What If We Ran a Comms Firm Like a VC Firm?

SISU: an obsession, a marcomms experiment, and the monkey on my back

Mar 25, 2025

SISU: the manifesto

“What if we ran a comms firm like a VC firm?”

As an academic discipline, storytelling was the first thing anyone told me I was truly good at. I was the editor-in-chief of The Main Four, the student newspaper at my high school in rural Michigan. I entered writing competitions in my spare time. I wrote a novel my senior year of high school, just to prove that I could. I taught myself how to write freelance in college instead of getting “a real job.” Writing evolved into a real career by the time I graduated a decade ago. In addition to freelancing, I landed a publishing deal in 2017 to write a book that analyzed modern relationships through the lens of cultural change and social science.

Being a writer was perhaps the most formative trait in my identity. And journalism was so entrenched in my DNA, it took me a long time to accept that I wasn’t one anymore.

A lot of us are former journalists now. Over the course of the 2010s, I watched traditional journalism falter under social media’s content deluge. Many of my friends were laid off from staff roles. Freelance rates dropped from $2/word to just cents. We had to write faster, and faster, until burnout rolled over us like a freight train. My friends went from staff writers at magazines to heads of content at startups, Substackers, or even influencers. And I used my book to pivot from journalist to tech founder.

Platform shifts create domino effects. As social media changed journalism, it was inevitable that the new nature of storytelling would change PR, too.

I just never thought that I would be invested in it.

My first exposure to PR was, of course, as a journalist – and let’s just say, it was perhaps the last career I envisioned for myself. After years of writing for magazines, I was receiving 100+ pitches a day from comms agencies that wanted me to cover – their product, their founder, their company. I opened maybe 5% of these emails. I responded to less than 1%. Most of the pitches were not remotely helpful, but rather completely transactional. Some called me by the wrong name, others clearly didn’t know what beats I covered, others did not understand how stories got approved. Most were just uninspiring; a few were actively offensive with their lack of tact. (Believe it or not, I still get these bad pitch emails more than five years after writing my very last story… Should I tell them, or no?)

My next exposure to PR came as a Head of Content & Comms at a venture firm, telling stories from the other side of the aisle. I helped manage PR agencies as an in-house platform leader – both for my firms and for our portfolio companies. In this position, with continual exposure to the ins and outs of agency work, I noticed why PR was as inefficient and frustrating (for many) as it was. As a lover of both generating results and saving time, it was hard not to dissect it.

Some of the issues I ran into:

→ Lack of knowledge. Many comms professionals have communications and PR backgrounds instead of deeply understanding a space/sector and its nuances.

→ Lack of strategy. Especially for smaller businesses, leadership assumes PR will bring a strategy to the table. In reality, the agency is often too disconnected from the top brass to understand the firm or company’s genuine business goals. What we end up with, in weekly meetings, is a giant game of Telephone.

→ Lack of experience. PR agencies sell a big vision, usually from a founder, principal, or managing director, and then the account is strictly staffed by junior folks who aren’t yet strong visionary communicators and/or who don’t have strong connections with media.

→ Too narrow. A lot of communications professionals only manage PR and traditional media relations, even though it’s clear that media has moved beyond that narrow view. You need to think about standout thought leadership, social media, distribution, and complementary marketing strategies. PR just means more these days, because we consume content in more ways than ever.

→ Gatekeeping. Some agencies claim they don’t measure outputs or hits, so you don’t know what’s performing – or need to dig it up yourself. Brand is hard to track, so they don’t create success metrics behind their work and you can’t justify their existence.

I want to be clear: Not all agencies are this way. I happen to know several amazing agency founders who are strategic, insightful, and excellent at their jobs. But others have failed to evolve with time, or have rested on the laurels of the big brands they represent for too long.

I was convinced – for VC and startups, at the very least – that comms, marketing, and content needed an integrated strategy. So I asked my firm to let me expand my role beyond content, into communications. I asked myself: If I could build a comms function from scratch, for a modern world, with first-principles thinking in mind, how would I design it? And then I built it, twice, at two firms, before deciding to build SISU: a modern communications consultancy, and what I often refer to as an “anti-agency.”

I don’t think you should be a founder unless you are obsessed with a problem. Like, Cady Heron-in-Mean Girls obsessed—spending 80 percent of your time talking about the problem, and the other 20 percent of the time praying someone else will bring it up so you can talk about it some more.

People always ask me why I decided I should start a company, and the answer is always the same: I tried not to. But I had a monkey on my back. When I tried to build a satisfying career in every possible way, besides starting my own business, besides going after The Problem, and that didn’t work, I knew it was time to start SISU.

