

Ask HN: No-names, tell your story on how you got PR coverage - kineticac

To all HN who aren't in YC: how did you go about getting PR coverage without the help of YCombinator's massive influence on PR firms?  Did you get massive exposure in a different way?  What tricks / advantages did you have?<p>And in the subject I mentioned no-names, people who have yet to have any coverage on anything they've ever built, how are you doing it?<p>For our site http://browseology.com, it's unclear if the idea is just not clear and understandable enough for PR to write about, or if they just don't care about our request emails because we're nobody yet.<p>Just wanted to see how the HN community is addressing this issue.
======
systemtrigger
> For our site <http://browseology.com>, it's unclear if the idea is just not
> clear and understandable enough for PR to write about...

Before you solicit more PR for Browseology I would tighten the story focusing
on the homepage. You have a pleasant, simple aesthetic but IMHO the homepage
contains too many words and options. The result is an unnecessarily confusing
first impression. My notes: <http://idea.s3.amazonaws.com/browseology.png>

You might want to gear Browseology more toward women. Women love shopping and
they're more social about it than men. I can imagine your app serving their
sensibilities better with a little wordsmithing. This might make PR easier for
you because it would focus your messaging on benefits rather than features.

~~~
kingsley_20
In that vein, show some product. What does "collaborative shopping" look like
on a screen? Bonus points if you show non-clipart people using your product in
a way that makes sense to your users. Would they also be on a phone call w/
each other, for instance?

I find that videos are becoming a popular way to tell that story - if you
choose to go that route, keep it under ~ 3 mins.

~~~
caffeine
kingsley's right. My impressions (these echo others'):

1) Get rid of all that text. Make the search box huge and pre-fill it with
something useful. Don't put a bunch of words underneath explaining what the
user should fill it with.

2) ~30sec video in _female_ voice of buying something together. Make sure the
first ("preview") frame is a picture that shows why your product is awesome.

3) Colors(!) on the front page. Looks like it was designed by a tasteful
developer, rather than a tasteful designer (if I'm wrong, then tell the
designer to get a bit crazier).

4) No elephants. Seriously. Nobody wants to be an elephant. Even 'gear nerd'
men don't want to be elephants. Unless .. you're selling elephants?

5) Integrate with FB/Twitter/Whatever. Put the logos on your _homepage_ so
that everybody knows you're 140ch-compatible. This will increase the buzz
factor.

6) If your site does badass technical stuff, write some technical blogs about
them and get them out to the relevant humangregators. Opinion-makers troll
technical posts to find the newest cool stuff.

------
pg
"Y Combinator's massive influence on PR firms"

I assume this was sort of a typo, but YC doesn't have any particular influence
on PR firms. I think you mean influence on the press.

To understand how to do without connections, it's probably helpful to
understand what value connections have. The point of connections is
authentication. If I recommend a startup to a reporter or an investor, they
know I have to tell the truth, because if I start to be a source of bum leads
they'll stop listening to me.

The value of authentication is that it makes judging you easier. If you come
highly recommended, a reporter or investor will at least talk to you. (The
joke is that the YC name can get you rejected by any VC in the valley.) If you
don't, they have to judge you for themselves, and that's hard, because they
get tons of inbound requests and don't usually have technical backgrounds.

There are two possible solutions: (1) get authentication by some other means
than personal recommendations, and (2) get publicity through venues that don't
require so much authentication.

The best strategy for (1) is to get lots of users. If your traffic graph (or
better still, revenue graph) is going up sharply, reporters and investors will
pay attention to you. In effect, users are recommending you.

You may say: how can we get lots of users without publicity? The same way
Facebook did: make something so good that users tell one another about it.
When you have exponential growth, you can start with a very small seed-- just
your friends and friends' friends-- and you'll still win.

