When should startups focus on getting press? (Jon Bier, Mike Haney & Casey Means)

PR is not a silver bullet. There are many variables that determine whether a brand should invest in PR early on, or even at all. In this episode, Mike Haney, Levels Editorial Director, and Casey Means, Levels Chief Medical Officer, sat down with Jon Bier. Jon is the Founder and Chief Executive of Level’s PR agency, Jack Taylor PR. They discuss the advantages of collaborating with PR agencies, why successful PR all comes down to storytelling, and the importance of aligning your brand with what’s going on culturally.

11:18 – Work with brands that are solving problems

Jon said that his agency only works with brands where they can tell authentic stories about how they’re solving problems.

We get hired a lot, I think because of referrals and because people think that we have all these connections. And of course, we’ve been in the business for years and we have connections, but that’s not at all what makes us great. You could eliminate all our connections and it would take us six months to get back to where we are because of the way that we approach it, which is value first. And that’s not… I’m not PRing you. I actually hate that phrase because what we do is we tell authentic stories about brands that are helping people in solving problems. And as long as we can do that, there’s a market for that. And if there isn’t, and this is the whole thing with PR and this is where it gets the stigma. I can’t do this for most brands. I can’t do it for Coca-Cola. I don’t want to and I can’t. If you’re Coca-Cola, buy a Super Bowl commercial, create an emotional story over attributes that you attach to a product that aren’t actually in the thing that you’re selling. But that’s an emotional story that you create and you attach it. That is not what we do. We shine light on products and things and brands and people that are solving major problems in the mainstream in the world.

14:25 – Not every brand needs PR

Jon said brands who don’t have that strong storytelling angle can still be successful, but PR won’t be their key to growth.

Whenever people are looking for PR for that, I’ll say, “Yeah, you might have this one…” You can tell one story about a brand that isn’t deep with story inherently, but you can’t do it sustainably. Nobody can. And so, you really need to be objective and say, “What is the story that we have to tell that’s actually solving the problem?” And if that story isn’t actually solving a problem in the mass or even in the niche, but if it’s in the niche, you probably don’t need a PR agency. You can probably hit that niche. It’s their job to cover you. You still have to tell a good story to them, but it’s their job to cover you and you should be able to do that. So, a lot of brands, we tell them that sustained PR is probably not the thing that is going to blow them up. That doesn’t mean that they’re not going to be really successful, it just means that they probably shouldn’t invest that money in PR.

20:00 – PR isn’t a silver bullet early on

Jon said most early-stage brands should not invest in PR until they’ve grown as much as they can on their own.

It’s very brand and industry and timing and money specific. There’s no one answer to that, but my advice to a lot of brands in that space is, if money is ever an issue, don’t do it, do not do it early stage. Grow until you can’t grow anymore from a brand perspective and then start thinking about that. PR is likely not going to be your silver bullet. If money is not an issue and you do have that depth of story, oftentimes it is the right move even early on in the brand’s journey.

21:13 – Look at the work of a PR company

Jon said to look into a PR company’s work before you start working with them. You want to see a wide variety of press coverage for their clients.

Look at the output, look at our work. The press part of our work is public record. So, we’re not breaching anything. Look at the press from the last two weeks to the last three or four months. And there’s a bunch of reasons to do this. But one, is you’ll see the quantity and the quality of the output. But more important than that I actually think. Is deep dive on that press. Look at the creativity. If they’re just doing round ups and gift guides, you’ve got your answer. If they are really talking about very nuanced things that are just representing part of the brand and they’re attaching it to a new cycle in a really creative, reactive way, and they are talking about the people associated it with it and everything that they can do to create that mosaic of press, they’re probably pretty good.

26:30 – More transparency is better

Levels is a very transparent company that gives Jon’s agency access to podcasts and recorded meetings and its internal processes. That is a great way to collaborate with a PR agency.

So, more is typically better. Let us sift through it and decide what is relevant and not, but we always want more. Sometimes clients will come to us and they’ll say, “Oh, we really only need X, Y, Z services. Can we negotiate on this?” And our response is always, “Well, our job is to story tell and by taking away that, you’re taking away our weapons. You’re taking away the tools that we actually do this with. So, no, we can’t negotiate on that.” But you guys are very unique as you know. In terms of the transparency, in terms of the way you operate your business, in terms of your organization and efficiency, to the point where I’ve never seen anything like it. You are very… You are trailblazing in this regard and it is actually more efficient. This is maybe an experiment in efficiency, but it actually is more efficient. It actually is more collaborative. It does allow us to have all of the tools that we need to do our job and then some. And yeah, I think that’s a huge reason for the success that we’ve been able to enjoy together.

29:07 – Use storytelling to educate

Jon said being the first one to come out and educate about a topic is a powerful place to be because you get to shape that story and feed a news cycle.

It’s twofold. It’s one, I want to spend time working on things that are meaningful, that help people. That we have a limited amount of time on this planet and I want to work on things that matter. And the other side of that is much more clinical. We actually can’t do it the other way. You’re going to have to work a lot harder and you’re going to have to get a lot less because if you can’t attach something to a news cycle, what are you really working on? Really trying to leverage contacts for magazines, you can’t do that often if there’s no story. So we look at where does this sit in culture right now? And you look at any of our brands, they’re all kind of connected. They’re all kind of vertical with those same themes and hooks. And it’s the only way we know how to do this. It is actually just deep, deep, nuanced storytelling and things that are quite early. So, we get to educate people. And that’s a huge part of this. Is that again, it’s not about logo, logo, logo, it’s about educating people about what we do almost more than it is about educating people about who we are.

34:56 – Look for cultural alignment

Jon said Levels hit the public consciousness at the right time for its message to be received. In years prior, it would have been more difficult.

There was no COVID, there weren’t people that were willing to spend in mass culture significant amount of money every month on their wellness beyond their gym membership and things like that. I mean, three years ago we had a hard time getting people that weren’t biohackers to pee on a stick to see if they were in ketosis. And so, culture shifted while we were actually developing this. And the timing of everything just happened to really, really align. And so, even though people weren’t looking for things on metabolic health, because they didn’t know what it was, they were primed to receive the education. And so, I do think that timing in culture is very, very relevant. And I don’t want to say we got lucky, but I think that everything that we’ve done has been in line with some kind of grasp on where culture was at in terms of receiving that information.

41:54 – Be platform agnostic

In this golden era of media, Jon said it’s best to go wherever the eyeballs are, whether that’s the New York Times or TikTok.

There’s more media and it is very widely consumed. And so an appropriate strategy should be to be platform-agnostic and to really go where you think that there is value in the story and in the eyeballs that they’re getting, whether it’s content creators or newsletters or things that aren’t traditional media. That being said, there’s still a ton of value in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal and Fast Company. And all of these brands that are established that do have respect, that do still have very high readership, that do have really amazing journalism attached to it. So there still is that the value that, yeah it’s true. Somebody on TikTok might get a bunch more views than the New York Times. That doesn’t mean that TikTok is better than the New York Times, but I think you’ve got to spread yourself out and go where the story is and where the eyeballs are and not be so concerned that it’s this or that. The beauty of this golden era, is that you actually can be almost everywhere a lot of the time.

49:38 – Think in terms of soundbites

Casey has learned a lot from being interviewed many times over the years. She recommends getting your soundbites down so that they can easily be lifted and placed in the story.

