Public relations buys the kind of attention you cannot purchase outright: a reporter who decides your story is worth writing, an analyst who quotes your spokesperson, a trade title that puts your launch in front of buyers who already read it every morning. Because nobody can guarantee that outcome, hiring a PR firm works differently from hiring a media buyer. You are paying for judgement, relationships and reaction speed, and those are harder to compare across proposals than a rate card. This page explains what public relations work actually consists of, how firms charge for it, and which questions separate a firm that will earn coverage from one that will send you a monthly activity report.
What a public relations firm is paid to do
Most engagements sit on five pillars, and a sensible proposal will say how much of your fee goes to each one.
- Media relations. Building and maintaining a list of journalists who cover your niche, pitching stories they can use, and following up without burning the relationship.
- Narrative and messaging. Turning what your company does into a position a third party can repeat: a core statement, supporting proof points, and spokesperson training so interviews stay on message.
- Material for earned channels. Press releases, bylined opinion pieces, original data studies, case studies, award entries, conference speaker submissions.
- Issues and crisis handling. Holding statements drafted before you need them, an escalation chain with named contacts, and an agreed turnaround for reactive comment when a journalist calls at six in the evening.
- Measurement. Coverage logs with links and dates, share of voice against named rivals, how often your key message survives into the published piece, and referral traffic to your site.
Notice what is missing. A PR firm does not control placement. If a proposal promises a fixed number of articles in named publications, ask whether those slots are paid placements, because that is advertising with a different label on it.
Where public relations ends and neighbouring services begin
Buyers often ask a PR firm to absorb work that belongs elsewhere, then judge it on results it was never structured to produce. Editorial production at volume, search driven articles and gated assets belong with content marketing agencies. Paid creator partnerships, contracts and disclosure compliance are the day job of influencer marketing agencies. Launch parties, press trips, trade show stands and the logistics behind them are handled by event agencies. Plenty of firms cover more than one of these, but the scope, the team and the fee should be written down separately for each.
Retainer, project or advisory: three ways to buy
A monthly retainer suits companies with a steady flow of news and a need for someone on call. A retainer is only as good as its definition, so insist that the contract names the people doing the work, the seniority mix, the committed hours or output counts, and the response time for reactive requests. Without that, a retainer quietly becomes a subscription to status calls.
A project fee fits a bounded event: a funding announcement, a market entry, a research report, a rebrand. Scope it with a start date, an end date and a named deliverable set, and agree what happens to coverage that lands after the project closes.
Advisory or day rate work makes sense when you already have an internal communications lead and need senior input on a specific decision, media training or a crisis rehearsal rather than ongoing execution.
Fees quoted per placement look attractive because they shift risk to the supplier. They also give the supplier a reason to chase any outlet that will publish, which is how brands end up with coverage in places their buyers never read.
Building a shortlist that is worth reviewing
Sector fit beats size. A firm already speaking to the reporters on your beat starts months ahead of a larger firm learning your category from scratch. Ask each candidate for recent coverage they secured for a comparable client, with live links and publication dates, and read the articles rather than the summary slide.
Then check the things that only surface if you ask. Does the firm represent a direct competitor, and what is their conflict policy? Will the senior people in the pitch room be on your account, and for what share of their week? Who keeps the media list if the relationship ends? Which markets can they reach directly and which are subcontracted to partner firms? If you need coverage in more than one country, compare a firm with its own people on the ground in London, New York or Dubai against one that will broker the work through a network.
What belongs in the brief you send out
Firms cannot price vague ambitions, and the vaguer your brief, the more identical and uninformative the proposals come back.
- The commercial objective behind the communications objective: entering a market, supporting a raise, defending a reputation, recruiting.
- Audiences in order of priority, and the publications, podcasts or newsletters they actually consume.
- Spokespeople, their seniority, their languages, and realistically how many hours a month they will give to interviews.
- Proof points you can put on the record: customer numbers you are willing to publish, named references, research you own.
- Topics that are off limits, plus the legal and compliance approval chain with expected turnaround.
- Your budget band and the period it covers. Withholding it produces proposals you cannot compare.
- How you will judge success at the end of the first quarter and at the end of the year.
Comparing proposals without being sold to
Normalise before you score. Put every proposal on the same time period, the same deliverable list and the same seniority assumptions, otherwise you are comparing a cheap quote with a junior team against a higher quote with a director involved. Score four things separately: relevance of the coverage they have already earned in your category, the quality of the reasoning behind their proposed angles, their ability to react inside a day when something breaks, and the clarity of their reporting. Price comes last, once the first four are comparable.
When you are ready to put the brief in front of several firms at once, request proposals through Edvido and compare the responses side by side instead of one call at a time.
Agreeing how the work will be measured
Settle measurement before the contract starts, because retrofitting it produces arguments rather than answers. Decide which publications, podcasts and newsletters count as a win for your business, and write that list down; coverage outside it is a bonus, not a result. Agree who logs coverage and in what format, so that every entry carries a date, a link, the outlet, whether your spokesperson was quoted, and whether your core message survived into the text. Add a baseline reading of share of voice against named competitors at the start, otherwise later reports have nothing to compare against. Track the commercial signals you can genuinely attribute, such as referral visits from an article, inbound enquiries mentioning a piece, and journalist requests arriving unprompted. Then set a review point where both sides can change direction without ending the relationship.
Failure patterns worth knowing before you sign
Volume dressed as progress is the most common one: a monthly report full of press releases issued and journalists contacted, with no article a customer would ever see. Advertising value equivalent, which prices coverage as if it were an ad slot, is a discredited metric and its presence in a proposal tells you something about the firm. Watch for the pitch team that disappears after signature, for a spokesperson who cannot make interview slots and therefore kills every opportunity the firm creates, and for the assumption that communications can repair a product or service problem. Finally, agree a notice period you can live with. A long lock in with no performance review is a risk the buyer carries alone.
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Related categories
content marketing agencies · event agencies · influencer marketing agencies
Frequently Asked Questions
How long before a PR programme shows results?
A public relations programme runs on editorial calendars, not on campaign flight dates. A firm usually spends the first weeks on messaging, media list building and spokesperson preparation, with first coverage following after that. Trade press moves faster than national business press, and feature slots in monthly titles are planned far in advance.
Should I hire a PR firm or build an in house team?
An internal lead understands the business and is always available; an external firm brings existing journalist relationships, surge capacity and experience of situations you have not faced yet. Many companies run a hybrid, with an internal communications manager who owns strategy and approvals and a firm that handles outreach and specialist moments.
Can a PR agency guarantee coverage?
No independent editor sells placement, so no honest firm guarantees it. What a firm can commit to is the work: the pitching effort, the assets produced, the response times, and a transparent record of who was approached and what they said.
What does a PR firm need from us to do good work?
Access and speed. Available spokespeople, facts that can be published, a decision maker who can approve a statement quickly, and early warning about news rather than a request the day before it breaks.
Is a local firm necessary for each market?
It depends on how the media in that market works. Some markets reward native language pitching and personal relationships strongly enough that a local partner is the only realistic route; in others a regional team with a good freelance network is enough. Ask candidates to be explicit about which markets they serve directly.
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