A growth-stage technology company should budget approximately $7,000 to $20,000 per month for a serious PR or combined PR and Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) program. The appropriate investment depends on the company’s competitive position, growth objectives, target markets and how much authority it needs to build.
At the lower end, a company can run a focused earned media program designed to establish credibility, secure relevant coverage and build executive visibility.
At $12,000 to $15,000 per month, it becomes possible to combine PR with a structured GEO program that includes AI-search measurement, content development and third-party authority building.
At $17,000 to $20,000 per month, the program can become considerably more aggressive, targeting multiple categories, competitors and stages of the buyer journey.
Larger investments can support original research, dedicated editorial operations and more ambitious category leadership programs.
Those figures reflect the current pricing structure at Proper Propaganda, a technology PR and GEO agency working with growth-stage technology companies.
They are examples of what a company can buy, rather than a universal industry pricing benchmark.
The more useful question for a CMO is what each level of investment should reasonably accomplish.
Because spending $15,000 a month on communications without knowing what success looks like is an expensive way to collect press clippings.
How much does PR and GEO cost in 2026?
Here is how we currently structure PR and GEO engagements at Proper Propaganda.
| Program | Fixed monthly fee | Potential performance fees | Maximum investment | Typical term |
| Public Relations | $7,000 | Up to $3,000/month | $10,000/month | 6–12 months |
| Foundation PR + GEO | $12,000 | $9,000 quarterly bonus | $15,000/month equivalent | 6–12 months |
| Expanded PR + GEO | $17,000 | $9,000 quarterly bonus | $20,000/month equivalent | 6–12 months |
| Category Authority Platform | $17,000 PR + GEO, plus $300,000/year for a brand owned publication | $9,000 quarterly bonus | $540,000 in year one | 12 months |
The distinction between fixed and variable fees matters.
Our PR-only program has a $7,000 monthly base, with up to $3,000 in additional compensation tied to earned media performance.
Our combined PR + GEO programs have fixed monthly fees, with potential quarterly bonuses tied to measurable AI-search visibility improvements.
The higher figures represent maximum fees when the relevant performance conditions are achieved. Pasted markdown
Let’s look at what a growth-stage CMO should expect from each investment.
A focused PR program / $7,000 to $10,000 per month
Best for: Growth-stage companies that need stronger media relations, executive visibility, product coverage and third-party credibility but aren’t ready to fund a comprehensive GEO program.
At this level, you’re buying a professional communications function.
That should include strategy and execution.
At Proper Propaganda, a typical $7,000 monthly PR engagement includes media strategy, journalist targeting, media materials, pitching, interview coordination, thought leadership, founder communications, media training, speaking opportunities and reporting.
The program also looks for industry trends and data-led stories that create opportunities beyond routine company announcements.
The fixed fee is $7,000 per month, with up to $3,000 in additional performance fees. The total monthly fee is capped at $10,000.
What should a CMO expect for $7,000 to $10,000 per month?
A properly structured program should establish a consistent media relations operation.
You should expect a clear editorial strategy, a prioritized list of relevant publications, a regular pitching cadence and an agency that understands which stories journalists are likely to cover.
You should also expect your executives to become more useful media sources.
For a consumer technology company, that might involve product reviews, category roundups, commerce coverage and expert commentary.
For a B2B technology company, the emphasis might be trade publications, executive interviews, original insights and industry-specific media.
Over six to twelve months, the objective should be to establish a stronger and more relevant third-party footprint.
What shouldn’t you expect?
A guaranteed number of articles in specific publications.
A promise that every launch will receive major coverage.
Immediate category dominance.
A comprehensive AI-search optimization program.
Those outcomes require different levels of investment, and some depend on editorial decisions the agency cannot control.
What should success look like?
I’d measure a PR-only engagement against five things:
- Relevant earned media coverage
- Competitive Share of Voice
- Executive visibility
- Category association
- Coverage quality and usefulness to the business
The final point matters.
A detailed product review in a publication that influences your customers may be more valuable than a passing mention in a much larger outlet.
At this budget, the objective is to build a credible and increasingly useful earned media presence.
Foundation PR + GEO / $12,000 to $15,000 per month
Best for: Growth-stage technology companies that need both earned media authority and better visibility across ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Gemini and other AI-search platforms.
This is where the communications mandate expands.
The company still needs PR.
It still needs journalists, reviews, executive commentary and relevant coverage.
But it also needs to understand how customers are discovering and evaluating companies through AI.
That introduces additional work.
Customer research.
Prompt analysis.
Competitive benchmarking.
Website and content assessment.
AI visibility measurement.
