Paid and earned media: why advertising and PR go together
The PESO model, the line between an advert and an editorial piece, and why media buying and press work are best planned as one campaign with one message.
In most companies, advertising and PR are decided in separate rooms. Marketing plans the adverts with a media agency; the communications team or a PR agency writes the press releases. Same product, often the same week — but separate timetables, messages and measures of success.
Readers, viewers and listeners never see that split. They see one brand — in the ad break, on a billboard, in a story on a news site and in an interview in a trade magazine. When those encounters contradict each other or simply ignore each other, the campaign loses force. That is why OMNIA PR rests on two pillars: buying media space and working with newsrooms.
The PESO model: four kinds of media
The communications industry has a handy shorthand for sorting media, known as PESO:
- Paid. Space the advertiser buys: a TV spot, a radio ad, a print ad, a billboard, an advertorial. The advertiser decides the content, the timing and the reach.
- Earned. Coverage a brand cannot buy but has to win: a story a journalist writes off the back of a press release, an interview, an expert comment, a review. The newsroom decides what runs.
- Shared. Social media, and whatever people share and say about the brand there.
- Owned. The website, blog, newsletter or company magazine — channels the brand owns and controls outright.
The model’s value is in showing how the four overlap and reinforce one another. An expert article on your own site can become the basis for a media interview; that interview gets shared on social; and a paid campaign gives it a reach it would never achieve on its own.
What advertising does, and what newsrooms do
Advertising gives you control. You know exactly what will be said, when, and how many people in the target group will see it. On TV that can be planned in rating points; on billboards by location and period. Paid media is the right choice when you need reach on a specific date — a product launch, a recruitment drive, a seasonal offer.
Newsrooms give you credibility. Information a journalist has worked on is read differently from an advert. The price is control: a newsroom may not cover the story at all, may cut it, may add a competitor’s view or may run it on a different day from the one you planned.
Advertising suits jobs that hinge on reach, frequency and timing. Media relations suits jobs that hinge on explanation, trust and expertise — and where the story genuinely has news value.
Where the line sits: advertorial versus editorial
Between the two sits the advertorial. It looks like editorial copy, but it is paid space and must be labelled as advertising. It is a legitimate tool for explaining a subject at length with publication guaranteed — but it is not PR.
Editorial coverage cannot be bought, and trying to buy it puts both your relationship with the newsroom and your brand’s reputation at risk. The distinction should be clear inside the campaign too: advertorials belong in the media plan and the media budget; editorial coverage is the outcome of working with journalists.
One message, two versions
A campaign should have one core message. How it is expressed for an advert and for a journalist, though, differs fundamentally.
An ad or a spot carries a single idea, a strong execution and a call to action. It is short, it is repeated, and its job is to be remembered.
A journalist wants to know why the story is news. What is new, who it affects, what evidence sits behind it, who can talk about it. A press release that reads like a sales flyer goes straight in the bin. The same message therefore needs a different angle for a newsroom: market context, clear facts, a spokesperson who is available and, where it helps, a real person’s story.
Take a hospital that needs to recruit staff. The advert says “Come and join us” and shows the benefits. For a newsroom the more interesting story is why the region is short of health workers, how the hospital has decided to tackle it and what that means for patients. Both talk about the same thing, each in the language of its medium.
Why plan them together
When one team sees both the media buying and the PR, three things can be aligned.
- Timing. Editorial attention can be built for the moment the paid campaign goes live — or the campaign can be launched once the story is already resonating in the media.
- Message. The advertising and the coverage do not contradict or drown each other out. The key messages are the same; only the form changes.
- Budget. It becomes clear what has to be bought and what can be earned through press work. Not every story needs paid space, and not every story will make it into the news.
There is one more side to this. The editorial and commercial sides of a media house are separate, and should be. Advertising in a title does not guarantee editorial attention, and decent press work should never be tied to it. Planning together means aligning messages and timing, not buying coverage.
How to tell what works
Paid media is measured in reach, frequency and cost per contact, and a campaign evaluation confirms the campaign ran as bought. Earned media is measured differently — by monitoring coverage, its tone and reach, share of voice against competitors and whether the key messages actually came through.
Be wary of AVE, the advertising value equivalent, which prices an editorial piece at the cost of an advert of the same size. It is misleading: it ignores tone and context and compares two things that work differently. A good evaluation puts both side by side — what the campaign paid for and delivered, and what the press work brought in.