New press stays platform set to connect hotels with vetted journalists and influencers
PressStays.com, launched by Pic PR, connects hotels with vetted journalists and influencers for press stays at £299/month, with 50+ hotels and 500 media members already signed up.
Hotels can now arrange press stays with vetted journalists and influencers through PressStays.com, a new platform from creative PR agency Pic PR – with more than 50 hotels already signed up and 500 journalists and influencers on board.
The new offering aims to make securing media exposure easier, more affordable and more accessible than ever before.
Launched today (Thursday 29 October) with dozens of hotels listed and hundreds of media members, spanning a mix of journalists and influencers, signed up and active, hotel membership costs £299 + VAT per month per property at an introductory early-adopter rate.
PressStays.com draws on almost 15 years of hospitality PR work at Pic PR and the agency’s long-standing media relationships. It aims to give hotels of any size access to press opportunities without the cost of an agency retainer, with a year’s membership costs about the same as one month of agency support.
Hotels create a profile and publish Press Stay Opportunities, which approved journalists and influencers can browse before they request a visit. The platform also works the other way. Media members post briefs that set out what they are looking for, and hotels can put themselves forward or invite suitable people directly. Hotels then decide which requests to accept, before conducting messaging and follow-ups within the platform. A Performance & Impact feature records the coverage and content each stay produces.
Membership is free for approved media, but every journalist and influencer must apply and pass a vetting process before they can join, which includes proof of commissions or previous editorial work for journalists, as well as audience checks for influencers. During final testing the platform has already been receiving an average of five new applications a day.
The launch responds to a growing problem for hotels. With content creators approaching constantly, it’s hard to judge who’s credible and whether a fee is fair on top of a free stay. On PressStays.com the hosted stay is the exchange, with no extra influencer fee, and expectations are agreed before the visit, while editorial coverage stays independent and is never guaranteed.
David Barrett, Founder and Chief Growth Officer of Pic PR
My role is about growth, and that doesn’t stop at the agency. It’s about helping the hotels we work with grow as well. PressStays.com goes even further, opening that support up to hotels far beyond our client list and helping the wider hospitality sector to grow, too.
We’ve arranged thousands of press stays over the years. We know how well they work, but we also know how much time goes into making them happen. The idea for PressStays.com has been in our heads for years and we wanted to turn everything we’ve learnt into something any hotel could use.
The influencer world has exploded. Hotels are approached all the time, but how do you know who’s genuine and whether you should pay them on top of a free stay? For smaller hotels without a PR team it’s become a minefield. We wanted to take that uncertainty away.
This doesn’t replace a good PR agency. Proper PR takes strategy and a huge amount of proactive work married up with creative storytelling, but a brilliant independent hotel shouldn’t miss out on coverage because it can’t spend thousands a month on PR. For roughly the cost of one night's stay, a hotel can now put itself in front of a whole community of journalists and influencers looking for their next story. Every hotel has a story worth telling. We’ve made it easier for the right people to find it
David Barrett, Founder and Chief Growth Officer of Pic PR
Pic PR was founded in April 2012 and hospitality is one of its core specialisms. The agency has won or been shortlisted in more than 80 major PR and sector awards in the past five years.