I have trouble calling myself a publicist, so I don’t. I can’t seem to wear the label. I’m just a founder, whose problem to solve is how we tell stories that resonate in the modern media landscape.

At SISU, we are creative communicators and macro brand strategists. We’re “Comms in a Post-Social World,” maybe Comms 2.0 (or 3.0?). We want to find your unique magic, your secret sauce; bottle it up into a recipe you can market and amplify, and then help you find the people that will be so grossly obsessed with you.

We’re not just a hammer seeking a nail. We’re a hammer if you are a nail – but we’re also a funnel if you’re a waterfall, a telescope if you’re a constellation, or a bottle opener if you’re a fine wine. The toolset that’s right for you will not be the toolset that’s right for your competitor. If there was a repeatable marcomms playbook that worked for every brand and company… there would be far more winners out there. This market is ever-evolving, and the way to break out will never look the exact same twice. You also need someone who really, really gets the market or markets you’re trying to enter.

The tools in SISU’s Comms 3.0 toolkit include:

→ Foundational Messaging. Your company is the story you tell. It’s your legend. Your reputation. We help create resonant core messaging for firms, founders, and startups, so they understand how to tell their story to various stakeholders and audiences.

→ Trendjacking. We will teach you how to be popular – or just, extremely relevant and top of mind.

→ Comms & PR. Don’t believe what you read: Traditional media is not dead! It lends brands the utmost credibility, and it will continue to have a critical place in this growing content ecosystem – to validate ideas, tell stories, and highlight how companies/firms/people stand out in a crowded market. At SISU, we help you tell the right story, your story, with the best-fit journalists. We make ourselves value additive to journalists in our sectors and bring them ideas that they will love. We also encourage clients to form direct relationships with journalists they’ll encounter often, and we never gate-keep. PR is, at its core, part of community-building for your firm.

→ Media Training. If you’re just answering interview questions, you’re probably doing it wrong. We teach you how to control an interview or command a stage, entering every engagement with a clear, direct communications strategy.

→ Thought Leadership & Content. Owned media is more important than ever, especially when brands own their own distribution channels. It’s also a place to authentically engage with a captive audience and really stand out. We build strategies to make this happen, and help you execute against them.

→ Creative Marketing. We have found the comms + marketing marriage is a beautiful one. We work with marketing teams to build out supplemental events, interactive content, newsletters, and more – and then we leverage those marketing materials in our pitches to journalists.

→ Distribution Channels. How do you reach your intended audience? How should you reach that audience? How do you leverage and tap into the audiences you already have? How do you build out new channels for engagement? We’ll help you generate connections and resonate with audiences across platforms.

Not exclusively, but often, I get referrals for firms and companies that know they need comms support but have also had past experiences that range from meh to terrible. I also get calls when a comms function needs to be built out for the first time—even after a failed attempt or two. I’m really proud to work with companies that want to try again, and prove what great comms can be.

We’ve done a lot since SISU began a year and a half ago. We’ve generated results for firms managing tens of billions and less than $10M in capital. We’ve launched companies from stealth and let our imaginations run wild to defy conventional comms standards.

We launched ATHLOS, a first-of-its-kind women’s track league to wild fanfare landing everywhere from The Athletic to Vogue. We worked with Colin Kaepernick on his new AI startup, Lumi, which was covered in the WSJ, TIME, Fast Company, TechCrunch, and Bloomberg. We’ve been lauded for our corporate social media game ;). We helped emerging firms like ex/ante (Forbes) and Vermilion Cliffs (Fortune), define a clear thesis and POV on the market, and then share that story publicly for the first time. We’ve had clients on TV shows like Good Morning America, CBS Mornings, Bloomberg, CNBC, and NBC News; and on stages like WSJ Tech Live, Bloomberg Invest, Fortune Brainstorm Health, TechCrunch Disrupt, and SXSW. We supported Camp FFF for Female Founders Fund, which celebrated 100 Series A+ women founders at a retreat in the Hamptons last summer. We helped relaunch Stability AI on the Fortune Brainstorm AI stage. We’ve landed clients on podcasts, and helped run podcasts for clients. We have generated deals, investor and LP inbound, worked on wonderful features and insightful op-eds.

As we enter SISU Act II, this is where the whole VC thing comes in. As partners to our clients, we plan to invest our time where we’re strong, focusing on core pillars – messaging, comms, and content. This is by design.

