Building Visibility: How "Featured" and "HARO" Are Revolutionizing PR

Information on NEW podcast website.

Chapters

• 1:07 Introduction to PR Review Podcast
• 3:06 HARO's Revival and Business Model
• 5:31 Featured Platform's Expert Connections
• 9:51 Quality Control and AI Detection
• 14:31 Global Reach and Expert Visibility
• 22:11 Future of Knowledge Sharing in AI

Transcript

Announcer: 0:36

Welcome. This is the Public Relations Review Podcast, a program to discuss the many facets of public relations with seasoned professionals, educators, authors and others. Now here is your host, peter Woolfolk.

Peter Woolfolk: 0:56

Welcome to the Public Relations Review Podcast and to our listeners all across America and around the world. Now, apple has ranked this podcast among the top 1% of podcasts worldwide. So thank you to all of our guests and listeners for your continued support and if you enjoy the podcast, please leave a review. Welcome to my listeners from all across America and around the world. Now a question for my listeners.

Peter Woolfolk: 1:23

As PR professionals, we are continually seeking ways to place our stories, particularly in this AI-driven age. So how can we better develop relationships with the media to enhance our media placements? Well, my guest today will share what is actually benefiting public relations and general relationships, especially with AI-driven communication being the norm. We'll also discuss his Featured platform. Featured connects subject matter experts with top publishers to increase their exposure and create quality, ready-to ready to publish Q&A content. More than 50,000 experts answer questions for Featured to get their insights published with over 1,000 publishers. Then, if you have not heard about it, help a Reporter Out has been restarted. That's what I said Help a Reporter Out restarted. So let me now bring in Brett Farmilow, ceo of Featured, and he joins me today from Scottsdale, arizona. Brett, welcome to the podcast.

Brett Farmiloe: 2:23

Peter, thanks for having me.

Peter Woolfolk: 2:25

So let's talk first about HARO. Help a Reporter Out. How did that come about that? Yes, it had closed its doors, but now you've been involved in getting it restarted again. Talk a bit about that.

Brett Farmiloe: 2:38

Yeah, definitely so. Help a Reporter Out connects journalists with sources for stories, and it's been doing so since 2008. 2008, it was started as a three-times-a-day email newsletter where actually journalists would post a HARO, and that's basically a request for sources for their stories. They would be summarized and sent out to a large list of sources and then sources could respond directly to the journalist if they could be helpful, and so it was acquired in 2010 by Vocus. Vocus merged with Cision in 2014, and then Help a Reporter Out was rebranded as connectively in april 24 and then connectively was discontinued in december of 24, which is when I reached out, said, hey, would you be interested in selling it? And so we acquired it, revived it in april of 25, earlier this year, and we're just a little over three and a half months since reviving it, and it has been very, very interesting, to say the least, in terms of people's enthusiasms for seeing this free service come back well, just out of curiosity now, when you say free service, how do you uh?

Peter Woolfolk: 3:50

since you paid for this uh organization? How do you generate income from it?

Brett Farmiloe: 3:57

Yep. So it's free for journalists, it's free for sources and it is 100% supported by newsletter ads. So at the very top of a HARO email you'll see a little sponsored by and it's a text ad that people who want visibility in front of PR agencies, in front of in-house marketers do in-house marketers, small business owners we'll have advertisers that support each HARO send.

Peter Woolfolk: 4:22

Okay, well, that's good to know. So we want to make sure that our listeners do know that Help a Reporter Out is up and running and if you can use it, I'd suggest go at it and make it work for you. Yeah, it's pretty simple, okay.

Brett Farmiloe: 4:36

I was going to just add on there in terms of anyone looking to get started. You could go to helperreportercom, input your email address and you'll start to receive three emails a day morning, afternoon and evening editions with requests from journalists to get connected with sources. So pretty easy to get going.

Peter Woolfolk: 4:54

Well, well said, and we appreciate that, and I'm sure our listeners will too. Now let's focus on featured. Let's talk about exactly what featured is and how PR folks can benefit from that.

Brett Farmiloe: 5:07

Yeah, so featured is like a 24 seven personal PR agent. So we have all of these different media opportunities that come into Featured. What we do is we'll monitor for relevant media opportunities, get you connected with those and then help you essentially draft an initial response to pitch to the journalist so that you're able to position your expertise and experience in a helpful way. So anyone could sign up for Featured, we have a freemium model where anyone could submit up to three answers a month at no cost and then, if you want more submissions on top of that, then we offer a variety of paid subscriptions that enable folks to do that.

Peter Woolfolk: 5:50

Talk about when you say answer, submit three responses. How does this actually work now, Because I'm saying the Q&A part of it.

