The Explosion of Public Crypto Companies Makes PR Essential, Not Optional

Debate is a feature, not a bug, of the crypto-verse. So many of the industry’s happenings — whether it’s retail trading fluctuations or implementing key technical updates to onchain ecosystems – are community-powered, and intentionally so.

It’s unsurprising then that this constant discourse also extends to corporate communications services – that is, the perception of how necessary they are. Some insiders, such as Balaji Srinivasan, believe that founders can generally save on PR costs altogether by bypassing news media outlets and directly broadcasting one’s message on channels such as X or Discord (“going direct”). Within a community-based, decentralized ethos, offering stories to a siloed, sometimes walled-off media outlet can seem inconsistent with the larger crypto industry.

To be fair, there is substance to this argument in certain cases, such as when a project is in its early days or relates to token launches, where community proximity is paramount. But on the whole, this perspective does not hold water. Crypto’s recent capital markets boom now necessitates “Boring old PR”: negotiating exclusives with reporters, writing press releases, building editorial relationships, and all the activity that accompanies it.

2025, in part sparked by the friendly regulatory posture of the Trump administration, has seen a surge of crypto companies, including Circle and various treasury strategy vehicles, entering the public markets. Just this year, Coinbase became the first pure-play crypto company to ever join the S&P 500. It is no mistake then that crypto companies like Coinbase, which were comparatively early in going public, have some of the more robust PR infrastructures in place in the industry.

In part, this is because there’s a clear investor relations need that is both tactical and strategic in nature. We are witnessing a surge in crypto companies preparing for IPOs and conducting reverse mergers to take advantage of the current regulatory climate. With expanding investor interest in crypto, it’s not just disclosure requirements; there is also a competitive imperative to drive short-term stock performance as well as long-term trust and credibility in the attempt to appeal to retail and institutional investors alike.

An essential means of achieving this is engaging with a variety of media outlets that serve as trusted and vetted third-party sources of truth.

The “Magnificent Seven” crypto trade outlets – Bitcoin Magazine, Blockworks, CoinDesk, Cointelegraph, Decrypt, DL News and The Block (not to mention others) – are powerful news outlets when it comes to moving public market sentiment. Combined, they reach millions of monthly readers and have their own dedicated social followings (for example, CoinDesk has approximately 3.3M X followers). They also don’t just report the news, but host major convening events, such as Consensus and Digital Asset Summit, and feature marquee podcasts such as Empire and The Scoop.

Furthermore, their core readership (and followership, for that matter) is loyal and intensely involved. Unlike other sectors, where we may see sporadic reader engagement with articles, crypto retail audiences voraciously consume, share and comment on news articles within the broader community, 24/7. On the right day and under the right circumstances, an article from CoinDesk can make a company stock go parabolic.

But you can’t put all of your eggs in this trade media basket. Retail crypto investors can be incredibly volatile, with dramatic and rapid sentiment swings. That’s where the more TradFi publications come into play, especially for publicly traded firms. Think The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg News and Fox Business. Working with this group of publications helps to build a diverse, robust following of retail and institutional investors as well as other audiences such as analysts and regulators.

This is where going it alone may not make sense. And we should also not forget that there are some companies and individuals without robust social followings who need media exposure to build them from the ground up.

Finally, it should be mentioned that there has been a substantial increase in the quality of PR services rendered to crypto companies over the last decade, as the crypto comms professional pool has increased, and overall subject matter expertise has deepened.

In this new reality, PR services, both from in-house and external agency professionals, are now essential, not optional. Public markets crypto incumbents and newcomers alike will swiftly find themselves in an arms race for top corporate communications talent. Because just like talent, the general attention of the press, even when initially plentiful, inevitably becomes scarce, and must be fought for. Some might push back, but overall, it’s a sign that the crypto industry continues to evolve and mature.