Earned coverage, not bought bylines.
A PR program built around the stories you can actually tell: founder-led angles, targeted pitches to the reporters who cover your beat, same-day answers to journalist requests, and podcast bookings — measured on placement quality, branded search and AI citations, not impressions.
What does a PR & earned media retainer with Flux include?
For $5,000 a month: 3–5 developed press angles a quarter, warm-intro and targeted journalist outreach, same-day filings on relevant journalist requests, 5–10 mid-tier podcast bookings a quarter, a press kit with reactive Q&A prep, and a one-page monthly report. We don't promise top-tier placements — nobody honestly can. We do run a consistent program aimed at staff-written coverage on publications that fit you.
The retainer.
Six parts, run together, so the reactive work feeds the proactive pitches and the measurement shows which is paying off.
Press angle development
3–5 sticky story angles a quarter, built from what you can genuinely speak to: a funding moment, original data, a real launch, or a position on news already in the cycle. Angles come before pitches.
Journalist outreach
Warm intros wherever we have them, and short, targeted cold pitches to the reporter who actually covers your beat — not a blast list and not the general newsroom inbox.
Reactive request monitoring
Qwoted, Featured and the other journalist-request platforms monitored against keywords tied to your real expertise, with same-day filings on the requests worth answering.
Podcast booking pipeline
5–10 mid-tier podcast bookings a quarter. They have become one of the more efficient earned-media formats, and they compound into the source relationships staff coverage comes from.
Press kit + reactive Q&A prep
A press kit a reporter can use without emailing you back, plus prepared answers for the questions your category gets asked, so a named spokesperson can respond inside a news cycle.
Measurement that survives a CFO
Placement quality, share of voice against named competitors, branded search lift, referral traffic, and AI citations on a fixed prompt set — baselined before the first pitch goes out.
Four real paths to staff-written coverage.
Contributor networks aside, staff journalists cover you for one of four reasons. Every angle we develop is built on at least one of them — the long version is in how to get featured in TechCrunch, Forbes, and Inc.
A funding announcement
Coordinated with an investor whose PR team already has the relationships.
Original data or research
A small study with a genuinely new finding is one of the most reliable hooks for unpaid coverage.
A real news angle
Something actually new, or a credible response to an event already in the cycle.
Source relationships
Being the useful, quotable source on a beat until reporters come back to you.
Baseline first, then pitch.
Baseline + angles
Agree the competitor set, the messages you want repeated and the AI prompt set, then record where you stand today. Develop the first quarter's angles and the press kit.
Reactive layer live
Request monitoring, keyword alerts and a pitch log running, with a named spokesperson ready to answer. This is the part that starts producing coverage soonest.
Proactive outreach
Targeted pitches and podcast bookings layered on top, steered by what the pitch log shows you can credibly speak to.
One-page report
What ran, how good it was, what moved — share of voice, branded search, referral traffic and AI citations — and what we are changing next month.
The measurement stack is laid out KPI by KPI in how to measure PR results in 2026, and the reactive layer in HARO alternatives in 2026.
You need something real to say.
This works best for founders and B2B teams in a defined category with a funding moment, original data, a genuine launch, or expertise a reporter would want to quote — and someone willing to be the named spokesperson and answer within the day. It is the wrong fit if you need a guaranteed headline by a fixed date, or if all you want is a "Featured in" logo; a contributor byline is the cheaper way to get that. If what you are really after is being cited in ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews, PR is one input — pair it with the GEO / AI-search sprint.
The PR library.
How much does PR cost? Forbes & TechCrunch pricing, 2026
The four things "featured" can mean, and what each one costs.
How to get featured in TechCrunch, Forbes, and Inc.
The four legitimate paths, and why a press release alone barely moves AI search.
Digital PR for SEO in 2026
Formats, pitching and measurement for earning links and AI citations.
How to measure PR results in 2026
The KPIs that survive a CFO, including AI citations.
Common questions.
How much does your PR & Earned Media retainer cost?+
$5,000 a month. That sits close to the 2026 industry average for a digital PR retainer, and it is roughly what it costs to run 3–5 developed press angles a quarter, same-day request monitoring, warm-intro outreach and 5–10 podcast bookings a quarter. The full breakdown of what PR costs across the market — from contributor bylines to $40K/mo agency retainers — is in our PR pricing guide.
Do you guarantee placements in Forbes or TechCrunch?+
No. A staff-written article cannot be bought, and no legitimate agency can promise one. What the retainer buys is a consistent volume of well-aimed, qualified attempts — angles worth a reporter's time, sent to the right person — plus the measurement to show whether it is working.
Do you sell contributor bylines or paid placements?+
No. Pay-to-play contributor content is easy to buy and readers, Google and AI engines have all got better at telling it apart from staff journalism. We focus on earned coverage. If a logo for a pitch deck is genuinely all you need, a contributor byline is the cheaper way to get it and you don't need an agency for that.
How does PR help SEO and AI search?+
Earned coverage on authoritative publications is one of the few link-building methods that survived Google's spam updates, and AI engines lean heavily on earned media when they choose what to cite. That is why we measure AI citations on a fixed prompt set alongside the classic PR metrics, and why this retainer pairs naturally with our GEO / AI-search work.
Who is this a good fit for?+
Founders and B2B teams in a defined category who have something real to say — a funding moment, data, a launch, or expertise a reporter would want to quote — and a person willing to be the named spokesperson. It is a poor fit if you need a guaranteed headline by a fixed date, or if there is nobody on your side who can respond to a journalist within the day.
Does a press release still help?+
Not much on its own. Wire distribution rarely produces staff-written coverage by itself. It is useful as a factual record to point reporters at, and we use it that way — followed by direct outreach to the reporters who cover your beat.
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