Cold Email Outreach for PR: The 2026 Playbook to Secure Earned Media & Build Authority

Why Traditional PR Outreach Fails in 2026 (And Why Email Is Still King)

The landscape of public relations has shifted dramatically. In 2026, journalists and influencers are inundated with approximately 269 billion emails daily. Traditional PR tactics—characterized by mass-blast templates, outdated contact lists, and superficial personalization—are no longer viable. When you send a generic pitch, you aren't just competing with other brands; you're fighting against sophisticated spam filters and the sheer fatigue of overworked editors who delete irrelevant messages before they even load. The barrier to entry for generating content has collapsed, creating a flood of synthetic noise that has trained journalists to filter out anything that smells like bulk generation. Even legitimate stories struggle to gain traction unless the outreach demonstrates an unmistakable human touch backed by machine learning precision.

The failure of traditional outreach often stems from a fundamental misunderstanding of the journalist's workflow. Rookie mistakes like using the CC field, sending identical content to multiple targets, or ignoring recent beats instantly signal low-quality outreach. Beyond the mechanics, there is a psychological component: when a pitch includes visible CC recipients or uses lazy personalization tokens, it violates the unwritten contract of privacy and exclusivity. Editors view this as a breach of professional etiquette. Moreover, static contact lists lead to rapid data decay. Sending to inactive addresses not only wastes effort but actively penalizes your sending domain in the eyes of ISPs. Modern systems must continuously validate records and maintain pristine sender reputation through tools like email testing and dynamic inbox rotation.

• Gone are the days of copy-paste blasts: 92% of journalists prefer email, yet they reject pitches that feel automated or lack specific relevance to their current coverage area.
• Data decay accelerates failure: Traditional contact databases suffer from rapid decay. Without continuous verification, a significant percentage of PR emails bounce or hit inactive addresses, damaging domain health.
• Manual scaling hits a ceiling: Attempting to personalize hundreds of pitches manually results in inconsistent messaging and missed follow-ups. Consistency is the currency of conversion in 2026.
• Lack of feedback loops: Traditional methods rarely provide granular analytics on open rates, reply sentiment, or subject line performance, making optimization nearly impossible.

Despite the noise, email retains its throne because it offers direct, searchable, and permission-based communication. Research indicates that 92% of influencers and journalists still favor email pitches over social media DMs or LinkedIn messages. This preference exists because email allows recipients to manage their intake efficiently and provides a permanent record of the value proposition. Timing matters: 61% of journalists prefer receiving pitches in the morning. Capturing this attention requires not just a great subject line, but a pitch structure anchored by a strong news peg and clear value proposition. Every successful message must answer the question "What's in it for my readers?" within the first two sentences. Delaying the hook or burying the lead is a guaranteed way to lose. Successful campaigns use AI research to uncover unique angles that align perfectly with an editor's upcoming editorial calendar, turning a cold outreach into a warm collaboration.

The modern playbook demands a shift from intuition to intelligence. By leveraging automated sequencing, PR teams can nurture relationships through multi-touch touchpoints that adapt based on recipient behavior. Whether you are expanding into new markets with multilingual campaigns or analyzing response patterns via performance analytics, the goal is to build authority at scale. Email is king not because it is old, but because it is the most powerful tool available when wielded with precision, relevance, and respect for the recipient's time.

How to Identify High-Value Journalists and Influencers Using Data-Driven Research

In the landscape of public relations, the barrier to entry for cold outreach has never been lower, yet the barrier to response has never been higher. With an estimated 269 billion emails sent daily across the globe, the signal-to-noise ratio is critically skewed, rendering brute-force tactics obsolete. A statistic that remains foundational to 2026 strategy is that 92% of influencers and journalists still prefer email pitches over other channels, but their tolerance for generic outreach has vanished completely. Modern PR professionals cannot rely on static spreadsheets or sporadic Google searches to build prospect lists. Instead, high-performing teams utilize AI-powered research engines to ingest vast datasets, identify emerging narratives, and score journalists based on behavioral patterns rather than vanity metrics like publication size alone. This shift from intuition-based prospecting to algorithmic precision ensures that every pitch lands in the inbox of a decision-maker who is actively seeking your story angle, drastically improving reply rates while protecting sender reputation.

