May 15, 2020
Zach Cutler is the 33-year-old founder of Propel CRM, a SaaS product that is reimagining and disrupting the Public Relations and forcing the entire industry to become more efficient, data-driven, and accountable. To learn more, visit: https://www.propelmypr.com/
You can’t buy happiness, but you CAN buy good press. And, public relations, more commonly referred to as PR, is a multi-billion dollar industry where agencies charge companies hundreds of thousands of dollars in monthly retainers to ensure they get their clients positive media attention. To get your company mentioned in an article by the New York Times or Wall Street Journal, featured in a popular magazine or trade journal, or endorsed by a YouTube star or Instagram influencer requires a not only a great deal of money, but time -- thousands of hours are spent pitching reporters at various outlets in the hopes of landing a good placement that is valuable to you or your client.
The problem is the way PR is done has not changed much, even with the advent of the digital age. The outreach and follow-up process is stressful, arduous, and time-consuming. On top of all that, a common charge against PR from the rest of the business world is that it’s expensive and lacking in transparency and accountability. Proving PR results in an objective way is hard. It can be exceedingly difficult to pinpoint what’s working, what’s not, and why, which makes it difficult for companies to optimize or improve their strategy.
My guest, Zach Cutler, came out of the PR industry where he worked for over a decade, eager to develop a technology solution that would make PR smarter, more efficient, ROI-driven, and more accountable to data-based metrics.
Almost immediately after exiting his successful tech-focused PR agency, Cutler PR, a company he started right out of college, Zach launched Propel CRM. More than simply a standard client relationship management software or dashboard, Propel uses AI and machine learning to help PR teams and companies of all sizes find and pitch stories to reporters in an organized, trackable way so that the results are easy to measure and quantify. Propel CRM is literally changing the way companies do PR, simplifying the outreach process, and making it more efficient and data-driven.