the power of pr: the ukrainian e-⁠residents empowering e-⁠resident storytellers

Maya Middlemiss • Dec 11, 2023 • 8 min read

PRNEWS.IO was founded by e-⁠residents in Ukraine in 2018. Now they're supporting fellow e-⁠resident founders to grow their businesses globally.

prnews.io is a content marketing platform helping e-residents grow their businesses — PRNEWS.IO is a content marketing platform made by e-residents, and now supporting e-residents

We often share stories here about how e-⁠Residency can be a pathway to building deeper connections with Estonia.

Many e-⁠residents who opt in to the convenience of online business infrastructure go on to become much more involved in the e-⁠Residency ecosystem. Perhaps they hire staff in Estonia, invest in other enterprises, or form new partnerships. Still others relocate, some ultimately going on to become long-term residents or even citizens, of our small yet mighty nation.

For PRNEWS.IO the pathway to Estonia has become truly circular and synergistic: They’re helping other startups to recognise the power of Estonia’s success formula, and become part of the Estonia story in their own right.

After all, storytelling is at the heart of PR.

The PRNEWS.IO journey to Estonia and the world

Alexander Storozhuk, CEO and founder of PRNEWS.IO

PRNEWS.IO’s own international story began in Ukraine, however, back in 2018. There, founder and CEO Alexander Storozhuk became an Estonian e-⁠resident. He saw it as a refreshing change from the challenges of Ukrainian bureaucracy. Furthermore, Estonia’s digital-first mindset was a good fit for the data-driven disruption of the PR industry that PRNEWS.IO were creating. Moving their business into an EU member country also brought the global perspective necessary for managing media messaging and content distribution today.

In 2023, the company is based in Tallinn, along with many Ukrainians who have had to leave their home country.

And Ukrainian entrepreneurs clearly learn fast.

“Even before the war started, we had a lot of enquiries,” Natalia Storozhuk, Head of Customer Onboarding, explained. ”People wanting to know about e-⁠Residency and Estonia. What life is like in Tallinn. People can read about it on a website, but they’d rather hear from real people, so we try to be good envoys for the e-⁠Residency programme.”

The team at PRNEWS.IO has found Estonia the perfect place to thrive and expand. Natalia continued:

“We are growing fast. We started with one employee in Estonia, but now are almost 20.”

With their eye on future unicorn status, the PRNEWS.IO team are about to relocate to larger offices, simply to accommodate their increasing headcount. But their new base in Tallinn has enabled them to grow faster in outlook and client base as well, as Natalia explained.

“Before our relocation, we didn’t deal with so many clients outside of Ukraine”, she continued. “It was more challenging for us to speak and work in English. But now, we’re meeting people every day, from Latin America, from the US, from India. And this is also a great base for attending international events and conferences.”

PR and content dissemination, 2023 style

PRNEWS.IO’s service involves content distribution and placement. Their clients can purchase direct slots for native format articles on over 100,000 reputable news sites across 198 countries, without long-term contract tie-ins. They work alongside media outlets on guaranteed publication, while also helping their customers to monitor and evaluate their media messaging activities.

“We help customers handle the mechanics of PR placement in the media, and that is a global requirement today. So, for instance, we help people in China make placements in US media, and vice versa,” Natalia explained.

“We didn’t set out to target Estonian businesses and media, because we know they can negotiate directly with each other. But we have helped several clients from Estonia target other markets, in the Baltics and beyond.”

The ease of doing business in a trusted online environment means that sometimes they get surprises however when working internationally.

“Sometimes we get a first payment from a client and see that they are from Estonia - and then we realise they’re an e-⁠resident company!” she explained. It goes to show that the content outreach and collaboration are effective strategies. Everything they are doing to support international entrepreneurship positions the PRNEWS.IO brand as helpful and authoritative in understanding exactly what their audience is looking for.

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New publicity for new e-⁠residents

That collaborative process is coming full circle now. PRNEWS.IO supports their clients and contacts to embark on their own e-⁠Residency journeys. The programme provides the technical and regulatory framework to take their businesses beyond borders, while PRNEWS.IO ensures their content does the same.