Data-driven research goes beyond finding names and email addresses; it involves constructing a multidimensional profile of each prospect to determine fit and receptivity. High-value targets are identified through propensity-to-reply modeling, which weighs factors such as recent article frequency, topic overlap with your brand, and historical engagement signals. A journalist at a tier-one publication may have lower priority than a niche expert at a mid-tier outlet who has covered your specific vertical three times in the last 90 days. By prioritizing relevance over reach, you align your outreach with the editorial calendars of writers who are already primed to discuss your category. Furthermore, analyzing open and click behaviors from previous campaigns allows you to refine your segmentation continuously. Teams that integrate performance analytics into their research workflow can dynamically adjust their prospecting criteria, moving away from underperforming segments and doubling down on the attributes that correlate with positive outcomes.

The most sophisticated aspect of modern research is contextual intelligence, which involves extracting the precise narrative hooks that will capture a journalist's attention. Every effective pitch requires a compelling angle, often anchored by a news peg tied to current events or a time peg linked to upcoming milestones. Data tools can scan thousands of articles to surface recurring topics, rising keywords, and gaps in coverage that your brand can fill. For instance, if an influencer has recently written about supply chain sustainability but has not mentioned circular economy solutions, your outreach can position your product as the missing piece of that conversation. This level of personalization demonstrates due diligence and respect for the recipient's work. When combined with automated sequencing, you can deploy follow-up touches that reference these specific insights, ensuring that subsequent messages remain relevant and non-intrusive. Automation should amplify the human insight gained from research, not replace the strategic thinking that drives meaningful connections.

• Recent Article URL: Always anchor your pitch to a specific piece of content published within the last six months, proving you understand their current editorial focus.
• Sentiment and Tone Analysis: Evaluate whether the writer favors data-heavy reports, anecdotal storytelling, or opinion pieces, and mirror that style in your draft.
• Optimal Contact Window: Leverage historical timing data; research indicates 61% of journalists prefer receiving pitches in the morning and 30% in the afternoon, allowing you to schedule sends when inboxes are freshest.
• Shared Connections and Signals: Identify mutual contacts, alumni networks, or common interests that can be woven into the introduction to lower psychological barriers to response.
• Domain Authority and Spam Filters: Verify the technical health of the publication's domain to ensure deliverability, avoiding high-risk environments that could jeopardize your sender score.

As brands expand into international markets, data-driven research must account for cultural nuances and linguistic diversity. A prospect who responds well to direct, feature-focused messaging in one region may require a more relational approach in another. Multilingual campaign capabilities enable PR teams to maintain the integrity of their research findings across languages, ensuring that enriched data points translate accurately and that personalization adapts to local communication norms. This is particularly critical when targeting global influencers who operate across multiple geographies. By feeding localized data back into your central repository, you build a global knowledge base that improves future outreach efforts. Consistency in quality and relevance across borders reinforces your brand's authority and positions you as a serious partner in the eyes of international media outlets.

Finally, rigorous research serves as the foundation for testing and optimization. Before scaling a campaign, validate your hypotheses by segmenting your high-value list and running controlled experiments. Use A/B testing frameworks to compare different subject lines, value propositions, and calls-to-action against subsets of your researched prospects. This approach minimizes risk and provides concrete data on what resonates with your specific audience. Over time, the accumulation of these tests creates a feedback loop that sharpens your targeting algorithms and refines your creative assets. Investing in comprehensive, data-backed research upfront pays dividends throughout the campaign lifecycle, reducing wasted effort, increasing earned media wins, and establishing a scalable process for building lasting authority in your industry.

The Anatomy of a Winning PR Pitch: Hooks, Pegs, and Value Propositions

Cutting through the modern media landscape requires more than just a compelling product; it demands a meticulously engineered narrative strategy. Despite the proliferation of social platforms, direct messaging apps, and automated CRM touchpoints, 92 percent of journalists and influencers still prefer email pitches and outreach over other channels. This overwhelming preference creates a paradox: email remains the highest-converting channel for earned media, yet it is also the most saturated. To secure placements in top-tier publications, you cannot rely on generic blast campaigns. Instead, you must construct pitches that respect editorial workflows while delivering immediate relevance. The foundation of this approach rests on three non-negotiable components: a sharp hook, a timely or contextual peg, and an unmistakable value proposition tailored to the recipient.

