Why you shouldn’t waste time on press for your startup

Media has lost the trust & respect of the people

Coverage of the recent FTX debacle seems to have been the turning point in public perception of large media outlets.

To briefly recap, Sam Bankman-Fried founded what he claimed were two separate companies: a hedge fund called Alameda Research and a cryptocurrency exchange called FTX.

FTX (once valued over $32 billion) collapsed in a matter of days in November 2022 after a series of damning revelations:

Bankman-Fried had secretly shifted $10 billion of FTX customer deposits to Alameda.

Coindesk reported that two-fifths of Alameda’s $14.6 billion balance sheet was held in FTT.

Worse yet, SBF had given himself a $1 billion personal loan out of Alameda’s coffers.

Shortly after FTX filed for bankruptcy and SBF resigned, Vox’s Kelsey Piper published screenshots of a private Twitter DM conversation with Bankman-Fried, who effectively confirmed that he & Alameda had been insider trading with customer deposits:

Despite the mounting evidence of deliberate fraud, once notable media sources such as Forbes, New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Reuters revealed their true colors, publishing back-to-back puff pieces about SBF:

CEO of Coinbase, Brian Armstrong, was particularly incensed by the media treatment of FTX’s legal debacle, calling it a “turning point for citizen journalism and loss of trust in MSM.” Coinbase has been pummeled by far less-friendly media coverage after announcing layoffs just weeks prior, so his reaction comes as no surprise.

Loss of faith in the mainstream media

The advent of platforms like Substack speaks directly to the growing loss of faith in media coverage.

Even Facebook CEO & founder, Mark Zuckerberg, went on the Joe Rogan podcast for his latest announcement (instead of doing any press interviews) — which makes sense considering journalists have continuously lambasted his billion-dollar bet on VR & the metaverse.

If unicorn startups and successful CEOs shun press interviews, why shouldn’t you?

PR is pay-to-play

If you see somebody on a “Top ___ Entrepreneurs” list, they probably paid for it. From Forbes & Maxim to LA Weekly, large publications & PR agencies have been exposed for charging thousands of dollars to feature in these types of articles:

You can even publish your own articles on Forbes if you pay the $2,000/yr fee to join “Forbes Council.” It gets even worse when you look into awards like Forbes 30u30, which multiple former winners have exposed as a pay-to-play list:

Why media coverage has become meaningless

There are two reasons for this shift media coverage:

Controversy sells — the era of clickbait quickly transitioned into the era of hit pieces.

Investigative journalism is dead — today, headlines precede the facts.

Headlines precede facts

Today, journalists choose an angle, then find the supporting evidence. The era of clickbait has all but extinguished the flame of investigative journalism.

For proof, you can simply browse through the daily posts on Help A Reporter Out (HARO), a service by PR Newswire which journalists use to seek expert commentary:

Most of the authors have already developed a thesis (albeit with no facts or research to back it up), after which they seek the evidence to substantiate it. This completely flips the journalism model on its head, and is particularly alarming in fields like health, science and psychology, where readers would expect facts to come before opinion:

Presumption: Mental health medication is superior to therapy

Presumption: younger workers prefer to work in-office

Presumption: Twitter takeover has spilled over onto Tesla

Presumption: REITs are a safe investment during recessions

Presumption: “Secure attachment style” doesn’t have any drawbacks

Presumption: the premise of this article was clearly written before speaking to any sources

The other half of authors publish formulaic pieces on the same topics (presumably because they are good for SEO and drive reliable organic search traffic):

For instance, this Forbes author has published pieces for years that follow the formula “Crisis management / succession lessons from [X current event]”:

He was particularly active during the Elon Musk Twitter acquisition deal:

Hit pieces generate clicks

Popular media sites (Business Insider in particular) have come under fire for publishing sensational hit pieces on tech CEOs (especially female founders, for some inexplicable reason):

Re: BI’s March 2022 hit piece on Glossier founder Emily Weiss

Re: BI’s Nov 2021 hit piece on Spring Health founder April Koh

Re: Verge / NYT / BI hit piece on Away founder Steph Korey

At the end of the day, media site earnings are predominantly ad-driven, which means the number of clicks they generate directly correlates to their revenue. As such, they are perversely incentivized to publish such controversial stories — whether truthful or not.

Although companies like Substack have attempted to disrupt the traditional model with subscription-based offerings, clickbait journalism will continue to exist until the “eyeballs”-based game of advertising changes.

Conclusion

Much like having a Stanford/Harvard MBA or wearing Steve Jobs-style turtlenecks (thanks Elizabeth Holmes) have become anti-signals for reputability over the last decade, mainstream media coverage is no longer an indicator of credibility.

Press & PR is very much a “pay-to-play” game, and unless you have billions in funding (like FTX), those dollars are probably better-spent elsewhere.