Brett Farmiloe: 6:01

So we've got over 2,500 publishers that will go to Featured and look at it as a way to generate free, high quality, human written content for their websites. And so how it works is a publisher will ask a question on Featured so they could say something like what's the best tip for small business owners to generate media exposure for themselves, and then we invite vetted experts to answer that question, and then what Featured does is we'll select the best answers, we'll convert those answers into a ready-to-publish article and deliver that back to the publisher to publish on their website. So the premise is that experts get exposure by being featured on external websites and then those publishers get free, high-quality content.

Peter Woolfolk: 6:48

How wide a range when I mean that, how wide a range of people who are sending the questions? I mean, are we talking about nuclear physics? Are we talking about baking a cake? You know, flying an airplane? Just how wide a range is covered there?

Brett Farmiloe: 7:03

Yeah, so we started off pretty focused in terms of questions we were targeting. We actually started in the human resource niche and then expanded out to marketing technology, finance, general business queries and now you're starting to see a good coverage of stuff that's like in the health and beauty space and lifestyle and attainment. So we're starting to expand out from that core set of questions that were around business. But anyone can basically set alerts for themselves. They could go into featuredcom forward slash alerts. They could input different keywords that pertain to their expertise on stuff that they want to be featured in. And I think the value proposition for featured in terms of expert sources is really just cutting through all the noise and getting connected with the right media opportunity at the right time. So you know Harrow is a very noisy space. Three times a day email newsletter with 20 or so you know opportunities for each newsletter, whereas featured is very much a set it and get notified when there is a relevant opportunity and get notified when there is a relevant opportunity.

Peter Woolfolk: 8:14

So reporters, basically from all stripes, so to speak, have an opportunity at least to participate in this.

Brett Farmiloe: 8:19

Yeah, I would say that HARO is an excellent source for reporters in terms of getting quotes for stories and putting that across the finish line. We're seeing that a trend in the space is relying more and featuring more experts in their stories so that they're satisfying stuff like in the AI driven world that's looking for expertise, experience, authority and trust.

Brett Farmiloe: 8:41

They're relying on expert sources as a way to add that credibility to those pieces. So journalists are very well equipped to be serviced by a helper reporter out it's right in the name and then with featured, we more so see a great product fit with publishers. Publishers who want to accept outside contributions get a more of an ask the experts type of column piece and doing that in a really efficient way.

Peter Woolfolk: 9:09

So, in addition to reporters, I would imagine you probably have college professors and other people who might also want to be involved and featured.

Brett Farmiloe: 9:18

Yeah, totally. I think that the personas really are marketing agencies, which are PR and SEO agencies that need to get their clients featured in the media.

Brett Farmiloe: 9:27

It's in-house marketing teams that want to position their internal employees whether that's executives or specialists positively in the media, or it's the do-it-yourself small business owner who is essentially looking to do marketing themselves. They don't have a four-figure monthly retainer to hire an agency and are looking to still get featured in the media so they can have visibility with their clients, and Featured is a great platform for them to show up, share their knowledge and receive that benefit that they would traditionally get with a marketing agency.

Peter Woolfolk: 10:04

Now, other than just the print media. I mean, are we also talking about radio, tv and online publications as well?

Brett Farmiloe: 10:14

Yeah, I'd say that the publications on Help Reporter Out are pretty diverse. You know, you could wake up in the morning and have an opportunity from ESPN radio and, you know, get featured on an AM station. And get featured on an AM station, you could have a gift bag request where there's an event that's happening and your customers are attending that event and you could get placed in a gift bag. There's podcast opportunities, but I would say the bread and butter of Harrow is online media, and same thing with featured. I think that, because of the mechanism of a publisher asks a question and they want to receive high quality content to publish on their website, you're going to see a lot of the digital and online media in that space as well.

Peter Woolfolk: 11:00

How does the organization putting out the question validate where it's coming from? How do you make sure that we aren't having somebody that's flabbergasted or masquerading as somebody else?

Brett Farmiloe: 11:17

Sure. So quality and trust is at the core of both platforms. One thing that we've done that's been really impactful is we'll run AI detection on every single submission. That happens through both Help Reporter Out and Featured. That helps us determine and flag 100% AI-generated responses.

Brett Farmiloe: 11:36

And we have different tools in place and transparency for publishers and journalists that they're able to one-click hide all AI-generated responses so that never even hits the inbox, or there's transparency with AI detection scores that are listed on every single submission. So a journalist or a publisher can essentially say, hey, was this AI generated or not? And we're able to do that confidence through a partnership that we have with a company called Pangram, which is an AI detection company out of New York. So that's one thing, and another thing that we've done to layer things on is profile verification. So we'll run a variety of profile verification checks against a person using third-party data to essentially, when they sign up for featured or help reporter out, we're saying how do we give this person a blue verified checkbox that says they are who they say they are, and between AI detection and profile verification.

