By Richard Dunkerley, Senior Content Strategist
As tempting as it is to use the old Mark Twain quote about exaggerated reports of death, I’m just going to leap right in and say I love trade media.
And far from being a diminished force, I believe it’s undergoing a renaissance. For one major reason (more about that later).
While my experience is almost exclusively limited to financial trade mastheads – including Money Management, Financial Standard and Financial Newswire – I daresay many of the characteristics I find so appealing about these publications are common across most industries.
Proper trades love technical stories
Most trade publications – at least those that haven’t morphed into glossy catalogues of paid content – are hardworking, ego free, and care about the technicalities. (In media training we are told ‘no one cares about your widgets! to which I reply – the trades do!!).
There are some great journalists in the trades
Many great journalists have started their careers in the trades, and I’ve got to spend time with all kinds – those for whom the trades were a launch pad for a role in the tier one publications (think Hannah Wooton or Alice Uribe), and those for whom the trades seem a longer term career choice (Jamie Williamson, Laura Dew, Chris Dastoor). And then there are the hands-on publishers and industry mainstays who have being doing their thing for years (think Peter Sobels at RiskInfo, Susie Newham at AdviserVoice, and Mike Taylor, founder of Financial Newswire).
The trades have endured challenging times
As I mentioned at the start, there are those who have written off trade media, viewing it as an inferior channel. Tier one coverage remains valuable, and we pursue it hard, but a well-placed 400-word feature in a relevant trade title can work just as hard for discoverability than a passing mention in the AFR. That’s because trade media allows you to actually tell your story in full, in front of a highly targeted audience that cares about the detail.
The last few years has seen a fair bit of consolidation in the space, especially in those mastheads targeting the shrinking financial adviser population. Some publications have gone by the wayside altogether – who remembers the Financial Observer?
But whilst recent times may have been challenging in the sector, I firmly believe it’s about to undergo a massive renaissance, and that smart comms teams are going to place a lot more importance on trade coverage.
Why do I say that?
Well, you may have heard about this little thing called AI.
AI search has become our default
One of the aspects of our lives that has already been transformed by AI is the way we search. ‘Generative Search’ is all the rage. I know that because my LinkedIn feed is bombarded by countless experts offering their wisdom on AI visibility. (As a bit of an aside, if you want to learn about AI search – a good starting point, before you bring in a consultant, is to ask AI itself).
Here’s a killer statistic from the start of 2026:
According to a study, 37% of consumers are starting a search with AI instead of Google.
And here’s another one from Forrester.
B2B buyers are adopting AI-powered search at three times the rate of consumers.
So, particularly in the B2B space, the game has changed from SEO to Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO), and crucially, GEO favours earned sources over paid, or brand self-generated content.
The other thing you will hear talked about a lot is ‘zero click search’. Basically, this means, because generative search responses are generally so rich in detail, the majority of searchers don’t need to click any further. To put this in perspective, the latest estimates suggest around 93% of searches in AI mode end without a click!
Why AI engines prefer earned sources over sponsored content
If you are a marketer and you need just one number to demonstrate why earned media should be your priority, then here it is: Research by Muck Rack – based on millions of AI-cited links – found that 94% of AI citations come from non-paid sources (and 82% of those are from earned media specifically.)
When an AI engine is trying to determine the credibility of a source, that assessment comes down to a simple question: is this information corroborated by an independent source, or is it just a brand talking about itself?
A company publishing on its own website is, in the eyes of an AI system, self-asserting, whereas a trade publication covering that same company provides external corroboration, which carries significantly more weight.
Another study quantifies what this looks like in practice: in nearly one in five brand citations, the AI engine chooses a third-party publisher over the brand website, even though the brand originated the content.
This shows how the old rules around SEO have been tipped on their head. Whereas Google’s algorithm rewarded the original, definitive source – the original, brand-owned page – AI citation behaviour rewards the most credibly corroborated source, which is typically the earned placement, not the brand’s website.
Syndicated press releases don’t solve it either
A note to all you PR do-it-yourselfers, studies show that press release distribution services (the old school ‘wire’) doesn’t cut it either. Studies suggest press releases account for just 0.04% of all AI citations. Dumping your news onto a distribution service isn’t earned media, and AI can spot the difference.
Not all earned media is equal
Different AI platforms behave differently, but a few things hold across all of them. Perplexity, which uses live retrieval as its core product, heavily favours named B2B authority. A Princeton study confirmed that AI engines show a systematic bias toward earned, authoritative, third-party media over brand content. And Ahrefs found that brand mentions correlate three times more strongly with AI visibility than backlinks, the mainstay of old school SEO.
Which brings us back to the trades
Trade publications are structured almost exactly the way AI systems look for credibility: subject-matter expert writers, factual and specific content, peer credibility within a defined industry, and consistent topical focus. AI treats depth as a proxy for authority.
As I said before, a passing mention in the AFR is a drop in the ocean. A 400-word feature in a trade title that names your firm, explains your position in detail, quotes your expertise, and situates it within a broader industry context? That’s structured knowledge, which AI will return to again and again when a relevant query comes up.
Whereas the old media paradigm was about reach, the new paradigm is about depth, and trade publications are built for depth.
Meaning in this new world, they matter more than ever.