And so taking it from the high level to the practical level, giving visuals and storytelling, I think those things are really important. I think one other thing that I’ve realized going back to this comment that Jon had made about how sometimes you can’t control what people say. You could have an hour-long interview and then it turns into a one-sentence quote, which may not even be what you actually specifically like the exact words you said. And that is something I think I’ve come to appreciate that really setting up people for success with sound bites is really important, making sure you’ve got your specific takeaways down and then delivering them in a way that it’s very clear to the person listening that this is a useful soundbite. So that means speaking slowly, really emphasizing what you’re trying to say and putting it in a package that could just be picked up and transferred to an article. When things are a lot more long-winded, tangential all over the place, that’s when I think it’s easier for things to be kind of spliced in a way that you don’t want them to be.

1:02:05 – Don’t rely on celebrities and athletes

Jon said that most brands should not rely on famous investors or partners to be their voice in the press. You need to lead with the people who are experts in your brand.

They’re not educated in the brand the way they’re supposed to. And because the athletes are celebrities, the journalist just wants to talk to them about the other thing that they’re doing that made them a good athlete or a celebrity. So the brand often doesn’t even get featured anyway, or if it does, it’s a throwaway question just so they could get the interview. And so more often than not… And we deal with this a lot. And our advice is usually, unless everything is really aligned, probably don’t do it. Also, it’s an easy way for brands to cheat. To take their foot off the gas. They’re like, “Oh yeah, but we have this huge athlete, we’re good.” No, you’re not. You’re probably actually in a worse position.

John Bier (00:00:06):

We did not make anyone successful. We saw a great brand from a story perspective that hadn’t realized its potential yet early. And that is what we do because whenever I look at things, I look at, “Hey, does this have a mass kind of story? Can this be a part of a news cycle? Is this solving a real problem in culture? Is this helping people?”

Ben Grynol (00:00:39):

I’m Ben Grynol, part of the early startup team here at Levels. We’re building tech that helps people to understand their metabolic health. And this is your front row seat to everything we do. This is a whole new level. It’s a question that so many startups ask time and time again. When should we go after press? Or should we go after press at all? It’s one of those things that startups never really know when they should go after press. Should they spend their time? Should they allocate their resources, that being both time and capital to go after tier one press? Or should they focus on building? Well, nine times out of 10, the answer is build, build, build. Iterate, build, iterate, build, get feedback from members. Get feedback from users, customers, due diligence in building a product that is going to be more impactful than this idea of a “launch.”

Ben Grynol (00:01:46):

This idea of getting press for the sake of getting press. Press is very much ephemeral, even though people think it feels really good. People think that there is some great impact, it’s going to be a life changing mechanism, some lever that gives people this idea of a launch, a rocket launching into the air if they land that tier one press outlet. Well, that might be the case. They will get some lift. There is no doubt about that, but press is ephemeral. An article comes out in the New York Times, that’s great. A ton of awareness for the company, a ton of awareness for the mission, the product being built, but there’s so much information around us at all times that that disappears pretty quickly. It’s great to have that to link it on a website on social, on different platforms to say, “Hey, we got the nod. We’re verified. We got the check mark that shows that there is some signal.”

Ben Grynol (00:02:39):

Some social proof in having these major media outlets embed what building. It’s really reassurance with both media and the general public to say, “Yes, we acknowledge what you’re doing is important,” but that goes away quickly. So, then the question becomes, well, should people focus on press? Should they do it at all? It’s very costly in both time and capital. Well, the answer becomes, if you can use these levers, if you can fuel this awareness time and time again on a consistent basis, then the answer becomes, yes. This is not something that’s sustainable for most small teams. If you’re a team of two people, five people, 10, even 20 people, spending that amount of time on press can take your attention away from building, building, building experimentation and building. Do that over and over again. That is the nature of a startup.

Ben Grynol (00:03:31):

So, how do you do this? Well, you can outsource. And for Levels, we work with Jack Taylor PR, JTPR, specifically John Bier, and his team, they have been an incredible partner to us as far as bringing awareness to Levels and our mission. This idea of bringing diligence, bringing attention to the metabolic health crisis and all the work that we’re doing to work towards educating the world about it. So, Casey Means, chief medical officer and co-founder of Levels. Mike Haney our editorial director, they work very closely with JTPR. They sat down and they dug into this idea of why would companies work with different PR agencies? There’s very good reason, and there’s a lot of cool information about the way that we’ve worked with Jack Taylor. They are an incredible resource to us and we’re grateful to have them on board for all the work that they’re doing and everything that they’ve done to bring attention to Levels. It’s very much a nurtured relationship. And it’s something that we continue to put attention on. Here’s Casey.

Casey Means (00:04:38):

Hello, everyone. Welcome to a whole new level. Casey Means here, co-founder and chief medical officer of Levels. And I am so thrilled about this episode because we are going to be talking about all things PR and press for a startup. I’m joined by our editorial director, Mike Haney, who co-manage press and PR with me and our very special guest John Bier, who is the CEO of our incomparable PR company, Jack Taylor PR. Welcome, John.

John Bier (00:05:12):

Thank you for having me. It’s rare for us to get asked for interviews from our brands and our partners. I feel like usually we’re like a secret weapon that’s kept in the closet or under the bed. So, thank you for shining some light on this. I appreciate it.

Casey Means (00:05:26):

Well, you are definitely our secret weapon and we can’t wait for this conversation. Our goals for this episode are really to help our listeners get a bit more of a fleshed out framework of how we at Levels have thought about press over the last almost three years and how that thinking has evolved and give anyone listening who’s a startup founder, some tips and perspective from what we’ve learned and from John’s incredible experience in this space. And so, just a brief intro on Mr. John Bier. So, John has 15 years in marketing and public relations. And as I mentioned, he’s the CEO and founder of Jack Taylor PR, which is the communication agencies with offices in Brooklyn, New York and Venice, California. He’s also an attorney by training and is an adjunct professor of marketing at NYU. And he’s just known so widely as an expert storyteller, brand builder, a connector of people and has worked with so many of the health and wellness industry leaders that we know and love. So, let’s jump right in. Here, Mike, I’ll pass it off to you to intro yourself as well.

Mike Haney (00:06:27):

Sure. Yeah. So, this is Mike, I’m as Casey mentioned, I’m the editorial director and working most directly now with John and his team on press. And I come out at it from sort of both sides of the equation, because I’ve been on the journalist side of PR for a long time and now being on the other side in the company, it’s fun to work on this topic. So, John, the thing we want to start with, and I think the most obvious question is, why are you not a practicing lawyer and how did you get into this PR business?

John Bier (00:06:54):

Yeah. So, it’s more how I got into the law business. I just didn’t know what to do after college. And so I figured that going to law school would at least propel me forward. Also, I was a dive master, it’s kind of the first level of professional scuba diving. And I went to law school in Australia. So, I was able to scuba dive and do the things that I love while not being by passionate about law, that non-passion propelled me forward to… I took the bar in Australia, then I did it in New York, then I worked at a firm there for a while. And the whole time, I felt like I was wearing somebody else’s clothes, living somebody else’s life. And I was kind of… I was like, “Is this what life is supposed to be? Just working for this external validation for someone else because you were told that this was what you were supposed to do?” And I stumbled into PR.

