering the same subject, but they’re producing fundamentally different forms of journalism. With a live segment, your job is largely to deliver insight. With a print article, your job is to help the reporter uncover the story.
I learned this distinction from working on both sides of the media. Before founding MACIAS PR, I was an Executive Producer with NBC and CBS in New York. Today, I prepare executives for television appearances and interviews with print and online journalists.
One of the biggest mistakes I see executives make is treating every media interview as if the preparation is interchangeable. It isn’t.
By Mark Macias Founder of MACIAS PR | Former NBC Executive Producer
I think there must be a new piece of startup advice circulating among venture capitalists. Three different founders approached me this week with essentially the same request: they didn’t want a PR campaign. They wanted one legitimate media placement. And they all used the same terminology – they wanted to “reverse engineer” it.
Three unrelated founders making nearly the same request in one week makes me wonder whether someone in the VC ecosystem is telling startups that this is how they should approach public relations.
I understand the logic. Startups have limited budgets. Founders are constantly being told to preserve runway. One article in Forbes, Fortune or another recognizable publication seems like a discrete investment with a tangible result. Secure the logo, put it on the website, share the article with investors and customers, and move on.
There’s just one problem. Earned media doesn’t work that way.
By Mark Macias Founder of MACIAS PR | Former NBC Executive Producer
Brian Cohen was Pinterest’s first investor. I was fortunate to attend a private dinner with him when he shared some advice with entrepreneurs in the room. It was impromptu so I had to take notes on what I had in front of me.
I’ve heard a lot of speeches about entrepreneurship over the years. Most follow a familiar script: work hard, believe in yourself, build a great team and never give up. Brian’s advice was different.
It was blunt and at times almost contradictory. Tell people when their ideas suck. Listen carefully to words. Don’t confuse execution with timing. Shoot for outcomes that seem statistically improbable.
By Mark Macias Founder of MACIAS PR | Former NBC Executive Producer
Is it worth hiring a PR agency for just one media placement? This is a real question we got from a business today: “I’m looking for help getting our founder one credible TV interview. Do you take on fixed-scope, one-off broadcast projects?”
The value of public relations isn’t simply appearing on television. It’s what happens when credible media coverage begins establishing a pattern around your company, founder or expertise.
One interview can certainly be valuable. It can introduce an executive to a new audience and give the company an important piece of third-party credibility. But by itself, it doesn’t build a brand.
Brands are built through repetition and association. You want journalists, customers, investors and eventually search engines and AI platforms to repeatedly encounter your company in credible contexts.
Maybe a CEO first appears in a trade publication discussing an industry shift. A few weeks later, a national reporter interviews the executive about breaking news. Another outlet cites the company’s proprietary data. Eventually, a television producer sees that body of coverage and recognizes the CEO as someone who has already contributed intelligently to the conversation.
Each placement reinforces the others. That is very different from saying, We need one TV interview. Who can get it for us?
By Mark Macias Founder of MACIAS PR | Former NBC Executive Producer
I took the photograph accompanying this article years ago after seeing this framed portrait on the street. I didn’t know where she lived, what she did for a living, what she had experienced or even why her portrait was sitting there. There was just a framed photo on the sidewalk and I had to know more.
Every face has a human story. Great PR finds it. For me, that idea gets to something fundamental about storytelling and earned media. Companies often approach public relations with information. Journalists are looking for stories. The difference between the two frequently comes down to finding the human being who can make the information mean something.
Why Characters Matter in PR Storytelling
During my years as an Executive Producer with NBC and CBS in New York, I saw plenty of pitches supported by impressive statistics, legitimate experts and important issues. But television taught me something that I’ve carried into every PR campaign I’ve worked on since: data can establish a story, but people make us care about it.
Imagine telling viewers that thousands of Americans are being displaced from their jobs. That’s significant information. Now introduce them to one 52-year-old worker who spent 25 years at the same factory, walked into work on a Monday morning and learned that his job was disappearing.
The statistic establishes scale. The person gives the statistic meaning.
A journalist can ask that worker what he told his family when he got home, whether he has enough savings to survive, what he’ll do next and whether he ever imagined starting over at 52. Suddenly an economic statistic has consequences we can see and understand. That’s the power of a character.
By Mark Macias Founder of MACIAS PR | Former NBC Executive Producer
When I was an Executive Producer with NBC in New York, I was the boss. I helped determine which stories we pursued, but that didn’t mean I walked around the newsroom telling experienced journalists exactly how to report their stories. That would have been a fast way to damage the creative process—and probably my relationship with the people producing the journalism.
Good journalists are independent thinkers. They want to investigate, ask their own questions and reach their own conclusions. You can give them direction. You can point out what they’re missing, and sometimes challenge them to look deeper. But there’s a difference between guiding a journalist and telling a journalist what to do.
That distinction is just as important in public relations, especially if you’re a CEO who typically tells others what to do. Persistence is necessary in PR. Aggression is different. And when you’re dealing with journalists, your approach can be just as important as your strategy.
By Mark Macias Founder of MACIAS PR | Former NBC Executive Producer
The little dog in this photo is Einstein. He’s my dog, and despite his size, he has never had much trouble getting attention.
There’s a lesson here for startups trying to compete for media coverage against much larger companies: You don’t have to be the biggest dog to get attention. You just need to give people a reason to notice you.
By Mark Macias Founder of MACIAS PR | Former NBC Executive Producer
Walk into almost any industry and you’ll see the same problem. Companies describe themselves with similar words and repeat similar talking points. From the outside, they blur together. That’s why I believe emotion, ideas and individuality are some of the most important ingredients in public relations. These three elements influence how people experience a story, and ultimately whether they remember the company or person behind it.
Andy Warhol demonstrated this principle in a completely different medium. A can of soup is one of the most ordinary objects imaginable. Millions of people walk past Campbell’s soup cans in grocery stores without giving them a second thought. Warhol didn’t invent the soup can or change what was inside it. He changed the context and, in doing so, made people look at something familiar in an entirely different way.
Great public relations can accomplish something similar. The raw material might be a company, an executive, proprietary data, a customer experience or an idea. Creativity doesn’t require changing the facts. It requires recognizing the unexpected, emotional or individual element within those facts that can make another person see them differently.
By Mark Macias Founder of MACIAS PR | Former NBC Executive Producer
One of the most important conversations I have with new clients happens before we pitch a single reporter: What should you realistically expect from a PR campaign, and how quickly should you expect it?
Every business wants media coverage quickly. I understand that. Maybe a product is launching next week, a conference is approaching, investors want more visibility or the CEO suddenly decides this is the month the company needs to be in the news.
But there’s an important reality about earned media that businesses need to understand: Just because your company waited until the last minute to start PR doesn’t mean a journalist will suddenly work on your calendar.
Reporters and editors work on their own schedules. And unlike advertising, you can’t buy your way onto their editorial calendar.
That’s why realistic PR expectations aren’t about lowering the bar. They’re about understanding how earned media actually works—and giving your PR strategy enough time to produce the best possible results.
