Karla Jo Helms With JOTO PR Disruptors™

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for High Velocity Radio.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here. Another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show, we have Carla Jo Helms, who is the chief evangelist and anti PR strategist with JOTO PR Disruptors. Welcome.

Karla Jo Helms: Welcome. Thank you I appreciate that.

Lee Kantor: Well I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about JOTO PR disruptors. How you serving folks?

Karla Jo Helms: Yeah, sure. Um, we are an anti PR agency, which means we use innovative, disruptive public relations techniques that are based on crisis management methodologies and the media’s algorithms to get unknown companies put on the map with a lot of consistent positive press. We’re typically dealing with companies that really need to educate their markets, because they have new technology that’s helping a lot of people, and people need to know what’s possible.

Lee Kantor: So what’s your backstory? Do you mind sharing a little bit about your journey?

Karla Jo Helms: Yeah, I don’t mind that at all. People ask that a lot. My background actually is in crisis management, and if anyone knows anything about crisis management, the very first thing people do when they’re in a crisis is in a business is they call the PR people. And it’s about 9% of my industry that are really trained in handling crises of public opinion. So these are like breaches, wrongful deaths, lawsuits, embezzlements things that are in the court of public opinion and are keeping a company from, you know, having a good reputation, which could impact, uh, revenues, impact jobs, impact the ability to compete. And my job was to go in and turn things around.

Lee Kantor: So then how did you make the move to this anti PR strategy that’s behind your your company today.

Karla Jo Helms: Yeah I um it’s okay. It’s a great story. Years of doing this I noticed that there was a common denominator with all of the companies that we had helped and turned around. They had, you know, superior services and products and technology. They were growing fast. They had a loyal following, but they were woefully naive in terms of building up a great publicity foundation of goodwill that protected their reputation. So they were very easy to attack by their larger competitors and turning them around, building up a good foundation of goodwill, good works, well publicized third party credibility through channels like yourself. Speaking of the issues and the the harms that they were solving with their technology and services and why they were doing what they were doing and how many people they were helping. We noticed a few things. Companies expanded much faster that way. Their marketing ROI increased. They expanded twice as fast as their competitors and their profitability increased. So I thought, you know what, let’s just take it and put it on the proactive side of PR and let’s help companies build this up before they get into trouble.

Lee Kantor: And then how did you land on anti PR. What was the thinking behind that semantic term.

Karla Jo Helms: We used to get other people or prospects customers people. They would say oh my gosh this has not been my experience with PR. Like you’re the antithesis of PR, you’re the opposite of PR. Um, you know, years of hearing that. Um, we decided that, well, we saw that we were really going up against sort of an ironic industry. Il. Um, as as great as PR is, um, it doesn’t always have the best reputation as an industry. So after years of being told you guys are like anti PR, the opposite of PR, we just rebranded that way because it is a trademark process. It is different than how proactive and traditional PR works and that’s how we came up to that. Our customers actually named it for us.

Lee Kantor: So you do a lot of work with technology firms, um, and new and old and, um, can you talk a little bit, maybe give an example of what would be a traditional PR approach to, say, a launch of a startup versus an anti PR approach to the launch of a startup?

Karla Jo Helms: Yeah. Uh, traditional PR approach is, uh, you know, let’s put out this, um, news that we have a great new company that, uh, is building this solution that is going to revolutionize an industry. Um, a lot of what they call fluffy news, right? Um, anti PR Anti-prom is really exploiting the biggest issues harm, controversy, money wasted, lost that this technology is solving. So say you have a med tech startup and they have a cardiology device that is, you know, able to detect heart arrhythmias in real time in patients and send that to cardiologists. Well, you know, people don’t know that there’s a problem or why they would need something until they actually know that there’s a problem. So Anti-poor would really expose the the time involved in the, the legacy technology of taking that particular heart monitor and having an arrhythmia go through a whole industry of middlemen that could translate it and then pass it on to the cardiologist 2 or 3 weeks later. Cardiologists get it very expensive reports. They see their patient has a heart arrhythmia. They send them to the emergency room, they could be too late. The patient dies. This is a very common thing that happens. And so instead of saying, we have a new heart monitor that helps cardiologists get information in real time, people may not even understand why that’s so important.

