The Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB) is a not-for-profit organisation owned by major rail industry stakeholders, helping its members deliver a better and safer UK railway.
The ResponseSource Journalist Enquiry Service celebrates a special milestone this year as it’s 25 years since its launch. The service has been there to assist thousands of journalists over this period, and give PRs the opportunity to secure media coverage for their experts, case studies, press releases and more.
Here is a look back at some of the biggest events and stories the Journalist Enquiry Service was able to help amplify across the UK over the last 20 years, and what’s happening in our 25th year.
Talking about big economic events from the last 20 years, 2008 would stand out for many of us in the UK and Europe – certainly comms and journalists tasked with covering the business and personal finance beat at the time.
Personal Finance-related media requests from journalists and broadcasters surged in the midst of the crisis, reflecting the immediate need for consumer information about what this meant for the public’s finances. And UK PR and comms people were there to help, offering advice from key experts and case studies from those impacted.
But that wasn’t the end of wide-spread financial woes, with the Cost of Living Crisis continuing to rumble on. First catching significant media attention towards the end of 2021, the Journalist Enquiry Service’s Personal Finance category saw a significant and sustained spike, increasing by nearly 70% from 1,926 in 2020 to a peak of 3,254 in 2022. Journalists needed practical, consumer-focused advice on budgeting, inflation, and debt, and turned to the UK PR users of the Journalist Enquiry Service for support. In 2022, Business & Finance media requests peaked again, (6,339) this time with asks for corporate strategy and the broader economic outlook.
What does this mean for PRs now?
If you want to reach out to a journalist covering Business & Finance in 2026, the focus should be on thought leadership and forward-looking analysis. Go beyond simple reporting when responding to requests and offer expert commentary on long-term economic forecasts, sector-specific performance in challenging environments, and strategic advice for businesses navigating the current climate.
Trying to get coverage with Personal Finance journalists? The big increase in the number of requests during times of crisis over the last 20 years suggests that the media is looking for immediate, practical advice on topics like saving, managing utility bills, mortgages, debt management, and more. For these significant events that will affect consumers due to high inflation and economic volatility, have experts ready to provide clear, non-jargon solutions.
While the Construction & Property and Manufacturing, Engineering & Energy categories on the Journalist Enquiry Service are traditionally less busy than others – primarily serving niche trade publications – related requests grew significantly between 2005 and 2008 – peaks coinciding with the planning and initial heavy construction phases of projects like the Elizabeth Line and the Battersea Power Station redevelopment – both having driven high media interest in the sector’s activity and scale.
Manufacturing, Engineering & Energy requests from the media have surged again recently – indicating the media’s increased focus on the industrial and supply-chain aspects of large-scale infrastructure, and perhaps the growing focus on energy transition, too.
What does this mean for PRs now?
When it comes to Construction & Property-focused media, general construction activity is less newsworthy than project milestones. If you want to get media coverage in this sector, focus on major project announcements, planning approvals, and any impactful delays. There is also a chance to cover innovative engineering if you can explain how it is done, the final launch, and what impact this is going to have on the sector and the local community.
Manufacturing, Engineering & Energy has seen major growth as a category recently and will most likely continue due to major projects like HS2 still on-going and recent ones like Thames Tideway only recently completed. The focus for PRs needs to be on technical innovations, UK manufacturing successes, and the energy implications of infrastructure. Stories and experts to talk about the materials used, the engineering feats, and the green energy solutions will resonate strongly with journalists covering this sector.
The Public Sector, Third Sector & Legal category is another traditionally smaller category for the Journalist Enquiry Service, but it’s seen a sustained increase in requests from the media since 2015 – unsurprising, considering the political uncertainty of Brexit in 2016, calls for Scottish Independence and several different changes of Prime Minister during the recent Conservative government.
The number of requests shot up from 1367 in 2014 to 2407 in 2017 – taking in the 2015 General Election and the 2016 Brexit Referendum, reflecting the massive focus from journalists on both the legal and public implications of leaving the EU.
Requests from journalists hit an all-time high of 2907 in 2022, coinciding with the Conservative government making multiple Prime Minister changes (Boris Johnson, Liz Truss, and Rishi Sunak) – journalists sought to cover the continued political instability, and the fallout around the cost-of-living crisis – something PR subscribers to the Journalist Enquiry Service were able to help with.
What does this mean for PRs now?
When political turmoil or constitutional shifts occur (like a new PM or a major policy pivot), PRs should focus on proactively pitching legal and public policy experts with clear, non-partisan analysis of how new legislation, devolved powers, or government restructuring will affect public services, the third sector, or regulatory environments. After an election or a major policy announcement (e.g. a post-Brexit trade deal, a new devolution package), the focus should shift to the mechanics and consequences of the policy. The number of journalist requests don’t just peak before a change, but also afterwards as the media covers the implementation and the ensuing legal and social challenges.
