Does company size matter when pitching the national media?

By Kim Smith, Client Services Director at Code Red and Kirsten Scott, Account Director at Code Red

As part of our research into national cybersecurity coverage, we wanted to get some specific data on any patterns between the size and scale of vendors being quoted in the national media.
We found clear evidence that national journalists take into consideration the financial punch a vendor has.
Our findings show that publicly listed vendors and those who have secured more than $50m in venture funding garnered significantly more national coverage compared to their smaller counterparts. In fact, over 90% of coverage came from these financially more significant companies.
There is a deeper question here: is it that journalists are disregarding the views of smaller cybersecurity vendors, or is it that only larger vendors are investing the time and resources it takes to secure national coverage?
In our experience while a smaller vendor may get a ‘hit’ in the national media on rare occasions (which takes a lot of work to be at the right place at the right time to connect with a journalist), the bigger vendors will more likely have a continuous presence with target journalists. It is this familiarity with the brand and the expertise of the spokesperson that then snowballs into a regular relationship with a journalist.
It is also likely that a smaller vendor will be working with a more restricted budget – which is often better placed in doubling down in the trade and specialist publications rather than the nationals, where they will be reaching more of their core audience on a more regular basis.
Our research strongly suggests that the national media should form part of a media strategy for a vendor when they are scaling up and have reached a good level of maturity in the market.

Should tactics change as a vendor gets bigger?
When working with clients, we have sometimes had conversations about whether the tactics should change as they grow in maturity.
Specifically, we have heard suggestions that “now we are a large-scale company, we should not be doing breaking news commentary and only going to the press with news about us as a business”.
It is natural for companies – and particularly their founders – to think that when they reach a large scale with significant financial backing that they are important enough to be the news, rather than to be commenting on other existing stories.
However, our research shows that it does not matter how big you get, breaking news commentary and contributing to features is a major source of media coverage, and a vendor is only losing out if they do not deploy this tactic.
In fact, the best approach is the ‘golden three’ no matter how big you get:
1. Breaking news commentary
2. Contributing to feature articles
3. Creating opportunities for specific profiles and features about the vendor
All three must be deployed for success.

For more data, insights and advice on securing coverage with national media, download your copy of our eBooks now.
Part one: Essential Insights for 2024
Part two: The Topics Making the Headlines in 2024