# Earned media: definition, PESO model and measurement What earned media is, how it differs from paid, owned and shared media, why it matters for AI answers, and how to measure it without relying on AVE. **Earned media is coverage and attention an organisation gains without paying for it: articles, interviews, mentions and recommendations that journalists or other third parties publish by their own choice.** What makes media "earned" is that someone else decides. An editor decides whether your study is worth a story. A trade magazine decides whether to quote your CEO. You can supply material, build relationships and offer good reasons to cover something, but the decision to publish, and what to say, sits with a third party. That is why earned coverage tends to carry more credibility than an ad, and why it is harder to plan. ## Earned media in the PESO model The PESO model sorts communication into four media types: paid, earned, shared and owned. It was created by Gini Dietrich, founder of Spin Sucks. In her [own account](https://spinsucks.com/communication/peso-model-breakdown/), her agency used the process for years before it officially launched in 2014 with her book "Spin Sucks". She describes earned media as what most people know as publicity or media relations: a newspaper or trade publication writing about you, or an appearance on the news. The point of the model is to plan the four types together rather than in separate silos. | Media type | Who controls the content? | Examples | | ------------ | ------------------------------------ | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Paid media | You, for a fee | Social ads, sponsored content, advertorials, paid newsletter placements | | Earned media | A journalist or other third party | News article, trade press interview, podcast guest spot, mention in a product comparison | | Shared media | Shared between you and the community | LinkedIn posts, comments, reposts, community discussions | | Owned media | You alone | Website, blog, newsroom, customer magazine | The lines are not always clean. An interview published in your own newsroom is owned media. The same interview in a national daily is earned. A paid guest article is paid media, even when it looks like editorial content. ## A worked example A fictional heat pump manufacturer surveys 1,000 homeowners. It publishes the results on its blog (owned), sends a [press release](/en/glossary/press-release) and posts the charts on LinkedIn (shared). Two weeks later a regional newspaper and an energy trade site pick up the figures and quote the company's spokesperson. Those two articles are earned media. Meanwhile the company promotes the blog post with ads (paid). When the team reports on earned media, only the two articles count. The reach of its own posts and ads belongs in other columns. ## Why earned media matters for AI visibility When someone asks ChatGPT, Gemini or Google AI Overviews about a brand or a product category, the answers often draw on editorial third-party sources. This is an observation from citation studies, not a fixed rule: which sources a provider uses depends on the question, the market and the date. The [AMEC GEO Principles](https://amecorg.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/26-05-15-AMEC-GEO-Principles.pdf) list earned media as part of the information environment that shapes AI-generated answers, alongside owned content, shared media and reviews. For how to read the research figures, see [Earned media and AI visibility](/en/blog/earned-media-ai-visibility-chatgpt). For how providers pick their sources, see [How AI answers select sources](/en/blog/how-ai-answers-select-sources). ## How to measure earned media A list of clippings shows that coverage happened. It does not show whether it achieved anything. Useful measures include: - **Reach.** How many people could potentially have seen the piece? This is an estimate, not proven attention. - **Share of Voice.** What share of coverage does your brand hold compared with a defined set of competitors? - **Sentiment.** Is the coverage positive, neutral or negative? - **Message pull-through.** Do your key messages appear in the text, and how accurately? These measures belong in a [media content analysis](/en/glossary/media-content-analysis) that ties them to communication objectives. AMEC's Barcelona Principles 4.0 ask for exactly that: measurable objectives set in advance, and evaluation by outcome and impact. ### Why AVE is not a good measure Advertising Value Equivalency (AVE) calculates what the space or airtime of a piece of coverage would have cost as advertising. The Institute for Public Relations' measurement commission rejected the term, concept and practice in 2009. The Barcelona Principles 4.0 call AVE an invalid measure that should not be used. An article is not an ad. It can be critical, miss your message or reach the wrong audience and still produce a high AVE. Read more in [What is AVE?](/en/blog/advertising-value-equivalency-ave) ### Earned media value and its limits "Earned media value" is a common label for a monetary figure attached to earned coverage. There is no standard formula. Many versions are based on advertising rates, or on reach multiplied by a cost per thousand, and so share the weaknesses of AVE. If you have to report such a figure, state the formula, the data and the period, and do not present it as impact or return on investment. ## How aclipp helps aclipp tracks earned media through global online monitoring across more than 150 million sources and shows next to it how brands appear in AI answers. That puts coverage and [AI visibility](/en/ai-visibility) in one workspace. Reach, Share of Voice, sentiment and message pull-through feed into [reports](/en/reporting).