For outsiders, start-ups and their culture are rather inexplicable. The exogenetic forces and the ambition, along with the inconstancy and the creativity of his industry seem to be tireless. What makes this scene look like how it does? We have discussed this with Jenni Schwanenberg from next media accelerator.

The new challenges go in hand in hand with the initial success of young companies. After a new idea arises, it is followed with the realization of this idea and the commercialization. Along with marketing, the first thing that comes to mind is advertising, no matter if the advertisements are in newspapers, on posters, the internet or even on the TV. However, a lot of people don’t really realize that PR also attracts positive relationships with journalists and the attention of target groups. Through authentic communication like interviews, the telling of companies´ history and philosophy and also the presentation of ideas and the products in different, maybe fallacious ways, will draw a lot of attention. Here we want to learn from our interview, how startups really take off and when PR becomes important for the new companies.

What do you think make start-ups special?
Start-ups are the companies which are founded with totally new ideas and are not geared to the existing business model. They are able to change quickly and work hard on their perceptions.

Start-ups mostly have a lot of ideas and want to bring them to the market soon, what kind of mistakes do those young companies often make?
Now, the young companies lack courage. I have collected the experiences that the older companies already know: perfection is often delayed. When situations are testing, mistakes are also to be expected. Those who are afraid to make mistakes are held back for too long a time.

Your business model is helping start-ups make the first step into their business life. What are the key factors when choosing the start-ups which you are willing to support?
The prerequisite is a good team. Too many start-ups don’t even apply this at the very beginning. We have to see firstly, if we are a really strategic partner, in other words, if our network really helps the realization of ideas or not. After that we take a harder look at the team, what can each person in the company do?  Has the team already worked together? Does the company actually belong to the founder? We discuss which team we will take on this base.

When the first step is complete and as the foundation of a business starts to progress, it is time to seek the attention of the public . Do start-ups care about media presence? Or is this restricted only to first time social media activities?
Our startups take care of their communication themselves, and the measures are really different. For example Spotgun will be seen in the autumn at Höhle der Löwen on Vox. Because they perform themselves in the advert break, their TV presence is wonderful. Spectrm, however, is very active on twitter, where currently the authors can be subscribed to Whatsapp. Twitter is the place, where the authors as well as newsjunkies can easily be reached. AdTriba is a B2B-company which must now make a name for itself in the eCommerce area. Media presence is limited to the industry media.

From what point does PR become important? What does the first step in the communication look like?
PR is important for every start-up, because every investor will google the company, the more results he/she can find the better. What the first step looks like can be as different as the stories that they tell. One person can tell the story of the personal history of the company’s founder, the other the story of ingenious technology.

Many young companies don´t really know how to act when dealing with journalists and communicating with their target audience, how do you find Media training for start-ups?
It depends a lot on the trainer. What is important is that he understands the goals of startups and doesn’t delay the teams. Generally I think that start-ups should consider if the training is necessary, or they can accept the mistakes to spare the time.

Many start-ups begin and end public relations with the presence of founders-publications and at branch events. That is a good start, but in order to be noticed by the target group, this is not enough. More actions are required for a successful PR. Start-ups usually offer excellent new products and a company structure which makes the industry branch really popular. But a one sided communication doesn´t achieve the desired success. For the founders, who don´t have a royal fan base for their products, the attention of the press is of the utmost importance if they want to address ideas and solutions to their target groups. Just a simple press report cannot increase publicity. That’s just the first opportunity to publish news, but there is still a long way to go to build a real relationship with media sector. In order to help the new companies, we offer them special, well designed and budget friendly PR-packets that work for the team.
The Interview was conducted by Jasmin Rast.
Thanks to Jenni Schwanenberg, next media accelerator.