Two public relations professionals want to modernize their “antiquated” industry with their tech-driven PR startup, DeskSides, that helps brands get noticed.
They hired a former principal engineer from Meta to build out the technology, which serves as a dual-sided digital hub to connect brands with journalists/freelancers and vice versa. The most recent version launched in October.
“Throughout our journey in PR, we realized we could fire ourselves and cut out the middleman to create a self-service PR system,” co-founder Allison Hogan said. “It’s time to switch things up, and we have a vision for it.”
Kansas City-based DeskSides is targeting small- to mid-size businesses, which often can’t afford a traditional PR agency. Even if they can afford one, it presents issues.
“Traditionally, publicists and journalists have the relationship and that's proprietary. So once you stop working with (the agency), the relationship for the small brand goes away,” Hogan said.
Once the PR relationship ends, it’s also tough for journalists to find the current contact.
As publicists, Hogan and co-founder Blish Mize Connor understand the challenges on both sides, Hogan said.
“It shouldn’t be difficult for these smaller brands to meet the media. The gatekeeping days are over,” said co-founder Mize Connor, who also owns local PR consultancy Blishful Thinking.
Hogan added: “We’re all about smaller businesses and smaller brands, and helping them grow through PR is key.”
The name DeskSides is a nod to the industry term for traditional in-person meetings between a publicist and journalist to build relationships and pitch story ideas. The startup aims to make things easier both for brands and journalists.
For brands, DeskSides offers a variety of subscription-based packages that cost a fraction of a traditional PR agency. Brands fill out an assessment, which includes details about their business, their PR goals and other pertinent information. Based on the assessment, the technology matches the company with a curated list of journalists who cover that same industry or type of business.
Through the DeskSides app, brands can decide who to meet with, schedule virtual meetings and communicate through the real-time messaging platform. They also can upload photos, press releases and other materials for journalists to access all in one place. In the future, the co-founders plan to add ongoing educational content, such as how to write a press release and interact with the media.
DeskSides helps brands cut through the clutter. It’s not uncommon for journalists to receive hundreds of email pitches a week, but only about half are relevant to their focus areas, Mize Connor said.
“We want to be able to give small businesses the opportunity to enter the game and have that one-on-one time, so that they’re either considered for press placements immediately or down the road,” she said. “A lot of brands didn’t have that opportunity to do PR until now.”
DeskSides is free to use for journalists. Like the brands, journalists also fill out a profile to make relevant connections. They have access to the same features and can search for vetted companies based on industries and topics, filter relevant pitches and scout niche stories. And instead of hunting through emails for links to press releases, photos and other brand information, they can access it in one place via the DeskSides dashboard. There’s also an opportunity to make money meeting with brands.
To craft a platform that equally benefits both sides, the co-founders are listening to feedback from their advisory boards comprised of journalists, business owners and business consultants.
Last year, DeskSides received a $20,000 grant from Digital Sandbox KC to build out the technology’s first iteration. The platform now has 20 journalists, 14 brands and a waitlist on both sides.
“We want to make sure we’re doing it the right way and not scaling too fast,” Mize Connor said.
In the future, the co-founders said there’s potential for PR agencies to use DeskSides as a tool to connect their associates to the correct media contacts. A goal is to integrate with a media corporation, like The Hearst Corp., to further scale. DeskSides also has received interest from entrepreneurs, artists and lawyers and plans to expand to that group in the future.
