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Jason Feifer (editor in chief of Entrepreneur magazine)12 October 2023

How to get press for your product

7Frameworks
15Insights

Frameworks in this episode

Marketing3 steps

Manufacture the Story You Belong In

When you're too boring to cover directly, create the news, trend, or data others must cover — and live inside it.

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Marketing3 steps

Pitch the Freelancer, Not the Editor

The hungriest, most reachable writer at an outlet is usually the freelancer — target them, not the busy staff editor.

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Marketing3 steps

Press as a Trophy, Not a Megaphone

The value of coverage is often the 'as seen in' validation you deploy yourself — not the readership.

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Communication3 steps

Problem-Solving Story Over Success Story

Editors reject polished wins — lead with the challenge you faced and how you got through it.

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Marketing3 steps

Reverse-Engineer the Publication's Mission

Editors serve their audience, not you — decode who each outlet serves, then fit your story to that mission.

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Communication3 steps

The Human Customized Pitch Email

A short, human, story-first email that proves it was written for this one person — not a mass blast.

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Strategy3 steps

The Press-as-Fundraising Filter

Only pursue press when you can name a specific business job it will do — same discipline as raising money.

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Insights & moments

The myth-busts, hot takes, explainers, and tools worth keeping.

Myth Buster· 1

Myth Buster30:30

Wire-Distributed Press Releases Are a Waste of Money

A bad PR agency will charge you to produce and distribute a press release on the wire, then send a report showing it landed on Yahoo Finance and MarketWatch. Feifer explains those sites auto-publish every press release, so zero real people see it. Don't confuse 'posted on a big website' with actual success.

  • The press release is no longer the primary unit of press attraction
  • Wire services get releases auto-posted to sites like Yahoo Finance and MarketWatch
  • Those pages exist to dump every release — nobody reads them
  • A placement report full of wire hits is not real coverage

“zero people are going to see it in the whole world because Yahoo finance has a section where they just publish every damn press release”

Jason Feifer · 32:00
#press-release#pr#myth#distribution

Hot Take· 3

Hot Take14:30

Editors Don't Care About You — They Serve Their Audience

The core mental model Feifer wants founders to internalize: writers and editors are not service providers who hand out press. They exist to serve their reader, listener, or viewer. You only get coverage by being useful to that audience, not by treating the journalist like a vendor.

  • Founders pitch as if ordering a hamburger — 'how do I get a feature' — treating the editor as a service provider
  • Editors care about their audience, not about the person pitching them
  • You get what you want only by being of use in serving the journalist's audience
  • Approach with an understanding of what they're trying to do for their readers

“they don't care about you they don't care about you they care about their reader or their listener or their viewer that's who they care…”

Jason Feifer · 15:00

“how do I get a hamburger from entrepreneur hamburgers right they're treating me like a service provider”

Jason Feifer · 14:30
#press#pitching#media#mindset
Hot Take29:30

Most PR People Are Bad — Hire the Ones Who Traffic in Relationships

Feifer says most PR people are bad at their jobs because they're lazy and rely on email blasts. A good PR person's single most valuable asset is active relationships with people in media. Run from anyone who guarantees press — writers do what they want. Hire the PR person who pushes back and tells you your story isn't right for a publication.

  • Feifer has told PR industry conferences most PR people are bad — and they all nod
  • The one thing that matters in a PR hire is active relationships with media people
  • A guarantee of press is a red flag — coverage is completely subjective
  • A PR person who pushes back on a bad-fit pitch is the one worth hiring

“most PR people are bad at their jobs and everybody nods like and they all know it”

Jason Feifer · 30:00

“the most important thing that a PR person can have is active relationships with people in media”

Jason Feifer · 32:00
#pr#agencies#hiring#relationships
Hot Take1:04:00

Success Stories Are Boring — Pitch the Struggle

Feifer will kill a story on the call if the founder pretends there was no real problem. Success stories aren't interesting to anyone; what's useful is hearing how someone faced a challenge you also face and got through it. He expects entrepreneurs to be open about the hard parts, and loses interest if they aren't.

  • A polished 'we succeeded' narrative is not interesting or useful to readers
  • Value comes from hearing how someone overcame a challenge the audience shares
  • Feifer will kill a story if the founder minimizes the real problem on the call
  • Be willing to be open about challenges — that's the make-or-break for coverage

“success stories are not interesting they're not interesting to anybody”

Jason Feifer · 1:04:30

“I hate success stories I love problem solving stories”

Jason Feifer · 1:05:00
#storytelling#interviews#pitching#vulnerability

Explainer· 3

Explainer16:00

Every Publication Has a Hidden Mission — Reverse-Engineer It

The same story gets accepted or rejected based on each publication's mission, which is rarely written on an about page. Feifer contrasts Fast Company (where business is going) with Entrepreneur (a magazine about thinking). At Entrepreneur he looks for a counterintuitive decision that solved a problem — not just 'I'm an entrepreneur.' You have to read the actual stories and read the tea leaves.

