Sesame Summit 2026 – application open

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Joanna Kirk


Correction/Clarification from Episode 004: Speaking off the cuff, I referenced a plague decimating the Native American peoples, when it fact, the original root cause can be traced back to Mass Genocide.


This week, I sat down with PR strategist, advisor and community builder, Joanna Kirk. Her track record includes clients such as Atomico, Station F, The ChangeNow Summit, Founders Factory, Made.com, Wirecard, and Ouishare Fest. To name a few.

Selected – The Sesamers Podcast – Episode 005 Show Notes

2:13 – Dan Speaks in French while introducing Joanna

3:08 – What Joanna has been up to

5:00 – Homeschooling. Do parents have a much deeper appreciation for teachers?

6:17 – Joanna’s “Other”

8:47 – “Hey Google, STOP!” And the longest and shortest stages of The Tour de France

10:00 – What is PR, and why do I need it?

11:50 – Dan makes people cry

13:45 – It’s all about perception

14:00 – PR is very human

14:25 – The journalist decides where the story is

14:43 – Not all brands are not in the right position for media

15:12 – How’s that whole handling his own PR for Telsa working out for Elon?

15:57 – PR is never the same. You never have the same ingredients

16:15 – What to be on the lookout for when you’re shopping for PR

18:20 – Red Flags

21:20 – Journalists are a fickle bunch

21:48 – Break

22:30 – Stopping PR? Why?

25:00 – The vaccine is on the way

25:20 – Why should I be doing PR now more than ever?

26:04 – New formats of content be launched

27:05 – It’s a tough time for media

27:56 – Tying things back to everyone’s “Other”

28:25 – Change can be good

29:44 – Horror Stories

31:20 – Random people to fill the space

31:30 – You’re a journalist! And YOU’RE a Journalist!

31:47 – A positive PR story

33:55 – Dan sings Roger Daltrey

34:15 – Joanna takes us out

34:49 – This has been the Selected Podcast; I AM your host Dan Taylor; and I. Am. Outta here.

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Last week, I spent three days at Bits and Pretzels in Munich — a startup-focused event with a distinctly Bavarian flavor. Think Oktoberfest meets startup conference, complete with dirndls, lederhosen, and more beer than you might expect. As someone building an AI-powered event platform, I went in with a specific mission: Observe how startups actually market themselves at events. Here’s what I discovered: GoodBytz: The power of good demos What they did: Robotics startup GoodBytz set up a booth where its robots prepared kaiserschmarrn (a traditional German dessert) all day long. Why it worked: Nothing beats seeing a product in action. While other booths had brochures and demos, GoodBytz’s robots were actually cooking. The smell, the movement and the end result stirred together an experience that people will remember and talk about. The lesson: If you have a physical product, show it in action. The old writing adage generalizes well: Show, don’t tell.  Let people see, hear and touch the product. WeRoad: The bathroom hack What they did: Posted “Missing Investor” flyers in bathroom stalls with QR codes pointing to their website. Why it worked: Pure genius. Every startup at the event was looking for investors, but the “Missing Investor” headline, while a bit on the nose, proved irresistible. Plus, bathroom stalls are one of the few places where people have 30 seconds to actually read something. The lesson: Think about where your target audience’s attention will remain undivided. Sometimes, the most effective marketing leverages the most unexpected places. Emqopter: Visual impact matters What they did: Designed a bright orange booth that displayed their drone prominently. Why it worked: In a sea of grey, white, beige and brown, Emqopter’s bright orange booth was impossible to overlook. The drone was real, too, and proved a real conversation starter. The lesson: Your booth is competing with hundreds of others. Make it visually distinctive and ensure your product is the hero. Quests: Community building using the product What they did: Created a busy, branded booth with accessories (toy car, traffic cones, a bulletin board) and used their anti-loneliness app to build communities among founders at the event. Why it worked: Quests used their product to solve a real problem right at the event, and the busy booth design generated energy and curiosity. The lesson: Use your product to solve a problem at the event — if it’s possible, of course. Demonstrate your value in real time. Dyno: Event-themed marketing What they did: Distributed branded electrolyte packs with the tagline “Your hangover ends. Your pension lasts – with Dyno.” Why it worked: Dyno aligned its messaging perfectly with the Oktoberfest theme. Every attendee was thinking about beer and hangovers, so Dyno’s goodies were quite relevant. The tagline was clever, memorable, and directly addressed a pain point most people at the event might have to deal with later. The lesson: Tailor your marketing to the event’s theme and culture. The more you tie your messaging and product to the context, the more memorable you become. So, what did I learn? Event marketing is about more than just showing up and setting up a booth; you have to understand your audience and create experiences that people will remember. Here’s what really struck me: most startups and even big companies don’t know how to leverage events properly. They book the booth, show up and hope for the best; maybe they bring some branded pens and a pop-up banner. Then they’ll go back home and wonder why they spent €5,000 in exchange for 50 business cards that never convert. The startups that stood out at Bits and Pretzels understand something fundamental: event ROI isn’t about booth size or location; it’s about strategy, creativity and planning. None of the startups above improvised on-site, or planned something the night before the event in their hotel rooms. They laid everything out 4-6 weeks before the event. A solid pre-event strategy is what separates successful event marketing from expensive booth rental.  But what matters most for early-stage startups is that you don’t need a massive budget to stand out. WeRoad’s bathroom stall hack probably cost €50 to print the flyers. A standard booth package at Bits and Pretzels would go for €3,000 to €5,500. The ROI difference is staggering when you compare the cost per meaningful conversation. That’s the difference between simply spending money and investing smartly. Building Sesamers has taught me that helping startups find the right events is only half the equation. The other half is helping them understand how to maximize ROI once they’re there. Good props aren’t a marketing expense; they’re opportunities to meet customers, investors and partners, and strike up engaging conversations.

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