The History of The PESO Model

The document discusses the PESO media model strategy, which stands for Paid, Earned, Shared, and Owned media. It provides descriptions of each component of the PESO model: owned media includes content created by the business; shared media refers to content shared on social media platforms; earned media involves securing media coverage through relationship building with journalists and influencers; and paid media uses paid advertising approaches like native ads. The document also discusses challenges with the different components and how the PESO model helps integrate these various media types for more effective marketing.

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The History of The PESO Model

Uploaded by

Avijit Chakraborty

We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.

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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

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PESO is a media model strategy that stands for Paid, Earned, Shared and Owned media.

Over a decade ago media channels used to be thought of in siloed ways:

 Paid media was the primary focus of advertising

 Earned media was the primary focus of PR
 Shared and owned media was the primary focus of … no one
The history of the PESO model
Though this idea of converging media was not new at the time, Gini Dietrich’s 2014
book Spin Sucks, coined the term PESO to include shared media (and, you know,
because “PESO” is catchy). In this book, Gini established a solid framework for
implementing and embracing this model that has become widespread in the industry.
This diagram gives a high-level look at how each channel works on its own, and with
each other.
Changes include:
 An increased focus on strategy versus tactics
 Google+ and Vine removed from shared media
 Email marketing now placed between paid and owned media
 Addition of lead generation, SEO, distribution and promotion, and marketing
communications
Though PESO is all about practicing a holistic marketing model, this doesn’t mean that
every professional needs to be an expert in ALL areas. We still need copywriters, SEO
gurus, paid media specialists, social media mavens, etc., to strengthen each PESO
component. The key is getting buy-in with your company or agency to ensure that no
content is created without the proper PESO treatment. This guide will cover the basics
of the PESO model to help all of your media channels act as a single unit and work to
strengthen each other.

What is owned media?

This is (naturally) the content your business owns. It’s created specifically for your brand
that is published to your website or other owned channels. You may host a blog on your
web domain (and if you don’t, you should probably start). Any content, from eBooks to white
papers to podcasts, are considered owned media assets.
These assets serve as the foundation to make all of your paid, earned and shared channels
work. You can’t launch a campaign without telling a story or sharing a message.

It’s estimated by Gartner that by 2020, customers will manage 85 percent of their
relationship with a company without ever talking to a human. The way that most of your
customers will first communicate with you is through your business’s owned
media (even copy and creative assets in a paid ad are considered owned media), making it
the most critical component of this model.
First steps
Aside from the cost of resources to create content, owned media is free. But depending on
your organization’s goals and team size, content creation could be a budget buster. To build
a library of owned content, look into options such as hiring internally, recruiting freelancers,
or working with an agency. Or develop a combination of the three.
Then, document a content strategy, which will help you understand your brand’s audience
personas, the keywords to target, what topics and types of content to create, the platforms
where you’ll publish content and how to measure performance.
Once a trusty and productive team is in place and there’s more content in the queue, you’ll
be able to determine how content will be used in the rest of your channels.

Shared media
There’s no doubt that we love to create acronyms and memorable terms in this industry. It’s
perhaps why shared media was added, so we could say “PESO” instead of “PEO.”
Regardless, shared media is a crucial addition and a component that hardly existed for
brands a decade ago.

Shared media could be considered a sector of owned media because you own the content
that is published to your social media platforms. However, each social platform has its own
quirks and characteristics that require different content and campaigns.

Understanding these nuances of the platforms and what segments of your audience are on
each will help dictate the owned media you create.

Online word-of-mouth
Once you share something to your social media channels, what happens next is out of your
hands. The engagements, comments and shares your content receives is up to your
audience. It’s online word-of-mouth, so you lose the ability to control exactly who is sharing
your content, what they’re saying about it and where it’s happening.

The slightest mistake can turn into a viral post that could be damaging to your brand. Take
this example of DiGiorno Pizza. They posted a tweet that misused a trending hashtag,
proving that they probably didn’t do their research before hitting “publish.”
But when a social media campaign is well-received, the results can be rewarding. When it
comes to shared media, the social posts you craft are just part of the equation. In many
cases, owned, earned AND paid media can all turn into shared media if people find the
content worth talking about and sharing with others. It’s a powerful way to spread
awareness of your brand, gain new followers and even generate new customers.