  • Fast Company under Bob Safian was about where business is going
  • Feifer frames Entrepreneur as a magazine about thinking, not about business
  • He looks for an interesting, counterintuitive decision that solved a problem in the business
  • No one publishes their true editorial mission — read what they publish and find the pattern

“the way that I think of entrepreneur is that it's not even a magazine about business it's a magazine about thinking”

Jason Feifer · 17:00

“did they make some interesting counterintuitive decision that solved a problem in their business”

Jason Feifer · 17:30
#publications#editorial#pitching#media
Explainer1:18:30

When You Can't Be the Story, Create the Context and Be Part of It

If your product is hard to write about, don't try to be the story — create or present a context you happen to live inside. Feifer illustrates with Fred Ruckel, whose cat toy got no coverage until he flagged an Amazon-to-eBay arbitrage scam hurting small sellers, becoming the main character of a 4,000-word feature. Barbara Corcoran and Zapier do the same by manufacturing newsworthy reports and surveys from their own data.

  • You can either be the story, be positioned as an expert, or create a context you're part of
  • Fred Ruckel's Ripple Rug got no press until he surfaced the Amazon-to-eBay arbitrage problem
  • Barbara Corcoran turned her own sales data into 'The Corcoran Report,' making herself the authority
  • Zapier pitches its fastest-growing-apps list from its own usage data every year — and outlets run it

“sometimes you are not the story but you can be part of the story”

Jason Feifer · 1:23:00
#press#positioning#data#strategy
Explainer1:36:30

Opportunity Set B: The Work Nobody Asked You to Do

Feifer credits his career to distinguishing two opportunity sets. Set A is everything asked of you — your job, what people expect. Set B is what's available to you even though no one is asking. He argues Set B is infinitely more important because Set A only qualifies you for what you already do, while Set B is where growth happens. Nobody told him to speak, get interviewed, or write a book — those were all Set B.

  • Opportunity Set A is everything asked of you; doing it well is table stakes
  • Opportunity Set B is what's available even though nobody's asking you to do it
  • Set A only keeps you qualified for what you already do — Set B is where growth happens
  • No one told Feifer to speak, get interviewed, or write a book; pursuing Set B redefined who he is

“opportunity to set B is what's available to you even though nobody's asking you to do it”

Jason Feifer · 1:37:30

“opportunity ATB is where growth happens and where you push yourself in different directions”

Jason Feifer · 1:38:00
#career#growth#mindset#opportunity

Story· 3

Story11:00

The Hot Dog Vendor Chasing the Wrong Magazine

A DC hot dog truck owner wanted a feature in Entrepreneur magazine. Feifer uses him to show that the right publication is dictated by your goal. Entrepreneur reaches a national audience, so 99.5% of readers can't buy his hot dogs — that coverage would be wasted effort. He should chase the local eater or the Washingtonian's food section instead.

  • The right outlet depends on who you actually need to reach, not on prestige
  • Entrepreneur is national/international — useless for driving local hot dog sales
  • A small shift to a local outlet gives far more payoff for the same effort
  • Match the publication's audience to your goal before pitching

“entrepreneur reaches a national to International audience so that means that 99.5% of the people who would read a story about this guy have no…”

Jason Feifer · 11:30
#press#targeting#publications
Story17:30

The Butter Dish Founder Who Did $10K of Market Research in an Airport

Joel Merzel, who makes a hinged butter dish, couldn't afford a $10,000 market research study. Sitting at an airport gate, she realized travelers had nothing better to do than answer questions about butter dishes — so she surveyed them gate by gate for free. Feifer ran the story not because of the product, but because of the ingenious, repeatable lesson. It came in as a cold email.

  • The product itself (a hinged butter dish) wasn't the story — the ingenuity was
  • A quoted $10,000 market research study was replaced by free airport surveys
  • Airports are full of captive people with nothing to do; each gate refreshes with new subjects
  • Entrepreneurs love the 'there's always another way' lesson — that's what made it publishable

“she looks around and she realizes that airports are full of people who have absolutely nothing better to do than answer questions about butter dishes”

Jason Feifer · 19:30
#story#market-research#scrappiness#pitching
Story59:30

The Cold Email That Nailed Every Rule: Meg O'Hara's Pitch

Feifer reads a real 'good pitch' from his inbox: Meg O'Hara, a Canadian landscape painter whose ski-resort business collapsed when COVID closed the border. Her cold email named his specific podcast, opened with a story instead of a value prop, and even listed problems and solutions in bullets — matching the show's format. It became a podcast episode. On the call, she was openly honest about her challenges, which sealed it.