In terms of the opportunities for the Third Sector, the periods of crisis or public sector cuts ( often a consequence of political change), increase the media’s attention on charities and non-profit organisations. PRs working in this space should focus on data-driven stories demonstrating the impact of their work in filling gaps left by state services and advocating for policy change.
The development of technologies has been vast over the last twenty years and from 2005 until 2017, there was massive growth and journalists have made use of the Consumer Technology category with requests rocketing up from 903 to 4794. This coincided with the explosion of smartphones, social media platforms, and the app economy, and journalists were keen to cover all these changes. Since 2017, the number of requests has remained high, with the media tending to focus on general consumer gadgets and apps as they develop and evolve.
The Computing & Telecoms category has likewise seen a similar initial rise in requests from the media, hitting its peak in 2016 with 3490. This was largely driven by the development of modern communication infrastructures such as broadband, 4G, and cloud services. Another increase in journalist attention came in 2023 after the launch of the first major landmark in large language models (LLMs) – ChatGPT. AI has become one of the most consistent keywords on the Journalist Enquiry Service, but deep tech topics like quantum computing can also crop up in other categories such as Business & Finance and Manufacturing, Engineering & Energy.
What does this mean for PRs now?
Journalists that cover consumer technology, such as gadgets, are less likely to be looking for the technical specifications (which drove interest pre-2017) and are now more focused on the cultural, social, or personal impact of the technology. For instance, covering the ethics of a new social media feature, or how an app changes lifestyle, will resonate better than simply launching a new phone model.
PRs working in spaces such as AI and quantum computing may want to look beyond just the Computing & Telecoms category and also pitch to business journalists who will be looking at the commercial application, ROI, or national industrial strategy behind the technology. Most tech journalists working on trade outlets will know the technical complexity of new technologies and will instead be interested in covering the tangible, real-world benefits of what is being developed and launched.
ResponseSource and Vuelio have always sought to support the comms and media industries with their unique challenges. This year, we’ve integrated media requests from the Journalist Enquiry Service into the Vuelio Media Database to enrich and expand opportunities for connection and collaboration.
Embedding media requests into the Vuelio Media Database directly provides PRs a peek into newsrooms now, combining with insight into what is coming up months in the future from forward features lists.
As the media and comms industry evolves with the changing times, the Journalist Enquiry Service will continue to be here to connect them, and help with the big news stories of the future.
Find out more about the Journalist Enquiry Service here.
Greater Anglia is the train operator running rail services across the East of England, connecting communities including Norwich, Ipswich and Cambridge with London Liverpool Street and Stansted Airport.
The Stroke Association is the UK’s leading charity dedicated to stroke survivors and their families, providing one-to-one support, scientific research and national campaigning.
The communications landscape has been transformed by the emergence of artificial intelligence, and the traditional tools of PR have had to evolve to keep up. For organisations operating in a world of fragmented media and accelerating sharing, AI must be utilised as a tool, but also treated as an influential stakeholder.
The challenge has taken PR & Comms professionals beyond traditional media monitoring, with success now also depending on whether Large Language Models (LLMs) recognise your organisation, your clients, and your messaging, and include them in their generated answers. If absent from AI summaries, your organisation risks becoming invisible to a generation of users who rely on these systems for their primary information.
AI is a powerful stakeholder in its own right, and like any other stakeholder, can’t be ignored.
During Vuelio webinar ‘AI as the new PR & comms stakeholder‘, the University of Huddersfield’s Dr Anne Gregory highlighted how the growing dependence on these tools is reshaping how we practice communications.
‘AI is much more than just an assistant; it is a powerful actor in the information ecosystem.
‘It mediates our engagement with organisations and individuals, and evidence is emerging that AI is often believed more than other traditional sources.’
This shift in trust represents a significant risk for those caught unprepared. If an LLM synthesises a narrative about your client or brand that is factually flawed, or omits your perspective entirely, the speed at which that ‘truth’ takes hold is fast.
However, many PR teams still aren’t paying significant attention to this. Purposeful Relations‘ Stuart Bruce highlighted how teams currently allocate their resources as just one example.
‘If you look at where budgets and effort are currently directed, the focus remains heavily on social media influencers,’ he observed. ‘Meanwhile, far less attention is paid to AI answers, which are becoming significantly more influential and persuasive.’
Media fragmentation has made it harder than ever to maintain a coherent narrative. Between political volatility, geopolitical shifts, and the sheer volume of digital noise, the feedback loop of communications is compressing. In this environment, comms teams need to go beyond monitoring and interpreting to anticipating and ‘pre-bunking’.
