IAM1204- Founder Provides Marketing and Public/Media Exposure

Patricia is the Founder and President of Pristine Advisers, a leading investor relations/public relations/media relations and marketing firm. She has been heavily involved with working with Board Members, Hedge Funds, Corporations, and Investment Advisors through her business. I have been in the IR/PR industry for over 33 years working for firms such as Handy & Harman, Citigate Dewe Rogerson, and The Altman Group, and have been heavily involved in IR/PR/Marketing/Media Relations/Raising Capital/Hedge Funds/BDCs/MLPs/ETFs and CEFs as well as Corporations and Individuals. She's a member of the Farmingdale Chamber of Commerce, has been featured in and on multiple magazines and newspapers, and won many awards for her work. She brings a high level of professionalism and excellent interpersonal skills to her work.

• CEO Hack: I talk to everybody and look forward to helping and learning from them
• CEO Nugget: Treat your company as a baby, be honest, and do the best you can
• CEO Defined: Growing up your baby

Website: https://www.pristineadvisers.com/

Wikitia – https://wikitia.com/wiki/Patricia_Baronowski-Schneider
YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/user/PristineAdvisers/videos
Vimeo – https://www.youtube.com/user/PristineAdvisers/videos
LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/company/1674911/admin/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/patriciabaronowski/
Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/PristineAdvisers?sk=wal
Twitter – https://twitter.com/pristineadvise1
Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/pristine_advisers/
Blogs – https://pristineadvisers.medium.com

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Transcription

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00:15 – Intro

Are you ready to hear business stories and learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and level up your business from awesome CEOs, entrepreneurs, and founders? Without listening to a long, long, long interview, you've come to the right place. Gresh values your time and is ready to share with you the valuable info you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO podcast.

00:44 – Gresham Harkless

Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast and I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Patricia Baranowski Schneider of Pristine Advisors. Patricia, it's great to have you on the show.

00:53 – Patricia Baronowski-Schneider

Thank you. Thank you for having me and happy to be here on your show.

00:56 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, super excited to have you on as a longtime contributor to our blogs and all across our network are super excited to get to stay across from you and to hear about all the awesome things that you're doing. But before we did that, I wanted to read a little bit more about Patricia so you can hear about some of those awesome things. Patricia is the founder and president of Pristine Advisors, a leading investor relations, public relations, media relations, and marketing firm.

She has been heavily involved with working with board members, hedge fund managers, corporations, and investment advisors through her business and she has been in the IR and PR industry for over 33 years working for firms such as Handy and Harmon City, Gate Do, Rogerson and the Altman Group, and has been heavily involved in IRPR marketing, media relationship raising capital, hedge fund, hedge funds, BDCs, MLP's, ETF's and CEFs, as well as corporations and individuals.

She's a member of the Farmington Farmingdale Chamber of Commerce has been featured in and on multiple magazines and newspapers and won many awards for her work. She brings a high level of professionalism and excellent interpersonal skills to her work. Patricia, super excited to have you on again. And I had that Alphabet soup in reading your bio, but super excited to hear about all the awesomeness. Are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

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02:04 – Patricia Baronowski-Schneider

I am. Thank you.

02:05 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Well, let's do it then. So to kind of kick everything off, I wanted to rewind the clock a little bit, a little bit more on how you got started, what I call your CEO story.

02:13 – Patricia Baronowski-Schneider

Okay, well, I, as you know, I run an investor relations, public relations, media relations, and marketing firm. Basically, I started at a job right out of high school. I was working, kind of started as an admin there. I enjoyed the company a lot because it wasn't like, say you're a receptionist and every day you answer the phone, it's the same thing every day here. It was just every day was different.

You never knew what your day was going to be like until you opened up your email in the morning. Maybe it's a calm day, maybe it's a chaotic day, but you're always. And it was always different. You know, every day's situation was completely different.

So everybody was always on their toes, running around, doing things. And I was like, this is actually a pretty cool job. So I worked my way up the corporate ladder, put myself through college, and just worked. I guess that was a good thing, though, because I worked with so many different aspects of the business where I knew all the ins and outs.

So as I progressed, it'd be, say, for example, if somebody says, you know, we need to put together this presentation and we have this going on, and I need this done in an hour. Having been on the other side, I can realistically say, yeah, that's not going to happen in an hour. It takes x amount of time to do this and we have to do this and that.