John Bier (00:07:48):

And really working at an agency that really focused on advertising agencies and books and things like that, but major agencies with major brands. And so I got a lot of looks very early at a lot of brands. I worked on brands that were doing Super Bowl ads and really had a lot of time with CEOs that had written books and gotten close to people in their seventies that had done all these amazing things when I was in my mid twenties. And so, it was an amazing entry point.

Mike Haney (00:08:17):

So many questions coming out of that. But I think the first obvious one is, how did you end up in Australia?

John Bier (00:08:22):

So, I had traveled there a couple years earlier and I had been backpacking and when 9/11 happened, I was in Indonesia, I was in Thailand, I was traveling through that part of the world. And I was like, “I don’t know what’s going to happen. Let me just go to Australia.” And really fell in love with it. And it just felt like a good place to spend a few years when I was young. It was also a lot less expensive to go to law school in Australia than it is in the US.

Casey Means (00:08:49):

Was it easy to do? Were there any hoops you had to jump through to go to law school there?

John Bier (00:08:52):

It was easy to do because I’m coming from Canada originally, but I always knew that I wanted to… If I was going to practice law, I was going to practice in New York. And they… You can write the New York bar with an Australian law degree. So, that was on the top of my mind going into it.

Casey Means (00:09:08):

Interesting.

John Bier (00:09:09):

Yeah.

Casey Means (00:09:09):

I’m also curious then when you got out of law, I like the phrase that you felt like you were wearing somebody else’s clothes when you were doing that. What did you find in the PR business? Did you start to feel more like you had found something that fit you or what was it about that shift that you found more fulfilling?

John Bier (00:09:26):

I think initially, I just needed a job. And then as soon as I got there, I was like, “Oh, shit I’m very good at this.” And instantly I was good, but I didn’t know anything. I was not polished. I’m still not polished. 15 years in I’m still not polished, but I’d get on the phone with these people and they would sound so good and my fraud complex would kick in and I’d be like, “What am I doing here?” Because the company to their credit realized that I was good quickly, and they gave me a lot of space to just be myself. And as long as I delivered results, they kind of left me alone to the point where I was camping out outside of Fox News and Bloomberg and hanging out at the bars and restaurants that the bookers and producers and journalists hung out at.

John Bier (00:10:17):

And I would basically work from there all day and just talk to people. But I was… I had no idea what I was doing. I had no practice. I had no polish, I had no system. It was just, I was very good at results.

Casey Means (00:10:30):

Yeah. That’s so interesting thinking about how to break into press and PR. Because something I feel like I’ve really come to realize over the last couple years, is that this is so much a relationship-based industry. And so, this was pre-Twitter, this was pre-Instagram I’m imagining. So, how… Yeah, what was the process of forging these relationships with some of these editors and journalists and whatnot? Was it really just getting out there and being where they were or how did that process evolve?

John Bier (00:10:56):

It’s interesting with relationships because in those days for me, it was very much about relationships. Because I didn’t have the skill sets that I have now to be able to provide value to look at it as I’m providing value to this journalist. And I’m going to tell this story that is going to provide value to their consumer. And so right now, we get hired a lot, I think because of referrals and because people think that we have all these connections. And of course, we’ve been in the business for years and we have connections, but that’s not at all what makes us great. You could eliminate all our connections and it would take us six months to get back to where we are because of the way that we approach it, which is value first. And that’s not… I’m not PRing you. I actually hate that phrase because what we do is we tell authentic stories about brands that are helping people in solving problems.

John Bier (00:11:52):

And as long as we can do that, there’s a market for that. And if there isn’t, and this is the whole thing with PR and this is where it gets the stigma. Not all brand… I can’t do this for most brands. I can’t do it for Coca-Cola. I don’t want to and I can’t. If you’re Coca-Cola buy a Super Bowl commercial, create an emotional story over attributes that you attach to a product that aren’t actually in the thing that you’re selling. But that’s an emotional story that you create and you attach it. That is not what we do. We shine light on products and things and brands and people that are solving major problems in the mainstream in the world.

Casey Means (00:12:32):

That’s so fascinating to hear that really it’s the storytelling that comes first. It’s actually the relationships are almost secondary to a depth storytelling. And I think that’s a really interesting point for probably a lot of people listening who are founders or in the tech space or whatnot, is that important. And I’d be curious if you have some thoughts on just maybe elaborating more on that storytelling piece as it pertains to companies, but also how companies should be thinking about even in the earliest days, telling the story of what they’re doing and how to actually improve and flex that muscle and skill. Because I believe that’s been a huge part of Levels as success so far, with press and PR. And I think it’s something that has evolved over the years, but what advice would you give founders and startups in terms of framing how they’re thinking about storytelling?

John Bier (00:13:25):

Yeah. And so we get brands that come to us every week with looking for PR and most of the time, I’d say definitely eight out of 10, maybe more, we tell them that they shouldn’t hire PR for a lot of reasons. One, in the early stage of a company, if you are… And this was something that we dealt with early on, we were working with smaller companies that earlier stages that the check size, the retainer size was smaller, but the value that they placed on us was so much higher. This was their golden ticket. This was their opportunity, this was where they put all their eggs in this basket. And I’m like, “It doesn’t necessarily work like that. Let’s say we’re successful and let’s say that you get on the today show one time. That’s not really going to make your brand.” You need a mosaic of story and you need it in all different parts. And the truth is that most brands, they just don’t have it.

John Bier (00:14:25):

And so, whenever people are looking for PR for that, I’ll say, “Yeah, you might have this one…” You can tell one story about a brand that isn’t deep with story inherently, but you can’t do it sustainably. Nobody can. And so, you really need to be objective and say, “What is the story that we have to tell that’s actually solving the problem?” And if that story isn’t actually solving a problem in the mass or even in the niche, but if it’s in the niche, you probably don’t need a PR agency. You can probably hit that niche. It’s their job to cover you. You still have to tell a good story to them, but it’s their job to cover you and you should be able to do that.

John Bier (00:15:05):

So, a lot of brands, we tell them that PR is probably… Sustained PR is probably not the thing that is going to blow them up. That doesn’t mean that they’re not going to be really successful, it just means that they probably shouldn’t invest that money in PR. And the other side of it is that if PR is ever taking away from operations or inventory or appropriately staffing your brand, it’s not something that you should be doing.

Mike Haney (00:15:33):

That’s such an interesting point. This reminds me of one of the things I wanted to get into and you led right into this, which is we’ve had discussions about this internally. And it literally just happened in an email a couple weeks ago. Sam, our CEO, CC’d me at an email back to another founder conversation he was having. And one of the things the other founder was asking about was our PR strategy. And Sam made a comment like, “80% of effort that goes into PR is wasted.” And I got my hackles all up and I sent him a note back saying, “Hey, that seems unfair. A lot of us are working really hard and we do really good at PR.” And what he meant, I realized when I went back and looked at the context of it, was that for a lot of companies who put all of their hopes into PR as a growth engine, that effort that goes into that is you’re not going to get the ROI on it.

Mike Haney (00:16:16):

So to your point, it’s understanding the role of PR within the larger ecosystem of it. And Sam’s point was, “Look, if you don’t have a product, or as you’re talking about a story to back it up, then all of the labor that goes into these press placements and things just isn’t going to matter.

