As a founder, you often find yourself juggling multiple tasks, from building your product, managing your team, to navigating fundraising, and delivering for customers. During all this, marketing and PR often fall to the bottom of your to-do list. It is easy to assume you’ll tackle visibility once the product is “perfect,” the sales pipeline is full, or your next big milestone is reached.

But the truth is, no matter how innovative your offering is, people can’t engage with what they don’t know or don’t understand. Many founders wait too long to invest in marketing and PR, thinking it’s something to consider after scaling begins. In reality, visibility and narrative-building are what help drive growth in the first place.

So, how do you know when it’s time to turn your attention to marketing and PR?

Below are five signs that indicate your company is ready for a strategic visibility push. If any of these sound familiar, it may be time to rethink your approach and prioritise your brand presence.

Your message isn’t landing

To begin with, you may want to check if your messaging is resonating with your audience. Do they understand your offering? And is this the best possible way to describe your company? If you are seeing that your sales cycle is quite long, it may be time to revisit your messages. 

If your prospects are left questioning what you actually do, and leads seem confused by your message, now is the time to clarify it. Start-ups, especially in the FinTech space, come and go, but a solid messaging that focuses on your differentiators and tells the correct story can be a powerful tool in seeing the success and longevity of your company. This will also give you the essential tools to know how to position your brand in a crowded market and supercharge PR storytelling.

The market doesn’t know you

If you are not part of the conversation, you are leaving leads on the table. You may often see your competitors mentioned in the press or brought up in industry conversations. If you are not pushing to be part of these, letting your competitors dominate the space unchallenged can be a risk to your business. They are building brand reputation and trust, while you are incessantly knocking on doors and trying to convince people each time that they can trust you.

PR and marketing can help you claim space in your industry and build authority. How, you ask? Both will help you meet your target audience where they already are. PR will help put your name in publications that they already read and show that you and your business are credible. Marketing will help keep your name in prospects’ minds along the buying decision journey and help you gain their trust.

You are relying too heavily on founder-led sales

At the beginning, it makes perfect sense that you, the founder, are leading most of the sales conversations. You know the product better than anyone and your passion is part of what gets deals closed. But if growth stalls when you are not in the room, that is a red flag.

When every opportunity depends on your time and energy, growth becomes bottlenecked. You can’t scale a business if you have to personally close every deal.

This is where marketing and PR become critical, not just as “support” functions, but as force multipliers. A strong marketing strategy educates your audience, nurtures leads and warms up prospects before they ever speak to sales. PR builds credibility and trust in your absence, making it easier for your team, or even your website, to sell effectively.

Ask yourself:

• Can someone who’s never met you explain your value?
• Are new leads coming in without direct outreach?
• Do prospects already know about you before the first call?

If the answer is “no” or “not yet,” then it is time to build visibility and credibility beyond yourself. That’s what marketing and PR are designed to do.

You have a new launch

Your product is great, and you expect it to be an important piece of the puzzle in the market. In reality, regardless of how unique and beneficial your product may be, visibility is not a given. This also applies to launching funding rounds or partnerships. Cutting through the noise and getting in front of your audience is a must. 

Relying on organic reach through social media, for example, is great, but it will all be dependent on your audience size. Instead, you should rely on strategic marketing and PR to help you amplify your message. Having a predetermined plan around content and a press push can have a more significant impact. It will ensure your launch is positioned in front of the correct audience and outside of a bubble that already engages with your company. 

You’re attracting the wrong audience (or none at all)

A clear sign that your message isn’t reaching the right people is attracting unqualified leads, having poor engagement on your various channels, and not seeing any interest from the media. Marketing plays a critical role in defining and reaching your ideal audience. It helps you clarify not just what you say, but who you’re saying it to. When done right, marketing aligns your content, campaigns, and channels with the people who are most likely to buy, invest, or advocate for your brand.

PR complements this by connecting your story to the right audience through industry media, strategic partners, and influential voices that can open doors. If you are not attracting the attention your company deserves, it is not a sign to stay quiet. It’s a cue to get intentional about your visibility.

Marketing and PR as growth tools, not a luxury



Marketing and PR are often treated as “nice-to-haves” for later, but they are the infrastructure that supports growth. They help you build trust, generate demand, shorten sales cycles, and attract the right people to your business.

If you’ve been waiting for the perfect moment to invest in visibility, you might end up waiting forever. The earlier you build your brand and own your narrative, the more control you have over your growth trajectory.

This blog is the first in a series built specifically for founders on how to best engage with PR and Marketing. If this resonated with you, subscribe to stay ahead, or reach out for a free visibility audit by our team of experts. We’ll help you figure out where you are and where to go next.