A hook functions as the psychological trigger that stops a busy editor from deleting your message. Weak hooks focus on company milestones or vague innovation claims, which instantly register as promotional clutter. Strong hooks, conversely, lead with curiosity, data asymmetry, or a highly specific insight that challenges conventional wisdom within the niche. Research consistently demonstrates that emails incorporating hyper-personalized opening lines and targeted references to recent coverage see reply rate increases of up to forty-seven percent compared to template-driven alternatives. This personalization is not merely about inserting a name; it requires demonstrating that you have analyzed the journalist’s beat, understood their editorial stance, and identified exactly why your angle aligns with their current content calendar. When executed correctly, the hook transitions the recipient from passive scanning to active engagement within the first two seconds of reading.

While the hook captures attention, the peg provides the structural reason for the story to exist right now. Effective PR professionals distinguish between news pegs, which tether your offering to immediate external events, and time pegs, which leverage predictable calendar markers. A news peg might connect a new cybersecurity protocol to a recently disclosed vulnerability affecting enterprise SaaS platforms, while a time peg could position a supply chain optimization tool ahead of peak holiday inventory planning. Timing matters immensely: sixty-one percent of journalists prefer to receive pitches in the morning, thirty percent in the afternoon, and only nine percent in the evening. The critical failure point occurs when brands force artificial connections that feel contrived to editors. Journalists can spot manufactured relevance instantly, and misaligned pegs damage credibility faster than they build it. To maintain authenticity, always verify that the external event or date genuinely intersects with your core narrative. If the connection feels tenuous, pivot toward evergreen storytelling anchored in proprietary data or original expert commentary.

• Lead with the reader, not the brand: Editors prioritize stories that serve their audience, so frame every sentence around the insight gap your pitch fills rather than your company’s feature set.
• Quantify the exclusivity: Clearly state what makes your angle unavailable elsewhere, whether through unique dataset access, executive interviews, or beta-testing results.
• Specify the deliverable: Outline exactly what you are offering, such as a downloadable benchmark report, a scheduled deep-dive interview, or a ready-to-publish quote block.
• Include a frictionless call-to-action: Replace open-ended requests with single-step next actions, like confirming availability for a ten-minute briefing or requesting the embargoed data package.
• Maintain thread continuity: Reference previous interactions or shared connections explicitly to reduce perceived risk and accelerate trust formation.

The value proposition ultimately determines conversion. Even the most clever hook and perfectly timed peg will fail if the underlying offer does not solve a concrete editorial problem. Journalists operate under relentless deadlines and space constraints, making them highly sensitive to anything that increases their workload without providing proportional return. Your value proposition must answer three silent questions: Does this save me time? Does this improve my publication’s authority? Does this protect my reputation? When pitching B2B technology or specialized services, avoid translating technical specifications into business outcomes that resonate with C-suite decision-makers. Instead, translate those outcomes into journalistic assets: actionable frameworks, predictive trends, or counterintuitive findings that challenge industry orthodoxy. Platforms like SendroAI streamline this translation process through A/B Email Testing, allowing teams to isolate which value statements generate the highest response rates across different editorial tiers.

Building this architecture manually does not scale efficiently, which is why modern PR operations integrate dedicated outreach infrastructure. Relying solely on spreadsheets and manual Gmail sends introduces inconsistent timing, inbox fatigue, and fragmented performance data. By leveraging Inbox Rotation, teams distribute outreach across multiple verified sender identities to preserve domain reputation while maintaining consistent daily volume. Coupled with Multilingual Campaigns, organizations can localize tone, regulatory references, and cultural nuance without fragmenting their core messaging framework. The result is a pipeline that respects editorial preferences while systematically feeding qualified opportunities into your media relations workflow.

Ultimately, securing earned media in 2026 requires treating cold outreach as a strategic discipline rather than a tactical afterthought. Every element of your pitch must survive editorial scrutiny, from the opening line’s precision to the closing request’s simplicity. When hooks capture attention, pegs justify timing, and value propositions align with journalistic incentives, response rates compound exponentially. Combine this anatomical precision with automated sequencing, continuous testing, and granular performance tracking, and your outreach transforms from sporadic attempts into a predictable engine for authority building. The journalists who respond are not looking for salespeople; they are searching for reliable sources who understand the craft of storytelling. Position yourself as that source, and the placements will follow.