John Bier (00:16:33):

Totally. You’re much better doing that. If that’s your goal, then spend it on traditional advertising, which is certainly a lot more trackable or historically a lot more trackable. Affiliate has really helped actually put a value on PR from a direct ROI perspective. But I agree with that sentiment exactly. You can’t look at true traditional ROI or if you do look at traditional ROI, I spend X, I get Y, especially from the beginning, you’re not going to likely see that value. It should be binary at some point, but you need to have a broader perspective of what your ROI is. How can you put the value on the brand awareness and all of that? Now there’s, I see, I get Instagram ads for a lot of Levels copycats and competitors. And you know what? It’s just the beginning. Of course, people see movement and also, you are not this type of thing where it’s like, “Oh yeah, there’s this hot new brand.”

John Bier (00:17:34):

You are a revelation of something like, this is a big, big idea that health as we’ve traditionally been looking at it, is not actually what health actually is. An apple a day keeps the doctor away, not necessarily. And this is just the beginning of an appreciation, a new appreciation, a new era of what health really is. And you can’t really fathom unless you’re looking at it from a very macro perspective. How big an idea that we are onto with this. Personalized wellness, metabolic health. These are things that nobody even thought about two years ago. And it’s just the beginning.

Casey Means (00:18:18):

So just to drill into that a little bit more, I think that’s a great point that PR can sometimes, I think be confused for an early startup as one of the sort of growth engines or growth levers. But like you said, that might not be the best ROI upfront. Maybe just go with traditional advertising or whatnot. So, with that in mind, what do you think is the right framework for an early startup to think about the role of press in the early stage? You mentioned brand awareness. Kind of what else should they be thinking about when they’re considering making this investment?

John Bier (00:18:53):

It’s very, very brand specific and industry specific. There are times if I look at an early stage company that because of the industry they’re in they’re already very well funded pre-launch. And so the financial factor, which is significant for a lot of brands early on, is not there. And then there’s the category. Is this a category where being first to market is really going to provide you a huge head start. And are you deep with that story enough to be able to have an agency assuming they’re good? Which is a whole other conversation. Because oftentimes I say that, because oftentimes brands are better served having somebody who is dedicated and experienced in-house helping them at those early stages. But if the agency is good, the agency model, if they are very good, typically is better just because you have so many looks at so many different brands. And that actually is just a better… There’s going to be better output tip long-term than one person. But I got off on a little edge there.

John Bier (00:20:00):

So yeah, it’s very brand and industry and timing and money specific. There’s a lot… There’s no one answer to that, but my advice to a lot of brands in that spaces, if money is ever an issue, don’t do it, do not do it early stage, grow until you can’t grow anymore from a brand perspective and then start thinking about that. PR is not going to be… Likely not going to be your silver bullet. If money is not an issue and you do have that depth of story, oftentimes it is the right move even early on in the brand’s journey.

Mike Haney (00:20:37):

I’m curious when you just talk there briefly about hiring a good agency versus not a good one, what do you tell brands they should look for in hiring an agency?

John Bier (00:20:47):

Yeah. It’s interesting. So, we always tell brands one, look at our work, at least the external part of our work. Why people think they’re paying us is for editorial coverage often. Of course, we end up doing a whole bunch more than that. We end up being full brand partners. We talk about strategy and behavior and a whole bunch of things that you can’t just quantify externally. But look at the output, look at our work. The press part of our work is public record. So, we’re not breaching anything. Look at the press from the last two weeks to the last three or four months. And there’s a bunch of reasons to do this. But one, is you’ll see the quantity and the quality of the output. But more important than that I actually think. Is deep dive on that press. Look at the creativity.

John Bier (00:21:37):

If they’re just doing round ups and gift guides, you’ve got your answer. If they are really talking about very nuanced things that are just representing part of the brand and they’re attaching it to a new cycle in a really creative, reactive way, and they are talking about the people associated it with it and everything that they can do to create that mosaic of press, they’re probably pretty good. The other thing is, and I don’t know why there’s this thing in PR. I mean, I do know why. It’s because most people don’t… They never share that because they typically don’t have it. It’s a murky industry often, because agencies will take clients that don’t have story. You could be the best agency in the world, we can’t tell stories. I can’t tell a story about Mountain Valley, my favorite water company. I love it. I get hundreds of pounds of it delivered to me every single… I feel bad because I’ve told this before and I always use Mountain Valley as my example because it’s always right next to me because I love it.

John Bier (00:22:32):

But there’s no story there. Hundreds of pounds of water being dropped off to me, which is, “Oh, cool. It’s in a glass bottle.” The carbon footprint is enormous and just there’s no… Just having a great water company even if they have a social impact component, that’s a little bit of lipstick, that’s not enough. Get referrals from the agency’s clients. That is a thing that is just not done often enough. And I really don’t know why. If you were hiring a babysitter, you’d get referrals. In any other thing in life, you get referrals, but those two things will sift out a lot of the fakers.

Casey Means (00:23:08):

That’s really helpful and practical advice. And I think one question I have, I think something that’s been so amazing about working with JTPR and you, is that it really feels like the agency is an extension of the company. We are very… I mean, there’s a lot of understanding and mind melding. I think it’s between the JTPR team in the Levels team, which feels really good because I know that we have a lot of confidence with the team going out and talking on Levels behalf and being able to actually do exactly what you just said, which is look at what’s going on in the news, look what’s going on and that’s relevant. And then at really in an agile way, think about what Levels is doing and create ideas and pitches to respond to those things going on.

Casey Means (00:23:54):

But that takes a lot of engagement and integration. And so, one thing that might be helpful to get your perspective on, is how can a company set up the agency for success in understanding what’s going on within the company and sort of what the thought processes are, what the story is. What’s the work and the preparation and the processes that can happen to really set the agency up to be able to do what you’re talking about?

John Bier (00:24:23):

Yeah. So, there’s a lot in that. So, one is a collaborative approach. You might want X, but you might not be an expert in storytelling. You might not be an expert in… We’ll have clients that come to us and they’re like… Still, in these days they’re like, “What if we get our logo on this person?” I’m like, “No, that is not what we do.” And it’s just not… Let’s say you got the logo and let’s say it was on the biggest show in the world. It still wouldn’t do anything. So, it’s not what we do here. And so, you need to be collaborative and you need to let the agency kind of tell you and you need an agency that will tell you that isn’t a yes team that is just like, “That’s a really bad idea because of this. That’s a bad idea because of this. This is a great idea. This has tons of legs. How about we do it this way? How about we do it this way?”

John Bier (00:25:19):

And then you’re like, “I would prefer if we focused on these types of things and then so there’s that, and it requires a lot of faith. This is a creative industry and we are not in control of what somebody actually writes. It’s often not going to come out exactly the way… In fact, very rarely will it come out exactly the way you want it. And that’s just a leap of faith that we have to take. And that’s why we try and do as much of the work as we can to guide it authentically, truthfully, based on things but in the direction that we actually want the piece to be in.

Casey Means (00:25:57):

And one thing that comes to mind is… And sometimes I feel for the JTPR team because we dump a lot on you guys in terms of, “Here’s our podcast, here’s our memos, long form memos. Here’s our Friday forum.” And just sort of a lot of like, “This is what’s happening at Levels.” Do you find that type of transparency is helpful, and are there ways for companies to kind of make the agency feel or understand more of what’s going on inside the company?

