How Olga Gonzalez took Pietra Communications beyond jewelry
Olga Gonzalez is CEO of Pietra Communications, a New York City-based public relations and marketing agency serving clients in jewelry, luxury, arts and culture, food, and trade shows. This conversation looks at how industry expertise and referrals shaped the agency, and why earned credibility matters as AI changes how people discover brands.
Build a business through trusted relationships and referrals, then keep extending your expertise as customer discovery changes. AI may alter how brands are found, but independent credibility, sound judgment, and human connections remain central.
What’s the short story of how your business started, and what makes it genuinely different from the other options your customers have?
Pietra Communications grew out of my background in the gem and jewelry industry, where I was working in-house in PR and marketing while building a freelance client base. I saw an opportunity to create an agency that combined deep industry expertise with strategic storytelling and a genuinely personal approach to client relationships.
What makes us different is that we understand our clients’ businesses from the inside out. As a trained gemologist, appraiser, and communications strategist, I bring technical knowledge and industry relationships that traditional PR agencies often lack. We’ve since expanded into luxury, arts and culture, food, and trade shows, but our philosophy remains the same: relationships first, strategy always. We operate as an extension of our clients’ teams, connecting them with the right people, opportunities, and audiences while building the kind of third-party credibility that advertising alone cannot buy.
How did you win your first customers, and where does most of your new business come from today?
My first clients actually found me through social media. At the time, I was working in-house in public relations and marketing, and independent jewelry designers who knew about my experience began reaching out to ask if I could help launch their new collections. What started as a side business grew organically into Pietra Communications.
Today, our new business comes almost exclusively through referrals, primarily from existing clients and trusted relationships. We’re very selective about who we work with because we believe in quality over quantity. We’re passionate about representing the best of the best, especially the hidden gems in their industries: exceptional businesses and people doing extraordinary things who deserve greater recognition. For us, it’s about finding the right fit, building lasting relationships, and helping remarkable brands get the visibility they deserve.
What’s one decision that changed the direction of your business, and one mistake that taught you the most?
One decision that completely changed the direction of my business was participating in the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program. It helped me realize that we had already built a strong reputation within our niche, and it was time to think bigger. We had established editorial relationships and expertise that could translate into other industries, so we began expanding our services beyond jewelry into luxury, arts and culture, food, and trade shows. Sometimes, you outgrow the box you’ve built for yourself, and the biggest opportunity comes from recognizing when it’s time to step outside of it.
One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned is the importance of carefully vetting your business partners. Anyone you recommend becomes an extension of your own reputation, so you need to be confident in the quality of their work and comfortable standing behind them. That’s also why I don’t believe in kickbacks or referral fees. I want every recommendation I make, and every recommendation someone makes about my agency, to be genuine, not motivated by financial incentives. Trust is one of the most valuable things you can build in business, and your reputation is shaped just as much by the company you keep as by the work you do.
What has changed in your industry or in what your customers expect over the last couple of years, and how have you adapted?
Artificial intelligence has completely changed the game in public relations. Breaking through the noise and earning credible, third-party recognition is more important than ever, especially as consumers increasingly turn to AI platforms for recommendations rather than relying solely on traditional search engines.
SEO and PR used to be treated as separate disciplines. Today, with the rise of large language models (LLMs) and generative engine optimization (GEO), they’re more interconnected than ever. AI systems draw on independent sources to evaluate brands, making earned media, reputation management, and third-party credibility increasingly important to whether a business gets discovered, referenced, and recommended.
We’ve adapted by evolving Pietra Communications into a GEO-forward PR agency. We now approach communications strategy not only through the lens of traditional media visibility, but also by considering how our clients appear in AI-generated answers, how their reputations are represented online, and whether credible independent sources support their expertise. It’s a constantly evolving landscape, and staying ahead of changes in AI, search, and digital credibility has become a major focus of our work. I often say, "SEO gets you indexed; PR gets you referenced." Today, that distinction matters more than ever.
If you were advising someone starting out in your industry today, what would you tell them to do first, and what would you tell them to ignore?
I would tell them to ignore the idea that things need to be done a certain way simply because that’s how they’ve always been done. Look forward, stay curious, and learn everything you can. The communications and marketing landscape is constantly evolving, and the people who succeed are the ones willing to evolve with it.
There was a time when marketing was largely about moving people through a straightforward funnel. Today, it’s about so much more. You need to be a thought leader, a product expert, an innovator, a storyteller, and someone who consistently thinks outside the box. It’s no longer enough to simply promote a product or service. You need to understand the industry, anticipate what’s coming next, build credibility, and contribute something meaningful to the conversation.
I also believe in reinventing yourself every ten years. Not because everything you’ve learned becomes obsolete, but because the world changes, industries transform, and the skills that brought you success a decade ago may not be the ones that take you into the next. Reinvention doesn’t mean starting over. It means building on your experience, challenging your own assumptions, developing new expertise, and being willing to step outside your comfort zone. I’ve always believed that you should never become so comfortable with what you know that you stop exploring what you don’t.
I would encourage anyone starting out to embrace emerging technologies, especially AI, but never at the expense of critical thinking, creativity, or human connection. Learn how to use the tools, but also learn how to ask better questions, challenge assumptions, and recognize opportunities others might overlook.
Most importantly, don’t confuse visibility with credibility. Anyone can create content and promote themselves. Building trust, establishing authority, and becoming someone others turn to for expertise takes a different level of commitment. And don’t underestimate relationships. Technology may change how we communicate, but genuine human connections are still at the heart of great business.
My biggest advice? Be a lifelong student of your industry, but never become a prisoner of its traditions. Reinvent yourself, question the status quo, and don’t be afraid to outgrow your own definition of success. The future belongs to people who are curious enough to keep learning and bold enough to do things differently.
Thank you to Olga Gonzalez and the team at Pietra Communications for sharing what actually worked with Leaders Perception readers.
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