A good example of (2) is to talk about your startup on venues like HN, where
many readers understand technology well and are capable of judging whether
something is good or not without any external seal of approval. Being on HN is
not the same kind of traffic boost as TechCrunch, obviously, but it's a start.
Literally, sometimes: sometimes TC gets leads here.

~~~
kineticac
Sorry Paul, I definitely meant the press. I think I'm lumping PR in general
with press incorrectly. Thanks for clarifying.

Your points on authentication is very interesting. It seems that the press
definitely cares about names.

Our feedback from Hackernews is good, but in terms of getting people psyched
about it, not so much, I think it's mainly because the target audience is not
exactly the best one. The feedback we ARE getting is awesome, technical
feedback, and experience driven feedback... but we haven't touched on the
users who actually want to USE it. We will probably attack the other
communities that are 1) people who love to shop, 2) people who do a ton of
research on products. That probably also includes a ton of women in that as
well.

Can't forget to build a good app either, so those improvements will come as
well. It's hard to know what direction to go in and what to focus on without
ample feedback. We have plenty of ideas of what could work, speculation, but
validation of these ideas, or even new ideas is what we're fishing for now.

~~~
raffi
I launched Feedback Army on HN and it did really well. I did it during a slow
news day which helped. And the whole idea came from an HN discussion which
helped. But I did make the front page of delicious that week. So sometimes it
can work.

------
anigbrowl
I'll tell you two things that are wrong with your site for free. You allow
people to shop together. In general, men compete to display their technical
knowledge about things in which they are interested, but don't shop socially.
I like sharing my knowledge with friends, but not with strangers or I'd pursue
a career in retail. I tend to note things and hunt for them later. Mrs Browl
likes to know what her favorite suppliers have on offer and forages about
until she finds something that interests her. They're equally valid but quite
different selection strategies.

Women love shopping together (frequently without any impulse to buy) because
they learn about their friends by seeing what they are interested in. So I
think your business model is _much_ more interesting to women shopping for
clothes than men shopping for digital cameras. If you buy into this idea, then
your target market is female friends separated by geography, not men who would
be equally happy working at Best Buy.

Now, your 'big elephant leading little elephant' logo reinforces your site
title 'browseology', which is presumably the study of how to successfully
browse Amazon for shopping purposes. For men, you're putting them in an
inferior position, implying they have less knowledge and bruising tender egos
by suggesting they lack browseology skills. For women, you're suggesting that
they are elephant friends. Women like elephants, but they don't want to
identify with them.

The idea and the technology both have merit. But the social contract you
present to potential customers is a double fail. So: rebrand. You could do
worse than grab a few co-workers, load up on weed and beer, and lock
yourselves in a room for the weekend with a TV that tunes only to Bravo and
TLC, to immerse yourselves in gender stereotypes.

~~~
kineticac
Men do a lot of research before purchasing some expensive gadget, they goto
discussions, review sites, and talk about it in forums. The way it's geared
now is sort of the way teenagers goto the store to show each other the coolest
things they can buy. So I see your point as being very valid here.

Haha @ "Women like elephants, but they don't want to identify with them."

------
kbrower
Submit to HN, reddit, digg, etc.

Contact relevant and/or popular blogs/news outlets with non-form emails as to
how and why they should write about your site. Getting on Lifehacker was a
huge boost for one of my side projects.

If you can afford it buy the keywords on google, yahoo, msn that are extremely
relevant.

Post to various web application directories(this was probably the least
effective use of time)

~~~
zeedotme
sounds about perfect..the only thing i'd add is actually try and contact
individual bloggers wherever possible. In an ideal world, you have already
established some form of relationship with a few of them.

~~~
kineticac
It also sounds like the first step is to make connections and get some
relationships going. It's like highschool all over again ;)

