Selecting a PR partner is one of the most consequential decisions a founder can make. 

A strong agency can clarify your story, open doors in new markets, strengthen your credibility with investors, and help you compete far above your weight. A weak one drains time and money without producing meaningful outcomes.

After years of working with founders across deep tech, fintech, AI, climate, and emerging enterprise sectors, we have seen a clear pattern. Teams that enter a PR partnership with the right questions avoid costly misalignment and attain far stronger results. The questions below are not a checklist. They are a lens for understanding whether an agency has the strategic depth, operational rigor, and narrative discipline to support high-growth companies.

#1: What experience do you have with companies at our stage?

The maturity of a company determines almost everything about its communications strategy. Early-stage startups need help shaping their stories. Growth-stage companies need support in coordinating markets, audiences, and internal teams. Late-stage companies need precision around timing and investor communications.

Ask the agency for specific examples of companies at your stage. Look for evidence that they understand the tempo, resource constraints, and stakeholder pressures you are facing. Founders gain a significant advantage when the PR team has already navigated similar inflection points.

#2: Do you understand our industry and its pace of change?

Every founder in tech competes in an information environment that shifts constantly. New regulations appear, competitors reposition, and journalists refine what they consider relevant. No agency can be effective if it is playing catch-up.

Ask the firm how they stay current. Inquire: Which reporters do they speak with regularly? How do they analyze trends within your vertical? 

Here, domain fluency is more than vocabulary. It is the ability to recognize the strategic significance of your work and communicate it accurately to investors, analysts, and media.

#3: How will you measure success?

Good PR does not hide behind vague metrics, even if professionals know they could use them to entice vanity-driven founders. A mature agency ties its work to business outcomes. This can include investor visibility, top-of-funnel momentum, category authority, thought-leadership traction, or strengthened positioning during fundraising.

When you ask about KPIs, pay attention to whether the agency defaults to impressions and generic activity counts. A strategic partner evaluates which metrics matter for your actual goals and sets expectations accordingly.

#4: How transparent is your team structure and accountability?

Many founders sign with an agency based on senior talent and then work primarily with junior staff. This is avoidable. Ask who owns strategy, who writes, and who pitches. Ask how decisions are made and how success is reviewed. Agencies that operate with clear lines of responsibility perform better, communicate faster, and avoid the common pitfalls of fragmented execution.

#5: What is your process for understanding our story?

No amount of pitching can compensate for a weak narrative. Before working together, understand how the agency plans to learn about your company. Do they interview founders, engineers, and customers? Do they examine your competitive landscape? Do they offer media training or narrative workshops? These steps show whether they treat story development as a discipline rather than a formality.

If an agency rushes into outreach without a discovery process, the outcome is predictable. Your messaging will sound generic or shallow. The cost of correcting that later is far higher than investing in clarity up front.

#6: How would you support us during critical moments?

Every company experiences moments that require rapid, coordinated communication. These range from funding announcements and product launches to market entries, strategic partnerships, acquisitions, or crisis response.

It is critical to ask how the agency expands support during these periods. A capable partner can shift quickly from steady-state operations to time-sensitive action, all without losing quality or alignment. In line with this, the ability to manage high-pressure communication is a defining trait of strong PR teams.

#7: How proactive are you in identifying opportunities?

Founders should not have to drive every idea. Strategic agencies bring insights to you. They monitor news cycles, identify trends, and propose angles that position you as a voice worth listening to. This involves surfacing journalist targets and offering thought-leadership concepts to maintain momentum even when internal teams are focused on product and growth.

Proactivity is not a personality trait. It is a standard of work. You will feel the difference within the first month.

#8: What does your media network actually look like?

Most agencies claim to have strong relationships, which makes it difficult for founders to assess real capability. Press for specifics, including names of reporters they have placed stories with recently and outlets that trust them with complex or technical content. 

Niche publications matter in your sector. Tech media is not centralized. It spans global platforms, regional business press, independent analysts, and specialized newsletters. An effective agency knows how to navigate this entire landscape, not only the most recognizable names.

#9: How long will it take to see results?

PR requires momentum, not magic. Some stories land quickly. Others take sustained narrative building, journalist education, and internal alignment. What matters is a realistic timeline and a clear plan for the first 30, 60, and 90 days.

Agencies that promise instant visibility tend to rely on generic outreach or inflated expectations. Look for partners who explain the sequence of work, the dependencies involved, and how trust is built with media.

#10: Why are you the right partner for our mission?

This final question reveals the agency’s philosophy. Strong partners see beyond transactional deliverables. They understand the significance of what you are building, the weight of the problems you are solving, and the long-term arc of your category.

Their answer should show alignment with your mission and a clear sense of how they can help shape your public identity. Founders succeed when their PR partner thinks strategically with them, not only executes tasks. At Mindset, we believe in working with founders who are building globally significant innovations. Your mission becomes our mission.

Final thoughts

A PR partnership influences how customers perceive you, how investors evaluate you, and how markets categorize you. The right agency sharpens your narrative, strengthens your position, and helps you communicate with confidence across every stage of growth.

These ten questions bring clarity to a process that often feels subjective. They help founders avoid misalignment and identify agencies that operate with depth and genuine conviction. 

When you enter a partnership with this level of clarity, the results compound. Your story becomes a strategic asset, and your communications become a driver of long-term momentum.

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