The PR Technology Landscape 2022

The PR Technology Landscape
Frank Strong
Sword and the Script Media, LLC
presented by:
www.swordandthescriptmedia.com

Agenda & Roadmap
• Perspectives of the PR tech landscape
• Review: 5 all-in-one PR tools
• Briefly: other all-in-one PR tools
• Innovations in PR tech to watch
CC BY-ND by Sword and the Script Media, LLC

Perspectives: incumbents vs. newcomers
Incumbents
Newcomers

Perspectives: company ownership
Startup
Independent Public PE owned Holdings

Perspectives: specialization
outreach
monitoring All-in-one other

PR tech considerations and caveats
• Be wary of numbers, i.e. contacts vs. records
• Most tools will do 80-90% of what you want
• Need & cost
• User interface
• Approachability / sales / support / CX
• Corporate outlook
"Lies, damned lies, and statistics"

Cision: overview
• Contacts: global media
• Distribution: email, wire services, HARO, ProfNet
• Monitoring: print, online, social, broadcast,
podcast
• Analytics: volume, sentiment, share of voice,
earned media attribution
• Paid media: retargeting

Cision: What’s interesting

• Ultimate all-in-one tool
• Global database
• Nostalgia
Reservations
• Big company
• Expensive $$$
• Focus on dealmaking
• Executive turnover
• Unapproachable
• Inflexible sales/pricing
Observations
Likes
• Speaks to the CMO
• No innovation recently
• Lot of partners
• Bolted together

Meltwater: overview
• Contacts: global media
• Distribution: email, newsletter, social media
publishing; partners with Globe Newswire
• Monitoring: print, online, social, broadcast,
podcast
• Crawler + partnerships
• Consumer insights for social
• Analytics: volume, sentiment, share of voice
• integration with Google Analytics
• NLP: 19 languages + context

Meltwater: What’s interesting
“The Deepreason.ai
technology will eventually
enable Meltwater to deliver
an Alexa or Siri-like
experience…”

• Crawler
• Paid attention to mobile
• Public = disclosure
• Innovation
Reservations
• Big company
• Expensive $$$
• Aggressive sales
• Broadening TAM beyond PR
• No PR on staff
Observations
Likes
• New CEO
• IPO: $400m war chest
• All-in-one for everyone
• Push into social + AI

Muck Rack: overview
• Database – tech + human review
• Distribution: email, partnership with Business Wire
• Monitoring: online, social, broadcast, podcast
• Crawler: 60,000 media outlets
“Muck Rack is like the ‘LinkedIn’ for journalists.”

Muck Rack: What’s interesting

• Treats journalists like
customers
• Focused on PR
• Relationships: PRM
• Ease-of-use
• Integrated/KM/workflow
• Approachable / customer
friendly
Reservations
• More intentional about new
features
• Privately held – little visibility
into its finances or viability
Observations
Likes
• Smaller, but not small
• Organic podcast tech
• Starting at $5k
• Will work with groups of
consultants

A brief history…
• Nasdaq: IR, Database, Globe Newswire
• 2016: Acquired MarketWired
• 2017: Apollo Management acquires West Corporation ($2B)
• 2018: West acquires PR/IR business from Nasdaq ($335M)
• 2019: West acquires Notified
• 2019: West rebrands as Intrado
• 2021: Intrado rebrands PR/IR/event division as Notified

Notified: overview
• Database:
• Like Google News + Hunter.IO + tagged with AI
• Distribution: email, GlobeNewswire
• Amplify: online newsroom and showcase pages
• Monitoring: online, social, integrations w/ LN
• 150 different countries

Notified: What’s interesting part I

Notified: What’s interesting part II
•A TV monitor in your
organization’s lobby;
•A big screen at your
customer conference;
•A booth display at a
tradeshow; or
•Any screen with internet
access.

• Build on modern tech
• Slick and intuitive
• Different technical approach
• Transparent on price: $10k
• 5 user seats
Reservations
• Big company
• Unproven / built overseas
• No new innovation in more
than a year
• Giant holdings company
owned by a PE firm
Observations
Likes
• Intrado has an events and IR
tools & approach

Brief history…
• 2013: Innodata acquires Bulldog Reporter
• 2014: Innodata acquires Media Miser ($5m)
• 2016: “GTCR [Cision] must divest Agility to Innodata Inc., or to
another buyer approved by the United States”
• 2016: rebrands Media Intelligence Solutions as Agility PR Solutions

Agility: overview
• Database: solid foundation with PR Newswire
assets
• Distribution: email, partnership with Accesswire
• Monitoring: online, print, broadcast, social,
podcasts

Agility: What’s interesting

• Straightforward basic
solution
• Focused on PR
Reservations
• Big company
• UI is underwhelming
• Some of the features was a
little clunky (i.e. topics &
folders)
• No PR person on staff
Observations
Likes
• Parent company has
potential synergies (AI)
across data/software

Agenda & Roadmap
• Perspectives of the PR tech landscape
• PR tech considerations and caveats
• Review: 5 all-in-one PR tools
• Briefly: other all-in-one PR tools
• Innovations in PR tech to watch

7 trends in PR technology to watch
1. AI-assisted contacts recommendations to pitch
2. AI predicting a pitches chances of earning coverage
3. Better collaboration for PR teams
4. Identifying backlinks in media monitoring (finally)
5. Podcast databases + monitoring
6. Earned media attribution
7. Advertising and retargeting based on earned media

Questions?
frank@swordandthescript.com
Put “PRCG” in the subject line

Who is Frank Strong?
• 20+ years in marketing communications and PR
• Both agency and corporate experience
• Education: BA, MA, and MBA
• 20+ years in reserve components of the military (retired)
• Hard working dad, licensed skydiver, certified SCUBA diver, karate + BJJ student

About Sword and the Script Media, LLC
Based in Alpharetta, Ga., a high-technology corridor in the
greater Atlanta area, Sword and the Script Media, LLC is a
veteran-owned boutique public relations and marketing firm.
We specialize in PR, content marketing and social media for
the business-to-business (B2B) community. We focus on
building consistent, sustainable and process-driven programs
for PR, content marketing and social media. A defining
difference comes down to our approach – that marketing
ought to have utility. This is because marketing that helps,
sells better than marketing that hypes.
www.swordandthescript.com

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