Brett Farmiloe: 12:37

that's how we're helping ensure journalists that the sources that are coming into their inbox are credible, reliable people. But, with that said, I think that we're at an all-time high in terms of misinformation and distrust in some of the stuff that's coming into the inbox. So we see that journalists still have their verification process on top of it, but we're doing things to try to make that a little bit more seamless on their side.

Peter Woolfolk: 13:00

And you know I ask that question because I certainly use AI-generated information. But what I do is, you know, maybe I ask the question, I'll set up what it is I'm looking for and look at what comes back to me. Then I read through it and make adjustments that fit what my style would be or how I would have responded to that. So there's a combination of AI involved and also some personal editing involved. How is that detected and not flagged as a strictly AI response?

Brett Farmiloe: 13:32

Yeah, you know, I think that it depends on how much editing that you actually do.

Brett Farmiloe: 13:37

What we're really trying to detect, and what publishers have asked us to detect, is who are the people who are not even reading their query and just have some sort of automation taking place that AI answers and submits on their behalf. That's the stuff that we're really trying to rise to the top of, like hey, this is stuff that we do want to flag. We do have a product featured, called Featured AI, that identifies a relevant media opportunity based off of your experiences, based off of a knowledge base that you create within Featured, and then we'll draft a suggested answer for that expert source to get them on their way. So similar to how you're using AI to essentially say hey, here's the question, what's the start of this answer? What direction should I generally head? And then you add your own expertise and experience on top of that, or your own style. We're doing the same exact thing, but allowing. The important thing here is to have the human in the loop and allow them to essentially take it across the finish line, rather than full automation.

Peter Woolfolk: 14:40

Yeah, I think I ask that question because you know a lot of people do talk about. As a matter of fact, I had some conversations yesterday that a college professor was saying that you know, students are using AI to turn papers without even doing editing, so obviously it's quick enough to pick up on it. But you know it's a time saver for me. You know I'll put in parameters of what I'm looking for and, as I said, I'll go read it and make modifications as they suit me and sound the way I would normally sound. So I thought that was just an important thing that people need to hear, both if you're generating information or if you're on the receiving end of getting information.

Brett Farmiloe: 15:26

Yeah, totally, and I think that there's a good safe place for AI use. I think that the ones that the publishers again don't want to have is a source that's not even knowing that that submission is taking place and they've got a full automation sequence that's running. That's the stuff that you want to detect and to make transparent. We do hear from a lot of journalists that they don't care whether or not a response is AI-generated or not, because the journalist ultimately wants to get connected with the right source for a story.

Brett Farmiloe: 16:01

And in all likelihood they're going to be connecting with that source, independently of that pitch, and doing an interview, doing some follow-up, getting the information that they need, and so the initial pitch being AI generated sometimes isn't as big of an issue. But for publishers, they don't want to publish just AI generated content. They want, you know, real, authentic, human insights that help differentiate what they can generate, you know, independently.

Peter Woolfolk: 16:30

Is there a sort of a in terms of the quantity of responses coming back from a particular area, such as maybe politics or science, or certain areas that perhaps respond more than other areas do?

Brett Farmiloe: 16:51

Yeah, I mean. I think that the harder it is to find a source, the more that platforms like Help a Reporter Out and Featured are helpful to journalists.

Brett Farmiloe: 17:02

So, if you think about why a journalist is actually going to use an expert insights platform like Featured or Harrow, they're going to use it when they don't have a source on their Rolodex. So if you need to get in touch with someone, that's hard to find, that's outside of that Rolodex. Harrow and Featured are great to bring. That's hard to find, that's outside of that Rolodex. Harrow and Featured are great to bring that source right to your inbox. But for a really general inquiry, chances are the journalist probably has a go-to that they could reach out to. So I feel like if you sign up for Harrow and you start to look at these emails, you're going to see some pretty odd stuff and there's a reason for that.

Peter Woolfolk: 17:41

I'm just sitting here thinking that hard copy newspapers are really suffering right now and their staff is decreasing, obviously for financial reasons. Have you run across any established publications that are using the service?

Brett Farmiloe: 17:58

Oh, of course. Yeah, I mean, we've got over 2,500 publications that are utilizing the service, and I think it's at a time where journalists are asked to do a lot more with a lot less. So, our goal as a platform is to help make their roles and jobs and responsibilities easier definitely not to replace them, because you need journalists there to essentially create the stories that matter and you know platforms like ours are here to support that.

Peter Woolfolk: 18:29

Now by any opportunities. Do you have responses from writers and reporters or others outside of the US?

Brett Farmiloe: 18:40

Oh yeah, definitely. I would say that 70% of our audience is in the US, another 15% is in the UK, and then we've got, you know, 5-10% in Australia, new Zealand and in Canada, and then another percentage that's outside of those regions.

