Bring engagement data to your media lists with Top Authors Leaderboard

Top Authors Leaderboard is now live in NewsWhip Spike, giving a precise, predictive view of the most influential journalists covering any story, topic, location, or keyword.

Historically, PR professionals have always assumed journalists at prestige publications are the most influential. They bring an important announcement to the FT, not The Verge.

In 2020, that assumption belongs in the past. 

Digital-first publications have built huge social media audiences. A reporter at a 3-person newsroom can become the most shared politics writer in America. The Verge has three of the top ten most influential writers in tech. 

Prestige publications still wield huge influence, but now they are part of a wider, networked ecosystem. With a pandemic and political polarization, media consumption in 2020 has been utterly transformed – in the sources being read, and the intensity of public engagement. 

We want to help our users – particularly PR professionals – understand that ecosystem, so that they can find the most important and influential journalists on any beat. To accomplish that, we’ve added Top Authors Leaderboardas a new dashboard component in NewsWhip Spike. 

With a Top Authors Leaderboard you can identify “the most influential voices in a space not just based on name recognition, but based on who is being shared the most on social”, as Bryan Pedersen, MSL CIO puts it.

That means media lists validated by crisp, real-world data. It means uncovering unexpected voices – along with the data to validate why you should contact them. It’s what Steve Rubel at Edelman called the “moneyball for media” power of NewsWhip.

What Top Authors Leaderboard does for you

As with everything we do, Top Authors Leaderboard is designed as a capability extender for busy professionals, giving you predictive power, and removing guesswork.

Plan strategies that make an impact

The Top Authors Leaderboard tracks engagement with articles by the author, and shows you who has the most impact with the public in an easy-to-view leaderboard. 

For media relations experts, it’s now much quicker for you to validate and build the perfect, high-impact media list. With knowledge of what has worked for each writer in the past, you can craft the perfect pitch too.

Respond to crisis quickly & effectively

For crisis management professionals, responding quickly is only part of your job — responding in the right place is just as important. 

Top Authors helps you quickly identify the reporters whose stories are influencing the public most around your crisis — increasing the impact of any crisis response plan.

Monitor real-time author engagement

Leaderboards allow you to identify and then track the authors that are most impacting the public perception in any domain of interest to identify new opportunities – and detect risks.

If you’re not a customer and you’d like to explore Top Authors Leaderboard – or any of our other predictive media capabilities – please get in touch today.