Media Relations

While technology and tactics have driven the evolution of the press release, perhaps the practice has been affected most by the way news is gathered and the way journalists and consumers process information: quickly and constantly. Here are some of the biggest changes and new considerations when engaging in the craft of press release writing.

We know newsrooms are shrinking, but what about the media ecosystem? A study from AirPR shows it’s growing. There were more publications in 2018 than in 2017. And the number of articles published also grew last year vs 2017. Journalists on average published 78 percent more articles in 2018, though word counts declined. Most of the growth in publications and articles came from so-called tier 3 publications. These publications might work well for brands.

For a brand with a small team and limited in-house resources, a strategic agency partnership can drastically widen your media relations efforts. It’s important to remember, though, that beyond an agency’s smooth veneer and talk must also be a proven track record. PR News spoke with some brand communicators to learn what they insist on asking when vetting an agency. Here are three questions that any agency should answer before you work with them.

Prior to PR News’ Media Relations Conference in December, PR News and partner PublicRelay, a media monitoring and analytics firm, convened a Communications Leadership

You can now find and reach almost anyone through social media, making it a quick and easy way to pitch. But should you? Likely, you’ll succeed only if you’re working on an important story that’s on a journalist’s beat. Here are some tips for getting it right.

Maintaining valid influencer relationships for your brand will only continue to be a crucial media relations strategy in 2019. But in this time of bots and paid followers on social, what’s the best way to make sure those relationships are on the level? How do you know you’re working with an influencer whose digital persona, and engaged followers, are legit?

We asked some influencer marketing experts to find out.

2019 brought new regulations, including one that requires hospitals to post online their standard prices. Unfortunately, the goal of transparency in hospital pricing is still a long way off. There are, though, takeaways that communicators in all fields can learn from this issue.

Here at PR News, media relations is a daily focus. It’s not just one of the key beats that we report on and  program events around—our media relations content also provides an opportunity for the rare conversation between editorial and comms, two different sides of the same media coin. That’s why we host our annual Media Relations Conference in D.C. every December. Here are some of the key takeaway’s from last month’s show at the historic National Press Club.

Veteran PR pro and former journalist Arthur Solomon offers the second of his two-part series about the valuable lessons communicators can learn from federal government communications. Pulled from 2018’s headlines, the examples he uses offer lessons in ethics, crisis and other PR activities.

After the spread of misinformation on Facebook prior leading up to the 2016 presidential election, the social giant began a partnership with journalists to factcheck and flag false news stories on the platform. Now, two years after the program began, some participating reporters are calling for its discontinuation, alleging that the partnership is little more than a crisis PR stunt and that Facebook has compromised their journalistic integrity.