Clients like Iryna Kupchenko, Cofounder and CMO at Bakksy.

“Like us, they [Bakksy] are a husband and wife team from Ukraine!” said Natalia.

They were our customers for 2 years and after the war they ended up in Tallinn, where we got to know each other personally.

“They were in the process of launching their fintech company and were planning to cover the EU, LATAM and Australian markets.

"We suggested they apply for the e-Residency program because we know what a strong community it has."

"As a woman in fintech and marketing, I knew their application would be very strong. And that has enabled them to launch in Australia, so they’re truly a worldwide business now.”

After their own trajectory, the PRNEWS.IO team certainly has insights into what makes e-⁠residents tick, and the factors which unite them, despite the diversity of their business models.

Another of their clients, Volker Kleinhenz, has a product-based enterprise in Thailand, supplying stevia to global customers. Natalia reflected:

“What e-resident entrepreneurs all have in common is that they’re not focusing on local markets. They have a global outlook, embracing a broader view of the world. They recognise the value of collaborating, just like when the local PR agencies understand it when we explain we can help their clients make an impact abroad.”

It’s highly synergistic.

Plus, the circularity of the ecosystem means that with so many happy clients amongst fellow e-⁠residents, PRNEWS.IO found it easy to ask for references to join the e-⁠Residency Marketplace. Being a part of this business directory allows them to continue to offer their services and support to further entrepreneurs all over the world.

PRNEWS.IO for e-residents

PRNEWS.IO help Estonian e-residents increase their brand awareness globally.

A bright future, for PR and content

It’s the rest of the world that interests PRNEWS.IO, which promises exciting ventures in 2024.

“We have plans and are considering a public offering next year in Stockholm or the Baltic exchange,” Natalia explained.

“It’s not about looking for money, it’s about reputation and PR, as a global enterprise. We want to target really big clients, and some of them would just prefer to deal with a publicly listed company. Entrepreneurs and e-⁠residents are very open-minded, but sometimes traditional corporations need to see you on the Nasdaq or similar.”

As a further part of the trust and ease requirements of going global, they have opened entities in the US and Hong Kong as well.

“Top clients from the US would just prefer to make a wire transfer to a US-based company, and in Asia, it’s easier to help local clients proceed with payments in local currencies with local platform options. Like for instance people in China, that’s convenient for them to pay through Alipay at PRNEWS.IO”

While happily based in Tallinn for now, 2024 will see PRNEWS.io travelling all over, to take their message of global content distribution directly to new markets.

Natalia Storozhuk, Head of Customer Onboarding at PRNEWS.IO

“We’re targeting 24 or 25 events around the world,” Natalia explained. “In April, we’ll be at our first event in Asia, Money 2020 in Bangkok. We expect to get acquainted with the local and international banks and payment solutions there. We’re going to IFX in Dubai, for our third time.”

It’s all about anticipating the needs of their present and future clients, to serve them better, and unlock new opportunities along the way.

“We have a real estate client here from Latvia, who is targeting the UAE and is interested in the rest of Europe. So we want to go to conferences to understand what the real estate market is talking about, what they’re thinking about in terms of PR and press coverage. And then we’ll be able to help them conquer those new markets.

“Event attendance also helps to reinforce trust, because the first time you go nobody knows you, but when you come the second time people say hey guys we were in touch the previous year, and it’s nice to see you again…

“I think we can call it all part of offline brand awareness. Because as an online platform, what we mostly do for our clients is online presence. But when we go to conferences, we are showing that offline awareness is equally important.”

Perhaps what PRNEWS.IO’s clients find so refreshing is their clear congruence, between what they say and what they do. Building their own flywheel of brand awareness, as they support and enhance their client’s global content distribution messaging.

PRNEWS.IO is not just adapting to the future of work and business, but actively shaping it.

Through their commitment to innovation, global collaboration, and trust, the ethos of the Estonian e-⁠Residency programme is enhanced and reflected, as they bring further future success stories into the ecosystem.