In a time where trust drives buying decisions, earned media is your brand’s most powerful endorsement. Authentic and organic, it enhances credibility and boosts your digital presence, making it an essential part of effective online reputation management.
This guide unpacks everything you need to know about earned media: what it is, how it differs from owned and paid media and actionable insights to harness its full potential.
• What Is Earned Media?
• Owned and Earned Media vs. Paid Media
• Examples of Earned Media
• The Role of Earned Media in Online Reputation Management and SEO
• 6 Strategies To Increase Your Chances of Obtaining Earned Media
What Is Earned Media?
Earned media is what it exactly means: content you’ve “earned” due to the quality of your product, service or content. It could be in the form of customer reviews, social media mentions and third-party coverage.
This form of media is essential in digital reputation management because it effectively builds trust and credibility. However, it’s also the most challenging type of media to obtain — because you don’t have direct control over it.
People will only enthusiastically leave reviews, recommend your brand, mention you in conversations and repost your material if they genuinely appreciate and connect with the value you offer.
Earned Media vs. Paid Media
Before we delve further into earned media and its role in managing online reputation, it helps to understand how it differs from other media types.
There are three types of media: owned, paid and earned media. Let’s begin with comparing owned vs. paid media:
• Owned Media refers to the platforms your business controls, like your website or social media pages. You manage the content, which makes it cost-effective and flexible. However, keeping it relevant requires ongoing effort.
• Paid Media involves ads or sponsored content — anything you pay for to generate quick visibility. While effective in driving traffic, it requires constant investment.
With owned media like blog posts and social media content, you have full control over the narrative. Meanwhile, with paid media, you choose where your ads appear and who sees them. Either way, you’re in the driver’s seat.
Earned media, however, is outside of your direct control, and it’s not something you can pay for. Instead, it’s what others say about your brand that you earn through positive experiences, not payments.
Examples of Earned Media
Here are some of the most common examples of earned media:
• Review Sites: Customers can leave feedback on Yelp, TripAdvisor or Google Business Profile. Getting honest, positive reviews on these platforms can help with online reputation marketing and influence purchasing decisions.
• Media Coverage: Organic mentions in articles, TV segments or gift guides qualify as earned media. Unlike paid coverage, these mentions are usually based on merit or newsworthiness (e.g., a product featured in a gift guide or a company’s achievements highlighted in a TV segment).
• Social Media Shoutouts: Customers might post about your brand on Facebook, Instagram and other social platforms, sharing their experiences or recommending your products. While you can’t control these posts, providing excellent service and implementing online reputation monitoring increases the chances of positive social media recognition.
The Role of Earned Media in Online Reputation Management and SEO
Earned media is a powerful third-party endorsement that builds trust and credibility. Thrive Local’s Senior Reputation Manager, Tim Clarke, explains that its authenticity makes customers far more likely to trust earned media than traditional advertising or company-controlled messaging.
Positive mentions from friends, industry influencers or respected publications enhance a brand’s reputation and foster trust. Encouraging these endorsements also promotes customer interaction, creating a more favorable and engaging brand image.
What’s even better is that there’s also a search engine optimization (SEO) value to earned media:
• Quality Backlinks: Earned media generates valuable backlinks from reputable sites, boosting your site’s trustworthiness and search rankings.
• Increased Brand Visibility: Mentions across platforms increase brand visibility, ultimately improving click-through rates and search result positioning.
• Fresh Content Signals: Regular earned media, like customer reviews or social shares, indicates that your brand is active, helping boost your “freshness” score and signaling relevance to search engines.
6 Strategies To Increase Your Chances of Obtaining Earned Media
While earned media isn’t up to you, there are ways to influence and increase your chances of gaining valuable coverage.
1. Create Shareable, Engaging Content
Crafting content worth engaging with and sharing is an excellent way to get started with driving earned media. It sparks conversations, giving your audiences something worth discussing and sharing, boosting brand recognition.
The question is, what does “shareable and engaging content” look like? This can be many things, including:
• In-Depth Industry Research
• eBooks or Lead Magnets
• Podcasts or Interviews
• New Tools or Product Launches
When choosing a topic, focus on what will resonate with your target audience. Consider what excites them and what they’re eager to learn more about. A well-chosen topic that aligns with their interests will encourage them to engage and share, creating opportunities for earned media through retweets, reshares and posts of their own.