Because the risk of being ignored by LLMs is a commercial one. Gartner’s recent report ‘Top Predictions to Inform 2026 Comms Strategies‘ highlighted a critical shift for Chief Communications Officers (CCO) towards Answer Engine Optimisation (AEO).
Gaining visibility in AI answers doesn’t require a skill set completely new to comms professionals, however. The shift can be simple: to be included in an AI answer, your organisation must provide enough digital touchpoints for the model to verify your information as reliable.
As Stuart Bruce puts it: ‘AI creates content in the same way a journalist or an analyst might, by synthesising countless bits of information from across the web.
‘The more touchpoints the AI finds to verify a fact, the more likely it is to include it. If we don’t create an environment where the AI can find enough evidence of our perspective, it simply won’t give it.’
The secret to a successful campaign in 2026 and beyond lies in ensuring your key facts, executive commentary, and brand milestones are structured and accessible to LLMs – placing information in enough reputable digital locations (from media outlets to white papers and official statements) that an AI agent perceives your narrative as the authoritative one.
As Dr Anne Gregory warned: ‘Once a narrative is set, it becomes extremely difficult to counter. This is why PR must come in early. AI agents use information to create their own sources of knowledge; if the data they collect is flawed, the consequences for the organisation are severe.’
PRs continue to be the architects of brand reputation, tasked with influencing both the human audience and the intelligent agents that interpret the world for them.
The organisations that will thrive in this AI-mediated world are those that earn credibility through the discoverability of their message – like the comms outreach of old, but evolved.
At Vuelio, our platform is built to support exactly this kind of purposeful communication, with our Lumina suite continuing to evolve to meet the needs of today’s comms teams. Whether you are in-house or agency, the goal remains the same: to ensure that when AI is asked a question about your sector, your organisation, or your clients, your voice is the one it uses to provide the answer.
Air Ambulances UK is a national charity that aims to champion, support, and represent the lifesaving work of air ambulance charities across the entirety of the UK.
Artificial Intelligence impacts PR & comms in two distinct ways. It transforms how practitioners work with massive volumes of media, and at a greater degree of sophistication and personalisation. At the same time, it’s also a powerful force shaping how information is surfaced, interpreted, and acted upon across the entire communications industry. What’s changed isn’t just ‘how’ you do the work, but your reason for doing it in the first place.
Not sure if you agree? The current landscape makes clear just how important factoring in AI’s influence is. According to Gartner’s latest predictions for 2026, the mass adoption of public Large Language Models (LLMs) as a replacement for traditional search is expected to drive a significant increase in PR and earned media budgets by 2027. To add to this, BCG’s AI Radar global survey found that corporate investments in AI have doubled since last year.
From the PRCA’s recent green paper on responsible AI, to the CIPR’s focus as part of its survey for 2026, the sector is rapidly investing in this future. And with the EU AI Act deadline on the horizon, the urgency for robust governance and planning has never been higher. As Rupert Younger, Director of the Oxford University Centre for Corporate Reputation, put it as long ago as 2024: ‘AI is not just a technology, it has become a stakeholder’.
To navigate this new reality, we were joined by Dr Anne Gregory, Professor Emeritus at the University of Huddersfield, and Stuart Bruce, PR Futurist and Co-founder of Purposeful Relations, for our latest webinar, ‘AI as the new PR & comms stakeholder’.
In the session, we explored how this new stakeholder is redefining reputation, influence, and strategy.
While many across the comms industry still view AI as a digital assistant for finding efficiencies and speeding up elements of our daily responsibilities, Anne argues it has moved into a more active role:
‘In one sense, AI is a compliant assistant, helping us along the campaign creation trail from research to identifying and prioritising stakeholders, tracking sentiment. But even here, it’s doing that in your name and in your organisation’s name. You have to have a stake in its work, because it certainly has a stake in yours.’
‘We’re becoming increasingly dependent on these tools, and they’re shaping our practice and behavior, but AI is much more than just an assistant. It’s a powerful actor in the information ecosystem.’
While AI lacks anything approaching human intentionality (for now…) its algorithmic processes produce significant real-world consequences. It shapes organisational perceptions and mediates engagement with individuals, often presenting summaries that are believed more than traditional sources.
‘AI is becoming a very strong stakeholder,’ said Anne. ‘ I like Dr. Nici Sweaney’s definition of these agents and AI, it’s an accidental stakeholder’.
Stuart Bruce added that there is still significant confusion regarding what AI actually means for practitioners. Purposeful Relations’ research with 72Point revealed that 44% of UK consumers trust AI answers – a figure nearly double the 24% who trust social media influencers:
‘If you look at where budgets and effort goes at the moment, it’s going to social media influencers; it’s not going into what’s happening with AI answers, which are becoming a lot more influential and persuasive.
