EcstaSHE Spotlight: Candice Teo
In this latest EcstaSHE interview, we spoke with Candice Teo, an executive PR and communications strategist with 20 years of experience building brands, narratives, and thought leadership across global markets. Since 2017, she has been at the forefront of Web3 PR and comms, operating across consulting and senior leadership in-house roles. Read on for Candice's thoughts on PR and AI, her business tips, and how Web2 best practices can help the longer-term positioning of the industry.
At Thrilld Labs, we believe that the future of Web3 is built thanks to connectivity and collaboration. That’s why we launched EcstaSHE, a business community for female Web3 professionals, leaders, and execs. Through the EcstaSHE interview, we feature women in our network who are building the future of Web3, sharing their thoughts on the industry, career tips and other learnings.
In this latest interview, we spoke with Candice Teo, an executive PR and communications strategist with 20 years of experience building brands, narratives, and thought leadership across global markets. Since 2017, she has been at the forefront of Web3 PR and comms, operating across consulting and senior leadership in-house roles. She is currently an independent principal consultant and fractional senior communications leader for ambitious Web3 organisations navigating complex ecosystems.
In her work, Candice helps companies bridge the gap between traditional finance and the evolving digital asset landscape, making her a trusted partner for organisations seeking institutional-grade communications. Additionally, she brings deep expertise in privacy, responsible sourcing, climate action, and DeFi, developed through her work with purpose-driven companies.
Prior to Web3, Candice spent over a decade in senior communications roles at public-listed companies across Australia, France, Singapore, and the U.S, developing expertise in integrated PR, brand strategy, and cross-market communications at scale.
Read more about what Candice is currently working on, her thoughts on PR and what changes are needed in the Web3 space below.
What are you currently building or working on within the Web3 space?
I run strategic PR and communications for companies who want to drive awareness of their work and global impact, and for C-level leaders to build their profiles and establish their reputation as subject matter experts.
This comes in various work streams, beginning with establishing a company’s overall messaging and narrative, and moving to planning PR campaigns, executing them, and managing the press office work for media and investor relations. These all have to relate back to business objectives and defined priorities. It’s all about communicating what the company is building and why it matters. They say that “If you build it, they will come,” but I don’t believe they will if they don’t know about it!
What’s the biggest misconception other people might have about your work, or about comms, PR and branding in our industry?
Besides the long-held misconception that PR and communications are the same as marketing, a more recent contender is that AI can replace PR and communications.
AI platforms are actually now part of the list of targeted channels for PR strategy, alongside media and search engines, where audiences can discover brands and expert commentary. These all require an integrated approach with PR, communications, brand and marketing. Establishing a pattern is how we’ve always built human ‘top of mind’ and it works the same for AI.
PRs largely focus on earned media to build awareness, reputation and credibility. The playbook isn’t new as it mirrors the solid PR approach that I’ve always worked on, just applied differently. Earned PR coverage is a large part of building search authority for both SEO (Google ranking) and AEO (AI citation). This is dependent on solid foundational communications work.
One cannot use AI to replace your voice and expect to build genuine credibility.
Setting aside the fact that LLMs still have a way to go in terms of churning out accurate and updated information, the masses are taking delight in identifying ‘AI slop’ and ranting against it. This signals distrust in the brand or personality who obviously demonstrate a lazy approach in the use of AI. As such, using AI generated content wholesale may render a negative reputational hit with audiences, as they can tell there wasn’t more work put in beyond a couple of prompts and copy/paste. Solid communications work can be enhanced using AI platforms but it still requires an experienced communications strategist to adapt as businesses evolve and the news cycle changes.
In addition, a large aspect of work still needs to be executed by the PR professional: the basics, like knowing immediately which journalist to reach out to and which channel of communication a specific journalist prefers for outreach. Some mainstream journalists still operate on the traditional process where they want a phone number to call. Thankfully in Web3, we can drop a Signal or Telegram message. Knowing these nuances are the results of actual relationship building by humans, something that no prompt can replicate.
What’s the most valuable business tip you’ve learned, and how has it influenced your growth?
I’ve worked in industries that seem very different but they all operate with trust requirements that are high stakes, carrying significant reputation risk. Markets change, technologies evolve, regulations turn. So I’ve learnt that prioritising long-term credibility is more important than short-term growth metrics.
Trust is a business asset.
So building trust, managing expectations and engaging in genuine relationship building are key to a sustainable and successful business. When circumstances change or a crisis happens, it determines whether your customers/clients, partners, journalists and even employees will give you the benefit of the doubt, or go straight to assuming bad faith.
This has influenced me in the way I approach my clients, leadership, teammates, direct reports, media and all other stakeholders. I invest time and effort to ensure there is a fit in work ethics, and then understand the company vision, technology, products and brand values. I ask uncomfortable questions when necessary and drive open discussions when tricky situations are pre-empted.
This way, my outcomes and deliverables are what I truly believe in. This has allowed me to successfully navigate steep learning curves time and again, to be effective across different sectors. It has also contributed to my growth into leadership and a trusted partner to executives and media.
What change(s) would you like to see in the Web3 industry, like asap?
The headlines need to move away from purely focusing on price action. There is a lot of good and impactful work that is being done in our sector using one or more emerging technologies that deserves the spotlight. Growing institutional interest is not a price event, rather it is about longer-term positioning and diversification, so constantly bringing the casino speculative side of the industry to the forefront is damaging in the long run.
Investors and founders need to look beyond finance-centric use cases. Neglecting non-financial and public sector use cases is neglecting a massive number of emerging tech applications that have a positive economic, societal or environmental impact on the world.
Relevant Web2 best practices do have their place in our industry. Founders and leaders should learn and apply these practices, to scale their business and products in a sustainable manner. While there is still space for experimentation, there are priorities that need to be on the list like minimising employee (the good ones) turnover and maximising sustainable revenue.
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Thank you, Candice!
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Web3 is bringing about a new world. What kind of world? An open, decentralized space where trustless tech thrives, individuals innovate, and communities continue to collaborate, we’d argue with some added alliteration.
Women like Candice are leading the way. We want you to join us in building that future. Whether you’re just starting out or are already in the space for a decade, EcstaSHE offers a space to connect, collaborate, and share in opportunity.
To read more on how Web3 is bringing new opportunities for women, and we might even add, brings about Fifth Wave of Feminism… check out our article here → Women + Web3: About a Merit-Based Space, Some Systemic Challenges, & a Fifth Wave of Feminism.
Join EcstaSHE
EcstaSHE seeks to connect action-oriented, professional female decision-makers in and around Web3 to enable networking and business collaborations. To this end, EcstaSHE offers regular sessions with panel discussions or fire chats, a siloed networking environment, newsletters, and other growth possibilities.
EcstaSHE members get prioritized access to conference tickets where Thrilld Labs provides giveaways. We also actively build speaking gigs, interviews, and business opportunities (at times) provided by our partners, whilst we also publish articles about business topics. We welcome women from diverse backgrounds, experiences, and expertise levels
To learn more about EcstaSHE and how to get involved, read more here or apply here.