~~~
grinich
what do you think the MBA is for?

~~~
kineticac
couldn't you argue that you can get as many connections without going for an
MBA? Or is that one of your suggestions?

------
thorax
We've actually had a lot of luck, but it's still really hard. We've been
working on a site to help small startups to track/manage their
interactions/promotions with the media (or at least help us do it, but we like
to externalize our own tools).

For our successes, sometimes you luck out:

* We created bug.gd and the day we uploaded the logo to a random "Web 2.0" site, one of the moderators posted it on Digg, made the front page, and from there it scattered throughout the world.

* We mentioned bug.gd to TC a couple of weeks later (since the Digg storm imploded our site) and it was picked up by TC, Mashable, Lifehacker, etc.

* As people ran into us and heard about us, they spread the word around, and now it grows on its own, getting covered in PC World, and even local news coverage in random cities: [http://blog.bug.gd/2008/11/08/buggd-coverage-on-wivb-buffalo...](http://blog.bug.gd/2008/11/08/buggd-coverage-on-wivb-buffalo/)

* At Pycon last year, we did a lot of spreading the word by mouth and lightning talk. As an experiment, we released error_help() from the Python interpreter so that you could get help for your most recent exception from the rest of the world who may have run into it. Very few people used it, but we got a lot of interest from people who heard more than a few words about it all.

* For yumbunny.com (a dating site experiment) we mentioned it to TC the week before Valentine's day and they covered it. We issued press releases about it, though, and no one cared one bit.

* For tinyarro.ws, it spread through Twitter like wildfire because it was so odd (and shorteners are inherently viral) and it ended up with coverage on Mashable, Lifehacker, and zillions of blogs.

The only advice I can give is to make something either: (a) Useful enough that
people want to talk about it, (b) Interesting/quirky enough that people want
to talk about , or (c) be lucky sometimes (i.e. keep rolling the dice and
trying until the die roll hits).

My best advice to you is:

* Try new APIs or new fads to get attention for yourself

* Seek partnerships that are mutually beneficial for popular sites

* Send not-too-uptight emails about your service to people you want to cover you. Try not to do form letters.

* Advertise on niche blogs or sites. While they may not give preferential treatment to advertisers, they will have heard of you so you don't end up in the spam folder automatically and you get their ear enough to say a few words.

~~~
kineticac
awesome stuff thorax! Seems like you guys have some good ideas that lend
themselves to being talked about naturally.

Getting new APIs or new fads is good, but they have to be fitting. Getting
buried in all of the trends going on might be harder than standing out in the
crowd as something totally different. But then nobody will find you with
searches and other trend word searches. I'll definitely keep looking into
hooking into trends when/if it makes sense.

------
webwright
So, we are in YC, but we'd gotten onto TechCrunch etc multiple times before we
were, so I'll respond anyways. You don't have to be "somebody" to get PR
coverage.

YC espouses building something people want. To get coverage, you need to build
something people want to talk about. You can substitute connections, bulldog
PR folks, or hurl money at the problem, but IMO you should never attempt PR
until you're pretty sure you have something to talk about that makes a
reporter say, "Holy crap-- that'll make a good story".

The common response is that it's really hard to be worth talking about with a
boring product, right? Because no one wants to talk about shoe companies
(except Zappos) or project management software (except 37Signals), right? If
your product isn't inherently interesting, you need to craft a different
story. About customer service mania or simplicity. Or how the idea came to
you. Or how your founders are living cheap to avoid funding (TicketStumbler
has done a killer job here).

Seriously, read "Made to Stick", or at very least read the summary.
<http://www.madetostick.com/excerpts/>

~~~
kineticac
thank you, that is really good advice =) We need to figure out what is that
"made to stick" story. Collaborative web surfing in real-time with zero-setup
for shopping doesn't seem to cut it =) hehe

~~~
Shooter
I think it would be easier for you to convey the idea of your site to
potential customers if you had a more descriptive domain name. 'Browseology'
is a good name, but not for what you're doing. In fact, 'Browseology' could be
almost _anything_ shopping or internet-related.

How about 'ShopSync' or something like that (that particular domain is not
available for new registration it appears, but it IS for sale.) There are many
variations on that domain concept, using synonyms and such, and many of them
seem to be for sale by the same domain owner...perhaps that person tried a
similar site and failed [or, more likely, never got started.] He/She may be
open to joint ventures or other creative arrangements if you don't have the
cash to buy an existing domain. I'm sure there are also other good domains
that you could find for just the registration fee. Browseology would be a good
name for your parent/holding company, once you're raking in the dough from
this and move on to your next project ;-)

------
ramit
Here's an interview I did about how I got into the Wall Street Journal, New
York Times, etc: <http://blog.mixergy.com/wsj-press/>

I also wrote more about getting press for blogs/companies here:
[http://www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/blog/getting-traffic-
fo...](http://www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/blog/getting-traffic-for-your-
blog/)

Btw, I now write for Lifehacker occasionally, so if you ever have interesting
startups, send me an email.

~~~
jamesk2
Ramit's stuff is cool. Also on mixergy is the interview with Tim Ferriss who
got his book "Four Hour Work Week" written about by tons of bloggers.

<http://blog.mixergy.com/tim-ferriss/>

~~~
kineticac
that's a good article too. thanks for linking that.

