Hire the Top Public Relations Experts

What is public relations?

Public relations is the discipline of earning media coverage and third-party credibility rather than buying or building it — placing a company's story in outlets the market already trusts. Core scope: media relations, executive positioning, launch and funding announcements, analyst relations, crisis communications, and digital PR aimed at earning authoritative backlinks.

PR now does double duty. The same articles and analyst mentions that build reputation with buyers are also the sources large language models and AI Overviews draw on when recommending vendors — a placement in a trusted outlet is now a citation signal for AI search, not just a reputation asset. See our SEO and GEO service for how that citation layer gets built and tracked.

What does a public relations expert do?

A fractional PR operator runs the earned-media system — pitching journalists, shaping the narrative execs repeat, and turning news into coverage that compounds in search and AI citations long after it publishes.

1. Media relations and executive positioning

They build relationships with beat reporters, pitch stories with genuine news value, and turn founders and execs into credible sources — bylines, podcast slots, and quote-ready commentary that builds personal authority ahead of company trust.

2. Launch, funding, and analyst relations

They time announcements and embargoes for launches and funding rounds, and manage analyst relationships — Gartner, Forrester, IDC — that shape how a market gets defined.

3. Crisis communications and digital PR

They prepare and run crisis response when reputation is under threat, and run digital PR campaigns — data studies, expert commentary, contributed content — engineered to earn authoritative backlinks, not just impressions.

Earned PR vs. paid media vs. owned content

These channels get lumped together as "marketing," but they buy fundamentally different things — confusing them is why PR budgets get judged on the wrong metric.

The three compound each other: earned coverage builds the authority that makes owned content citable, and owned content gives paid media something credible to amplify. Pairing PR with our content marketing service puts earned and owned authority to work together.

How do you measure public relations?

PR is measured on share of voice, coverage quality, referring domains earned, and — increasingly — how often a brand is cited by name in AI-generated answers, not on press-release count or ad-value equivalency.

• Share of voice — coverage volume and tone relative to named competitors.
• Referring domains earned — the digital PR angle: high-authority sites linking back, compounding organic rankings.
• Outlet tier and relevance — one mention in a publication your buyers read outweighs ten in outlets they don't.
• AI citation frequency — how often the brand gets named when someone asks ChatGPT or AI Overviews to recommend a vendor.

A senior operator sets this framework before pitching a single story, so every placement is judged against pipeline influence and citation lift, not vanity impressions.

When should you hire a public relations expert?

Hire one when you have real news — a funding round, a launch, a leadership hire — and no one to turn it into coverage, or when competitors consistently out-appear you in the press and in AI-generated answers.

It's also the right call when reputation risk is rising with no crisis plan, or when entering a category with no analyst relationships. A fractional expert brings press-tested relationships without the ramp time of a full-time hire, and pairs naturally with a fractional CMO.

How to hire a public relations expert with GTM 8020

GTM 8020 is a go-to-market agency with only senior operators on its team. Tell us your challenge and we put the right operator from our team on it:

• 1. Book a free 30-minute call. Walk us through your company, upcoming news, and the coverage problem you're solving.
• 2. Meet your operator in 1–2 weeks. We assign a senior PR operator from our team whose relationships fit your stage.
• 3. Work together directly. Your operator embeds fractionally — hands-on, and you can scale as your press calendar demands.

Common public relations mistakes

• Pitching without real news value. Journalists ignore self-congratulatory announcements dressed as news.
• No consistent spokesperson. Rotating who speaks for the company dilutes the authority one voice can build.
• Treating digital PR as pure link building. Campaigns built only for links, with no real story, rarely earn either.
• No crisis plan until a crisis hits. Reactive communications under pressure damage trust faster than the incident.

Browse our experts to see public relations operators with media relations and digital PR experience across B2B SaaS, fintech, and enterprise software, or book a free call to get a senior operator from our team on it.

Industries we specialize in

Our public relations operators have run media relations, executive positioning, and digital PR programs across SaaS, fintech, healthcare, ecommerce, enterprise software, and marketplaces — each with its own trade press and analyst landscape.