Earned Media
Traditionally, earned media is a PR pitch sent to a journalist who may include the brand in a
featured story or mention it in an article in some way, whether it’s a print or online
publication. In this sense, earned media is all about relationship building.
New definition of earned media
Today, PR and marketing pros aren’t just pitching journalists; they’re pitching blogger and
social media influencers with large followings who trust the influencer’s recommendations.

In addition, they’re sending pitches to editors and webmasters of relevant websites inquiring
about including a backlink to a piece of owned content or to contribute a guest post (which
usually includes a link or two back to the brand’s website).

The challenge of earned media

Whether it’s securing coverage in a print magazine, a blog, or on an influencer’s Instagram
page, it’s tougher than ever for your pitch to stand out. Fifty-seven percent of top-tier
publishers receive between 50 and 500 pitches each week while 53 percent of journalists
report that they rarely or never read pitches. This data doesn’t include editors and
webmasters at other organizations who receive pitches to write a guest post or to include a
backlink.
It takes more time and energy to secure earned media. It’s why PR and marketing
professionals are supplementing their outreach strategy with paid media solutions.

Paid Media
Paid media has quickly become your best strategy for better targeting and control of who is
seeing your content. It’s how you’ll get your owned content seen among the saturated
online landscape — put it right in front of their faces.

Typically centered on pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns on Google or a local newspaper

website, paid media tactics now rely largely on native advertising. Native ads are media
placements that fit the form and function of the surrounding editorial content on a webpage.
It should look “native” to the page.
The ad links to sponsored, owned or earned media — really, anything your brand wants
people to read. Here are examples of three popular native advertising types, and the pros
and cons of each:

1. Content Syndication Using Discovery

Platforms
Content discovery platforms such as Outbrain, Taboola and StackAdapt are a common
native advertising format. They highlight thumbnails, headlines and links to content at the
bottom of an article. It looks to be part of a “read more” section of a website with the main
goal of driving high traffic at a low cost.
2. Social Media Promotion
Promoted posts on social media look just like all the other posts in your feed — they fit the
look and feel of the platform and use language such as “Sponsored” (Facebook) or
“Promoted” (LinkedIn) to designate it as a paid post. With refined targeting options
(especially on Facebook), you’re more likely to reach the people that would actually convert
after engaging with your content.
3. Sponsored Content
Sponsored content is also considered a type of native advertising because it fits the form
and function of its host, but it’s not an ad. It’s a longer-form piece of brand-sponsored
content such as an article or video that lives on a media publisher’s site. According to
this Moz blog post, “Brands value this because association with a publication and exposure
to its audience can drive awareness, traffic, conversions and leads.”
The content is not about the brand, but rather a related topic. If you’re selling eco-friendly
napkins, your article won’t be about how your company was founded. Rather, it’ll list five
tips for going green while eating out. Your article will only have one or two brand mentions
throughout.

4. The Modern MAT Release

Before the term “sponsored content” became so buzzy, PR pros used the MAT release to
garner media coverage in publications across the country.
MAT releases are still a tried-and-true content distribution method, used mainly to increase
brand awareness. Unlike paying one fee to host content on a publisher’s website, you pay
for a MAT release to be distributed through a vendor (like Brandpoint), and the article is
then placed within the publications in that vendor’s content distribution network.

Editors also have the opportunity to choose content from brands to fill space when needed,
which turns the MAT release into an earned media property as well. To further capitalize on
this placement, you can share a published MAT release with your social media followers.

https://wadds.co.uk/blog/peso-for-marketing-and-pr#:~:text=The%20PESO%20model
%20allows%20communicators,out%20over%20the%20last%20decade.

Disadvantages: of paid media

 Frequency: too high a frequency (number of times your audience

is exposed to your message) can become a trigger to tune out
resulting in the audience disregarding your messages or offering.
 Expense: it can become expensive for smaller businesses and
startups to execute due to the time and costs associated with
setting the right campaign and managing the campaign to
achieve maximum effectiveness.
 Rejection: people can ignore or dismiss your advertising by
believing it is not relevant to their needs
 Competition: the display advertising and search advertising
space is very cluttered with increasing number of advertisers
daily. Both display and search advertising work on a bidding
process, with the highest bidder winning and being exposed to
the audience. This means that smaller companies often have to
be clever to outperform the bidding of companies with large
budgets.