------
callmeed
Blog often and comment on other blogs as well

Sponsor events or workshops relevant to your industry

Give something away for free (we created a free WordPress theme and are
releasing some open source projects)

Give your product away for free to influential/VIP customers. This helps a lot
if you get the right people. Developing a couple relationships like this can
really help you early on.

Submit your app/site to magazines for review.

Check out HARO. I made some connections there ... to early to tell if its
valuable though <http://www.helpareporter.com/>

~~~
kineticac
thank you for the suggestion of HARO. I will definitely check it out.

------
smakz
First rule of PR: Know your audience. IMO you are marketing your site all
wrong if you go after the HN/Digg/Reddit crowds, which generally tend to be
more techy.

You should be hitting the websites which would want to use this service, deal
sites, shopping forums, price comparing forums, etc. Attack the
forums/discussion areas in those sites, which are very large. If the shoppers
from those sites aren't interested in your service, then you may have a
problem with execution/the idea behind your website.

Again, HN/tech crunch/digg/reddit is the wrong audience for your idea.

~~~
joepestro
For sure, and we agree.

We're not looking to convert on this audience (HN/techcrunch/digg/reddit etc)
- we just launched and we think feedback like this from really smart people is
super useful. We're still gathering information before we feel like we can
present an easy-to-use package for consumers.

It's harder on price comparison forums to ask our customers what they want and
get a conversation started when they're looking to discuss the best deals on
digital cameras. We tell them about the product, and hope they try it out. If
they don't reach out to submit feedback, it doesn't help us as much in
improving.

------
alain94040
I have been on both sides: having a startup to pitch, but also being a
journalist who needs new news to talk about.

Mass e-mailing journalists and issuing formal press releases is obsolete,
that's for sure.

You need to build a relationship with a few key influencers. The problem is
that they tend to behave like deaf people and typically won't answer your
e-mails. And being obnoxious is not the way to go past that hurdle.

So it takes months of being smart, showing smart, getting to know other people
like you, or slightly ahead of you, maybe piggy-backing from other events,
etc. If you persevere, eventually you'll get the connections and the coverage.

------
jlees
Find a flavour of the month or trend and surf it. Develop a Wave gadget,
develop a Twitter app, use $BUZZWORD, whatever.

It's not obvious from an immediate glance at your site exactly what it is and
why it's special. I have to read lots of text. Journos love pictures.

~~~
kineticac
Yeah, I feel you on the text. We need some nice mini screenshots of the
different ways this works. It's hard to show with static images in a dynamic
real time app. Maybe we need to talk to a designer.

------
raffi
With Feedback Army, I subscribed to "usability testing" blog keywords via
Google alerts, and then occasionally taking some time to ping bloggers about
my service. Ditto to giving away something to the bloggers. Make it as
frictionless as possible for them to try your stuff.

By as frictionless as possible--make it so they can click a link and
immediately without doing anything--see what your product does.

I also found having a media kit is useful and point them to it. In the media
kit try to have a short/non-markety summary of your service, logos/graphics
for their use, relevant links, the bios of your team, and direct contact
information.