‘Anne talked about accidental stakeholders – you’ve actually also got the accidental AI users, because even those people that aren’t using AI, they’re still going to be seeing those AI overviews in search. This is where we talk about ‘zero click’, because people are often seeing those answers and going no further.
‘It’s not just about visibility, it’s actually also about accuracy – how your organisation is being portrayed, your leadership, and your people. You’re going to want your particular perspective to be coming out in AI answers.’
If AI is treated only as a tool or assistant, organisations face substantial reputational risks. Anne warned about the danger of underestimating AI’s power to curate and shape truth:
‘For a lot of people, it has become a source of truth. Maybe PR people are more skeptical of AI than others… but the world isn’t peopled by AI experts or public relations experts. Even though we know these summaries are often incomplete and biased, we tend to believe them. If we don’t regard AI as an influential stakeholder, we could be putting ourselves in jeopardy.’
Anne pointed out the difference with this stakeholder and stakeholders as they’re currently understood, particularly the media.
‘There’s an interesting difference here. If you’ve got a beef with a journalist and you think they’ve not represented you fairly, you can go and have a conversation with that journalist, and you can present them with a case. You can even go to the editor and get some sort of redress. You can’t do that with AI, not in the same way at all.
‘AI is a very powerful and influential stakeholder, but not one that you can necessarily influence back directly. Once a narrative is set, it becomes really, really difficult to counter it. Which is, of course, where PR comes in.’
Trouble can also come if comms practitioners fail to make full use of traditional tools in the PR kit that came way before AI: getting a story out to as many influential sources as possible.
For a practical example, Stuart shared the story of a university industrial dispute. The AI’s narrative was dominated by the trade union’s perspective, because the union had provided multiple touchpoints – website statements, social media, and media quotes. The university, in comparison, having viewed the situation as negative, only responded directly to journalists:
‘The trade union gave them half a dozen quotes – the university gave them one. It just wasn’t credible. This is what AI as a stakeholder actually means. The more touchpoints that AI can find to verify that a piece of information is a fact, the more likely it is to be included in that AI answer.’
Anne reflected on the speed of adoption, noting that CIPR’s AIinPR 2018 literature review could not have predicted the current reach of generative models. She admitted that while the PR industry was initially slow to adopt and adapt, it has quickly developed an ‘obsession with tools’ rather than considering the broader implications:
‘We didn’t realise that AI is a stakeholder for the whole organisation. We are only now waking up to the fact that we have an enormous role in the governance of these systems. At the end of the day, we’re talking about the legitimacy of whole organisations.’
Stuart emphasised the need for PR and comms teams to factor AI’s influence into strategies now, particularly to curtail false narratives, misinformation, and disinformation:
‘If organisations aren’t doing something now, it’s too late.
‘NATO published a paper on misinformation and disinformation and one of the concepts that NATO talks about a lot is “pre-bunking” and “inoculation” – making sure that your information is out there. And that’s what you need to do with AI – it’s too late to wait, and watch, and see. You actually need to be making sure that it understands your perspective now – it’s not just as simple as dealing with a truculent journalist or an activist group. AI is influenced by a multitude of sources.’
With a lack of one source of truth regarding the ethical use of AI, Stuart highlighted the importance of ‘living and breathing’ internal governance and responsibility, involving continuous training and feedback loops:
‘Too often what people try to do is create an AI policy, and on its own, that’s fairly meaningless. Governance is something entirely different. The policy only means something if you’ve done some training to go with it.’
Stuart introduced the concept of a ‘social license’ for AI — gaining trust from other stakeholders, internal and external, for how an organisation embraces the technology.
‘It’s making sure that it’s not just about how you as PR people or comms people are using AI, but how the organisation is embracing it. How on earth do we get trust from all of our other stakeholders for the things that we might want to do with AI? How do we bring our employees with us? How do we make sure that we’re using it in the most sustainable way possible?
‘What are we doing to address issues around bias and inclusivity, fairness and access? The answer is going to be different for each organisation.’
Both speakers offered critical advice for practitioners to follow now. Anne urged the comms industry to continue to question what AI offers and evolve their approach as the technology changes:
‘Constantly ask yourself three questions: Why are we using AI? How is it built? And who is it going to be affecting?
‘Remember, it’s not just an agent at your service; it’s an equaliser of power that takes a stake in you and your organisation as much as you use it to influence others.’
Stuart expressed concern that hype, and confusion, around terms like Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) is turning a portion of comms people off of thinking about the ramifications of AI as a stakeholder:
‘There is a lot of hype, but the fundamental point remains: you must renew your communication strategy. If comms people aren’t thinking about this this year, they’re going to be in real trouble.’
When asked for tips on making media outreach more AI-friendly, Stuart was adamant: do not write for machines.
