How to Get Insights Using the Dashboard

One of the central missions of Propel is giving you a deep understanding of what's working and what can be improved. On the dashboard, you can find a wide array of analytics that can give you insights about the success of campaigns, employees and accounts overall. Our graphs include:

• Pitching Volume & Effectiveness
• Batting Averages
• Number of Articles Published
• Propel Factor/Article Score
• Leading Contacts
• SEO Value

To change the date range, click on the time period drop-down and select the range you are interested to analyze.

To filter by account, pitching initiative or employee, click on the "View" drop-down.

If you want to get additional training on how to use the dashboard, please reach out to me at idan@propelmypr.com

How to Secure More Opportunities with the Propel Story Funnel

Click on the "Story Funnel" tab to see your entire pipeline of opportunities, broken down by pitches "sent," "opened," "responded," "materials/interview," "article secured," "article published," and "not interested." Click on the reporter's name to see their profile page – which includes your entire history of communication with them, their contact info, and any notes you may have.

Click on the  "Add new card" button on the top-right to create an opportunity that was initiated off-line.

You can filter the funnel by user, account, or pitching initiative.

To update a status of an opportunity, simply drag and drop from one column to another. You can also click on the arrow in the top right corner of the card and select which column you want to move that card into.

After an article publishes, update the card status to "Article Published"  – at which point a pop-up box will appear. Fill in the URL and publishing date so that the article will be added to the dashboard and reports.

Phew, that's it! You are ready to start pitching and managing your team's PR efforts with Propel. If you have any question or would like to schedule a training session to learn more advanced tricks, please reach out to me at idan@propelmypr.com.

How to Navigate Your Media Lists

Click on "Media Lists" in the navigation bar on the left

Find the media list you want to start pitching by either filtering by account or searching by media list name.

Click on the numbers to open the media list and on the pencil to add contacts from the database.

NOTE: numbers represent the total contacts that were already pitched out of the total contacts on the list.

Find the contact you want to pitch using the sort and/or search bar. Filter contacts to see just the ones that are assigned to you, not already pitched, etc.

Remove contacts from the list or assign users to pitch them.

Pitch by clicking on an envelope - your email client will be opened.

* If you are using Gmail and it doesn't automatically open, we recommend reading the following tutorial: Mac users, Windows users.

Phew, that's it! You are ready to start pitching and managing your team's PR efforts with Propel. If you have any question or would like to schedule a training session to learn more advanced tricks, please reach out to me at idan@propelmypr.com.

How to Create a New Account

 First, go to the Accounts section and click on "Add New Account".

NOTE: Accounts are clients.

Enter basic information about the account. If you are in a hurry, you can click  "Finish" after completing only the few required fields. If you have a few minutes, it is recommended to complete the next steps in order to get the most out of Propel.

Enter website and social media links for the account.

NOTE: Although these fields are not mandatory, Propel uses them in order to identify backlinks in articles published when calculating the Propel Factor and SEO Value. Therefore, in order to get the most out of Propel, it is recommended to at least enter the account's website address when setting up the account.

Assign existing users (i.e. team members) or add new users to the account. By adding users to an account you give them access to see data and activity related to that account.

Complete the  "Audience" screen by entering the business type, relevant industries, and media outlets of interest. If you don't know which media outlets are most relevant, or you prefer to not complete this field, Propel will still work fine. However, the more information you enter here, the more LORA – Propel AI Engine will be able to help you by making intelligent recommendations for which reporters to pitch.

Enter any key messages related to that account. Messages should be a few words. For example, if you are representing a ridesharing app, a sample message may be "sharing economy transportation is more affordable."  Then, add any one-two word tags related to that account. In the ridesharing example, sample tags may be  "urban transportation," "sharing economy,"  "smart city,"  "on-demand transportation," etc.

Propel will use this data to help you build media lists more efficiently and to evaluate the quality of your coverage.

Finally, you can add a logo for the account.

Click finish when you are done. Congrats – you have created an account! You can edit any of this information at any time, by clicking on the account name and editing any of the steps.

If you have any question or would like to schedule a training session to learn more advanced tricks, please reach out to me at idan@propelmypr.com.

How to Create a Pitching Initiative

Click on the "Pitch" button on the top right corner of your screen. This will prompt you to create a  "Pitching Initiative", which is a specific campaign/pitching effort within an account. For example, this may be a news announcement for a specific account, or a bylined article. It could also be a specific newsjacking effort, a trend story pitch, or a variety of other activities.

Give the pitching initiative a name, enter which account it is for, and choose the type. In addition, you can pick a publishing deadline for time sensitive announcements or you can select "No Deadline Required" for ongoing/evergreen initiatives.

Select any key messages that are relevant for this pitching initiative, or add new ones. This is optional. It enables Propel to help you evaluate pitching initiative effectiveness later.

