Darren gets the vision seen.
27 years at Sloane & Company, to sole CEO, now founder of Higher Plane Media. The through line: constant elevation.
Named one of healthcare's most influential communicators. PM360 cited Darren's three decades leading Sloane & Company's healthcare practice, with work spanning CVS, Walgreens, Ro, and Included Health.
Read the PM360 profile →
Constant elevation.
A founder supplies the vision. Darren supplies the exposure that makes it real — placed in front of the reporters, producers, and editors who decide what the market pays attention to.
A practitioner CEO, Darren worked across industries at Sloane & Company, majoring in healthcare and minoring in technology, retail, financial services. The company's industry-agnostic approach has resulted in wide-lens connectivity making Darren one of the rare healthcare communications professionals that can consistently deliver elevated opportunities outside of healthcare. His belief that there are ten ways to get into the WSJ outside of the beat reporter, frames an approach that feeds constant elevation.
Darren brings the judgement of a firm CEO with the attention of someone working five clients, not fifty. He provides:
Narrative Elevation
Translates a healthtech story so it reaches beyond the trade press and into the rooms that set the broader conversation — business, finance, and culture.
Earned Media Access
Relationships built over 30 plus years mean the guest-anchor seat instead of the five-minute hit, Barron's coverage as a private company, and Axios BFD, rather than Axios Healthcare, placements the industry's own conventions say shouldn't be possible.
The Long Game
An ongoing partnership, not a single campaign. Darren's clients get bigger without leaving behind what made them worth covering in the first place.
Media matters more than ever. Three numbers worth knowing:
Earned media drives 84% of AI citations across ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini.
Source: Muck Rack, What Is AI Reading Report55% of PR professionals use securing coverage in high-authority publications as their top strategy to improve visibility and citations in AI-generated search results.
Source: Muck Rack, State of PR 2026AI-driven search traffic (Generative Engine Optimization, or GEO) often converts at roughly 3 times the rate of traditional search traffic (Search Engine Optimization, or SEO).
Source: Microsoft ClarityAI is the ground game now. Everyone has access to it. Higher Plane works above it: thirty plus years of relationships are what decide whether a specific reporter opens the email at all. A language model can write a strong pitch. It can't get anyone to read it.
“I can hear a company's story and see where it fits on the biggest stages in business. Then I bring it to people who trust me enough to listen.” — Darren Brandt, Founder, Higher Plane Media
Thirty-plus years in the PR trenches. Twenty-seven of them at Sloane & Company as employee #1 — a lifelong comms practitioner and senior leader who spent the last 10 years serving as CEO. Darren has done the building, the leading, and the work itself.
I — Employee #1
Joined Sloane & Company in its early months and helped build the firm from the inside, years before “media relations” and “AI” shared a sentence.
II — Co-CEO to Sole CEO
Never moved away from the practice of PR as he led the company over the last 10 years. Specializing in Elevated Media / commitment to Digital Health, he built and ran Sloane's healthcare practice specifically — a core center of excellence within a firm that also covered energy, financial services, media and technology. And instilled in the company a deep appreciation for earned media - starting a Media Interview Series that included luminaries from CNBC hosts to Editors in Chiefs of leading business publications and Substackers!
III — Higher Plane
Founded Higher Plane Media to take that same healthcare excellence and go higher — working directly with the entrepreneurs and healthtech leaders who need the access without an agency layer in between.
Founders and CEOs who have worked with Darren. Many for decades.
“He knows everyone, and he’s good at finding the overlap between the zeitgeist and the story you’re trying to tell.”
— Jonathan Bush, Co-founder and former CEO, athenahealth; CEO, Zus Health
“He led a team that, with a front-page Wall Street Journal story, arguably publicly launched the category known as the retail health clinic industry.”
— Hal Rosenbluth, Co-founder, Take Care Health; former President, Health and Wellness, Walgreens; CEO, New Ocean Health Solutions
“The best communications advisors don’t simply secure media placements — they help leaders articulate why their work matters.”
— Katherine Stueland, CEO, GeneDx
“Darren/Sloane helped us rise above the jargon and hype by first getting our message right, then finding creative openings where our point of view could get real traction.”
— Ash Zenooz, former CEO, Commure
“Every founder and enterprise CEO should have a comms partner whose ambition and belief rivals their own.”
— Ron Shaich, Founder and former CEO, Panera Bread; Chairman, Cava; Managing Partner and CEO, Act 3 Holdings
What we build together
Distinguished in high-level earned media, executive positioning, thought leadership, and narrative development — built on the belief that earned media was never a lesser channel. Work spanning startups to Fortune 10, across healthcare, technology, retail, and financial services, gives clients the widest possible lens into where their next opportunity actually sits. That's the advantage for anyone who wants to be seen as more: elevated, differentiated stages, not just the ones their category assumes.
Earned Media Strategy & Access
Placement strategy and direct relationships across business, finance, culture, and health trade media — built to get a story into rooms an ordinary pitch never reaches.
Executive Positioning & Narrative Development
Translating a founder's vision into a position the market can repeat back, built for healthtech leaders who want to change the game.
Thought Leadership
Shaping opinions on key topics that are larger than the company itself, to demonstrate the wherewithal of company leadership and drive opportunities to be seen as more, elevated amongst your competitive set.
Three ways to work with Higher Plane Media
Direct engagement
Work directly with Higher Plane Media's core, highly distinguished centers of excellence: high-level earned media, executive positioning, thought leadership, and narrative development.
The full nine, à la carte
Add the elements you want: Investor Relations, Content & Writing, Strategy & Planning, Internal Communications, Transaction Support (M&A, IPO), and Crisis. Digital, Paid Media, Public Affairs, and Research are available through partner solutions.
Bolt onto an existing agency
Plugged into your current PR or agency relationship as senior reinforcement — injecting new life and capability, and watching that program bloom.
Twenty-seven years at Sloane & Company.
Thirty years working with founders who believe they can change the world.
Career arc
Employee #1 → Managing Director → Co-CEO → Sole CEO → Higher Plane Media (27 years)
Recognition
PM360 ELITE 2025, “PR Guru”
Sample Platforms
The Wall Street Journal, CNBC's Mad Money, Axios BFD stage (two years running), NYT DealBook, WSJ op-ed pages, The New Yorker, Barron's, STAT Summit, Plain English and Masters of Scale podcasts, the Profile
Client range
CVS, Walgreens, Ro, Included Health, Honor, Ezra, Commure, GeneDx, Sondermind, Innovaccer, Firefly Health.
Fortune 10 to early-funded startups
Your story is ready. Getting the right person to respond is the hard part.
Communications value has been reprioritized. What if AI can do strategy to the point where Claude can give you a 95% ready-to-go reduction-in-force rollout plan, but can't get the New York Times columnist or Substack writer to hear your pitch?