Short PR pitches – 150 words or less – had a better response rate (5.89%) than long pitches (1.46%) – 500 pitches or more, according to data analyzed by Propel.
These monthly summaries have been full of news and ideas around AI in PR tech for the last few months – and it’s coming to a quick stop this month.
Some might find that refreshing because the larger market discussion of AI has covered a lot of ground – from awe to panic. If you look hard enough, you might be able to chart headlines in chronological association with the five stages of grieving.
Now it’s gone quiet. Are we all AI-ed out? Perhaps.
That brings us to the first story in this month’s PR tech sum – which covers news from the vendor community over the last month.
1. Pithy pitches get a better response rate
Propel said an analysis of “nearly 500,000 pitches sent through the platform in Q1 of 2023” found journalists “responded to 2.91%.” That response rate is consistent with the company’s previous reports.
Short pitches – 150 words or less – had a better response rate (5.89%) than long pitches (1.46%) – 500 pitches or more. Meanwhile, most pitches go out on Tuesdays but about one in five (22.55%) journalists responded on Thursdays.
The report also found:
“Pitches mentioning AI had a 91% open rate but a 1.96% response rate. However, pitches mentioning the phrase “generative AI” had a 71.26% open rate and an 11.34% response rate. This suggests that while AI-related pitches are being opened, reporters are specifically looking for scoops related to generative AI.”
The generative AI pitch ship has probably sailed already though, in my opinion. Your pitch will need to be unique to gain any interest moving forward; anything else is simply catch up. We might be all AI-ed out.
Separately, “podcast pitches increased by 21.23%” and had better response rates at 15.06%.
2. PR tech mentions
- Muck Rack announced an integration with Slack. This allows PR pros to publish media mentions identified by Muck Rack’s monitoring system to a company Slack channel automatically. I recommend being cautious here: you don’t want sales or the C-Suite getting spun up over an article that PR hasn’t seen yet – because you were stuck in a meeting when the mention was published to Slack. It’s the same issue as with notifications going out to a distro list by email.
- Prezly made UX improvements to the way it displays media contacts.
- GlobeNewswire said it published a lot of press releases over the last two years. The company teamed up with PRWeek for a survey that found most PR pros believe press releases are important. Who knew?
- Meltwater published its annual report. The company reported $478 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR) and according to my quick look at its income statement – earned a net profit of $1.3 million in 2022. This is a significant turn from a loss of ~$19 million reported the year prior. Separately the company also announced it’s another step closer to seeing itself acquired by a private fund.
3. PR tech people on the move
- Internal comms platform Staffbase announced three executive new hires: Bijal Pateljoins as Chief Financial Officer (CFO), Neil Morrison joins as Chief People Officer (CPO), and David Burnand as join Chief Marketing Officer (CMO).
- Investor relations platform Q4 appointed Keith Reed as Chief Operating Officer (COO).
- Cision named Antony Cousins to head its AI strategy. Cousins joined Cision when it acquired Factmata late last year.
4. Content picks
- LinkedIn is making over 100 AI courses free through June 15, 2023, according to a public post by a company salesperson on the platform.
- Here’s a handy list of sites for checking salary benchmarks.
- Prowly published a list of 10 Must-Read PR Blogs To Follow In 2023. The list includes this blog – thanks, folks! – along with perennial bedrocks like Spin Sucks and movers-and-shakers like Garrett Public Relations.
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Have an interesting announcement from a PR technology vendor?
Here’s the updated list of PR technology companies I’m watching and here’s how to get on my radar.
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If you enjoyed this post, you might also like:
A Fairly Comprehensive List of PR and Comms Technology Vendors for 2023 [PR Tech Sum No. 40]
Image credit: DALL-E, “a robot looking very tired in the style of van Ghoh”
