The Death of the Press Release (And What Actually Works in 2025)

Based on the Forbes article "2025 Media Relations Strategy From Muck Rack's Journalism Study" by Lilian Raji

Your PR strategy is probably broken. While brands celebrate their "direct-to-consumer" liberation from traditional media, the smartest players are quietly mastering a very different game.

This episode dissects Muck Rack's latest journalism study revealing the brutal reality of modern media relations. 86% of journalists immediately delete irrelevant pitches, only 22% regularly respond to PR outreach, and yet 84% admit some of their best stories still come from those pitches.

It's not that PR is dead—you're just doing it spectacularly wrong.

Discover the shocking wake-up calls:

• Why Elon Musk's "fire the PR team" strategy tanked Tesla's stock
• How one executive's meltdown became a LinkedIn viral public shaming
• Why 35% of journalists abandoned X entirely (and where they went instead)
• The rise of independent journalism and why it's your secret weapon
• Why 47% of journalists describe their work as "exhausting"—and how to actually help

From the "editorial Hunger Games" of modern pitching to the platform migrations reshaping media engagement, this episode reveals why empathy and precision beat spray-and-pray tactics every time.

Essential listening for CMOs, PR professionals, and anyone who still thinks a mass-blast press release will save their brand.

Warning: You might discover your "media strategy" is actually media sabotage.