By: Guillaume Pare

A single press placement feels like progress. Carson Spitzke, founder of Spitz PR, has spent enough time in this space to know it’s usually just the start of the work, and that the companies treating it as the finish line are leaving the most value behind.

How does repeated media coverage build something that one placement can’t?

Trust isn’t formed in a single moment. It’s formed by pattern recognition. When a buyer searches you and finds coverage spread across months and publications, they’re not reading each piece. They’re registering that you keep showing up. That consistency is what authority actually looks like from the outside, and it’s impossible to manufacture in a sprint.

What’s the connection between consistent coverage and AI search visibility specifically?

This is where it gets concrete. 86% of AI citations come from sites with five or more interconnected pieces on a topic. A single article might surface once. A body of coverage across credible third-party publishers creates the kind of citation ecosystem AI models keep pulling from. “One placement gets you in the conversation for a moment,” Spitzke says. “Consistent coverage is what gets you cited next month, and the month after that.”

Research on earned media distribution found that brands with six-plus months of consistent earned coverage see 40 to 60 percent increases in cumulative reach and link equity. That’s not a campaign result. That’s compounding.

What types of coverage hold up best over time?

Founder interviews and bylines in category-relevant publications, because they attach a named, credentialed perspective to the brand. AI systems increasingly weigh author credentials when deciding what to cite. Anonymous content or generic brand posts carry less and less weight. The record that lasts is built by a visible person saying specific things in places with editorial standards.

How should companies think about PR as an investment rather than a cost?

The question I’d ask is: what is your competitor building right now that you’ll have to catch up to later? Every placement they earn is becoming part of a citation history that AI models already trust. Brands that wait will be competing against established citation histories they had years to build. That gap doesn’t close easily. “The brands that get this right aren’t thinking about the next article,” Spitzke says. “They’re thinking about what the body of work looks like in two years.”