‘We should still 100% be writing for humans. However, it’s possible to write for humans in an AI-friendly way so that AI can understand and read it as well.’
He identified three factors AI prioritises:
Recency: AI likes fresh content to supplement its training data. If you have a research report, keep refreshing it with new aspects.
Relevance: AI recognises specialist niche titles and trade media. Some syndicate titles that practitioners sometimes sneer at are actually vital because AI uses them to fill data gaps.
Reputation: AI looks for ‘proof points,’ like whether a spokesperson has a matching biography on the website or a consistent LinkedIn profile.
Stuart suggested that practitioners must broaden their scope of stakeholders. While first-tier earned media remains important, much of it is hidden behind paywalls. AI will look elsewhere for information:
‘When a comms team is doing outreach, if the CEO has got a limited time to do interviews, it changes the priority of the ones we’re going to accept. When we talk about owned media – not just necessarily talking about your own owned media – often we’re talking about partners, suppliers, or customers, and what they’re publishing and sharing.
‘We are in public relations – the key word is “relations”. Sometimes we focus on two small a segment of stakeholders. We might look at the media, we might look at politicians, but it needs to be a lot broader than that.
‘We really need to understand all of the relationships that an organisation has and think about whether we can manage those relationships in a better way, but also what impact that’s going to have on AI answers, because it is going to have an impact on both.
‘Fundamentally, organisations need relationships to exist. You can’t exist in a vacuum, so it’s important that we get this right.’
And to finish on a positive note: Anne saw great opportunity for public relations’ new stakeholder in AI – bringing new ways to connect and relate:
‘That’s one positive thing that AI can help us with. Look at the spread of relationships that are going to help us get traction with a whole range of other organisations, and influential people.’
For more on how AI is speeding up the spread of information – and challenges to the comms industry – check out our previous webinar ‘AI, Disinformation and the Risks They Pose for Communicators Today‘ with Thomas Barton, Executive Director of the Council for Countering Online Disinformation and CEO of Polis Analysis.
ParcelHero is one of the UK’s most trusted parcel price comparison websites, helping with deliveries to over 220 countries through couriers including DHL, UPS and DPD.
Great Western Air Ambulance Charity (GWAAC) is a flying emergency department, bringing critical care paramedics and consultant doctors to the most serious medical emergencies.
What are journalists looking to cover in April and beyond? With another big holiday now behind us in Easter, it can be tricky to know what topics might stand out for the media in among all the current affairs and trending issues. From insight via the ResponseSource Journalist Enquiry Service (which is now also available in the Vuelio platform), we share what journalists have been looking for recently and where you can expect to get media coverage over the next month or so.
The Home & Garden category is always a popular one on the Journalist Enquiry Service but recently ‘home’ has been cropping up in a lot of enquiries – in March, it appeared in 11% of the total for the month. Within this, there were also around 2% focused solely on ‘interiors’ as journalists look to get experts and comment on ways that people can make home improvements before the summer arrives.
Journalists at Your Home, Livingetc, Homebuilding & Renovating, House Beautiful, Metro, Daily Mail, and Ideal Home all sent enquiries last month relating to the home. These included looking for case studies of interior designers or influencers who have created a beautiful home, expert commentary about using vintage pieces from the 1960s in homes, home storage products to review and for information on a Spring/Summer home, garden & DIY makeover feature.
Going forward? In April last year, ‘home’ appeared in just over 8% of the total requests meaning that journalists will continue to be looking for experts, products to review and case studies for the rest of this month and likely into May as well. Interior designers are particularly popular but anything home-related will have a good chance of securing media coverage in either consumer magazines or websites.
Marathon season is very much upon us with the Brighton marathon taking place last weekend, and Manchester happening this weekend, before London on 26 April. The media has been looking for experts in this field, and ‘running’ has cropped up in 2.5% of requests in March. Journalists have also looked to cover health and fitness more generally as well and ‘fitness’ appeared in just over 2% of the enquiries last month.
The running-related requests have included the best running essentials for beginners inspired by the London Marathon, a physiotherapist specialising in running, and PTs and running experts to provide advice and tips on carbon plate trainers. Meanwhile, the fitness enquiries have seen journalists looking for diet and fitness transformations of women over 40, information on the new wave of wearable health and fitness tech you can talk to, and a physiologist or sports science expert to provide comment for a piece about cardio fitness.
Going forward? We are very much into ‘running season’ right now and the media are regularly looking for experts (running coaches, former athletes, and personal trainers) to help give advice or tips to tie in with their articles. Running appeared in 2% of the total requests in April last year, so we would expect to see similar engagement this year. Fitness more generally is a frequent keyword on the service and normally offers up more opportunities to feature case studies and products to review. If you have experts ready to give comment then they could get coverage in Women’s Health, Men’s Fitness, The Times, Marie Claire, or The Independent as journalists from all these titles sent a request last month.