Karla Jo Helms: But if you really like take into account why people go to the news, they’re looking for information that’s really going to help educate them and solve their problems. And you learn about the number of people with heart problems. You learn about this particular industry. That was great at one time. But now because we have so many issues with health and we have so many boomers that have, you know, cardiac disease, and we have so many cardiologists that are inundated with paperwork and insurance regulations that they’re not able to get the information fast enough to save their patients lives. And we can tell this story and really educate people on the problem that startup becomes super relative to our economy, to our health care, to health care facilities, to cardiologists. And they have a ton of positive publicity around that. Rather than doing the 70 year old technique of let’s putting out a really good news, fluffy press release that touts how great this company is, but doesn’t really talk about what they’re doing and then how it’s going to impact society.

Lee Kantor: So when you create a piece of content like that, are you actually producing the content or are you kind of, you know, doing the scripts and the messaging and the, um, delivery in terms of video and all, all that it takes, because of the more and more media companies becoming leaner and leaner, that if you give them something that’s well produced and informative, that that gives, that makes their life easier.

Karla Jo Helms: Yeah. That’s you hit the nail in the head. Um, today we have to really help reporters and journalists, uh, do their job for them or help them do their job for them. Connect the dots. Get the sources for the story. Do the B-roll craft the messaging? Uh, you know, you name it. Uh, we have to do that today. So that’s we’re like an extension of the news. We really help journalists do their job. Uh, just even much better. We’re not only bringing them stories, but we’re also connecting the dots and doing a lot of the collateral that they need to tell those, you know, impactful stories.

Lee Kantor: So, um, in your career, I’m sure you’ve seen the media kind of evolve to where it’s at now and how, um, are there different strategies today in a world of Substack, um, versus, you know, a day of, you know, lots of local newspapers and lots of local news stations?

Karla Jo Helms: Yeah. You know, it’s very interesting that you ask, um, but today we’re in an alternative. We’re in a world of alternate media. Mainstream media calls my firm, um, you know, every day asking about, uh, certain narratives or certain trends that they’re seeing in trade publications, industry press podcasts, even. Right. Um, or aggregate. Um, you know, media outlets that are aggregating stories. Um, and so you have this great benefit today to communicate to, um, many targeted segments of the business population along many channels where people get their information. So today, it’s not really like I’m aiming to be in, you know, the top mainstream media outlets. Those are really peppered in, um, where everybody’s getting their information or alternate channels where people are going to where they actually trust what’s happening. And regional media is not that far off, right? Um, regional media really communicates to their areas, they know what’s happening in their areas. And, you know, a lot of, um, like new technology or businesses today that are making an impact in their community. Regional media and community news is extremely impactful.

Lee Kantor: Now in your work with technology firms. Uh, do you work with like VCs do they hire you to work for their with their portfolio of clients, or do you work with individual, um, startups.

Karla Jo Helms: And individual firms and, uh, private equity? Yes, all of the above.

Lee Kantor: So it’s, um, so you have relationships with people who might have several different startups, and this gives them all kind of a leg up when it comes to the marketing and rollout of their startup.

Karla Jo Helms: Yes. Yeah. I mean, look, venture capitalist and even private equity firms, I mean, they they always want a return on investment for their companies. And uh, today it’s a PR world. Uh, buzz and influence really impacts the markets. Um, it can be upwards of a third of the valuation of a company like goodwill or reputation and really guiding and, um, you know, controlling public opinion to the best you can, uh, is really very important today, not only to startups, but those that fund them.

Lee Kantor: So what, um, maybe some advice for the startup founder out there and especially the maybe the tech startup founder who isn’t as, um, knowledgeable about marketing? Is there some do’s and don’ts? Is there some things that you would recommend? Early steps. Um, you know, when it comes to launching a new product, especially a technology that may be a disruptive.