John Bier (00:26:30):

So, more is typically better. Let us sift through it and decide what is relevant and not, but we always want more. And we never… Sometimes agencies, clients will come to us and they’ll say, “Oh, we really only need X, Y, Z services. Can we negotiate on this?” And our response is always, “Well, our job is to story tell and by taking away that, you’re taking away our weapons. You’re taking away the tools that we actually do this with. So, no, we can’t negotiate on that.” But you guys are very unique as you know.

John Bier (00:27:02):

In terms of the transparency, in terms of the way you operate your business, in terms of your organization and efficiency, to the point where I’ve never seen anything like it. You are very… You are trailblazing in this regard and it is actually more efficient. This is maybe an experiment in efficiency, but it actually is more efficient. It actually is more collaborative. It does allow us to have all of the tools that we need to do our job and then some. And yeah, I think that’s a huge reason for the success that we’ve been able to enjoy together.

Mike Haney (00:27:38):

I’d love to dive a little deeper on that. Maybe put some meat on the bones of some of these concepts we’ve been talking about using Levels as a bit of a case study, because we’ve been with you guys now for about a year and a half almost. I think it was a year ago, November. I think we signed on with you guys right around the time I started. So, I’d love to hear you just reflect on what’s worked, what hasn’t, and specifically, what did you hear in that criteria that you look for when taking on a client? When you and Levels first started talking, what made you decide this was a company you wanted to go at very early stage at that point? And the second part of that I think would be, what’s worked over the past year. I think from our perspective, it’s been a phenomenal success. I can’t think of a tier one outlet that we haven’t been in yet. And I’d love to hear you reflect on why that’s the case.

John Bier (00:28:24):

Yeah. So, it all starts at the beginning. And to be fair, we’ve worked with a lot of brands that are high nine and 10 figure brands that were not high nine and 10 figure brands when we started working with them. But we did not make anyone successful. We saw a great brand from a story perspective that hadn’t realized its potential yet early. And that is what we do because whenever I look at things, I look at, “Hey, does this have a mass kind of story? Can this be a part of a news cycle? Is this solving a real problem in culture? Is this helping people?” And like I said earlier, it’s twofold it’s one. I want to spend time working on things that are meaningful, that help people. That we have a limited amount of time on this planet and I want to work on things that matter.

John Bier (00:29:19):

And the other side of that is much more clinical. We actually can’t do it the other way. You’re going to have to work a lot harder and you’re going to have to get a lot less because if you can’t attach something to a news cycle, what are you really working on? Really trying to leverage contacts for magazines, you can’t do that often if there’s no story. So we look at where does this sit in culture right now? And you look at any of our brands, they’re all kind of connected. They’re all kind of vertical with those same themes and hooks. And it’s the only way we know how to do this. It is actually just deep, deep, nuanced storytelling and things that are quite early. So, we get to educate people. And that’s a huge part of this. Is that again, it’s not about logo, logo, logo, it’s about educating people about what we do almost more than it is about educating people about who we are.

John Bier (00:30:21):

Because if people don’t know what metabolic health is and we are basically inventing the category in mass culture, it doesn’t really matter who we are. So, it’s those things… And it takes a client that understands, “Hey, we barely got to mention in this huge piece in the new Yorker metabolic health in general.” And be like, “No, no, that was a huge piece for you.” That’s educating mass culture about a change in how we perceive medical care from mass, and I mean mass in the universal sense to very, very personalized. And it’s not just a slight shift, it is rewriting it. And so, having a brand that has that potential and having the people at the brand to actually see that and actually know that it’s not always about gift guides and affiliate links, it’s much more attached to an actual like cultural moment in history.

Casey Means (00:31:25):

Yeah. That really resonates. And I think something that I’ve thought about a lot since the beginning is the mission of Levels. The mission of Levels is to reverse the metabolic disease epidemic. Right? The mission of Levels is not just to get Levels on the arm of every single person in the world. We’ve really always focus on that broader mission. And I think that’s really played into our press strategy over the past few years. And what has been such a nice alignment with JTPR, is that exactly like what you just said in your last response. It’s about the broader cultural shift. And almost, I think often in health tech creating a whole new category that doesn’t exist. And that doesn’t mean just slamming the world with the word Levels. It means helping people understand the problem and why it affects them and what are the potential solutions for it kind of more broadly and just building the context for which a product might fit in.

Casey Means (00:32:22):

And that I think in my mind has been a really effective strategy sort of when we initially started working with your team, which was in November of 2020, our first focus was sort of a sprint towards getting coverage around our seed raise, which was incredible. And that was a bit more focused on Levels, but peppering in a lot about metabolic health. And then immediately after that wave was over, we really shifted into more of the broader talking points around metabolic health and these issues. So, I’d love to hear your perspective for people about maybe misconception around press is just getting your name plastered on anything that you possibly can versus investing in sort of more setting a scene around the broader problem that the company is addressing and where to sort of invest time and resources in that?Because from where I stand, investing in those broader metabolic health issues or topics has been incredibly valuable for Levels and it’s really fit with our broader goal of in our content, in everything we touch, how do we add value to the person who’s on the receiving end?

Casey Means (00:33:34):

How do we actually put something out there that benefits their life? Storytelling about Levels might benefit their life, but actually educating them about a problem that might affect them definitely with really meaty, interesting content and perspective, benefits them more. So, can you just talk about kind of that dichotomy of brand focused versus problem focused and how companies should kind of be thinking about that?

John Bier (00:33:59):

Yeah. And so, it’s very bespoke in the sense that we always have to factor in what are the attributes of the brand. And people throw around the word disruptive. But most brands that people say are disruptive are not disruptive, but when a brand is actually disruptive, it’s the best adjective to describe them. And you guys are truly that in the sense that inventing a category in culture for a more mass consumer. And this is not… So when we talk about metabolic health, nobody… Now people just talk about metabolic health like it’s a thing, but we kind of introduced that into culture and now it’s just accepted as a part of wellness that is current and still ahead of its time, but current. So, let’s say we tried to do this three or four years ago. We probably would’ve had some success educating people about metabolic health, but no one was actually looking for it.

John Bier (00:34:56):

There was no COVID, there weren’t people that were willing to spend in mass culture significant amount of money every month on their wellness beyond their gym membership and things like that. I mean, three years ago we had a hard time getting people that weren’t biohackers to pee on a stick to see if they were in ketosis. And so, culture shifted while we were actually developing this. And the timing of everything just happened to really, really align. And so, even though people weren’t looking for things on metabolic health, because they didn’t know what it was, they were primed to receive the education. And so, I do think that timing in culture is very, very relevant. And I don’t want to say we got lucky, but I think that everything that we’ve done has been in line with some kind of grasp on where culture was at in terms of receiving that information.

Casey Means (00:35:52):

One other just minor thing I would just add there, I love the way that you framed that, the timing was right and people didn’t know that that they needed this, but they were able to receive it. But one other thing that I think has been a takeaway over the past couple years in addition to that has been that in some ways and for some platforms and for some journalists, it’s kind of easier to get on their radar talking about the problem than it is talking about the product. Some people don’t, I think especially podcasters hosts don’t want to feel like they’re to just help you hawk your product, but they absolutely want to help their listeners understand a problem. And so to position me as coming out there to talk about this health crisis, how it’s affecting people, what the future of nutrition looks like, why personalized health is empowering and may shift the healthcare system, those are sort of in a way they’re going to maybe not threatening, but they don’t come off as like, “Oh, we’re here to sell Levels.”