So it really helped me to formulate, you know, I guess, a business because I knew every aspect of it. And I stayed with one company for 16 years, learned my way up the, you know, learned every aspect of the business. That company wound up closing. So then I was going to another job. I had been out of the job market for 16 years at that point. One of the ironic things that I found was when I was looking for another job, say, for example, I went to another agency, they said, we do investor relations, but all they did was annual reports.

And I was like, well, that's odd. We do so much more than that. I go to another company, they say we do public relations, but all they did was advertising.

So it was always ironic that I said, wow, we do so much more. So I wound up going to another company, which had nothing at all to do with what I did, but they kind of complemented me to an extent. So we said, okay, I'll join forces there. We'll make this a full-service agency. But I really didn't have much to do with that company at all.

So I wound up working remotely from them after the first two years. So I've been doing the whole remote thing post pre Covid. Yeah. So I stayed there for about six years under that company, and then they were going to be selling their company. And it got to the point where like, okay, do I go for another job again, or do I just branch on my own? And ironically, I started my own company and every client followed me again.

So I think that was a good testimony that they appreciate the work that I do, they value what I do, and we do offer a lot of services that they're not going to get. In most companies, you'd have to hire two, or three different agencies to get what we're giving under one roof.

04:43 – Gresham Harkless

I wanted to drill down a little bit more. I know you touched a little bit upon like, what you're doing for your clients. Could you take us through a little bit more on what that looks like what that process is and how you said the clients you work with?

04:52 – Patricia Baronowski-Schneider

Yeah. So say investor relations, we'll take that for starters. So we're the middleman of the client and the investment community. The investment community consists of analysts, brokers, institutional shareholders, and retail shareholders. So it's not like a company. Like we get a little tricky sometimes. Our company says, well, we issued our annual report and we sent out our quarterly press release. We've done enough. You could do so much more, though.

So every day, what is going on? What's the portfolio manager, what's the management doing? Because the investors don't want to drop money and say, okay, set it and forget it, we're good. No, they want to know that you're not asleep at the wheel. You're constantly involved so that they feel comfortable having invested their money. So we kind of are the middleman. We communicate and say, okay, well, here's what the management's doing.

Here's a new product that they're coming up with. Or, you know, if the stock market, it's like a roller coaster. They go up and down. So when the stock markets are down, you don't want people to say, oh my God, my stock, I have to sell my shares. No, that's a great buying opportunity. Look at the historical value of this. It's going to go back up and think of if you buy, you could double or triple your money.

So it's just constantly communicating with the investment community. And then public relations is obviously marketing a company to the public. And now, obviously, social media has kind of run rampant. It's not just a matter of saying, posting something once a day, and calling another day. Yeah, you can post stuff, but where's the public? Okay, so say, for example, Coca-Cola. Okay, so you have a new soda. That's great. We post that. But what about Pepsi? When they say soda, does your name come on top or is it Pepsi?

Okay, well, do their shareholders or the public know about you and what you're doing and any new products or what the management's doing that he just visited here or you just donated to this event, whatever?

Constantly throwing your name out there and then finding out where are people even finding out this information? Because everything's different. When you think of the audience, there's such a wide variety. You have your mom and pop, you have the younger generation, and you have the technology. I mean, so your message isn't the same. You might have ten different types of audiences, so your message is going to be ten different types of ways and then where to promote that. I mean, it is a lot of work, but it's what's needed.

So that's why a lot of times people will outsource that to us because it is a lot of detail, but you know, that's kind of really marketing to the public. And then you have your media relations. That whole landscape changed. Years ago you would have 100% reporters writing about a company. Now it's like 75% is paid reporting. So yeah, I could get somebody unfortunate Forbes for like 20 grand. That's not the same. Out of the 25% that's left, 15% are your contributors.

Your competitors are probably just contributors to publications. So out of that, you have 10% of reporters now that will write about you. But they're getting pitched all day long. So to write about you, they're probably just going to take a quote. So now I have to investigate who's writing about what. Where do you fit in, what can you possibly comment on? Can I even get you a quote there?