With Spring now fully in bloom and better weather (slowly) returning, journalists look to cover gardening tips and tricks to share with their readers. ‘Gardening’ appeared in a little over 5% of all the requests in March with ‘plants/planting’ featuring in 1.5% as the media sought advice on what flowers and shrubs people should be looking to plant during this season.
Journalists at Country Living, Good Housekeeping, PA Media, Gardens Illustrated, and woman & home have all sent gardening-related enquiries in March. These have mainly been asking for experts to answer questions such as solving daffodil blindness, whether you should get rid of caterpillars and about self-seeding plants. There have also been a few case study requests for people who grew their own balcony garden in a city apartment, and for products to review such as lawnmowers and other gardening equipment.
Going forward? April last year saw a similar level of interest in gardening to March this year with 5% of all enquiries being around this topic, and it then increased in May 2025 to over 6%. Journalists will tend to seek out gardening experts to share their advice but there will also be the chance to get products featured and case studies as well.
The current war in the Middle East has generated a lot of media attention and that has fed through to the Journalist Enquiry Service as well, particularly in relation to ‘energy’ which appeared in just over 3% of the requests last month. The war’s impact on gas and oil prices has been the main focus of journalists sending requests and we are likely to see more enquiries regarding energy experts and analysts to share their insight going forward over the next few weeks and months.
Another topical issue is the ‘environment’ and that cropped up in 3% of all enquiries in March. With Earth Day taking place on 22 April, there is likely to be a greater focus from the media on this topic. If you have environmental experts or case studies of people that are making a difference to reduce their impact on climate change and global warming, then they could well get national or broadcast coverage.
Want to get the most out of the ResponseSource Journalist Enquiry Service? Find out how here.
Fred Marketing is a full-service marketing agency based in Hull, with PR and press release distribution among its core services.
In the fast-paced world of public relations, success often comes down to timing – and precision. To help you hit the mark this month, the Vuelio research team has been busy adding new opportunities for media outreach and connection to the platform.
April has been a month of significant expansion and refinement – from forward features, to increased international data, the platform is more primed than ever to help you navigate the media landscape and share your message.
Here is a breakdown of the latest data and trends to inform your strategy for the coming months.
Our research team has been hard at work to ensure the platform remains accurate and comprehensive for comms. This month, an extra 5,745 outlets were added to the Vuelio Media Database, bringing the total database to over 1.24 million media destinations worldwide.
Our international reach continues to broaden, so if you are managing global accounts, make the most of extra opportunities in these key markets:
United States: +980 new outlets
Italy: +531 new outlets
France: +325 new outlets
South Korea: +220 new outlets
In the UK, we’ve added refreshed and deepened information for 2,671 media contacts, ensuring your outreach engagement rates remain high.
There are now 35,684 individual opportunities to dive into for your media outreach.
Instead of reacting to the news cycle, look months ahead to see when major publications are planning features on everything from renewable energy to wedding trends.
How to use this data across sectors:
The Journalist Enquiry Service, now accessible within the Vuelio platform, remains a vital pulse-check on what the media needs from PRs. In April, the team processed over 2,000 submissions from journalists, broadcasters, and content creators, with the Daily Mail, The i paper, and PA Media leading the charge.
If you are looking for quick wins this month, our data shows that journalists are actively searching for:
Practical Living: Beyond just interiors, there is a shift toward practical advice. Think home improvement, cost-saving tips, and sustainable living.
Broadening Tech Horizons: While AI still dominates the headlines, journalists are now seeking expert commentary on broader digital transformation and how technology impacts traditional business sectors.
Specialist Insight: We are seeing a steady rise in requests for authoritative, human voices to comment on complex health and social topics – get case studies and spokespeople primed and ready.
Best of Lists: There is an insatiable appetite for product reviews and buying guides, particularly in the home and lifestyle categories.
To wrap up this month’s update, we asked our Research team for their top tip for the coming weeks. The consensus? Lead with demand, not lists.
Instead of simply blasting a press release to a pre-saved media list, use Journalist Enquiry Service insights to see what journalists are actually asking for today, and then use the Forward Features tool to see what they will be asking for in three months.
When you approach a journalist with a solution to an editorial gap they’ve already identified, you stop being a pitcher and start being a partner.
Find out more about Vuelio’s suite of products for PR, comms, and public affairs professionals here.
Jack & Grace is a communications agency using comms as a force for good, working with brands that value people and planet as well as profit.
Pow Food is a nutrition-first workplace and events caterer, using whole, nutrient-dense ingredients and chef-prepared menus to help fuel productivity.
