Alexander Lichtman on why IT companies, startups, and investors need to build PR

Alexander Likhtman, city — Almaty, CEO, LinkedIn

About Me

I have been working in PR since 2001—25 years now. I lead the ITCOMMS agency. We operate in Central Asian countries and the Caucasus, excluding Turkmenistan, and primarily collaborate with technology companies, which account for about 90% of our clients. Most often, these are large international companies that need to enter regional markets through a single point of contact.

I also teach PR to professionals and participate in professional associations in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan.

How the PR field in the IT industry is developing today

IT companies are gradually realizing the importance of communications. Previously, many believed: “We build the product—that’s enough.” Now, they are actively engaging in PR, but their understanding is still forming. Often, companies start talking about themselves abruptly and without preparation—for example, buying interviews with founders whom no one knows. The awareness is there, but the results do not always meet expectations.

When it comes to corporations and international business, the demand for PR is quite clear. This function is institutionalized for them: they know why they need communications and build them into every market they enter.

However, there is usually no immediate task to “sell right now,” “hire right now,” or “raise investments right now.” This is systematic, planned work on building and maintaining market reputation to achieve various strategic goals.

Requests for crisis management arise periodically. Unfortunately, they most often come after the crisis has already occurred, making it harder to respond. But there are also requests to develop crisis strategies in advance—before the crisis hits. And that is encouraging.

International companies usually focus on share of voice. They almost always have competitors against whom they measure themselves.

There is no idea of one-off activity here. Especially if competitors are quite active: they need to either catch up or surpass them in terms of media presence and reach. Therefore, for international companies, there is no minimum level—say, “we did three publications and can relax.” Communications are built as a constant, systematic effort.

For local companies, everything depends heavily on their goals.

When it comes to building overall reputation, there is also no minimum volume of publications. The key is consistency: regular publications and a coherent narrative about the company. You cannot present yourself as an ESG company today, a top sales performer tomorrow, and the most technological company the day after—that does not create a unified image, and it is difficult for the audience to understand who the company really is.

Startups, on the other hand, most often come with two types of requests:

1. Investments. Not just “find us money,” but help us pass due diligence and ensure that potential investors know about the company before meeting them.
2. HR brand. Startups want to attract talented people by explaining how work is organized and ensuring employees stay. This request is more common among mature startups that have already found their product and are focusing on team quality.

If a startup’s goal is to attract its first investment, the focus is usually on PR for the founder or the unique technology. It is important to understand that at this stage, PR is not needed to sell the product but to interest investors. Broad recognition is not yet required if there is no product-market fit and the startup is still looking for its niche.

Systematic reputation work and PR for sales become relevant at the scaling stage—when there is a ready product or a tested hypothesis, and the startup is entering new markets.

For example, imagine this situation: I am a startup and I want to reach Murat Abdrakhmanov, but I cannot get through his assistants, secretaries, or inner circle. However, I know that Murat recently gave an interview to The Tech. In such a situation, even a single publication in a media outlet can work. After that, I can write a post on LinkedIn: tell them that I have an article in The Tech, tag Murat Abdrakhmanov, and mention that we are talking about the same topic.

If Murat notices this, if the topic is important to him, and he resonates with this startup’s perspective, then a meeting might happen at this stage. Further communication can continue via direct messages—and the contact is effectively established.

PR for founders is also important for crisis strategy. The Higgsfield case showed that its founders, Yerzat Dulat and Alex Mashrabov, remained low-profile for a long time and rarely appeared in the public sphere. They only began to appear more actively in the media in recent months, after the company achieved a high valuation.

If the founders had been more open from the start and regularly communicated with the audience, weathering the crisis might have been easier. Then it would have looked less like a sudden defense against attacks and more like a dialogue from people who have long been part of the ecosystem.

It is important to create the image of a constant participant in the ecosystem: answering questions, sharing experience, managing LinkedIn, publishing columns, participating in podcasts, and giving interviews.

For such work, it is not necessary to hire an agency or a professional PR specialist—at the start, you can handle this yourself. Professionals and teams are needed when it comes to building corporate reputation, promoting products and technologies, and creating demand on a larger scale.

It is important to create stories that are interesting for your target audience to read and listen to. Then media outlets themselves will be interested, publications will be free or of higher quality, and this increases citability—it is a win-win.

If the goal is to get publications at any cost, and there is a budget but no understanding or control, there is a strong temptation to produce low-quality content for money. As a result, advertising or partner materials often appear that no one is interested in—neither the publication nor the readers.