So it's a lot of work and the whole industry's changed. So again, it's constantly evolving, keeping up. Everybody now is becoming a contributor, especially with COVID-19 everybody doing stuff remotely, doing stuff on their own. So there's a lot more noise that you have to kind of weed through. And, you know, it's made the job a little more difficult or a little more challenging, but, you know, nonetheless, it's stuff that's needed to help market these companies.

08:09 – Gresham Harkless

Would you consider that to be what I like to call your secret sauce? This could be for yourself the organization, or a combination of both. But is it that ability to look at things strategically and creatively and be able to come up with those solutions for your clients?

08:19 – Patricia Baronowski-Schneider

Yeah, for sure. It's tricky because my company name is for state advisors, so people just by that name don't always know what we do. So I get bombarded with so many people soliciting my work. So one of the things I found unique was somebody pitched me, and I liked their strategy, where they said, why pay an agency thousands of dollars per month to maybe get you media exposure, but we can guarantee you two media exposure a month, blah, blah, blah.

So I was always thinking, for me, I'm like, okay, cool, where do you post this? And it's probably just some website that they have on their own that they just have a contributor post two articles. So my initial thing was, okay, but who would even go to that? I've never heard of this.

Then they researched me, realized I was a competitor, and they took off. The problem is, that's okay that you did that, but that's where the marketing comes into play. I can post something on my own website, that's great. But now, it takes the job of where do I put it in front of? And it's a lot of work. It's researching, you know, competitor analysis, swot analysis, blah, blah, blah. Like, who's posting where? Where do they find it? Because even, say, investors, there are chat rooms. I mean, there's just so much information, and you have to get that story in front of all of these different eyes.

So I love that challenge. And always the investigator thinks, okay, where can I post this? Who's posting where? What do they know about? Where do they find you? Blah, blah, blah. It's fun, but it is work.

09:27 – Gresham Harkless

I wanted to switch gears a little bit, and I want to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an app, a book, or a habit that you have, but what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

09:37 – Patricia Baronowski-Schneider

I think it is the fact that I'm always learning what else I could possibly do. Like, even with LinkedIn, for example, I'll just, you know, people, there's a lot of things going on with surveys now. So one of the things was today somebody posted a question on a survey. What do you think is more important? Sales and marketing.

So, of course, I give my two cents. But now everybody in the industry is now also chiming in. So now I get to see how they all see it. What are they doing differently? If someone else thinks something different, that's great. Show me why. Because I want to understand. So it is a lot of work. It's not just me every single day saying, okay. It is what it is. Same routine. It's really what is out there, what are people talking about? What's new, what's different? And I want to hear everybody else's opinion.

So they have a lot of these social media apps now, networking things, and some people won't deal with other people because they're like a weird competitor. Yeah. No, I mean, maybe they are, but maybe they deal with totally different types of clients. So I talk to everybody. I'm curious to know, what do you do? Maybe you're going to teach me something I didn't even know about and vice versa.

So I'll always give opinions. I'll always give my two cents on what I think maybe you should do. But some people, I've learned a lot that way. People would talk about all different new trending things, maybe in a whole other state. I'm like, okay, that's kind of cool. And even if it doesn't help me, I'm always like, I think I know somebody that I can tell about that. So, you know, so I'm connecting with other people.

So, yeah, you could just be stale and do the same thing every single day. But I think, you know, really trying to help other people, it's learning what everybody's doing, you know, and educating yourself, networking, finding out who's doing what, who can help who. And, you know, I think it goes a long way that way.

11:10 – Gresham Harkless

Would you consider that to be what I like to call a CEO nugget? This is a little bit more of a word of wisdom or a piece of advice. It might be something from your book, or if you were to hop into a time machine, you might tell.

11:20 – Patricia Baronowski-Schneider

Yeah, I mean, I learned, you know, the hard way when you, if you're an employee at a company, you don't have to deal with some of the craziness that you deal with being the CEO. But I learned the hard way. But I think the biggest thing is I always treat my company as my baby, whereas someone else might see it as a paycheck, and you learn that the hard way.

So I think being a CEO really shows you the importance of what you're doing, because now this is yours. Your reputation's on the line. It's not like if I screw up, it's on his name. I don't care. Doesn't work that way. This is your business. So really going above and beyond, because it's your name that counts, improving yourself. You want to, at the end of the day, say, you know what I did? This is my company. I did this and I'm happy and I'm proud of it. I always tell every client, your success is my success, because if I fail on you, how does that look for me?

