What does an ORM firm need from us to actually start moving the needle?

The startup checklist is short by design. Clients provide what only they have; Five Blocks produces everything else from its own diagnostic before the first strategy conversation.

What the client provides

Priority keywords and topics

The searches that matter to the audiences you care about, the terms your investors, journalists, or candidate pools are likely to run.

Current executive bios

The company’s own version of each executive’s biography, used to cross-check what search and AI engines currently surface against what the company intends.

Prior PR or comms materials

Any press releases, briefing documents, or backgrounders worth reusing or factoring into the source-layer picture.

Current reputation concerns

A candid description of existing issues, including anything sensitive or off-limits, so the diagnostic is scoped to the real risk picture and not a sanitised one.

Target audience definitions

Which investors, which journalist pools, which candidate markets, because the right keyword set and channel priorities depend on who is actually doing the searching.

Technical access to owned properties

Credentials or authorised access needed to implement changes on the company’s own web properties once the strategy is set.

What Five Blocks produces independently

Everything outside that list comes from Five Blocks’ own diagnostic: the IMPACT™ and AIQ baselines, the Wikipedia and Knowledge Panel review, the entity audit, the peer landscape, and the source-layer assessment. Most clients are surprised by how little they need to assemble before kickoff.