~~~
kineticac
Ah a media kit is a good suggestion, but I feel like it might be yet another
page that's full of text... maybe if the product is slightly hard to
understand, that would be good.

~~~
raffi
Good copy editing can reduce this. An extra page doesn't hurt anything if
you're only sending certain people to it. In a way a media kit is a targeted
landing page for people you want coverage from.

To me, you fall in the slightly hard to understand category. I grok pair
shopping but because you're innovating with a new thing, I'm confused and
don't know what experience to expect. This leaves me confused.

If I was working with you, here is what I would do:

Take two laptops and $100. Go down to the local starbucks. Find pairs of
people sitting at tables.

Ask them to try your site, in exchange you buy them each a drink. Or if you
want to get really fancy... do a Microsoft--you find it, you keep it thing and
let them spend like $20. (If you do this, I'd record them and get their
permission to use it--could be good fodder for your site)

This experience will give you an idea of how people are responding to what
you're doing.

------
tjdziuba
I started a blog called uncov.com. Talked a lot of shit on a lot of people,
built a personal brand.

Product ended up failing, but I made enough connections along the way that I
landed on my feet.

By the by. If you're counting on PR as your primary distribution strategy,
you've already failed.

~~~
kineticac
good point about PR being the primary distribution. Ideally nobody wants that.
If you can ever glance at the whiteboard at the YC office, it shows a
dominating spike in traffic for techcrunch coverage, and then a sharp
dropoff... after that it's all up to your product. So initially, good
exposure, but you need a product that counts.

------
tptacek
Pick a fight.

~~~
joepestro
We tried this recently with Browseology. It backfired.

~~~
Scriptor
When you go to every comment thread discussing Google Wave and say that your
service is the same idea, when clearly the only thing they have in common is
sending real-time data back and forth, people tend to get annoyed.

Honestly, have some respect for your own product. Don't try to piggy-back on
others' popularity. And try to look at things objectively. I understand that
you may be excited of your app's real-time features, but just because
something else does real-time updating doesn't mean they're the same thing.

Honestly, you're not Google, so don't try to make it look like what your
project is as big as theirs'. You don't need to do that for people to be
interested in your site. Just advertise it as what it is, a real-time way to
shop with someone else online.

~~~
joepestro
Point taken.

It's actually more similar than might appear at first glance. Google Wave is
real time, and when someone types/edits the wave you're looking at, you see
that. On Browseology, when someone types in a search or any other text, you
see that. When you change pages, so does everyone else. It's this real time
updating that lets everyone browsing together see the same thing.

We're really excited about Browseology, it's true. Of course I have a lot of
respect for what we've built from scratch. We tried to let people know about
it while Google Wave was getting a lot of attention. This wasn't the right
place to do that.

And you're right - we're not Google. Does that mean we can't build something
that would be useful for you? We wanted to let everyone know that they could
try this out now (instead of waiting months for the public release of Wave) to
see what this aspect of real time collaboration looks like.

~~~
Scriptor
_Does that mean we can't build something that would be useful for you?_

You can always do something profound and useful. Just make sure you don't get
carried away with your own excitement. Browseology and Wave share real-time
features, but that doesn't really mean they're the same "idea".

Remember that the wave idea and online shopping are completely separate
things. I think your mistake was in not realizing this. Real-time editing,
which is the similarity you mentioned, has already been implemented in apps
like Google Docs and Etherpad.

And you're right, it's not a good idea to try to get attention by taking the
spotlight from someone else (although it could be said that Google's partial
Wave release was a response to Microsoft's Bing announcement).

One thing you could do right now is write an analysis of the technical aspects
of what you did, comparing yourself to Wave _and_ other real-time apps. Make
sure you talk about both the similarities and the differences, especially what
makes your app different.

~~~
ahoyhere
Not to mention, real-time "social shopping" and "leading other people around
the web" apps/services already exist and have for ages.

I don't see a differentiator, just a bad attitude.

------
martinkallstrom
For great ideas about how to do PR, look at what Pingdom does. They are
extremely good at getting their name thrown around by releasing reports about
interesting stuff noone else cares to measure.

------
aschobel
Hard work, email bloggers & reports, but sometimes you get lucky.

A CNet reporter quoted me for a front page Google Wave story and linked our
site. Instant traffic spike.

------
kineticac
I see a lot of suggestions and ideas, also looking for real stories of how you
did it, and what came out of it. Just out of curiosity ;)

------
dbul
"Build something people want."

~~~
kineticac
and "Build something people want to talk about"

------
j0ncc
Make something awesome.

~~~
jmtulloss
You mean people can just detect awesomeness out of the blue and flock to it?