Determining the future of your communications strategy shouldn’t feel like guesswork. In 2026, the industry is moving from tactical delivery to an era of strategic value, where the most successful teams act as the architects of an organisation’s social and reputational capital.
Following the PRCA’s update of its official definition of public relations, Gartner’s ‘Top Predictions to Inform 2026 Comms Strategies‘ report lands at a time when the PR and communications profession is redefining itself from the inside out.
Here are predictions that have direct implications for external PR and earned media strategy, and how Vuelio can help comms, PR, and public affairs professionals meet the challenges ahead.
Gartner predicts a fundamental shift in how trust is established. 60% of communications leaders are forecasted to focus their strategy on ‘Earned Proof’ – building trust based on what an organisation can demonstrably show, rather than just what it claims.
In an environment where AI systems increasingly mediate what audiences see, brand reputation will depend on the credible, raw material that both humans and AI models use to determine trustworthiness.
Building this proof means understanding how your stories are being interpreted. Vuelio’s Media Monitoring provides a 360-degree view of your impact across broadcast, print, online, and social media. However, in a fragmented landscape, a list of clips is no longer enough.
This is where Lumina, our AI suite built specifically for PR and comms, becomes vital. Its Stories & Perspectives module moves beyond simple alerts to cluster mentions into narratives, reflecting different media and stakeholder angles. By seeing how stories evolve and where they gain traction, you can identify the exact moment to inject authentic voices, such as employee or customer advocacy, that AI models interpret as markers of trust.
Gartner anticipates that the speed of the news cycle will demand ‘Reputation Agility’; an ability to detect early signals and respond before misinformation enters AI-generated summaries. This is a critical defensive measure, as Gartner predicts that 70% of communications leaders will use AI-driven tools to detect and respond to reputation-damaging content before it reaches a mainstream audience. The path a story takes today is kinetic, often striking political triggers that abruptly change its trajectory.
Navigating this complexity requires breaking down the walls between media management and public affairs. If your platform only tracks one strand of a story, you are missing half the picture.
Vuelio offers a fully integrated platform that connects media monitoring with a comprehensive Political Database and Political Monitoring. This allows you to track a narrative as it travels from a local planning debate to the floor of the House of Commons. Our in-house Policy Research team acts as an extension of your own, flagging relevant announcements and providing the context needed to respond at pace.
‘The path a message takes in today’s multi-platform media and political landscape is often unpredictable, subject to potential rebounds and buffers,’ explains Kelly Scott, VP of Government and Stakeholder at Vuelio. ‘In this environment, it is absolutely vital to correct misinformation at pace, engage with both media and political influencers, and mobilise credible third-party voices.’
Gartner posits that PR and comms professionals are transitioning into a central intelligence role. This shift is driven by the need to manage automated influence; Gartner predicts that by 2027, 30% of influencer-driven interactions will be managed by AI entities, requiring comms teams to monitor brand representation not just in headlines, but in the answers generated by AI systems.
Operating as a central strategist requires moving beyond counting clips and towards measuring value creation. Vuelio Insights provides AMEC-accredited analytics that allow you to track share-of-voice and key message penetration, linking coverage directly back to commercial goals.
Vuelio’s Stakeholder Relationship Management (SRM) is purpose-built for the nuances of comms. It serves as a corporate memory, allowing your team to log every interaction, from a call with a journalist to a meeting with a civil servant, in one searchable place. This ensures your organisation speaks with one voice, protecting your reputation across all channels.
In this evolving landscape, the PR professional is becoming the primary architect of brand reputation, tasked with influencing both human audiences and the intelligent agents that interpret what those audiences see. By aligning human trust with machine interpretation through a unified platform, you can transition from being a communicator to a strategic leader who predicts shifts and advises at the highest level.
The future of comms is integrated, evidence-led, and highly strategic. At Vuelio, we believe that providing the right intelligence infrastructure is the only way for organisations to operate at the speed and scale this new environment requires. Our commitment is to empower communications teams to deliver meaningful impact by turning complex data into actionable strategy.
By unifying media, political, and stakeholder intelligence into one ecosystem, we’re here to help you understand not just what is happening, but why, and what to do about it.
Want more about stakeholders strategy? Sign up to Vuelio’s upcoming webinar on an increasingly important stakeholder in 2026 – artificial intelligence. Join us for ‘AI as the New PR & Comms Stakeholder‘ on 21 April.
Political reporting in the UK is arguably more splintered and divided than ever before. Combine that with a significant number of younger people losing interest not only in politically-focused news, but in politics completely, the media ecosystem is a difficult one to operate in for journalists, but also for PR teams with important messages to share.
At the recent Society of Editors conference, political reporters from newspapers and broadcast media reflected on the challenges and opportunities – here is what this means for PR and comms professionals navigating the political sphere.