My first hire, Priyanka Suri, a former venture investor (and my old-turned-new colleague), joined me to help make us the most incisive marcomms people you’ll meet in this ever-expanding ecosystem; she leads messaging and ops for SISU. And my second hire was Hannah Stern, who has worked at two of the top tech PR firms serving fast-growing startups; she leads PR and distribution. I will start spending even more of my time where I started—content—while continuing to oversee firm and client strategy across all three core pillars.

We hustle. We’re smart. And we’re story-first. We have true venture capital and startup DNA, and we’re passionate about helping compelling operators and investors break out. And at SISU, we build our comms portfolio like a VC would build its investment portfolio—that means focusing on key thesis areas, and, yes, sometimes taking equity as we place bets of our own.

*An old SISU logo mockup + proof of my master plan.*

We’re also very honest if we’re not the best fit for your company or goals. As Pri and I learned during our time in venture, some startups are great but don’t fit your thesis—or the white spaces where you see obvious opportunity. For us, we see opportunities for startups to fill gaps in the market through the lens of storytelling. We see white spaces for solutions the public is craving, set against the backdrop of the cultural zeitgeist and emerging trends.

Here’s where we’re sourcing:

The Modern VC — We come from this world and we’ll stay embedded in it; we look for VCs that have a sharp view on the market, a right to win, a competitive advantage, or those who are true sector specialists.
New Media — There are thousands of ways to tell stories – better, faster, more curated. We like companies that leverage new forms of media, and ultimately, enhance storytelling. Because stories run the world.
Sports x Tech — With a captive audience craving more chances to engage with their favorite teams and athletes, we’re seeing sports meet technology for a huge surge in new leagues, platforms, and tools to give the consumers what they want.
Wellcare — Healthcare is evolving from treating problems to preventing them; we love tech that keeps doctors ahead of the curve and patients in better control of their well-being.
Commerce — We’re commerce junkies; we love companies that help consumers transact—wherever they are, in new forms and formats.
AI for Humankind — AI works best when it helps humans become better, enhancing their strengths and creativity instead of replacing it.
Communities — Community is the best and brightest growth strategy; we like companies and brands that feed a loyal user base and find more ways to serve them, with natural network effects.

We’re not saying we wouldn’t ever take on a client that falls outside these buckets, just that we have a strong preference for where we—as SISU—see opportunity.

In my heart, I hold two core truths at once: That I’ll be a storyteller for the rest of my life, and that the way I tell stories will continue to evolve and change. So far, it has already changed more times than I can count, from pitching stories to editors, to telling stories to the broader public, to writing a book, to becoming a founder selling a vision, to helping clients connect with their audiences.

SISU aims to be on the forefront of whatever’s next—whatever mediums are shaping the future of storytelling, whatever companies are shaping the future of our world. And we’ll keep evolving our strategy to meet the moment. We want to be as nimble and growth-minded as the startups we serve, powered by sisu.

With that, I’ll rewrite this post in 5 more years. Thanks for reading.

Greatest [Press] Hits

The New York Times: Alexis Ohanian at Seven Seven Six is relaunching Digg with Kevin Rose.
Architectural Digest: Anu Duggal from Female Founders Fund shows off her glorious Hamptons garden.
Barron’s: CapitalG Managing Partner Laela Sturdy lands a spot on Barron’s 100 Most Influential Women in U.S. Finance for the second year in a row.
Adweek: ScorePlay’s tech is lauded as the game-changer that it literally is.
Runner’s World: ATHLOS announces the date (!!!) for 2025’s race — October 10th at Icahn Stadium in New York City.
CNBC (via Web Summit): Alexis Ohanian explains the massive opportunity in women’s sports. At Forbes 30/50 Summit, Alexis Ohanian shares why he’s investing in women (in sports and beyond; an easy choice!).
Fortune: Rex Woodbury introduces Daybreak’s $33M Fund I in Term Sheet—alongside some very Taylor Swift and Betty Crocker references.

Content Stuff

Why BAM Believes in Consumer in Any Environment — BAM Ventures’ Shamin Walsh explains where to find opportunity in consumer and how a firm can win across consumer categories.
The Duality of Infrastructure Investing in an AI World — Headline’s infrastructure pod breaks down how they’re analyzing their investments as AI takes centerstage.
Why Don’t Gen Z Men Like Poppi? — Plot’s analysis of why Pepsi would want to buy Poppi for almost $2 billion (!!), and it’s not because the young men are into it.

Interested in PR/marketing support for your startup or VC? Enlist SISU, Jenna’s comms firm.

Email: jenna@sisubrandpr.com