Peter Woolfolk: 19:00

Well, one of the reasons I asked that question is because we are global and, as a matter of fact, one of the interviews I've got sometime later on this month is with somebody in Australia. To date, I think we have had guests on here from at least 10 foreign nations, I'm not sure and we're heard in over 3,000 cities around the world. So that was one of the reasons I wanted to ask that question, because you know folks you never know who might read what or what they can provide to you.

Brett Farmiloe: 19:30

Yeah, absolutely. I mean we'll see a lot of requests both locally in those regions, so a UK publication looking for UK-based professionals. We'll also see a lot of international publications that are looking for more US-based readership to ask queries and questions. So, yeah, I would definitely say it's the most well-known global brand that exists in terms of matching journalists with sources.

Peter Woolfolk: 19:58

It's the most well-known global brand that exists in terms of matching journalists with sources.

Brett Farmiloe: 20:10

Well, I mean, is there anything that maybe I've missed in terms of asking you about both features and Harrow that you think needs to be made known? Now? Yeah, I think that the whole concept of visibility needs to be visited and defined, and what I mean by that is what's the problem Like? Why would you ever use one of these platforms? You know you're a business professional. You mentioned time as a scarcity, you know, and a limited resource. Why would you spend time answering questions from journalists?

Brett Farmiloe: 20:36

And the problem that platforms like ours solve is you need to build visibility with your customers.

Brett Farmiloe: 20:43

You need customers to run your business, and the thing that you have an abundance of is knowledge.

Brett Farmiloe: 20:48

You have knowledge about your business and you need an outlet to share it. That's where platforms like ours come into play, and so whether and today, in 2025, it used to be visible in the publications that your customers are reading, and now what's happening is we're seeing this shift from search over to AI visibility. Most people are now using an AI platform like ChatGPT to get their questions answered, and so how do you now become visible in an AI platform, and so I think that you're seeing companies like ours help support that, to say, not only can you get featured in different publications, but also by sharing your knowledge through platforms like ours, you could potentially be cited and visible in AI platforms when a customer reaches out and has a relevant query or question and you want to be visible to be surfaced in those recommendations. So I think that there's a lot to be determined in terms of how that's done, but we're just on the cusp of how that is being done and we're really leading the charge with that.

Peter Woolfolk: 21:57

When you say on the cusp of being done. What do you see being added to your service in the near future or distant future?

Brett Farmiloe: 22:05

Yeah, I think that you know, one of the challenges with running a business like ours is that not all answers get put to use. So typically we'll see about 42 answers or submissions per query or question, and so the journalist might use one query or one quote. Out of that, a publisher might use 10 or so. So the majority of answers and knowledge that gets shared via featured doesn't get featured, and so one of the things that we're actively working on and we'll be launching here you know, probably by the time this episode comes out later in September is Q&A pages. So essentially, this is an AEO, or answer engine optimization, type of an initiative for us where every answer that gets submitted through featured will be visible and marketed to AI visibility platforms.

Brett Farmiloe: 23:00

So now all knowledge that is shared has the ability to not only get featured in publications, but also in LLMs. So I think that that's going to be a real game changer for us, because, at the end of the day, the problem that we're solving for our customers is how do you get visible in front of your customers, and this is one thing that we're looking forward to.

Peter Woolfolk: 23:20

Well, brett, one of the things I can say right now is I'm really glad that we had a chance to chat with you, because one of the things that I like to do with this podcast is to bring our listeners information that one they may not have heard of, but, more particularly, that they can actually use in their everyday work. And this certainly sounds like something that a lot of people journalists, pr folks, marketers and so forth would be a benefit to them, especially both of what you have featured and Harold, because Harold was a big deal for a while and the fact that you've resurrected that. I'm sure a lot of people tipped their hats to you.

Brett Farmiloe: 23:56

Yeah, you know, it's been fun. It's been fun, and the thing that drives me, more so than not, is everyone's an expert in something. Everyone has knowledge to share, and it's very cool to be able to open those doors and make both platforms very accessible for anyone to step in, be themselves, share their knowledge, share what they know and be rewarded for that.

Peter Woolfolk: 24:16

Okay, well, I certainly want to thank you for joining us today. I'm glad that we had a chance to get connected. I think this is some very, very useful information that a lot of people will really appreciate.

Brett Farmiloe: 24:28

Cool. Thanks for having me on, Peter.

Peter Woolfolk: 24:30

All right, brett, let me say thank you again. My guest has been Brett Farmilow. He is the CEO of Featured and, I guess, the new owner involved in the restart of Helpful Reporter Out, and if you've enjoyed the show, we'd certainly like to get a comment from you and also let your friends know that you've been listening to the Public Relations Review podcast. Thanks again.

Announcer: 24:59

This podcast is produced by Communication Strategies, an award-winning public relations and public affairs firm headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee. Thank you for joining us.