11 recommended tools for media relations
Managing media contacts doesn't have to be painful. Here are some recommended tools for media relations to help PR teams scale their efforts.
Let’s be real—managing media relations can feel like herding cats.
Journalists get slammed with pitches every single day (somewhere between 51 and 100 emails a week, according to Cision), and most of them? They go straight to the trash. In fact, 99% of journalists say those pitches miss the mark entirely.
That’s why PR professionals need better strategies for building relationships with the media. And no, we’re not talking about cramming everything into a spreadsheet and hoping for the best.
The good news? There are media relations tools that can handle the time-consuming tasks for you.
These tools are designed to help you streamline everything—from finding the right journalists and crafting targeted pitches to tracking brand mentions and measuring the success of your outreach.
Whether you’re working with a lean team or running a full-scale PR operation, using the right tools will make your job easier and more effective.
Below, we’ve rounded up some of the best media tools—ranging from free options to feature-packed platforms—so you can focus less on admin work and more on building relationships that actually drive results.
Oh, and one more thing—we’ve also included some free media monitoring tools at the end of the article. We know budgets can be tight.
Let’s dive in!
💡 Pressed for time? Here’s what matters:
Media relations tools help PR teams connect with journalists, monitor brand mentions, and manage outreach more efficiently.
- Top tools include Prezly, Prowly, Meltwater, and Muck Rack.
- Free options to explore: Google Alerts, Talkwalker by Hootsuite, Prowly’s 7-day trial, and Muck Rack free tools.
- FAQs cover media materials, sources, and the role of media relations in public relations.
What are media relations tools?
At its core, a media relations tool is anything that helps you connect with journalists, influencers, and media outlets in a more organized and effective way. Think of it as your go-to system for keeping track of who you’re pitching to, what stories they’re covering, and whether they’re even opening your emails.
Most media relations tools come packed with features to make your life easier, like:
- Media databases to help you find journalists based on their beat, location, or outlet.
- Pitching tools that let you send personalized emails and track metrics like opens and replies.
- Monitoring tools to keep an eye on brand mentions, industry trends, and even your competitors.
The goal? To help PR teams stop wasting time on irrelevant pitches and build genuine connections with journalists who actually want to hear your story. It’s like having a smarter, faster version of your traditional PR processes—all in one place.
So whether you’re a one-person team juggling a million tasks or part of a large PR department, the right media relations tools can help you level up your game.
Recommended tools for media relations
1. Prezly
Prezly is an all-in-one media planning tool that helps PR teams manage media outreach and create engaging press materials.
It features a contact management system that lets you organize journalist profiles, track past interactions, and store notes about each contact. This helps PR teams build and maintain stronger relationships with the media.
One of Prezly’s standout features is its Story Editor, which enables you to create visually engaging press releases. You can embed videos, images, and multimedia elements to make your stories more compelling.
Another useful feature is the platform’s archiving system. All your press releases and media kits can be stored in a centralized hub, allowing journalists to access your brand’s full story timeline. This makes it easier for them to get the information they need to cover your story.
Prezly’s Starter Plan starts at US$60 per month per user, which includes unlimited stories and up to 2,000 media contacts. Pricing adjusts based on the number of users and newsrooms you need, making it flexible for different team sizes.
Falencia Naoenz
2. Prowly
Prowly is a media relations platform that helps you find and manage journalist contacts with ease. It features a searchable database of over 1 million journalists, which you can filter by location, topic, or publication to find the most relevant contacts for your campaign.
Its built-in CRM lets you store contact details, track communication history, and organize outreach efforts in one place. This means you won’t have to rely on spreadsheets or switch between multiple tools.
If you’re unsure whether Prowly is the right fit, they offer a 7-day free trial—no credit card required. For ongoing use, their Basic Plan starts at US$210 per month, which includes access to the journalist database, email pitching, and analytics tools.
The platform also includes customizable email pitch templates, so you can send personalized messages in bulk. Prowly tracks email opens and responses, making it easier to monitor the performance of your outreach campaigns.
3. Anewstip
While Prowly lets you find journalist contacts based on a set of filters (topics, country, job role, etc), Anewstip takes it one step further.
With this app, PR practitioners can find journalist contacts based on what they’ve written or tweeted about in the past. Anewstip users can also subscribe to public media lists created by other users, making it a great example for those looking for media tools to simplify their outreach process.
PR staffers can browse around the platform and store 200 journalist contacts (consisting of social media links and geographic locations). Teams can gain additional features such as direct contact info and email pitches with a paid account, starting from US$200 per month.
4. PressPage
PressPage offers several different things, such as media relations, online newsrooms, and distribution services. The app’s newsroom and email builder includes custom drag-and-drop features, making the process more user-friendly. A subscription to PressPage also comes with access to 860,000 journalists and ‘influencers.’ The tool also offers a dedicated support team to ensure smooth usage.
When it comes to pricing, PressPage’s starter plan provides unlimited publishing and contacts priced at US$399 per month.
5. Agility PR
Agility PR offers a CRM tool with an additional newsroom function to host all PR-related materials like press releases and logos. Its CRM includes more than 1 million media contacts, as well as database management and email analytics features.
Agility PR offers additional services for media monitoring, newswire, and ad-hoc campaign reports. However, there’s no public pricing available, so interested practitioners need to get in touch with the team to learn more.
Ramya Priya
6. Muck Rack
Muck Rack is a platform that helps PR pros find and connect with people in the media (think: journalists, podcasters, freelancers, columnists, etc). The tool supports automated and personalized email pitches, news monitoring, team collaboration, and PR performance reports.