So your success is my success. So I think, yeah, just going above and beyond being honest, being upfront, and doing the best that you could possibly be is what really will make you stand out from anybody else.

12:16 – Gresham Harkless

I definitely love those nuggets. And so I want to ask you now my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. We're open to having different, quote-unquote, CEO's on the show. So, Patricia, what does being a CEO mean to you?

12:27 – Patricia Baronowski-Schneider

I think it means to me, really. It's almost like having a newborn. You want to grow this, and this is your baby. You want to grow this to be the best that it could possibly be. You don't want to kind of do a crackerjack job on it. You really want to give it the best you want to. You know, you're in charge. You have a company. You have a value. You want to have a legacy of, you know, this is what I accomplished and kind of like growing up your baby, you know, you want to give it your all. You want to do the best that you possibly can be. In the end, you want to see this child grow up to be this big flourishing, you know, an adult.

So that's how I feel with every client or every customer or whatever the case may be for every CEO. You know, you're really standing tall. You've built something, you created something, and now you want to grow it to be the best that it could be. You know, that's kind of your baby.

13:13 – Gresham Harkless

Truly appreciate that, Patricia, and I appreciate your time even more. What I wanted to do is just pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional that you can let our readers and listeners know and, of course, how best they can get a hold of you, get a copy or book and find out about all the awesome things that you're working on.

13:27 – Patricia Baronowski-Schneider

Thank you. Well, I just say for everybody else, anybody who's an entrepreneur or CEO, you know, like I said, the ironic part was the LinkedIn survey today about sales and marketing. The tricky part is with marketing, it's hard to see ROI on that because it's more of the sales team that you see it up. But, like, I use the example of a shirt. If I'm a. I'm, you know, I just created this brand new shirt, and I want to sell it to the whole world. Okay, but does the whole world even know about this shirt? Like, how do they even know? That's where the marketing comes in.

So you might not always see the ROI on that, but you need that. I used it. The example of, you know, full, full basis to a home run. You need the marketing to fill the bases, and then you have the sales team come in and make the home run. So it's a lot of work, but I say it's definitely needed. So, you know, for someone, it's hard when you're the CEO, especially if you're doing this on your own in terms of, oh my God, there's so you have to run a company. I have to market myself. Social media.

Oh my God, how many social media where am I posting? Then there are blogs and there are videos. It's a lot of work. So sometimes outsourcing is not a bad thing. It's not like someone's going to come in and take over your company. That's what you're paying people for. And then there are ways to barter it. You can barter with other people. You help me with this and I'll help you with that. And there's a lot of people that will do that. So I guess my only advice is, you know, keep on, don't lose faith. It is difficult when you're first starting out to have a lot of things that happen to you. I mean, Lord knows I've gone through it, but, you know, you have a dream, you have a plan, you have a company. Keep moving forward.

Do the best that you can be. Do the best that you can do, be the best that you can be and you'll be successful. And as far as, and by all means, if you ever want any questions or have any questions, I'm happy to answer them. No worries. To get in touch with me. My name is Patricia Baranowski Schneider. My email is P. Baranowski, which is pbaronowski@pristineadvisors.com 631-756-2486. Our website is www.pristineadvisors.com, and again, that's advisors.com. and if you'd like a copy of my book, I would be happy to send it. Just fill out the contact us on the website and I'll be happy to send it to you. And I wish everybody the best of luck. All of us.

15:43 – Gresham Harkless

Yes, absolutely. And to make it even easier, we'll have the links and information in the show notes, too, so that everybody can follow up with you and get a copy of the book here about all the awesome things that you're doing. But I truly appreciate, you know, that reminder as well, too, because I think so many times we forget and don't realize that the people who become successful are those people, as you said, who rest but don't quit. Those people that continue on.

And even if it's less than ideal times, then they continue to kind of march on because they have such a strong mission and vision for what they want to do and also for the impact they want to make. So thank you so much for doing that and reminding us of that as well, and I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

16:15 – Outro

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes Google Play and everywhere you listen to podcasts, SUBSCRIBE, and leave us a five-star rating grab CEO gear at www.ceogear.co. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.

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