How to decide which story your business should tell and how to share it.

Hello and welcome to this episode of The Unnoticed Entrepreneur. Today, I'm delighted to have Donna Laughlin joining me from San Jose, California. Donna, welcome.

Thank you so much for having me on the show. I literally am in the middle of Silicon Valley, which is San Jose. It used to be called Land of Heart's Delight, where we grow Apple computers. But once upon a time, we grew apricots, apples, grapes, and more.

And you're at the center as well, of course, of innovation, which is why you've helped to launch over 500 companies. And on the show today, I'm going to ask you to share with me how entrepreneurs can get noticed. So Donna, tell us, if you're not Steve Jobs, you're not Elon Musk, you don't want to be on the front and upfront. How does an entrepreneur get noticed?

You know, it's a really fun process. I'm just fascinated with people and their stories. Always have been since I was a child. And I think the first thing is what I like to do is I call it a napkin conversation. You and I sit down and we have a chat and we go through a discovery process looking for something that's like, might be ordinary, but it really is extraordinary. Such as maybe you won a science fair when you were 10 years old, or you were flying an airplane by the time you were 12, or you traveled the world and lived in Uganda and the Philippines and parts of Asia by the time you were 13. All of those incidents or opportunities would influence your lens on the world, your life experience. And so taking you into a journey and looking back and having some retrospect oftentimes will find something that's a thread that you didn't think about.

Right. So if you do that discovery and you find someone has something, but what if it's not necessarily directly related to the company?

Well, one of the things that I find that is pretty common is curiosity. You know, what was that curiosity as a child? And oftentimes as an adult, we kind of dismiss it or we put it in our back pocket. And curiosities around— I work with entrepreneurs who are food scientists that are bringing alternative products to market, alternative meat products, alternative dairy products to market. And it's interesting, they had early days or memories in the kitchen with their grandmother or another family member that inspired them to do something different. that kind of, they didn't realize how influential that was to their journey. Or they were tinkering or making something, you know, from the local, you know, hobby store or in a classroom project. And they loved a particular aspect of modeling or building something and also put that. So bringing an obvious back up front is a little bit of, you know, it's a bit of a, I would say sometimes it can be a little bit of a cathartic experience for some, but I really like to get the entrepreneur to think out of the box. Don't think just about the product or service that you're bringing to market. Think about the experience that you want to bring to the end user or to the partner or to the customer. And think about that, why you decided you wanted to create this to begin with. What was that kind of it factor that you were chosen to be the one to take the product or service to market and be the agent of change? And that's ultimately what I'm looking for is why are you bringing this to market and what personal benefit may it add on the market? So there's a couple of story themes. of technology or innovation. I like to— it's a common theme. The other is the dramatic transition or turnaround story. I was a school teacher, but now I became an entrepreneur. I was a doctor and now I actually want to bring a consumer product. So what made that shift happen? And the other one that I see quite often, and it's a fun one, is the personality of the individual. We have some big personas in the tech and innovation sector, which I work in, the Steve Jobs and the Elon Musks of the world. Not everybody is going to have that same persona, but one of the ones that I think it's very Americana, and I think it that's quite enduring is Debbie Fields, who created Mrs. Fields cookies. It's a very common chocolate chip, American chocolate chip cookie, but the persona and the creation of Mrs. Fields cookies became like the lady who lived down the street who brought you out a fresh plate of cookies. So if you imagine if you're having your biscuit with your tea, but it's your neighbor down the street that made this biscuit or a grandmother, that's exactly the type of really personal story that she brought into the brand. And I think, you know, that, that's very enduring. And when one can bring that personal experience and a fond memory or, you know, incident, you know, in school or college or in relation with a milestone with a family member. I think that's when products become very personal and interesting and that persona can be built.

So I was having a conversation the other day with a consultant about at what stage it's the founder's story that's important. And at what stage is it the product story that's important? And at what stage is it that the customer story is important? Donna, what's your view on that? Because we hear a lot about the, you know, people buy why, customers buy Why do you focus on your founder story or do you focus on your product story or do you focus on your customer story? What's your view on that?

It depends who you're having the conversation with. I know with the venture capital investment conversations, they absolutely want to know who the founder is and who are the people in the room. That often will dictate whether or not they're going to invest in a company. The product and the product execution oftentimes is secondary with that particular venture group, because if they have confidence that the people in the room that are bringing the product to market have been there, done that, they're likely to invest in the fact that they have experience. If the product is, you know, me too versus a challenger versus a disruptor product, I think that's where you really need to get into the enigma of the customer mindset. Focus groups, whether they're, you know, paid with a big brand agency or you accumulate your own focus group and get feedback is invaluable of knowing who your customer is and knowing who you want to target. I think it really comes down to who you're speaking to. And oftentimes, you know, I'll be in early stage conversations. where the founders, the investors, as well as the strategic partners are all in one room. And you need to make sure that you're adjusting the conversation to the dialogue of who it is that you're trying to charm. I'm going to use the word charm, but who you're trying to bring into the conversation.