Content development.
Third-party citation analysis.
Ongoing optimization.
At Proper Propaganda, our Foundation PR + GEO program costs $12,000 per month, with a potential $9,000 quarterly performance bonus.
When the bonus is earned, the maximum quarterly fee is $45,000, equivalent to $15,000 per month.
The program typically includes 8 to 10 GEO-aligned content assets per month, alongside the core PR mandate.
What should a CMO expect at this level?
The first expectation should be a proper diagnostic.
Before producing content, the agency should understand how customers use AI.
At Proper Propaganda, we begin with customer research, including a focused survey examining which AI tools customers use, how they phrase questions and where AI enters their research or purchase process.
That information helps establish a prompt universe.
A prompt universe is a structured collection of the questions customers ask AI systems throughout the buying journey.
An initial implementation can involve mapping approximately 100 to 300 prompts into a monitoring platform and establishing a baseline. Pasted markdown
From there, the program should identify where the company is visible, where competitors dominate and which sources are influencing AI-generated answers.
The work then moves into content and authority building.
Why does the PR component matter?
Because much of the information AI systems cite comes from outside a company’s website.
Muck Rack’s research into AI citations examines the sources used in millions of generative AI responses.
Its May 2026 analysis found that earned media represented approximately 84% of citations in its dataset, with journalism accounting for 27%.
Muck Rack uses a broad definition of earned media, so these figures shouldn’t be interpreted as saying traditional news coverage alone accounts for 84% of AI citations.
But the research reinforces the importance of the wider information environment surrounding a brand.
A company can publish excellent content and still have a weak third-party authority footprint.
That’s one reason combining PR and GEO makes sense.
What should success look like?
Within the first quarter, I’d expect a functioning measurement system, a defined competitive benchmark and a clear understanding of the company’s most important AI visibility gaps.
By months three to six, the program should be producing useful content, building relevant third-party authority and showing which interventions are associated with changes in visibility.
A CMO should be able to answer:
Are we appearing more frequently across commercially relevant prompts?
Are we gaining visibility against competitors?
Are more relevant sources discussing and citing us?
Are AI systems associating us with the categories and problems we want to own?
The program should produce measurable progress, although improvements cannot be guaranteed.
At this budget, you’re investing in a combined communications and AI visibility system.
Expanded PR + GEO / $17,000 to $20,000 per month
Best for: Established growth-stage companies competing in crowded categories, entering new markets or attempting to displace better-known competitors.
This level is appropriate when the company needs to move more aggressively.
Perhaps you’re entering the United States.
Perhaps your competitors dominate AI recommendations.
Perhaps you’ve raised a substantial round and need to establish a stronger market position.
Or perhaps your company operates across several product categories and needs authority in each.
At Proper Propaganda, our Expanded PR + GEO program costs $17,000 per month, with a potential $9,000 quarterly performance bonus.
When earned, the maximum quarterly investment is $60,000, equivalent to $20,000 per month.
The program includes the Foundation scope, with additional resources for content, competitive positioning and earned media.
That typically means 12 to 20 content assets per month, deeper coverage of priority topics, more intensive executive visibility work, expanded media targeting and award or recognition programs.
What should a CMO expect for $17,000 to $20,000 per month?
I’d expect the agency to be actively addressing competitive authority gaps.
Consider a growth-stage company selling enterprise cybersecurity software.
Its two largest competitors appear frequently when buyers ask ChatGPT for recommendations.
Those competitors have more relevant editorial coverage, more product comparisons, more category content and stronger executive visibility.
A Foundation program might concentrate on establishing the company’s baseline and addressing its most important gaps.
An Expanded program can pursue more of those gaps simultaneously.
That might mean developing content around several commercially important topics while conducting targeted media outreach, securing product evaluations, building executive authority and improving how the company is represented across third-party sources.
The objective is to compete more effectively for the attention and consideration of customers.
What should success look like?
At this level, I’d expect a CMO to see measurable movement across several areas.
Competitive Share of Answer.
Non-branded prompt coverage.
Category association.
Executive authority.
Earned media quality.
Third-party citations.
Product recommendations.
And, where measurement permits, downstream commercial signals.
A larger budget should support a broader scope and faster execution.
It doesn’t automatically guarantee faster AI visibility gains.
The starting position of the brand, the competitive environment and the quality of the available evidence all matter.
At this budget, the company is making a more substantial investment in competitive authority and market positioning.
Building a category authority platform / $300,000 to $540,000 annually
Some growth-stage companies have a more ambitious objective.
They want to become a recognized source of information within their industry.
That requires a different investment.