How to Personalize at Scale Without Losing the Human Touch

The modern public relations landscape is drowning in noise. With approximately 269 billion emails sent globally daily, cutting through the inbox requires more than clever subject lines. In fact, 92% of journalists and influencers explicitly prefer email pitches over social DMs, yet the same audience actively filters out anything that smells like automation. When managing outreach across dozens of verticals, the temptation to rely on static merge tags is strong. However, superficial personalization burns sender reputation and damages credibility. True scalability in PR outreach does not mean diluting your message; it means engineering a system where journalist-specific context is generated consistently, without requiring manual copywriting for every single sequence.

The foundation of scalable personalization lies in shifting from reactive customization to proactive intelligence gathering. Instead of waiting until the last minute to manually research a reporter’s coverage, you must embed dynamic data extraction directly into your workflow. By leveraging an AI research engine, your outreach team can automatically surface a journalist’s recent article, their stated editorial interests, and their preferred communication style. This intelligence feeds into your templates, allowing you to craft opening lines that reference specific story angles or align your pitch with upcoming seasonal themes. The result is an email that feels handcrafted by a senior strategist, yet is produced at the volume required to secure consistent placements. When every touchpoint is anchored in verified context, response rates climb because reporters immediately recognize the relevance of your value proposition.

Once your personalization logic is established, maintaining deliverability while scaling becomes the next critical hurdle. Journalists expect timely responses, and delayed follow-ups often miss the news cycle entirely. Implementing inbox rotation ensures that your outreach never triggers spam filters due to identical sending patterns, while preserving a healthy sender score across primary domains. Coupled with automated sequencing, you can orchestrate multi-touch campaigns that adapt based on engagement signals. If a reporter opens your initial pitch but does not reply, the system intelligently shifts to a lighter, value-add follow-up rather than repeating the original ask. This behavioral responsiveness mimics the patience of a seasoned PR professional, keeping conversations alive without crossing into harassment territory.

• Anchor every hook in recent work: Reference articles published within the last thirty days to demonstrate active monitoring, not bulk scraping.
• Match tone to publication voice: Adapt your sentence structure, formality level, and formatting preferences to align with the outlet’s existing editorial standards.
• Segment by beat and geography: Group targets by vertical expertise and regional market focus to ensure localization and cultural relevance in your messaging.
• Validate before deployment: Run every template through AZ email testing protocols to catch accidental personalization errors, broken links, or compliance flags before they reach inboxes.
• Track sentiment over speed: Prioritize meaningful conversation starters that invite collaboration, rather than transactional requests that trigger instant deletion.

Finally, as your PR operations expand into international markets, linguistic nuance and regional compliance become non-negotiable. A pitch that resonates with tech editors in San Francisco may fall completely flat when translated literally for financial journalists in London or Tokyo. Deploying multilingual campaigns allows you to maintain your core narrative while adapting idioms, currency references, and regulatory disclaimers to match local expectations. Meanwhile, continuous optimization depends on rigorous measurement. By routing all engagement data into centralized performance analytics dashboards, you can identify which personalized variables drive replies, track domain health across rotations, and iterate your approach in real time. In 2026, the reporters who respond are the ones who prove, within three seconds of reading, that you understand their editorial world better than anyone else.

Deliverability Secrets: Keeping Your PR Emails Out of Spam Folders

In the high-stakes world of public relations, your email signature is often your first handshake with a journalist who receives hundreds of pitches daily. When your outreach lands in the primary inbox, you secure a conversation; when it hits the spam folder, you risk immediate reputational damage before a single word is read. For PR professionals aiming to secure earned media in 2026, deliverability is not merely a technical checkbox—it is the gatekeeper of authority. Research indicates that over 43% of all marketing emails fail to reach the primary inbox, a statistic that becomes even more critical when targeting editorial teams with rigorous filtering protocols. Securing a mention in top-tier publication yields ten times the ROI of paid ads, yet a single deliverability failure can silence your message permanently.

Foundation starts with authentication protocols that prove your identity to mail providers. Every PR campaign must implement strict SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records to demonstrate legitimacy and prevent spoofing. Without these DNS configurations, major providers like Google and Yahoo will flag your messages as suspicious, regardless of content quality. Implementing DMARC with a p=quarantine or p=reject policy sends a strong signal to receivers that you actively control your domain and monitor its usage. Aligning your 'From' domain with your website's root domain further reinforces trust, as mismatches raise suspicion scores among algorithmic filters. SendroAI assists in configuring these policies dynamically based on your current reputation score, while tools like AZ Email Testing simulate ISP filtering logic to catch alignment errors and toxic keywords before they impact live campaigns.

