Stepping outside of what you know in any career can be scary. Many of us (including Britt + Jackie!), had our start in media relations through the SEO-world. But, there’s more to PR than placements and backlinks. And, where do PR’s who may have been pigeonholed into one single specialty go from here? Our guest today, Shonali Burke, is a Public Relations scholar and renowned consultant. She is here to guide us outside of what we know and into the unknown. From it, we’ll all come out with a better understanding of what Public Relations actually is, and how we can be the best practitioners we can be.

In this episode, you’ll learn...

We sat down with freelance journalist, Susan Johnston Taylor about some real-life examples of when PR’s have exceeded her expectations and when they haven’t. We discuss what it takes to maintain a relationship with a freelance journalist (vs. a staff writer), but there are takeaways that may be implemented no matter whom you're reaching out to.

In this episode, you’ll learn...

Welcome to our season 2 kickoff! In this episode, our special guest, Rand Fishkin (founder of SparkToro and previous co-founder of Moz), discusses with us a situation all marketers have found themselves in before: a boss or client demanding a “prestigious placement,” foregoing the (actually, HUGE!) potential of working with other "lesser-known" publications. 

In this episode, you’ll learn...

Plus, learn what's in store for season 2 of We Earn Media! 

In honor of our season 1 finale, we've decided to forego our usual guest/interview format in order to self-reflect on the podcast so far. In this episode, you'll hear our favorite season 1 takeaways, what we have in store for season 2, and a little background on who we are! If you're reading this, we want to hear from you. Email us at [email protected] or find us on Twitter/Instagram (@weearnmedia). 

Originally, we intended to hop on a call to catch up on work and life with the Aira PR team. Instead, we decided to hit that record button and bring this conversation to listeners to talk about how a real PR firm is handling pitching under Covid-19 successfully. Quite frankly, we love how these creative geniuses have balanced both client and reporter expectations seamlessly and complementary to each other under this pandemic. Their insight serves as an inspiration for all PR’s during this time.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

Our guests are:

We sit down with Michelle Rafter, a freelance business reporter whose focus right now is Covid-19’s impact on tech, work, and industry.  Although she doesn't rely on traditional press releases to craft her stories, she offers some valuable lessons around how PR's may still work with freelance reporters like her. 

In this episode you will learn:

We chatted with Frankie Rendón, head of media relations for Student Loan Hero and Lisa Rowan, a reporter for Lifehacker: Two Cents, to get the scoop on what it’s like to work on both sides of personal finance media during Covid-19.

In this episode you’ll learn about:

Even if you’re not in the personal finance industry, this episode still holds some universal lines of thinking that we believe all PR’s should be exposing themselves to at this time.

Miranda Marquit has been a full-time freelance financial writer and money expert for almost 15 years. If you’ve ever been involved in the personal finance space, it is very likely that you have come across (and even pitched) Miranda. She has contributed to several financial outlets including Huffington Post, The Balance, U.S. News World & Report. Needless to say, she is one of the most prolific writers in the space.

If you all listened to our episode with Alan Henry, then you’ll remember how he believes freelance writers are the future of mass media and highly recommends PRs build relationships with them. To further test this theory, we asked Miranda for her opinion and a very interesting conversation plays out.

Full show notes here

We sat down with Casey Bond, money reporter for the Life section at HuffPost, to talk about the time she uncovered a fake financial expert, and then another. While it’s unfortunate that she can’t stay away from these PR fraudsters, her experience opens up the conversation for pitching best practices, ethics and more.  As Casey puts it, “Whenever you call in an expert it’s because they are supposed to be providing something to you that you can’t figure out yourself or find easily.” Listen to learn about Casey’s journalistic standards, including but not limited to: the best way to respond to a HARO, what makes a content piece newsworthy, and how PR’s may ethically build rapport with a journalist without ever meeting in-person. Full show notes are here.