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Coverage where your buyers actually read.

Media relations, corporate and crisis communications, and executive commentary, placed where the people who buy from you actually read.

A woman being interviewed on camera in a studio.
First coverage
Month two or three
Runs
Monthly
We do not report
Advertising value
Discuss a PR mandate

What PR can be held to

Coverage in publications your buyers read, commentary that makes your executives worth quoting again, and a prepared position for the day something goes wrong. Those are the three things this work delivers and they are the three it should be judged on.

The first month produces very little visible output and it is the month that decides the rest. We work out what is genuinely worth saying, build a media list of journalists who cover your category rather than a database export, and prepare your spokespeople. Pitching before that is how relationships get burned, and journalists remember.

Trade press usually matters more than national press for the companies we work with, and it is much harder to sell as a result because the logos are less impressive. A piece in a title that four hundred of your buyers read is worth more than a mention in a national daily that none of them finish.

We report coverage secured, where it landed, and what it did to brand search and referral traffic. We do not report advertising value equivalent. It is a number invented to make PR look like media buying, it is not accepted by anybody who scrutinises it, and putting it in a report is a way of avoiding the question.

Scope

What is included

  • Story development

    Finding what is genuinely newsworthy in what you do, which is usually not what the company is most proud of. A product update is not a story. What it changes for somebody might be.

  • Media relations

    A real list of journalists who cover your category, built and maintained by hand, and pitching that respects what they actually write about.

  • Press materials

    Releases, backgrounders, executive biographies, fact sheets and images, prepared so a journalist on a deadline can use them without asking for anything.

  • Executive commentary

    Bylines, comment on category developments and speaker positioning, so your people become somebody a journalist calls rather than somebody who calls journalists.

  • Spokesperson preparation

    Message discipline and interview practice, including the questions nobody wants asked. A good story given to an unprepared spokesperson becomes a bad quote that outlives the coverage.

  • Crisis communications

    A holding position, an escalation path and named responsibilities, agreed before anything happens. Written in a quiet month, which is the only time it can be written well.

How it runs

  1. First month

    Story development, media list building and spokesperson preparation. Little of this is visible from outside and all of it decides whether the pitching that follows works.

  2. Months two and three

    Pitching begins and first coverage usually lands. Commentary and byline programme starts, and the crisis position is drafted while there is no crisis to react to.

  3. Ongoing

    Story development and pitching each month, executive commentary, and reporting on coverage, brand search and referral traffic against the baseline set at the start.

What you get

  • A maintained media list of journalists who cover your category
  • Releases, backgrounders, biographies and an image library
  • Bylines and commentary placed under your executives' names
  • A written crisis position with named responsibilities
  • A monthly report of coverage, and what it did to brand search

How it is judged

  • Coverage secured, and whether it ran in titles your buyers read
  • Share of voice against named competitors in trade press
  • Brand search volume and referral traffic from coverage
  • Inbound approaches from journalists, which is the real signal

Questions we get asked

Can you guarantee coverage?

No, and neither can anybody else honestly. Journalists decide what runs. What we commit to is the work: the story development, the list, the pitching and the preparation. If somebody guarantees placements, ask whether they mean paid ones.

How long before we see coverage?

Usually month two or three. The first month is spent on what is worth saying and who to say it to. Pitching before that is faster and it costs you the relationships you will need for the next twelve months.

Do you pay for placements?

No. Some publications sell them and we will tell you plainly when that is what is on offer. Paid coverage does very little to brand search and nothing at all to what a buyer treats as evidence.

How do you measure PR?

Coverage secured and where it landed, share of voice against named competitors, and the movement in brand search and referral traffic against a baseline set before we start. Not advertising value equivalent, which we will not put in a report.

What happens if something goes wrong publicly?

You use the position we wrote in a quiet month: a holding statement, an escalation path and named responsibilities. We are reachable outside office hours for clients on a retainer, and the first hour is the one that matters.

Can you work alongside our in-house team?

Yes, and it is common. They usually hold the internal relationships and want outside help with the list, the pitching and the volume. We agree who owns which journalist at the start, because being approached twice about one story is remembered.

Next

Tell us what you know that others do not

The thing your team argues about internally, the data you sit on, the trend you saw first. That is where a story usually is, and it is a better starting point than a product announcement.

Discuss a PR mandateBack to reputation and employer brand

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