Although PR professionals know they need a mutually beneficial relationship with journalists to be successful, figuring out exactly what they’re looking for is often frustratingly unclear.
We wanted to demystify the landscape by using data to give us substantial insight into exactly what will resonate with journalists based on what’s actually getting coverage.
As such, within this study we elected to take a data-driven approach, focusing on five verticals: Tech, Travel, Health, Entertainment, and Personal Finance. Within each vertical we looked at 20 publishers; and for each publisher, we analyzed both the most recently published 1,000 articles, plus 1,000 of the most shared articles within the past 12 months.
We used this data to try to ascertain the following for each vertical:
- The assets journalists are looking for
- The topics which are getting the most coverage
- The vernacular journalists are using
- The publications to prioritize
- How to tailor your pitches
- Whether there is really a “best” day to pitch
We’d like to thank the following people for providing expert commentary, and sharing their insights and thoughts on this study:
Andy Barr, Owner of 10 Yetis
Jasmine Birtles, Personal Finance journalist and founder of MoneyMagpie
Alex Cassidy, Head of Outreach at Verve Search
Surena Chande, Former Entertainment Journalist
Sophie Hines, Freelance Travel Journalist
Shannon McGuirk, Head of PR at Aira