While many newspapers have in the past declared their political allegiances, especially in the run-up to elections, the majority of political journalists today are striving for neutrality. This is even more important for broadcast journalists, as Sam Coates, deputy political editor at Sky News, explained:
‘When you’re a broadcast journalist, people have a different type of relationship with you than they do with journalists in print. They form a view on how you go about your job and how you present what you say. Therefore, fairness when reporting across political parties and reporting across the government system must be absolutely at the heart of your approach.’
Aubrey Allegretti, chief political correspondent at The Times, has worked across ‘the full political spectrum’ when it comes to news organisations, having reported for HuffPost, Sky News, and now The Times. Aubrey hasn’t found it too challenging to adapt as ‘you are led by the stories and the facts that present themselves’. Integrity to the story was something that Sam also emphasised – ‘you’ve got to be respected on all sides’ to earn the trust of audiences, sources, and colleagues.
The impact on PRs: Political press releases and information should be presented as neutrally as possible. Broadcast journalists especially can’t be seen to favour a particular side and the facts need to be trustworthy and reliable for use. Some news outlets do still have more of a political stance, so always keep in mind who you are reaching out to when putting a press list together for your media outreach, and what will most likely appeal to them.
To help, the Vuelio Media Database features content details and deep intel on media covering the entire political gamut, featuring print, broadcast, podcasts, social media, and more. To receive requests directly from reporters and broadcasters covering politics in the UK and internationally, check out the Journalist Enquiry Service, now embedded into the Vuelio platform.
With politics now inextricable from the majority of media reporting, Vuelio’s integrated political suite also offers a Political Database, Political Monitoring, and more, all in one place.
The majority of national press titles will have a journalist based at Westminster making use of their lobby pass to the Houses of Parliament, Downing Street, and daily briefings.
Sam believes that it’s important that there are journalists on site ‘trying to understand how political parties, government departments, Downing Street, and the operation of power actually works’ and communicating this to the public.
Aubrey echoed the importance of the lobby as ‘a really powerful force’, highlighting its role during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, as journalists demanded answers from the government on issues with national significance.
Local news outlets are unlikely to have a journalist based out of Westminster and therefore have a different focus when it comes to reporting on politics. Maria Breslin, editor of the Liverpool Echo, explained:
‘We have a local democracy reporting service, which is really important in terms of reporting on what is happening on the ground with our local authorities and our councils. I think we’re in a different space than the national press. We’re thinking about how politics impact on the lives of people, and telling people’s stories, as opposed to politics for the sake of politics.’
Impact on PRs: It may sound fairly obvious, but national press journalists are looking to get political news and information that is going to impact the whole of the country. Already inside Westminster, they have the ear of government officials, so exclusive political research and information with implications on a national scale will catch their eye.
Local outlets are much more focused on their specific audience and are, naturally, covering politics closer to home. Case studies are likely to resonate well with local political reporters, or experts that can delve into how the latest political issue, controversy, or announcement will affect people directly, and what it means for their town, city, or county.
Have relevant case studies to offer journalists? Connect with local reporters via the Journalist Enquiry Service.
While national and local press have different audiences that they target, both are now increasingly moving towards where their audiences are getting their news – social media. Maria remarked on the fact that there is now ‘a whole generation of people who source their news from different platforms’. This includes platforms like TikTok (a social platform increasingly employed by Reform UK in its campaigning) for big political events like party conference season.
This has been a key consideration for Sam and Sky News as well, which has a daily podcast, previewing what the day ahead looks like from a political viewpoint. It’s been put together with the audience front of mind:
‘Everything about how we do that podcast is designed to meet a very particular audience. It’s made so it’s ready for the commute of people, largely in Westminster, and it was conceived and designed because we had this audience in mind. And this is the kind of conversation and thought process that’s going on at Sky News right now.’
Impact on PRs: While political reporters and columnists are still writing for print, there is an increasing likelihood that the content will go out across various platforms including vertical video sites like TikTok. Journalists therefore no longer just need facts and stats, but may require visuals and spokespeople to work across these different mediums. If you’ve got experts who are comfortable with speaking on camera, or would be willing to make appearances on podcasts or vlogs, then this will help them to stand out and get them coverage.
To monitor which platforms to target for your upcoming campaigns, Vuelio Media Monitoring and bespoke reports from the Vuelio Insights team offer a 360-view of what is becoming an increasingly fragmented media and political landscape – harder to navigate than ever before, but filled with extra opportunity to share your story. Want more insight? Uncover narratives emerging in the press with Vuelio Lumina.
For more on navigating the modern media landscape, download Vuelio report ‘How news travels in today’s fragmented media environment‘.
Faith Matters was founded by Fiyaz Mughal OBE in 2006 to provide faith communities with conflict resolution tools, working on integration, cohesion and countering extremism.
