Consultancy: what I do (and don't do)
Famously, Meatloaf [above] would do anything for love, but he won't do that. I've got a similar philosophy...Aside from event speaking and workshops, the other thing I spend a big chunk of my time on is doing consultancy for tech and media companies.The work I’ve done to date includes:
advising a media company on the launch of a forthcoming publication
advising tech companies on their content strategies
advising tech companies on how to launch new products and the messaging they should use for different audiences. While I won’t write everything for each of them in the future, I sometimes write for them to help set a tone and standard of output
casting an editor's eye over blog posts, marketing copy and more, to make it tighter, more persuasive and more engaging
The fun thing is, the range of activities I can do with these companies is flexible, and will no doubt evolve over time. In some cases it's likely to crossover with my other activities like speaking and education, or go in a totally new direction. Exciting times.
“...But I won’t do that”
The one line I've drawn is not to get into pitching journalists for coverage of my clients. On a personal level, I fear if I got into straight PR work I’d never get out. It's hugely time-consuming to do it properly, and I’d risk losing the variety I mentioned above.But there are good reasons for my clients that I don’t do straight PR work, too. It’s now harder than it has been for a long time for startups to get coverage in the tech press. The scope of 'tech' has expanded, so tech journalists have far more to write about than they did a few years ago. Law, politics, social issues, crime – they all have many more 'tech news angles' than they did a few years ago. That means there's less scope for writing about new tech companies simply because they're interesting. And there are now many more startups vying for attention anyway.The result of this is that you often now need to take a different, broader approach to telling your story, and that's what I focus on. I may sometimes introduce a journalist to a client, but I'm not going to be handling embargoes and press release distribution. I should point out that there’s definitely still an important role for PR people who focus on the tech sector! There are talented people in that field I can recommend to clients who need them.Whether you’re a technology company looking for me to help with your narrative building, a media company looking for an experienced external editorial voice, or you have different ideas about how I can help you on a consultancy basis, get in touch: martin@martinbryant.net.See also: Speaking and Workshops