2. Build Relationships With Industry Journalists
Reporters and journalists often seek quotes and insights from industry experts to add credibility and depth to their stories, creating valuable opportunities for brands like yours. By becoming a reliable source, your brand can gain visibility through reputable media mentions.
However, media relationships require genuine, ongoing nurturing. Building rapport with journalists requires regular engagement and mutual value.
Here are some quick tips to build strong media relationships:
• Engage consistently to stay on their radar. Comment on their articles and share their work on social media.
• Be a resource, not just a pitch. Offer helpful information or insights, even if it doesn’t immediately benefit you.
• Be timely and respectful. When journalists reach out, respond promptly with clear, concise information. Respecting their deadlines and time constraints goes a long way.
3. Encourage Customer Reviews and User-Generated Content
Customer reviews are a form of earned media that can significantly influence customers’ perception of your brand and consumer behavior. Positive reviews build trust and credibility, encouraging potential customers to engage with your brand. Conversely, negative reviews can deter prospects, making digital reputation management essential.
Another thing you want to focus on is user-generated content (UGC). As its name suggests, UGC is any content about your brand created by consumers rather than your business.
It often showcases authentic customer interactions with your brand, building trust and driving engagement. Moreover, it reduces the need for in-house content creation, making it a cost-effective way to support your online reputation marketing efforts.
By actively encouraging customer reviews and UGC, you can enhance your online presence, master managing online reputation and attract new audiences through authentic, earned media.
4. Leverage Influencer Collaborations
Influencer marketing continues to be a powerful strategy in 2025, with the industry projected to reach a record high of $33 billion by the year’s end. Brands increasingly recognize the value of collaborating with influencers to enhance their reach and credibility.
That said, effective influencer campaigns don’t just happen — they’re built on mutually beneficial relationships.
To cultivate strong relationships with influencers:
• Research and Personalize Outreach: Understand the influencer’s content, audience and values and tailor your communication to reflect that genuine interest in what they do.
• Offer Value Beyond Compensation: Provide exclusive access to products, share unique insights or collaborate on creative projects.
• Maintain Open Communication: Establish clear expectations and encourage feedback; these build trust and keep both parties aligned.
• Engage Consistently: Show your support and Interact with their content by liking, commenting and sharing.
5. Monitor and Respond to Online Conversations
Engaging in online conversations is a straightforward way to increase earned media opportunities, making it vital in digital reputation management. Active participation lets you address customer questions, resolve issues and encourage positive experiences that lead to trust and loyalty.
You can get started with free social listening tools like Google Alerts for efficient online reputation monitoring. These tools can help you stay on top of brand mentions, enabling you to promptly respond to praise and address feedback. The result? Thoughtful, consistent engagement that helps shape customer perceptions in meaningful ways.
6. Monitor and Measure Your Earned Media Value
Think of Earned Media Value (EMV) as the “buzz factor” quantified. It quantifies the organic exposure your brand gains from customer reviews, social media mentions and press coverage. This metric helps you understand the real impact of your visibility in the digital space without paid promotion.
To track and measure your EMV effectively, align your online reputation monitoring with your strategy and platforms.
For instance, for your website, you want to monitor referrals, mentions and backlinks to gauge search engine impact. On the other hand, for social media, track brand mentions and relevant keywords to see how your brand is being discussed online.
Bonus: Prepare for the Highs and Lows of Earned Media
When working to increase earned media, it’s crucial to anticipate and prepare for all types of attention — positive and negative. Earned media won’t always be favorable, and criticisms may arise.
On the bright side, they add authenticity to your online reputation marketing.
“It’s better to have a high score over four stars rather than a perfect five,” Clarke said.
Customers expect even top brands to face occasional criticism.
Stay true to your brand and have a plan for handling both positive and negative press. When you embrace feedback when managing online reputation, you can demonstrate transparency, turn challenges into opportunities and make the most of your earned media strategy.
Deliver the Authenticity Consumers Crave With Thrive Local
Today’s consumers value authenticity. Earned media is the key to cultivating trust, credibility and visibility for your brand — which Thrive Local helps you deliver with ease. Effortlessly generate customer reviews, manage local citations and gain a complete view of your brand health, all in one powerful platform.
Explore Thrive Local with a free demo or schedule a consultation with our experts today.