Volume management is equally crucial for maintaining inbox placement. Journalists are sensitive to sudden spikes in traffic from unknown sources, and sending thousands of identical pitches from a single address triggers rate-limiting algorithms designed to stop spammers. To mitigate this, utilize Inbox Rotation to distribute outreach across a diversified pool of warm, aged domains. This strategy mimics natural human behavior, spreading send volume over time and reducing the load on any single IP address. Domain age matters less than engagement history; new domains require gradual ramp-up schedules, while older domains can handle higher volumes if maintained correctly. Inbox rotation should pair fresh IPs with established sending profiles to inherit trust. Avoid sudden volume jumps; instead, increase send counts by 20% weekly until reaching target thresholds. This methodical approach builds a positive interaction history, proving to algorithms that recipients expect and want your content. Consistent engagement across diverse geographic regions also strengthens global reputation.

• Clean Data Hygiene: Remove hard bounces immediately and suppress persistent soft bounces to keep complaint ratios below 0.1%.
• Hyper-Personalization: Superficial tokens are insufficient; reference recent articles or beats to boost engagement and lower spam flags.
• Reply Monitoring: Respond promptly to replies to signal active conversations to ISPs, reinforcing sender reputation.
• Consistent Scheduling: Space out sends throughout the day to mimic organic human activity rather than bot-like bursts.
• Plain Text Preference: Prioritize clean HTML or plain text formats; excessive images and tracking pixels can trigger filters.

Content relevance directly impacts engagement metrics, which feed back into reputation over time. High bounce rates and spam complaints signal to ISPs that your content is unwanted, causing immediate delivery degradation. In PR outreach, generic mass emails are easily identified and discarded by modern AI-driven filters. Instead, craft hyper-personalized narratives that reference specific pain points, recent company news, or mutual connections. Using AI Research Engine capabilities helps you gather precise details about journalists' interests, enabling subject lines and hooks that resonate rather than annoy. True relevance reduces the likelihood of recipients marking your email as spam, which is the strongest negative signal for deliverability. By generating unique angles for every prospect, you ensure that each email feels handcrafted. This level of customization lowers unsubscribe rates and boosts reply velocity, both of which positively influence inbox placement algorithms. For global PR efforts, Multilingual Campaigns respect local sending norms and language preferences, further enhancing engagement and reducing cross-border spam flags.

Finally, continuous monitoring ensures sustained performance in an evolving threat landscape. Deliverability is dynamic; algorithms change, and domain aging requires ongoing maintenance. Track key metrics such as open rates, reply rates, and bounce classifications to identify trends early and adjust tactics accordingly. While automated follow-ups nurture leads, aggressive sequencing can trigger fatigue and increase suppression risks. Use Automated Sequencing with intelligent pauses to space out touches appropriately without overwhelming the recipient. Advanced analytics dashboards provide granular insights into which campaigns perform best and which require adjustment. Integrating Performance Analytics gives you visibility into global inbox placement rates, allowing you to pivot strategies instantly. Reviewing click-through data helps refine content themes that drive action without triggering keyword filters. Regularly prune inactive contacts and refresh your contact database to maintain list hygiene, which is essential for keeping spam complaint ratios well below the threshold tolerated by most providers.

How SendroAI Automates Your Entire PR Outreach Workflow

In 2026, securing earned media requires more than just a compelling story; it demands a precision-engineered outreach infrastructure. Journalists receive an estimated 300 pitches daily, creating a bottleneck where only the most relevant, timely, and personalized messages break through. SendroAI transforms your PR team's capability by orchestrating a fully automated workflow that scales high-intent relationship building without sacrificing the nuance required to win over editors. By integrating our AI Research Engine with intelligent sending protocols, you eliminate the administrative friction of manual prospecting while amplifying the quality of every interaction. This system operates as an intelligent multiplier, turning small PR teams into high-output media engines.

