So you’ve aimed at increasing your brand’s credibility online and sourced at Help a Reporter Out (HARO). But until now you’re having a hard time competing with million subscribers over the same email queries you’re eyeing for.
Other PR experts also comment on the volume of emails they receive every day. It buries other messages, making it harder for them to run through one to see which one fits their expertise.
Finding and interacting with a journalist can be daunting. In fact, 61% of PR pros admit it’s one of their greatest challenges.
If you share the same sentiments and want to try your luck of searching journalists with other PR tools, check out our list of HARO alternatives and competitors.
1. SourceBottle
Like HARO, SourceBottle is a platform for journalists and expert sources. It’s a home for bloggers and reporters looking for sources to quote or stories to feature.
SourceBottle Key Features
It notifies you every time a journalist looks for information and insights into your field of expertise. On top of that, SourceBottle is a free online service.
SourceBottle also provides more opportunities if you go with its paid subscription. Its Giveaways provides you with samples, goody bags, giveaways, and products you can test and review. Meanwhile, its Case Studies are beneficial for most PR professionals. It gives you opportunities to showcase your expertise by providing insights that can be used in a media pitch.
What’s nice about SourceBottle is that you can filter through the queries and only get the relevant ones based on your preferences. You’ll receive only two “Drink Up!” emails a day, which contain queries on the topics you’ve chosen and the categories and geographies you’ve set.
SourceBottle Pricing
It’s free.
2. Terkel
Terkel is ideal for content publishers. On this platform, you’ll have the opportunity to get published just by answering questions. It’s a community that features insights from experts and turns them into high-quality blogs.
Terkel Key Features
Terkel believes that every brand has a community. Each community has accumulated insights and experiences throughout the years. Terkel provides the space and gives you the voice to share your expertise.
Terkel has high-quality publication partners, so if you’re a business looking for opportunities to get published, you better make use of this alternative and get published on one of Terkel’s website partners, including the University of Arizona.
Unlike HARO that quotes your insights in content, Terkel provides an entire article. The process starts with Terkel posting questions from its partners. It then searches and selects the best answers and writes a final draft. The partner website needs to approve the article for publishing.
Terkel Pricing
Lite plan is free for 5 answers a month. Paid plans start at $99 a month.
3. Muck Rack
Muck Rack touts itself as the new standard in PR software.
Muck Rack Key Features
It contains three key features a PR platform should provide: search for journalists, monitor news, and create coverage reports in one platform.
Its media lists are kept up-to-date, so you don’t have to waste time maintaining old media contact lists. What’s more impressive is that Muck Rack notifies you when reporters you have added to your media lists have new beats or jobs.
When you use Muck Rack, you will be notified whenever key contacts write or tweet about your industry, niche, and beat. Its media monitoring feature allows you to monitor new stories related to your field by creating alerts for your keywords on Muck Rack.
One of its key features is to measure your work’s impact or influencer campaign. Whenever it’s necessary, you can create a report on your campaign by turning your data into professional coverage reports. Compared to other Muck Rack alternatives, it allows you to add graphics and article snippets to show off your work’s impact.
Muck Rack Pricing
Muck Rack starts at $5,000 per year.
4. Meltwater
Compared to other HARO alternatives listed here, Meltwater allows you to engage with your audience by replying to comments on your social media accounts.
Meltwater Key Features
Meltwater is a media intelligence platform that allows you to monitor your overall brand awareness through media mentions.
You can search through its database of journalists’ and influencers’ profiles. Likewise, you can use keywords related to your industry if you want to search for publications and reporters.
Most of its features are ideal for larger companies that have extensive press coverage and PR teams. Meltwater allows you to create dashboards to monitor your digital marketing performance.
Not only that, you can make use of its intelligence tool to track your competitors’ media coverage.
Meltwater Pricing
It starts at $4,000 per year.
5. Prowly
Prowly is a full-suite PR tool, catering to every need you have for effective public relations campaigns.
Prowly Key Features
Prowly allows you to send customized pitches to prospective media contacts.
You can also create an online newsroom, which serves as one source of information for journalists who might be interested to know about your brand or expertise in the industry.
Prowly boasts of over 1 million contacts in its media database where you can choose a journalist that could be looking for information or expertise that you have.
Prowly Pricing
Prowly has a free version for a 7-day trial, which you can then upgrade to an Essential plan for $189 a month or a Professional plan for $259 a month billed annually.
6. Qwoted
Similar to HARO, you can find journalists on Qwoted and pitch your expert insights for the stories they’re working on.
Qwoted Key Features
With Qwoted, you need to apply as a source and get approved first. You’ll have to create a profile with your credentials and expertise. Once approved, you can reply to the journalists’ queries via Qwoted’s platform.