Casey Means (00:36:55):

We’re genuinely here to talk about message that we are, I think, it’s very clear how authentically passionate we are about it. But I think strategically it’s been helpful for really a focus on those more setting the stage and the interesting intellectual issues for which the product slides in. It fits into that. What’s funny is that one thing I’ve noticed with a lot of podcasts is we’ll certainly upfront talk about how this is not going to be a podcast about Levels, it’s going to be a podcast about the problem. But often those conversations, they naturally lend themselves to filtering down to talk about what’s potential solutions, which is where kind of Levels comes in. But it’s a different framing than coming at it as let’s just talk about Levels, let’s just talk about biosensors and sort of the company.

Casey Means (00:37:46):

And I think in a sense can kind of also allow for bigger outlets. I think about someone like Kara Swisher, some of the big journalists we’ve talked to just talk about one specific product that only has maybe 20,000 people who have gone through the program, can maybe feel small, whereas talking about the most monumental issue facing the Western world in terms of healthcare is a little bit of a broader thing that people can kind of hook into. So, I don’t know if that resonates, but that’s just something that feels like has distilled over the past couple years.

John Bier (00:38:19):

Yeah. We also have the benefit and I agree with all of that. The personalization of the product, the fact that it is data that is specific to the user means that we can provide value and you can’t really take Levels out of that equation. They’re not excited about Levels the brand, they’re excited about Levels the… They’re excited about the data and the input that they… The data that they’re getting from using it. And so when they talk about it, they can’t just going to say, “Oh yeah, this commodity brand.” The brand gets built on the back of the value that it provides. And it’s very personalized, which just hits us in a different way.

John Bier (00:39:02):

Of course, they’re going to talk about the brand when they just got all… They just tested it for a month and they got all this amazing data that super relevant to their life, just wearing it for a few weeks. It’s a pretty special thing. And again, it’s not something that is transferable to every brand. You have to look at what the product and the thing and the stories associated with it and how those things resonate with people and culture. But in our case, it’s very, very personal. And that is just amazingly helpful from a story perspective.

Mike Haney (00:39:38):

John, one of the things I’d love to hear you talk about that comes up a lot internally is how the PR landscape has changed in terms of outlets. So, I mentioned before, we’ve gotten a ton of tier one press, right? And when I say that, what I mean is New York Times, Wall Street Journal, New Yorker, Economist, Kara Swisher. But those all I’ll fit into one specific camp of outlets. And as a journalist it’s where I come from. So, I orient around primarily print or traditionally print-based magazines or newspapers. But then you’ll hear a counter argument from people who don’t maybe come from that space and say, “Yeah, it’s great. But the time says what? Five million subscribers are making that up. And Johnny X YouTuber has a 100 million views of this video. So why are we bothering at all with these old guard media outlets? Shouldn’t we put all our effort into the YouTubers or the Instagram people who have 20 million followers?” How do you think about outlets? How do you think the landscape has changed from a time when it was just purely those sort of old guard outlets?

John Bier (00:40:36):

Yeah. I think it’s a golden era right now. And especially for PR, because if you look back just a few years ago, what you had was print media dying, outlets trying to build up their digital platforms, doing a lot of advertorial just to stay afloat, which would’ve been the end of media in terms of… What I mean by advertorial is that brands would pay for things that look like editorial coverage and they would get these big spreads in the magazine. But people are reading these outlets because of the curation and because of the journalism and because of all that. And there was no affiliates, so you couldn’t really track anything anyway. So, it was looking like this was going to be kind of a dark time for traditional editorial and PR in general. And then brands started being able to make money from affiliate links and so they could keep their editorial curation and just get paid on the back end without actually sacrificing anything or just doing things because they needed a paycheck.

John Bier (00:41:39):

And so, I think… And also in that time, people became more and more and more and more and more and more connected, which we can have probably a long conversation on whether that’s beneficial for people’s health overall. It probably is not, but there’s more media and it is very widely consumed. And so an appropriate strategy should be to be platform agnostic and to really go where you think that there is value in the story and in the eyeballs that they’re getting, whether it’s content create or newsletters or things that aren’t traditionally media. That being said, there’s still a ton of value in the New York times and the Wall Street Journal and fast company. And all of these brands that are established that do have respect, that do still have very high readership, that do have really amazing journalism attached to it.

John Bier (00:42:35):

So there still is that the value that, yeah it’s true. Somebody on TikTok might get a bunch more views than the New York Times. That doesn’t mean that TikTok is better than the New York Times, but I think you’ve got to spread yourself out and go where the story is and where the eyeballs are and not be so concerned that it’s this or that. The beauty of this golden era, is that you actually can be almost everywhere a lot of the time.

Casey Means (00:43:05):

Yeah. It feels incredibly synergistic to me, the traditional media with the more modern channels in the sense that each one kind of taking from the other cues about what’s hot. And just, they kind of feed off each other a little bit. Certainly, people I think in the YouTube or podcast space are going to be following what’s in traditional media and using that as a signal, but also vice versa, maybe more so on the former though. I don’t know how much traditional media is taking from… Well, actually from podcasts and whatnot. That’s a funny thing to say right now since we’re dealing with the Joe Rogan controversy right now. And literally that’s what’s all over traditional media. But it has felt to me like it’s been very synergistic.

Casey Means (00:43:49):

You’ll get YouTube content creators doing a compilation video for instance, about Levels where one of their images will be a slide of just all the traditional print media that has featured Levels. Like, “Oh my gosh, this is really taking off. So we’re going to do a deep dive into my month using Levels.” But it’s almost like supporting evidence for why this is worth talking about. So in my mind, it’s fed off of each other really, really nicely. And there’s something just very unquantifiable that comes from that traditional media being in a feature in the economist or the New York times or Wall Street Journal. Does it drive a lot of immediate sales? Absolutely not. I think we’ve kind of seen that we don’t get big spikes in signups maybe after an economist article. Does it build an ecosystem of surround sound of legitimacy brand awareness respect? Absolutely. And so, yeah. So, that’s kind of some of the things I’ve seen. Mike, I don’t know if you have other thoughts on sort of that type of synergy.

Mike Haney (00:44:52):

Yeah. I think definitely that synergy… I mean, I can say as a journalist, you’re constantly looking for ideas. I mean, that’s all a journalist has is, “What am I going to write about next?” Particularly if you’re not a breaking news journalist, but you’re in service or lifestyle or health and wellness space. So you are absolutely looking at the niche, content creators, Instagram feeds, whatever, to see what people are talking about. And when enough of it bubbles up through that space that you feel like it’s legitimate enough for you to confer the legitimacy of your traditional media publication upon it, because it is something that editors and writers of those think about. The other benefit to those, I think all the things you mentioned as well, John, are true. I think that surround sound of legitimacy is a really nice phrase. The other thing I didn’t really appreciate until I got here is how useful it is even for internal company morale.

