How startups can get their stories across to media

Startupidea

First, the why

• You have a story to tell• Tell it through someone else• Independent• Different filters, lenses, perspectives• To get feedback• And share the link

Media

• Channels• Verticals• Geographies• People

Connect

• First move• Response• Track• Follow up

What works

• Respect• Listening• Explaining• Plainspeak• Evidence• Accessibility

Business leaders need to be authentic, credible, interesting, engaging, topical, and fresh, with their inputs.

What doesn’t work

• Delay• Argument• Belittling• Ambiguity• Distraction• Demanding• Abstraction

Do you have a story to tell

• internalised• New• Different• Inspiring• Authentic

Smart world

A smart world is out there, cutting across generations and geographies, horizontals and verticals, driven by technology, willing to connect and listen, see and study, the work of domain experts and entrepreneurs.

It is also open to be inspired and join hands.

Example

Story - Shiva

Story begins

• Even while advising budding entrepreneurs to focus on identifying the right mix of skill-set in their co-founders, Shiva cautions them about some of the common pitfalls, in this brief interaction withYourStory.

• Read on the Q&A with S. Shivakumar, CEO, iSource Solutions, in which he also narrates his entrepreneurial journey, and talks about his recent expansion in the US and India.

Q: First, your story, Shiva, as an entrepreneur.

• I attribute my entrepreneurial adventure to my father, a small-time grocery store merchant, and my unfortunate (injury) sports career. From childhood he involved us in all his trading endeavours. My attempt to become a professional sportsperson and play basketball taught me leadership traits and the never-say-die attitude.

Story of growth

• Before iSource, I tried my hands with several IT, dotcom, HR consultancy and related businesses. iSource was born during the early stages of the BPO boom in India, in 2004. We have grown to 200-plus people with 4 offices in India and 2 offices in the US.

Q: About the recent expansion in the US, and India.

• We realised the importance of the US local partner and worked diligently to win the trust of potential partners. We partnered with a leading healthcare accounting and advisory firm, and incorporated a joint venture company in Florida with local sales and support staff. It worked like magic, and we bagged $1 million worth of contracts in a short span of 2 months, and are working on a $5 million goal before the end of this year.

US, India

• We are looking to repeat this success in the Midwest through similar partnership ventures with established local partners in Chicago and Missouri.

• In India, we have expanded our operations in Thiruvananthapuram Technopark to attract the talent pool in Kerala. Our Coimbatore and Madurai branches are training a large pool of talent which will be inducted into our workforce soon.

Q: On the women workforce.

• Empowering women is the need of the hour. We have been employing an increasing number of women in our offices. We provide free training (on the US healthcare revenue cycle management) at our branch offices located in the Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities.

Q: Your advice to entrepreneurs.

• Budding entrepreneurs should focus on identifying the right mix of skill-set in their co-founders.

• Marketing cannot be outsourced. Don’t try to ignore this.

• Raising funds cannot be done simply by hiring the so-called consultants and paying them. Avoid hiring consultants to raise funds. Do the right PR exercise to attract investors and make money chase you, not the other way.

Telephonic interview

Comments

Ashvin Bhatt · Software Engineer at Persistent Systems

• Overall nicely tied up. Heading of the article does not support article.

Adhithya Vignesh · Technical Consultant at Tamil economic conference

• Thanks for the motivation and knowledgeable insights.

Shares

• FB – 82• Twitter – 23• LinkedIn – 14• Google Plus – 3

To Do

• Discover your story• Narrate it• Get feedback• Refine the narrative• Go LIVE• Face comments, respond, GROW

A few links

• https://soundcloud.com/your-story• http://www.youtube.com/user/yourstorytv/vi

deos• http://yourstory.in/author/murali-d/• http://yspages.com/edit/createnew• http://news.yourstory.in/• http://techsparks2013.yourstory.in/

A 30-second exercise

• Activate your phone recorder• Speak into your phone for 30 seconds about

your work, startup, successes, takeaways, plans

• Share it with someone who can give you feedback

• Feel free to mail the audio clip (or, a re-recorded clip for a minute, later) to me

Another exercise

• Think in tweet length• Assemble thoughts into sentences• Put sentences together in paragraphs• Gather paras into a page• Use visual guides, graphic relief • Put yourself in the shoes of the reader, listener

Johari window - of Joseph Luft and Harrington Ingham

Once upon a time…

• Identify stories about your work that can be told again and again, with different pegs, to a variety of audience, at varied lengths, suiting the mood, taste, culture.

• Borrow stories and acknowledge them, retell stories and relate them.

Thank You

D. MuraliManaging Editor, YourStory

+919444907996 @dmuraliYSmurali@yourstory.in

http://www.linkedin.com/in/muralide