Muck Rack claims to provide the most recent contacts by constantly tracking signals from across the web. Using its ‘PR search engine,’ users can obtain detailed info about media contacts, such as their emails and social media handles.
PR professionals can also upload their existing lists of data about media personnel. When changes occur – such as job updates or when new work is published by that author – this list will update automatically. In short, this helps PR folks clear out inactive contacts and prevent bounced emails.
The pricing for Muck Rack is only available upon request. Packages are customized based on each client’s needs.
7. Cision Connect
Cision is one of the most well-known platforms in the PR field. One of its features, Cision Connect, is a relationship management service that gives users access to a network of more than 1.1 billion influencers, journalists, media outlets, and opportunities.
After selecting relevant contacts, users can send story pitches to them, either one-by-one or to several people at once. PR pros can also use Cision’s Story Kit, which is essentially a tool to easily construct a professional press release. Users are prompted to add components like PDFs, quotes, images, and videos. Content created through Story Kit can also be delivered directly to relevant media contacts.
Currently, Cision’s pricing is only available upon request and plans are tailor-made for each client.
8. Meltwater
Meltwater is another platform that furnishes clients with a media database and PR distribution. Users can access fairly comprehensive information via Meltwater, like contact details, roles, and beats.
The platform’s AI-driven search engine also curates media contacts based on the content of their recent articles. This makes it easier for PR professionals to filter out the most relevant ones.
Using Meltwater, businesses can distribute press releases regionally, nationally, or globally. The platform also comes with analytics and services to help teams measure content performance and engagement.
Meltwater’s price is available on request and interested companies can ask for a demo before committing to a plan.
9. BuzzSumo: Journalist Profiles
BuzzSumo is a content marketing platform that offers unique media tools examples, such as its Journalist Profiles feature, which helps PR teams build relevant media lists.
Users can gather useful intel on journalists, such as their name, location, and email, and track their article history to better understand their areas of interest.
PR pros can use this data to create relevant pitches, outreach emails, or social media content. However, it's important to note that this tool does not yet support direct press release distribution.
Journalist Profiles is available with both paid and free packages. Prices for paid plans start from US$99 per month.
10. Respona
Respona is an end-to-end tool for PR outreach efforts like link-building, collaborating with influencers and bloggers, and finding journalist contacts. The tool also supports personalized pitch emails to allow brands to stand out among the countless emails in a journalist’s inbox.
Its contact listing service helps businesses connect with journalists who work on relevant beats. This increases the likelihood that a journalist will pick up the pitch and allows brands to reach a larger potential audience. Respona’s global database contains journalists at publications of all different shapes and sizes.
Respona offers two pricing options, both of which allow users to comb through its database of journalists. The standard plan weighs in at US$145 per month, and the custom plans start from US$299 per month.
Enricko Lukman
11. Onclusive
Onclusive now includes PRgloo, offering a platform for PR teams to easily connect with journalists and media. It provides a database of media contacts that is regularly checked and updated to ensure the information is accurate and useful for users aiming to reach out to the right people.
The platform features capabilities for creating and sending media-rich emails, maintaining up-to-date media contact lists, and scheduling email distribution. It also tracks the success of press efforts by linking media coverage back to the initial outreach.
With PRgloo becoming part of Onclusive, users have access to a broader range of tools in one platform, making media relations tasks more straightforward. For pricing, Onclusive invites interested teams to contact them directly, as it offers solutions designed to meet the specific needs of each team.
Free media relations tools
Thankfully, some free tools for media relations can help you get started with journalist outreach, press release distribution, and media monitoring without breaking the bank.
Here’s a curated list of platforms that offer no-cost features or trials:
1. Muck Rack demo and free tools
Muck Rack provides a free demo of its platform for those who want to test its capabilities, such as accessing a media database, tracking journalist activity, and managing PR outreach.
Additionally, by signing up for a free account on their website, users can access some tools like creating journalist lists, exploring articles written by journalists, and basic tracking features. These resources make it a valuable option for professionals looking to explore media relations tools before committing to a paid plan.
2. Google Alerts
Google Alerts is a free and reliable way to stay informed about brand mentions, competitors, and trending topics in your industry.
To be fair, Google Alerts may not have advanced features like paid media monitoring tools, but it can help PR teams track newsworthy updates and identify which journalists or outlets are covering relevant stories. Use these insights to build a targeted list of journalists and pitch ideas that align with their focus.
3. Prowly's 7-day free trial
If you’re searching for a full-featured media relations tool to test, Prowly offers a 7-day free trial without requiring a credit card.
During the trial, users gain access to its journalist database (with over 1 million contacts), CRM functionalities, and email pitch features.
This is a great way to experiment with tools for public relations and evaluate whether the platform aligns with your PR goals before subscribing.
4. Talkwalker by Hootsuite
Talkwalker’s free plan is a social media monitoring and analytics tool that can also serve as a basic solution for tracking media coverage.
With this platform, you can monitor brand mentions, hashtags, and relevant keywords across online sources, including news sites, blogs, and forums.
While it’s not a traditional media relations tool, its monitoring features make it useful for identifying media trends and tracking campaign performance.
FAQs
What are media relations materials?
Media relations materials include press releases, media kits, fact sheets, and multimedia content (like videos and images) designed to help journalists cover your story accurately.
What are the sources of media relations?
Sources for media relations include journalist databases, media outlets, press contacts, and tools that aggregate information about journalists and their recent work. Tools like Cision and Meltwater can help you identify and connect with these sources.
What is media relations as a tool of public relations?
Media relations refers to managing communication and building relationships with journalists, bloggers, and media outlets as part of a broader public relations strategy.
Tools like Muck Rack and Agility PR simplify this process by centralizing journalist outreach and tracking campaign performance.