Mike Haney (00:45:39):

And I think this can be over indexed on, I think people can get distracted by shiny objects. And I think that’s maybe the downside of it, but we had a recent in January, we had just a crazy couple of weeks where a whole bunch of things hit at once and Casey did a presentation in our weekly forum, our all hands meeting just walking through all of these placements that we had gotten. And a number of people when we got to the part of our forum where we say, “What are you excited about this week?” I was struck by how many people went like, “Wow, we got a good housekeeping award. That’s crazy.”

Mike Haney (00:46:09):

You’re like, “Oh my God, we were in the Economist!” I think that legitimacy thing extends to your own employees in your own company as well, particularly for an early stage startup. Where folks who’ve been with us since the beginning are like, “I cannot believe this company that was seven people, is now being covered in the pages of the Economist.” And I think I take the point not to over index on that, but I think it’s important to recognize the value of that as well.

John Bier (00:46:28):

I think it’s very valuable. It’s about… It’s connected to that whole Simon Sinek thing that people don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it. And creating that type of excitement and loyalty and being part of a team that believes in something, is a big part of that. People are not just working for you for a paycheck. And to be perfectly honest in this market, you need it, because there are so many jobs out there for really good people. And the way that you’re going to keep them, I don’t think is just continuing to give them raises every time they get a job offer, it’s actually getting them to actually be part of what you’re doing and believe in you completely. And that’s a huge part of it.

Mike Haney (00:47:14):

One more thing I want to touch on while we have time. I’m going to throw this question at Casey and then John, I’d love to hear you reflect on it. Casey, you’ve undoubtedly been sort of our primary spokesman I think, to a lot of this tier one press. Josh, our other co-founder has done a lot as well, but you’ve been on a ton of podcasts, you’ve spoken to an awful lot of journalists. I’m curious what you’ve learned in that role, dealing with journalists that you feel would be valuable for other folks starting out in this space to listen?

Casey Means (00:47:39):

Yeah. It’s been a fascinating learning experience over the past almost three years doing this. And now, oh, I don’t know. Probably talking to more than what? 50 journalists over that time and over 80 podcasts. It’d be nice to take a little time away to just reflect on all the learnings. But I think there’s a couple things that definitely bubbles to the surface. One is that I think you really have to put yourself in the position of who their readers are. You are essentially helping this person, whether it’s a journalist or podcast host create content that’s going to be interesting to their readers. And just keeping that in mind, I think is useful, because you could wax poetic about everything that you want to talk about, but I think staying focused and thinking about what’s going to be interesting, what’s going to add value, what ties their topic in with your company in a way that produces something like a really valuable nugget for their reader, is a good framework to go into the conversation with.

Casey Means (00:48:38):

It’s what we always talk about. How are we going to add value to the internet? That is such an important piece to never forget, I think even in interviews. So for instance, if someone wants to talk about out the Levels data set, I think it’s important to talk high level about what a data set like Levels can do for the future of the industry. It’s going to absolutely transform the way we think about evaluating food because it’s the first time we’ve had objective feedback in large populations about how people are responding to food. So that is really theoretically interesting, but then a few really concrete, visual specific takeaways from the data set that they could potentially give to their readers of we have learned that pairing fruit with fat, like almond butter, or cheese or whatever, lowers glucose responses, such that it’s an actual actionable takeaway. Something like an outlet like Good Housekeeping or Women’s Health or Well and Good or something like that. They’re looking to provide those types of tips for their readers that really helps.

Casey Means (00:49:38):

And so taking it from the high level to the practical level, giving visuals and storytelling, I think those things are really important. I think one other thing that I’ve realized going back to this comment that John had made about how sometimes you can’t control what people say. You could have an hour long interview and then it turns into a one sentence quote, which may not even be what you actually specifically like the exact words you said, and that is something I think I’ve come to appreciate that really setting up people for success with sound bites is really important, making sure you’ve got your specific big takeaways down and then delivering them in a way that it’s very clear to the person listening that this is a useful soundbite. So that means speaking slowly, really emphasizing what you’re trying to say and putting it in a package that could just be picked up and transferred to an article when things are a lot more long winded, tangential all over the place, that’s when I think it’s easier for things to be kind of spliced in a way that you don’t want them to be.

Casey Means (00:50:41):

So I think thinking in terms of sound bites. Well, also building a lot of context in the conversation for the journalist, but giving some very clear takeaways, I think is really helpful. When those have been lifted and put in an article, I always feel better about it because it feels like I had a little bit more control. I think just two other things I would mention is, one, I think there’s a lot of utility in having different co-founders talking about different things. So press can be a lot and very time consuming and as well as podcasts and other external facing things and something that’s been nice is having Josh and I kind of attacking different aspects of this. Josh has often done articles related to fitness and sort of he got the CrossFit background. So fitness and technology, he’s an engineer and very into fitness. And so he’s been able to really speak well to that and kind of honed his narratives and talking points around that.

Casey Means (00:51:37):

And I’ve really much more gone in the systems issues, medical, nutrition, women’s health, personal agency, and future of patient empowered healthcare, doctor anecdotes, my time in healthcare anecdotes, et cetera. And because it’s really a skill of figuring out what your narratives are going to be and really nailing them over and over, having a little bit of dividing and conquer has been really helpful because Josh has some really great anecdotes more about the technology side and the fitness side that he can bring in. So that’s one thing if it’s possible for a company to kind of have two people at the company kind of hitting different areas, I think that’s a good way to do things. And I would say the very last thing I would say, and we’ve touched on this already in the conversation is focusing on the broader mission and the broader education more so than just the company. It’s such a privilege to have the opportunity to talk to people who can spread these messages.

Casey Means (00:52:37):

And so it’s how do you want to spend your time with that person who’s going to be putting something out on the world that you get to be involved with? So thinking about it as this is a real privileged opportunity to share what you know about these issues that are facing humanity in a way that’s compelling. So, I spent 90% of my time, I would say with journalists talking about the broader issues around the metabolic health crisis, the relationship between all the chronic disease we’re seeing, why the system, the healthcare system needs to change if it’s actually going to solve these issues? And how an empowered population who understand their own bodies is going to be good for everyone.

Casey Means (00:53:13):

And so, I think just really spending a lot of time reflecting on what do you want published in the New York Times that’s going to help the most people. And that is in my mind perspective, not just Levels, Levels, Levels. It’s the synthesis of where the world kind of, where we want it to go. And then of course, the company naturally fits into that. But I think it’s a lot more compelling to talk about that bigger issue than just always drilling in on the company. John, I don’t know if those kind of resonate with you, but would love to hear your take.

John Bier (00:53:48):

No, 100% they do. I mean, being interviewed is an art in its own thing in the sense that it’s not a conversation in the pure sense of the conversation. Somebody asks you a question, you give them an answer. You do have to… You have to have an idea of the things that you want to talk about and you have to remain completely authentic and truthful, but you also have to… It is a thing that will be published that is going to tell a story about you and your brand or something that you actually also want to get out there in the public sphere.

John Bier (00:54:22):

So it’s not a conversation in the pure sense of what that is. You do have to be able to be aware of that and make sure that you guide that conversation in a way that makes sense for the messages that you’re trying to tell the world and you’ve become, because you’ve done this so often at this point, and you’re I think naturally good at. You are just very artful at that. You have this amazing skillset to be completely authentic and actually tell the story that you want to tell.