Okay. So that's really good because what it's showing is that you need to have multiple messaging, don't you really? It's not enough just to have one, you know, who I am, I'm the founder repeated. You need to have a—

Yeah. And I just have So I'll give you an example. I've worked with a couple of companies I've been working with from 3 to 7 years, which in the agency environment is a nice length of time, right? But their original story and the launch story that I took them to market with is sizably different than their story today. And so if you think of it almost like a closet of clothes, you're going to have clothes that maybe you wear year round. And you're going to have clothes that you might wear seasonally if you're You know, summer attire, depending on where you live in the world, your summer attire could be your year-round clothes, right? Say you're living in the Philippines and you don't need a coat, but every once in a while you might travel someplace you need a coat. And I look at positioning a little bit like a closet that you need to selectively put on the things that are going to fit. It's not really one size fits all. And you might need to take off and add on accessories and garments as needed, depending on the conversation that you're having.

So that's interesting, that idea that you have sort of a, as you say, a wardrobe and depending on the environment that you're in, and also over time, you've helped over 500 companies, Donna, with your PR firm. Have you seen some trends, especially as you're in Silicon Valley with this sort of crossing the chasm? Are there some particular sort of tools or strategies that you found have been particularly useful for those tech companies that have been crossing the chasm?

Yeah. You know, one of the things that I like to do are fireside chat conversations with this, with the C-suite, with the founders, if they're still with the company or with the executive team, leadership teams, as the organization gets bigger, at least on a quarterly basis, it's really important to know exactly how sales are, how was customer engagement, strategic partners, any of the good, bad, and the ugly, what's happening. The more access and the more insight that I have to that type of content, the more effective I can be. I don't like to be in a crisis scenario. I like to be in preventative and not, you know, we all, I'm sure you have experienced as well, times where something doesn't work as advertised or customers are disgruntled, but you need to be in front of those conversations. Versus reacting, so I think it's really important. The things that can shift and change, you know, are everything from supply chain to big box companies taking a lead on things that might be sold online, or consumer awareness and consumer behavior channels change. A Zoomer and a millennial shop very different than a X and a boomer, right? And so, in understanding those markets, and if the market I have often had companies where they think their target market is a millennial, and it turns out that. It's not, it's actually an X or a boomer. And therefore you have to change and adjust the conversation into those markets. The other part that works really well is bringing in that same founder and leadership team into the narration discovery process, not on a one-time launch, but several times in a year, looking at the story themes that work and then recalibrating them and coming up with new themes that could work better. So story in BBC is very different than writing a story that could potentially appear in Vanity Fair or Road and Track or Financial Times, right? One of the publications I particularly read a lot, and I think it's really helpful for entrepreneurs to read, is, you know, Wired is great for innovation and tech. I love Entrepreneur Magazine, but I'm kind of a sponge when it comes to world news. So I look a lot at BBC and Financial Times and looking at the columnists in the entrepreneurial sections. And there's a lot of great resources online, you know, such as your own podcast, being able to look for things that are going to allow entrepreneurs to constantly be exactly what we're intended to be, entrepreneurial. So when I formed my business 20 years ago, I didn't actually create my business to be an entrepreneur. I created my business because I didn't find an agency that I wanted to hire when I was on the corporate side. That was my shift in my career was, okay, I'm not finding what I'm looking for. So therefore I'm going to create it. And that is a pretty common theme with entrepreneurs.

Yeah, I'd agree. That's actually why I set up the company in Singapore in '95, because I couldn't find an agency that I needed from my research from the UK. So that shifted my life to go to Asia. You talked, Donna, as well about acorns and unicorns and about, you know, some companies are seeds and some are so quick. Do you want to share with us what you mean and how can a company go from being an acorn to a unicorn?

Yeah. Well, you know, there's been a lot of talk and there's been a lot of books written about the unicorn, the billion-dollar companies, the Googles and the Teslas of the world. But I work with the younger, earlier-stage companies and entrepreneurs. And I thought about really planting seeds and being able to build, you know, a foundation. And if you look at when you plant a seed and the first thing happens, you start, you know, building the roots and then you got to water, you got to nurture, you need sunlight, you need, in some places would argue, you need to talk to it. Right. And as the tree begins to grow, if you plant an acorn, eventually it's going to be a majestic oak. And so I look at the power of the unicorn as being the companies and the entrepreneurs that are actually deeply passionate. Passionate and deeply rooted into the conviction of who they are and bringing their product or service to market. And guess who hangs out underneath the majestic tree? The magic unicorn. So that's, you know, coming from the agricultural belt, I do think that Silicon Valley mystique and the way that we look at products and services has elastized. And I work with clients all over the world. And I think that if I had a visual, I would see these unicorn seeds planted all over the world and harvesting this majestic, you know, oak And from the oak tree comes new ideas and new approaches and new thoughts and new theories. So I don't know, I just sit underneath a majestic oak tree and kind of procure and grow ideas that just be a galloping unicorn. I don't know. I like working with the, you know, the hungry early-stage companies that really want to make and change difference. And sometimes the acorns become unicorns. I've had that pleasure a few times in my career, but I think there's a lot to be said about planting a really strong foundation and And that is with looking at everything we talked about in terms of your customer set, your product, your innovation, your engineering, your operations. And people like us are typically curious anyhow. You know, as a former news reporter, I've always asked the question why. And to the point that, you know, sometimes for every why there is a because I was told so. But I think one of the responsibilities that we have as communicators is to help Help entrepreneurs become entrepreneurial because oftentimes they forget why they even set out to start the journey.