PR for Investors

The venture capital and private equity markets have become more transparent than two years ago. The situation used to be different. Now, investors also face difficulties in forming a pipeline and attracting high-quality projects.

All communications always depend on business goals. If an investor has no pipeline and no one knows them, they need to build their positioning. For example, this could be a new angel investor who has money and a decent background but is still unknown in the market. It is important to show that they learn from their mistakes and to do so transparently: it should be clear right away that they are a newcomer, their check size is not large, and mistakes are possible. This generates interest from established players who will watch their actions and investments.

If the investor’s goal is to improve the quality of the incoming pipeline, it is important to demonstrate their approach: tell about the mistakes startups make that come to them, explain how due diligence is structured, and why they select certain candidates. This helps startups improve their products and teams, increasing their chances, while the investor sees an improvement in the quality of incoming projects.

The Role of Media and Effectiveness

Practical tools for IT companies include media, personal branding, and community, but there is no single tool that guarantees results on its own. Even major events, such as a meeting with the president, do not work without further dissemination and audience engagement. Effectiveness is formed by a combination of factors: media, bloggers, niche influencers, and conferences of various scales—from local to international.

Events and community-building activities that you host—business breakfasts, meetups, and other meetings—provide reach and engagement because participants share their impressions on social networks and expand the audience. Media can create materials that are simultaneously interesting and useful for advertising. For example, instead of a standard CEO interview for the company’s anniversary, it is more effective to present 10 stories about clients who have been collaborating with the company for 10 years, showcasing their experience and interaction. Such content is perceived as lively, natural, and builds trust with the audience.

Own media turn out to be effective: TikTok, YouTube, columns on Facebook—as expert content, not just SMM. After some time, newsletters similar to Substack or LinkedIn will work well here too. They allow PR specialists to reach larger newsletters with an individual author, rather than through media or podcasts.

English-language platforms show that everything depends on the goal: for HR branding, narrow meetups and influencers are important; for financial goals, business publications and national media that complement community-building are key.

Currently in B2B in Kazakhstan, and at least in Central Asia, LinkedIn is gradually becoming the Instagram for business. And that is good.

But whether media should go there is not a given. Perhaps it is enough to create a convenient snippet for sharing so that materials display beautifully on LinkedIn. This might yield more effect than full-scale work on the platform. I am generally a proponent of the approach: do less work and get more results. Therefore, to the question: “What is more effective?”—I would first ask: “Do we even need to go there?”

If we talk about Instagram, it is quite difficult to make technology content interesting there. The only thing that consistently attracts attention is visual content: for example, videos where various devices are crushed by a giant press, and users just get hooked on watching it.

Aside from such formats, I do not understand how a technological company can organically exist on Instagram. At least, I have not seen examples where a tech company successfully solves its tasks on this platform—if it is not something like Kaspi, which operates in the B2C market.

Telegram, most likely, cannot be ignored. It provides reach, builds community, and allows direct interaction with the audience—through posts, newsletters, and other actions.

But it is important to understand that everything can change quickly. Tomorrow Instagram might roll out new functionality—and technological companies will go there. For example, I still cannot answer the question for myself: do I need to be on Threads? People get hooked there, but the quality and direction of discussions are very mixed.

A website is needed at least because there are people who are still accustomed to visiting it. Plus, LLM models read it. And most importantly—you cannot sell media without a website. You can talk about hundreds of thousands of subscribers on social networks, but people will still look at you through SimilarWeb. If there is no website or it is not developing, the picture there will be sad.

We measure the effectiveness of PR and advertising for clients by its impact on results, when possible. For example, a venture fund had a pipeline of X, and in the early stages, publications—interviews, materials about startup successes, investments—did not lead to noticeable changes in the business. Later, after a year, the pipeline grew by 60%, which became an indicator of effectiveness.

If the goal is specific, such as increasing brand awareness in the market, we formulate it and evaluate the result. If direct measurement is impossible—which is often the case when many marketing activities are happening simultaneously—then we look at indirect metrics: share of voice, interaction with publications. If materials are shared, commented on, and cited, it means they are working.

Another tool is SERM: we look at what appears in search results for the brand or technology. If publications appear on the first page, it means PR is delivering results. Additionally, personal recommendations and distribution via WhatsApp work: if business partners or colleagues send a link to a publication, this also shows real effect and recognition.

Recommendations

Do not engage in PR for the sake of PR itself. Any communications must be directly linked to a specific business goal—to strengthen it, support it, or help achieve it. If there is no such goal, PR activity is unlikely to bring real benefit.