Casey Means (00:54:52):

Mike, I just want to ask you a question and get John’s input on this as well. Something that we have really evolved into is really in a sense merging editorial and press in an interesting way. We are putting out so much written content and using those as kind of fodder four pitches and that crosstalk has been interesting. So, I’d be curious to hear how you’ve approached that Mike, and if there’s any kind of takeaways that other people listening can think about in terms of how these two areas of a company editorial, blog, et cetera, can synergize with PR?

Mike Haney (00:55:30):

It’s a good question. I think it comes back to what John was saying before about identifying what story it is you’re trying to tell. And I think you added a nice layer on that with what is this perspective that you would want in the New York Times? It’s probably the same perspective that you want to communicate through your own content that you’re creating. So, I think of us as essentially trying to tell the same story, achieve the same kind of educational mission as just the outlet that I work most directly in day-to-day is the website. And that’s sort of my channel that I own. And the JTPR team owns sort of third party media channels where the story is going out. And the two can absolutely work together. I think where we have a unique advantage that not everybody does is that we dedicate a lot of internal resources to telling that broader story.

Mike Haney (00:56:20):

And so we just create all of this material that becomes fodder for the team. And as you mentioned earlier, the JTPR team is great at doing this at mining the blog, reading the articles that we put out, reading the newsletter, plucking out from that storylines that they think might resonate to third party media outlets. I think not every company focuses their content that way, so if the only content you’re putting out is sort of marketing content that’s pushing your product and you want your PR team to tell your broader story, then you’re sort of doing two different things. Sometimes look, that might be the right way to go, but you’re just not going to have that kind of synergy that we get to have where I feel like we’re all sort of part of the same team we’re just working in different outlets.

Casey Means (00:57:02):

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And John, one last question for you, because this has been something that we’ve really leaned into more in the last few months, which is utilizing our network in press. So, we have an amazing advisory board and we have some really high profile investors and we’ve started working them more in with pitches. And as a way to really help hit areas that they’re focused on that kind of feedback in the level. So for instance, Dr. Sara Gottfried, she’s a women’s health expert. There’s a lot of really interesting parallels between women’s health and metabolic health. So we can form some pitches that really work to her strengths, but that also hit a different press area than maybe we focus on before. So, any thoughts on kind best practices for leveraging your network for press as a startup?

John Bier (00:57:50):

Yeah, you have to be careful. And I say that because one, when you’re working with doctors that have a specialization in one part of something that we do, that’s a natural fit and they’re going to be very on brand because they’re talking about things that they’ve dedicated their lives to. And they’re looking at data and it’s very like a priority, are kind of the information that we’re giving. But beyond that, when you’re not talking about professionals and you are talking about investors and things like that, that can be a slippery slope for a lot of reasons, but you don’t know why someone is talking about you. People tend to… They’re investors, but they might have other agendas that they want to support. They might want to build their brand in a different way. They might have not a really clear grasp of what actually is going on internally with the company.

John Bier (00:58:43):

So as long as you’re comfortable with that person speaking on behalf of the brand, that’s giving someone a lot of power. You are really empowering that person. And so you just have to make sure that you are really, really confident that that person is going to be serving the best interests of the brand and not actually hurting us. The more people that you have speaking of the out the brand that are less connected to it, the more opportunity there is for it to not go like you planned it.

Casey Means (00:59:12):

That’s really interesting advice. I think that makes sense in terms of the people closest to the company obviously, like a co-founder or something like that, are going to have the most nuanced overview of what are the key points we’re trying to get across what’s happening in the company right now? Very little room for misinterpretation. I think when I reflect back on how we’ve worked with some of our advisors so far that’s been successful, I think one thing I’ve really appreciated that JTPR has done, has like really been willing to work with the PR companies or the PR people who are working with the advisor. For instance on a book launch we’ve had. David Perlmutter’s coming out with a book, Drop Acid next week, Sara Gottfried came out with Women, Food and Hormones. And how can we… It’s really more of an approach thing.

Casey Means (00:59:54):

How can Levels work together with this amazing person who again, is trying to get this message into the ecosystem? The book isn’t selling Levels, however, the book is magnifying the light on this topic that matters. And so therefore given kind of everything we talked about in this conversation, there’s a values alignment there. And I do think the fact that Women, Food and hormones, which is all about glucose was a best seller, is certainly in that sort of a way that might not be super obvious, very beneficial for the general ecosystem. So kind of working to support those kind of things that are going on with people in the network that may build the surround sound.

Casey Means (01:00:36):

And then I think in very specific instances where journalists have requested a quote from someone in the network kind of keeping things quite narrow, like asking an investor, an advisor, to give a very specific quote about a sort of specific topic about Levels. Like, “Can you talk about company culture or the growth of your…” Or something like that. Those have been… But I hear what you’re saying. We’re just giving free rein of how having an external person being a spokesperson for the company that could get… There could be potentially some areas for things going in a different direction than kind of what you anticipate.

John Bier (01:01:14):

You guys are very good at this. And usually always there’s a long tail to whatever we’re doing that goes back to Levels in some beneficial way. But this is… I’m glad that this came up because it’s a topic that comes up a lot just with our brands in general, not with you, but a lot of brands use athletes and celebrities and things like that. It’s a huge red flag. Yes, if you use it as a cherry on otherwise really well thought out strategy and that athlete or celebrity is legitimately connected, it’s part of their purpose, they are really well briefed and they have the platform to be able to actually make it something that benefits the brand and not something that’s just shiny, then it can be good. But more often than not what happens is, the athletes don’t show up. They don’t participate the way that they’re supposed to.

John Bier (01:02:05):

They’re not educated in the brand the way they’re supposed to. And because the athletes are celebrities, the journalist just wants to talk to them about the other thing that they’re doing that made them a good athlete or a celebrity. So the brand often doesn’t even get featured anyway, or if it does, it’s a throwaway question just so they could get the interview. And so more often than not… And we deal with this a lot. And our advice is usually, unless everything is really aligned, probably don’t do it. Also, it’s an easy way for brands to cheat. To take their foot off the gas. They’re like, “Oh yeah, but we have this huge athlete, we’re good.” No, you’re not. You’re probably actually in a worse position.

Casey Means (01:02:42):

Oh my gosh. I think we could mine you for these amazing insights for the next hour, but thank you so much for taking the time to do this, John. I think this conversation is going to be so useful to a lot of people. And I think one of the takeaways that I’m taking from this that I hope other people really distill is the importance of storytelling. And that is something that any founder can reflect on and think about. And what is the story you’re trying to tell that’s going to change the world? As you’re developing your product and hiring the engineers and all this stuff, spend a significant amount of time thinking about that. I think the payoff is hard to overstate and is a necessity before really investing heavily in press and PR. So, thank you so, so much John and Mike, and this was really wonderful to speak with you. It’s been a real honor to work with JTPR.

John Bier (01:03:33):

Thank you. And the feeling is mutual. We love working with you and we love… I don’t think we can really quantify it properly that we are working on something right now that is changing the way that people see their own health. Something that has not changed in our lifetimes really, and in our parents’ lifetimes. This is a really, really mass issue that has huge impact that is changing the world and we are just at the very beginning. And I’m just so grateful to you guys and to be part of this team. So, thank you.