Karla Jo Helms: Yes. It’s such a great question. You know, I have a podcast where I talk to disruptive innovators, um, every week that are building brand new technologies, uh, in, you know, agriculture, education, uh, the financial markets, healthcare and so forth. And I am hearing that they are learning, um, that one of their biggest skills is becoming a really good storyteller today. Uh, the technology no longer or good works, the technology, the merit of the technology no longer speak for themselves. They have to really tell the why behind the story, why they built it, why it’s helping. Um, before they get into the bells and whistles and all about the technology. People today really want to, you know, they buy into the why before they buy the what. And one of the best things that, um, brand new startup founders can do is really craft their storytelling skill and, um, sell the problem that they’re solving. Quit leading with the solution. People don’t understand the solution until they really understand the problem that it’s solving and why you’re solving it. Many people have personal stories. You know the one I told you about the med tech company? I mean, he had a parent that, uh, you know, had a heart arrhythmia, and that information didn’t get to the cardiologist in time. And he was a technologist, and he says we can do better. Many tech startups and founders, they have these incredible stories, and they’re deciding to do something about it. And those stories is what sells now.

Lee Kantor: Is there a story you can share? Don’t name the name of the organization, but maybe, um, share a little bit about the problem they were having before they started working with your firm, and how you helped them maybe get the escape velocity they needed to grow.

Karla Jo Helms: Yeah, sure. Um, you know, let’s say, uh, a company that, you know, there’s a lot of, um, things that go on in our society that sometimes are not, like, great to talk about. Um, it might be considered, say, a stigma. For instance, you know, back in the day, do you know what chargebacks are?

Lee Kantor: Chargebacks for your credit card.

Karla Jo Helms: When you file a chargeback on your credit card?

Lee Kantor: Yeah.

Karla Jo Helms: Yeah. So you get something in the mail or it’s not what you wanted or you did say you didn’t get it right. Uh, it didn’t get delivered right. You call visa, you say it didn’t get delivered. And so they go, great. Well, we’ll charge it back. We’ll give you a credit back on your card. Well, this is a big problem in the financial world and the e-commerce world. In fact, 84% of all chargebacks are fraudulent. But just, you know, several years ago, it was taboo to talk about, as a merchant having chargebacks even when they could prove that they were fraudulent. The consumer really did receive the package. They did send it. Um, but they filed a chargeback anyway. And Visa and Mastercard would penalize merchants if they went over a 1% threshold of having chargebacks filed on them. So merchants were afraid to speak up. Um, and so this was sort of taboo, right? And we had to get a lot of publicity, uh, for merchants being able to speak up about fraudulent chargebacks that were costing them so much just to stay in the business. Right. Um, so much so that it created over a period of a couple of years, really exposing this, getting people to talk about it, show the different states that were having the biggest fraud, fraudulent chargeback issues. Uh, what, you know which gender is mostly responsible for chargebacks, by the way? It’s female. What industries are more prone to having chargebacks? What are things that merchants should do to mitigate this? Um, Visa and Mastercard started to listen to merchants instead of penalizing them. And so what became a profit center per se for Visa and Mastercard that would actually charge merchants to file these chargebacks even when they were fraudulent. It became a cost center, and it started to create an ability for merchants and visa and Mastercard and chargeback entities, mitigation entities, to work together as an ecosystem. That’s how you change the court of public opinion for business.

Lee Kantor: And, um, who is the ideal client? Is it just technology firms or or now do you go into other industries?

Karla Jo Helms: We mostly work with technology firms. Most everything is technology based today. Um, so that is our particular niche. Um, but if people have particular things that they need help with regarding, uh, publicity or public opinion, public opinion issues, we will talk to them, but we may not take them on, but we might refer them to someone in our network.

Lee Kantor: Is it mainly B2B or it can be B2C?

Karla Jo Helms: It’s mainly B2B, yes.

Lee Kantor: And if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team, what’s the website? What’s the best way to connect?

Karla Jo Helms: Great. The website is jetpens.com. Com that’s the best way to reach out to us. Um, and a member of our team, an anti PR advisor or even myself as the chief strategist, we can talk to you and advise you and let you know what can be done to help you.

Lee Kantor: All right. Well, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Karla Jo Helms: Yeah. Thank you very much.

Lee Kantor: All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on High Velocity Radio.