  • Subject line and first line made it instantly clear the pitch was targeted to him and his show
  • She led with a story and a lesson, not a company value prop
  • She listed problems and solutions in bullets, mirroring the Problem Solvers show's structure
  • It arrived as a cold email — and her openness about real challenges on the follow-up call clinched it

“she told me the story that was going to be relevant to my audience she got there quickly and it felt like to me this…”

Jason Feifer · 57:30
#story#pitching#cold-email#example

Takeaway· 5

Takeaway08:30

Only Chase Press When You Know What It's For

Feifer's test for whether to pursue press at all: treat it like raising money. You raise money when you know what the money is for; you chase press when you know what the press is for. 'I deserve this' or 'I worked hard' are emotional, not tactical, reasons and won't help your business.

  • Don't pursue press without a concrete tactical answer to 'what do I need press for'
  • Good reasons: drive awareness of a new product, or show the market takes you seriously when raising
  • Press is an unpredictable add-on, not a growth strategy to bank on
  • 'I deserve this' is not a tactical business decision

“think about press the same way that you think about raising money which is to say you do it when you know what the money…”

Jason Feifer · 09:00
#press#strategy#founders
Takeaway39:30

The Real Value of Press Is Often the Trophy, Not the Traffic

Your story might only reach 5,000–10,000 people even on a huge site — but that's often fine, because the point isn't the readership. The value is the social cache: turning the article into an ad you promote to a targeted audience, or slapping 'as seen in' on your website. Feifer's own Variety coverage drove nothing directly but is in every partner and advertiser email.

  • Even on major sites, a story often reaches only 5–10,000 people
  • Smart founders turn coverage into promoted ads targeted at the people they want to notice
  • 'As seen in' validation is often worth more than anyone actually reading the story
  • Feifer's Variety piece drove nothing directly but adds weight to every outbound email

“as seen in is probably more valuable than anyone actually reading that story to begin with they probably won't read the story”

Jason Feifer · 40:30

“sometimes what you're looking for is a prize to walk around with”

Jason Feifer · 41:30
#press#validation#distribution#marketing
Takeaway46:00

Pitch the Hungry Freelancer, Not the Salaried Editor

Publications use lots of freelancers, and they're a better target than staff. Feifer contrasts himself — a salaried editor buried in unsolicited pitches — with his wife Jen Miller, a freelancer who has to hustle for stories to get paid. A freelancer is more incentivized to find stories, gets far fewer pitches, and is far more likely to read yours and take it seriously.

  • Freelancers are independent contractors who must pitch stories to get paid
  • They're hungrier for stories than salaried staff and receive fewer pitches
  • Chances a targeted freelancer reads your email are close to 100%
  • Spot freelancers via the byline ('writer'/'contributor' not 'staff') or a quick Google of their portfolio

“Jen has to hustle for her food”

Jason Feifer · 46:30

“the chances of her reading it are close to 100%”

Jason Feifer · 48:00
#freelancers#pitching#targeting#media
Takeaway42:30

Don't Pitch the Editor-in-Chief

Founders email Feifer because he's the most visible name at Entrepreneur and they assume the top person makes the decisions. But the editor-in-chief doesn't source most stories — he works with editors who develop their own ideas. Pitching him is like emailing Bezos about an Amazon order. Instead, find who actually writes about your subject area by surfing the site.

  • The editor-in-chief is the most visible and easiest to find — which is exactly why he's the wrong target
  • His job is to approve and refine editors' ideas, not to source stories himself
  • Find who's actually writing about your subject area by browsing the publication
  • Some outlets have beats, some don't — but you can figure out each writer's interests by what they cover

“if you have a problem with a purchase that you made on Amazon you don't email Bezos he's too busy”

Jason Feifer · 43:00
#pitching#targeting#media#editors
Takeaway1:27:00

Be Human — It's a Human Business

Feifer's closing principle: press releases and talking-point interviews don't work because they aren't human. Media is a barely data-driven industry where subjective humans decide how to serve other humans. Write a human email, be a normal person on the call, and you'll be dealing with a human who receives that — get protective or over-framed and the reporter may write a worse story.

  • Press releases fail because they aren't human; talking-point interviews fail for the same reason
  • Media is barely data-driven — the product changes every story, so it can't be optimized
  • Write a human email to another human, not marketing copy
  • Being a normal, open person on the call is why a reporter writes a positive story instead of a hit piece

“press releases don't work because they are not human”

Jason Feifer · 1:27:30

“be as human as you can and you will be dealing with a human who will receive that”

Jason Feifer · 1:28:30
#press#communication#mindset#interviews