The cornerstone of SendroAI's efficiency is its ability to merge deep intelligence with execution speed. Manual research is the primary bottleneck for PR teams trying to secure coverage, often consuming up to 70% of their weekly hours before a single email is sent. Our AI Research Engine dismantles this constraint by autonomously scanning publications, tracking journalist activity, and identifying "news pegs"—the critical temporal hooks that make a pitch irresistible. When a reporter publishes a piece on a relevant topic, the engine flags them immediately, allowing your team to craft a pitch within minutes that ties your brand narrative directly to their current editorial focus. This level of responsiveness capitalizes on the news cycle while it is still breaking.

Journalese operate on tight deadlines, and timing is everything. Research indicates that 61% of media professionals prefer receiving pitches in the morning, yet managing timezone-specific send windows manually is prone to error. SendroAI integrates smart scheduling capabilities that align your dispatch times with each reporter's local business hours, ensuring your pitch lands when inboxes are fresh. Combined with the AI Research Engine's ability to detect "time pegs"—such as upcoming product anniversaries, regulatory deadlines, or industry events—your outreach becomes inherently urgent and valuable. This synergy of timing and relevance dramatically reduces the likelihood of your email being buried under the hundreds of other messages competing for attention. Furthermore, SendroAI ensures your messages actually reach the inbox through robust Inbox Rotation technology, which intelligently cycles your outreach across multiple email accounts and domains. This distribution mimics natural human behavior, keeping your sending volume within safe thresholds for each account while maximizing total throughput.

• Scalable Personalization: Send unique, context-rich messages to thousands of prospects without manual effort, ensuring every journalist feels valued as an individual.
• Intelligent Sequencing: Deploy multi-touch follow-up workflows that adapt to recipient behavior, capturing attention over days or weeks without manual tracking.
• Deliverability Protection: Leverage Inbox Rotation and domain warming protocols to keep your PR outreach out of the spam folder and into the editor's priority inbox.
• Global Reach: Use Multilingual Campaigns to expand your earned media footprint across borders, engaging local journalists authentically in their preferred language.
• Data-Driven Refinement: Apply A/B Email Testing to constantly improve open and reply rates, turning every campaign into a learning opportunity that compounds performance over time.

Beyond research and drafting, SendroAI ensures your messages actually reach the inbox and engage the recipient. Deliverability is paramount when pitching high-value media outlets; a single bounce or spam complaint can derail your entire campaign. The technical foundation of SendroAI also includes advanced domain reputation management. Before launching a campaign, the platform guides you through systematic domain warming processes, gradually increasing sending volume to establish trust with Internet Service Providers (ISPs). Inbox Rotation works in tandem with these protocols, dynamically shifting traffic away from any account showing signs of fatigue or increased bounce rates. This proactive approach protects your primary corporate domain from damage, a critical safeguard for organizations that rely on their main email infrastructure for internal operations. For agencies managing multiple brands, SendroAI supports isolated sending environments, preventing cross-contamination of reputation metrics and ensuring each brand maintains its own pristine standing in the eyes of inbox providers.

Automation should never come at the cost of compliance or brand safety, especially when dealing with sensitive media relations. SendroAI embeds governance directly into the workflow, providing granular controls over consent management, unsubscribe handling, and regional privacy regulations like GDPR and CCPA. Our platform tracks every interaction with immutable logs, giving your legal and PR teams full transparency into how data is processed and used. Additionally, the Automated Sequencing module supports sophisticated logic branching. If a journalist replies positively, the sequence pauses, and a notification fires to your CRM so a human team member can step in to nurture the relationship. If they do not open after three touches, the system gracefully removes them from the active cadence to preserve your sender score. This balance of machine efficiency and human oversight ensures your outreach remains respectful, professional, and effective throughout the entire lifecycle of the campaign.

To translate these operational gains into business value, SendroAI's analytics extend beyond email metrics to correlate outreach activity with downstream PR outcomes. You can track how many meetings booked via your campaigns resulted in published articles, social shares, or inbound inquiry spikes. This attribution model helps justify marketing spend and demonstrates the tangible impact of your outreach efforts to executive leadership. Moreover, the platform supports exportable reports tailored for different stakeholders, whether your CMO needs high-level ROI summaries or your PR directors require granular data on subject line performance. With SendroAI, you don't just automate outreach; you build a self-improving system that consistently elevates your authority and secures the earned media mentions that fuel long-term growth.