Set milestones/tasks for the pitching initiative. This list is automatically generated based on the pitching initiative type you selected and you can add/remove stages based on your preference.

NOTE: This is an optional task management feature that allows managers and team leaders to set deadlines and assign responsibility for the various stages within a pitching initiative.

Enter any specific search phrases relevant to the pitching initiative, which will allow Propel to help you discover relevant reporters for this pitching initiative. You can also enter which tier levels you are interested in getting coverage in for this pitching initiative. Both of these are optional. Lastly, choose whether you'd like to copy an existing media list or create a new one. If you're just getting started with Propel, you will want to create a new one.

You are ready to go - click "Finish & Go to media list".

If you have any question or would like to schedule a training session to learn more advanced tricks, please reach out to me at idan@propelmypr.com.

Getting Started with Propel

Welcome to Propel!

We are really excited to introduce you to Propel! We built Propel to improve the lives of media relations pros. We are media relations experts that have worked in PR for years and chat with hundreds of PR firms to learn the problems they are facing and help them improve their agencies with technology.

First, you'll want to download our Gmail Chrome Extension. If you don't use Gmail, don't worry! You can still use Propel – you'll just need to set up DNS records.

Then, you'll want to learn the basics on all of the features we provide: 

How to Pitch with the Propel Gmail Plug-In

How to Secure More Opportunities with Story Funnel

How to Get Insights Using the Dashboard

How to Create a New Account

How to Create a Pitching Initiative

How to Navigate Your Media Lists

Pitching With the Propel Gmail Plug-In

The Propel Gmail Plug-In allows you to pitch reporters and influencers directly from your Gmail inbox. All you need to do is download our Chrome extension and login to Propel.

Step 1 - Pitch

1) After installing the plug-in, you can start pitching by simply clicking on the Propel logo (next to the send button) in a compose new message window.

2) Then you will be asked to select a pitching initiative. You can either pick from the most frequently used or search for a pitching initiative by entering the pitching initiative or account name. If the pitching initiative doesn't exist in Propel yet - click "Create new" to add it.

3) Then a pop-up will appear with all of the reporters on your media list. You can select which contacts you'd like to pitch now by clicking the checkbox next to their name. You can select as many contacts as you'd like.

4) If you select more than one recipient, each of the recipients will receive a separate email, which you can personalize by using Propel's mail merge feature. Do this by clicking on "Insert mail merge fields" and selecting the variable field you desire – options include first name, last name and publication name.

*NOTE: Mail merge does have two limitations - First, you must send the first email using the Propel extension and not from your mobile device or a different browser. Second, no attachments are allowed in the first email when pitching multiple contacts at the same time. If you want to attach a press release or media kit we recommend including a google drive or dropbox link instead.

5) You can set a reminder to follow-up with the contact(s) you are pitching to if you don't hear back from them in a specific time period or by a specific date.  

Step 2 - Track

Now that you have pitched, the plug-in helps you track responses and organize all of your reporter interest in a clear way that helps you prevent opportunities falling through the cracks. 

1) Click on the Propel logo to check if you have follow-up reminders due, which are represented by the number in the red circle. Then, click on the notification to go directly to your Propel's follow-up folder.

2) Click on the Propel folder in your Gmail inbox to see all of your ongoing communications with reporters. Here, you can filter by account, pitching initiative or status (sent, opened, responded, etc.). For example, you can easily see all of your pitches that were opened and not yet responded, in order to follow-up, or the ones that are awaiting materials or an interview in order to remind you to touch base. 

3) Finally, every time you hear back from a reporter, you can update the story funnel status or set yourself a new follow-up reminder from the open mail thread itself.

You can also track and organize all of your reporter opportunities through the Propel Story Funnel in the web app.

I hope this tutorial helps! If you have any additional questions or want to schedule a 15 minute 1-on-1 training session, please reach out to me at idan@propelmypr.com

Forbes Magazine names Propel one of the "15 Technology Companies to Watch in 2018"

We are humbled to be named by Forbes as one of "15 Technology Companies to Watch in 2018".

The PR industry has adopted technology at a snail’s pace compared to the rest of the marketing ecosystem. Propel, a recently launched AI-driven CRM for PR, is on a mission to help the PR industry innovate. The platform increases efficiency of public relations workers. By collecting loads of data and leveraging wisdom of the crowd, Propel enables PR teams – either agency or in-house – to understand which journalists are relevant, which pitches are resonating, and which campaigns are working. Propel offers actionable insights to help users hone in on the right messages and reporters, and improve quality and quantity of coverage. The CRM also offers powerful streamlining and organizational tools that help users more easily manage their workload, as well as a dashboard for managers that makes clear which employees and campaigns are most effective. The Tel Aviv-based company launched this year and is in the midst of a funding round.