Since you have your profile up on the profile, journalists can also reach out to you with their inquiries, depending on your niche and expertise.
Qwoted Pricing
You can join Qwoted for free and respond to journalist queries up to 3 times a month. It also has paid plans that start at $149.99 a month.
7. JustReachOut
JustReachOut is another platform that allows you to find journalists, as well as podcast hosts and bloggers, relevant to your niche or industry.
JustReachOut Key Features
You can pitch to relevant reporters as an expert source for their stories or pitch similar articles you’ve written for their content or blog post that has broken links.
You can also pitch yourself as a podcast guest and get interviewed, or pitch a full article to bloggers that accept guest posts on their websites.
What’s good about JustReachOut is that you can track the pitches that you sent and see whether the journalists have seen and opened them.
JustReachOut Pricing
JustReachOut starts at $199 per month or $1,910 a year.
8. ProfNet
ProfNet is quite similar to HARO, being under the same parent company Cision.
ProfNet Key Features
Like HARO, you can connect with journalists looking for experts in their news releases and create media lists.
What makes ProfNet different from HARO is that it’s meant for PR professionals. When your pitch is chosen, you’ll be featured in a press release. With HARO, you’ll get coverage for stories.
You can also get requests from journalists who need speakers for conferences and tradeshows.
ProfNet Pricing
ProfNet starts at $1,500 for a single industry segment, with five accounts for information officers. You can create unlimited expert profiles and be eligible to submit unlimited pitches to queries.
9. Twitter
Some journalists and writers post their requests for expert insights on Twitter.
Twitter Key Features
You can search the hashtags: #journorequests, #PRrequests, and #RadioGuestList.
If journalists provide their contact information in their bios, you can send your pitches directly to their email. Otherwise, you can also send them a message or respond to their tweets.
One advantage of using Twitter to search for queries is that you face less competition. However, you need to do additional work to verify the journalists or writers and which media outlets they’ll be publishing your quote. If you’re looking to get published in high-authority sites, you may want to filter reporters writing for low-ranked websites.
Twitter Pricing
It’s free.
10. PitchResponse
PitchResponse is software built to help brands, marketers, PR pros, SEO specialists, website owners, and PR agencies get quality backlinks and media coverage.
Sourcery Key Features
You know how time-consuming it is to become a creditable source and track your PR outreach activities. With Sourcery, you can cut your outreach time by 90% and land media coverage from publications with high domain ratings (DR) of 70 and above.
You can increase your brand awareness and get more inbound traffic and leads. Sourcery also offers strategy and coaching for pitching journalists so that you’ll have better chances of getting high-quality media coverage from the right journalists and publications.
Sourcery Pricing
You can start using Sourcery with a free trial and only pay if you want to upgrade. Sourcery pricing starts at $29 per month.
11. Forbes Councils
If you’re an executive or entrepreneur looking for ways to have your business be featured on Forbes, Forbes Councils is a paid annual membership you can consider.
Forbes Councils Key Features
It’s an invitation-only organization for senior-level executives that meet the criteria, which include a minimum of $1 million revenue or financing or at least 3 years of experience as a publicly recognized career, leadership, business, or executive coach. If you qualify, you can send your application via its website and its selection committee will evaluate it.
When you’re accepted, you can share your insights in a community-style roundup piece or author an article yourself.
Forbes Councils Pricing
Forbes Councils has a membership fee of around $2,000 a year.
12. OnePitch
If you’re in the tech industry, OnePitch is a good platform for you. It’s ideal for small businesses. You can connect with tech journalists, send personalized pitches, and earn media coverage. It’s also a good place to build meaningful relationships with relevant journalists. OnePitch also allows you to track your pitches and create a custom media list.
OnePitch uses artificial intelligence (AI) to help you make more effective pitches. What happens is that you tell your story by filling out a pitch template or uploading your press release. The AI analyzes your pitch along with its data on top-tier and trade news outlets and gives you a curated media list. You can then choose from among the curated reporters the ones you can pitch to cover your story.
OnePitch Pricing
Creating an account with OnePitch is easy and free. You can also request a product demo.
Wrapping Up Help a Reporter Out Alternatives
Businesses, especially the smaller ones, have valued HARO for the ways it has increased their online visibility. However, its subscribers have rocketed to a million, decreasing your chances to be acknowledged as a source.
While HARO remains a prime tool with over 75,000 journalists and bloggers, it isn’t the only choice for PR people. There are other tools that you can try, or better yet, work with it alongside HARO to get more media opportunities. Explore other HARO alternatives and competitors to start finding media contacts and media list building. Start with the public relations software and tools we have mentioned above and see which ones work for you the best.