Yeah, that seems to be a challenge as the organization gets bigger. Sometimes the team gets bigger, then the focus can be diluted, can't it? You mentioned, Donna, about what you're doing globally for brands. Any guidance for entrepreneurs that are dealing outside of their home markets? Because with the internet, even, you know, a local company can be global, especially if it's maybe selling an internet-based product or a virtual product. Any experience or any guidance you can give for those entrepreneurs that are going across markets, across cultures?

Well, I think one of the key things is to really know, you know, I'm American, I've traveled in multiple places. You need to think, you know, be very localized and to be able to understand the psychographics and the demographics who you're selling to, right? This is common marketing, but I think you really also need to ensure that the language is localized. And I used to, you know, I talked about Mrs. Fields and their cookies. That doesn't mean anything to a British kid growing up. It's biscuits, right? So being able to be localized and to also be empathetic, you know, what is happening within a cultural set. So things that millennials and Zoomers are very values-driven, a very different approach than Xs. I actually think the Zoomers are more like boomers, which is interesting, right? Because they're like a couple of generations down. But I think we really need to be thoughtful and considerate in bringing products to market and not say, oh, you know, the market will accept it and embrace this. That it needs to be customizable and it needs to be thoughtful.

And what about for you, Donna, what's working? As an entrepreneur, I mean, you've had your business for 20 years. You've got a fantastic client base. How have you been getting noticed?

Well, you know, I started to sit down and write a book and then I got a little stuck, to be honest. And I didn't really want to be isolated and alone in a room because writing a news story, it doesn't seem like a lonely journey, but writing a book is a little bit of a Lone Ranger. I decided to create a podcast called Before It Happened, which is really a podcast around visionaries and the future that they imagined. And so a lot of it is tech and innovation, but I also have Just amazing people that are doing some breakthrough things in different markets and in science and health and aerospace and different places. And for me, that was just an opportunity to go back to my journalism roots and my reporting roots and create stories that might be said maybe at a conference that we weren't having, or at the counter at the diner or a cafe or bistro where we once were going, but we hadn't been going. So I went through a whole process of just looking for some amazing entrepreneurial people that I could showcase their stories in the format of a podcast. And that's been really a great, I'm going to say a great vehicle for conversations and breeding in companies and clients to work with in different categories I hadn't thought of. I work a lot in transportation and robotics and artificial intelligence. I hadn't done anything in food and beverage or science. Plants-based foods or animal plant-based food type things. So that's brought in a whole new opportunity. And now I actually have the brainwaves to sit down and work on the book, which will be focused on how does an entrepreneur bring their authentic story to market? And I'm going through a process myself and you're a writer and, you know, writing can be a wall full of Post-it notes or it can be audio or just old-fashioned. I literally have my word processor and a typewriter and my Office, to date myself, just for inspiration. But the other platform that I think besides podcasts, I think is really effective. And I do a lot of podcasts, not just my podcast, but guests such as your show. I also mentor and speak at universities and I'm involved in mentoring the next generation, which is exciting. And last but not least, internships and inspiring the next generation of interns to choose communications, journalism, or public relations as a profession, I think is This is one of the components of advocacy that I'm really, really proud of.

Donna, and rightly so. And I've seen you have an amazing podcast and I'll obviously put a link to that in my show.

If you want to find out about you, Donna, how can they do that? A couple of quick places. I love to hang out on LinkedIn. It's Donna Laughlin, L-O-U-G-H-L-I-N, and it will say LMGPR, which stands for Leadership Momentum and Growth. And then Instagram, the Before It Happens Show is the best place to get the latest information on episodes and upcoming guests.

Donna Laughlin joining me all the way from San Jose, California. Thank you so much for joining me today on the Unnoticed Entrepreneur Show.

Oh, thank you so much. Are you going to do a sing out and sing the song?

Do you know the way to San Jose? But I can only do the Frankie Goes to Hollywood. Can you do the Dionne Warwick?

Oh, you know, I don't think there's that much difference really. Although Dionne would be quite glamorous and she would— there's a part. La la la la la la la la. Yeah. I don't know. I think we better stick to Rick first.

I think we'll stick to Rick. Donna, thank you so much from San Jose for the Unnoticed Entrepreneur Show. This Entrepreneur Show. Thank you so much. Great.

Thank you so much for having me.