At Proper Propaganda, our Category Authority Platform combines an Expanded PR + GEO program with a dedicated, brand-owned editorial publication.
The publication cost starts at $300,000 annually.
The accompanying PR + GEO program costs $17,000 per month.
Potential quarterly performance bonuses bring the maximum first-year investment to $540,000.
The minimum engagement is 12 months.
What does a company receive?
The publication can include a dedicated editor, contributing journalists, an editorial calendar, original reporting, data journalism, distribution and audience development.
The PR + GEO program operates alongside it.
This gives the company the capacity to publish a sustained body of original information around its category.
That could include research, expert analysis, industry reporting, customer insights and useful resources.
The publication should maintain credible editorial standards and clearly disclose its ownership. A brand-owned outlet does not acquire the independence of earned media simply by hiring journalists.
What should a CMO expect?
A program of this size should be judged over a longer horizon.
I’d expect the company to establish a substantial library of original, useful content.
I’d also expect a more developed audience, stronger category associations, greater opportunities for external citations and a continuous source of material for PR and GEO.
The company should have a better chance of becoming a recognized contributor to important industry conversations.
There is no guarantee that AI systems will cite the publication or that journalists will treat it as independent authority.
Those outcomes depend on the quality, originality and relevance of the work.
At this level, the investment is about building an enduring category information asset.
Why is GEO becoming part of the PR budget?
For growth-stage CMOs, this is an increasingly important budgeting question.
Traditionally, PR, SEO and content marketing were managed as separate functions.
PR handled journalists and reputation.
SEO handled search visibility.
Content marketing handled owned content.
Those responsibilities still exist.
But generative AI creates more overlap.
A customer can now ask an AI system to recommend a company, explain a category, compare products or evaluate a vendor.
The system may use information from the company’s website, third-party publications, product reviews, comparison pages and other sources.
The company’s visibility depends partly on how effectively those sources represent it.
Ahrefs analyzed 75,000 brands across ChatGPT, Google AI Mode and AI Overviews and found that branded web mentions correlated strongly with AI visibility, with correlations ranging from approximately 0.66 to 0.71.
YouTube mentions showed an even stronger correlation of approximately 0.737.
By comparison, the number of pages on a company’s website showed a correlation of approximately 0.194.
Ahrefs cautions that these relationships do not establish causation.
But the findings raise an important question for CMOs.
If the wider web is strongly associated with AI visibility, how should the company coordinate its PR, content and search investments?
That’s the opportunity GEO creates.
What should a proper GEO program include?
At Proper Propaganda, we use a six-stage framework:
Audit → Strategy → Foundation → Content → Authority → Measurement
Our GEO framework explains how those activities work together.
The Audit establishes the company’s current visibility and how customers use AI.
Strategy determines which prompts, audiences and categories matter.
Foundation addresses website accessibility, clarity and technical issues.
Content creates useful information that answers customer questions.
Authority focuses on third-party evidence and external credibility.
Measurement tracks changes and informs the next cycle.
Google’s own guidance for generative AI search emphasizes valuable, original content and explains that established SEO fundamentals remain important for AI Overviews and AI Mode.
The work requires more than publishing articles and checking whether ChatGPT mentions the company.
Which brings us to another important budgeting question.
How should PR and GEO performance be measured?
A CMO spending $12,000 to $20,000 per month should expect a clear measurement framework.
I’d divide the scorecard into five areas.
| Objective | What to measure |
| Earned media authority | Relevant coverage, competitive Share of Voice, coverage quality, category mentions |
| Executive authority | Interviews, expert commentary, speaking opportunities, citations |
| AI visibility | Share of Answer, prompt coverage, position in answers, recommendation rate |
| Third-party credibility | Relevant web mentions, reviews, comparisons, external citations |
| Commercial contribution | Referral traffic, assisted conversions, qualified inquiries, sales usage of coverage |
No single metric tells the whole story.
A company could improve its Share of Answer by appearing in more educational prompts while remaining invisible when customers ask for vendor recommendations.
That’s why prompt segmentation matters.
For a growth-stage company, I would separate AI visibility across the buyer journey.
Education.
Discovery.
Evaluation.
Validation.
Purchase.
Post-purchase.
Each stage has different commercial implications.
How do performance-based fees work?
This is one area where agency pricing deserves more scrutiny.
At Proper Propaganda, our PR-only engagements combine a fixed monthly fee with performance fees tied to earned media outcomes.
The current example has a $7,000 monthly fixed fee and a maximum of $3,000 in variable fees.
Our combined PR + GEO programs use a different structure.
The current pricing model provides a $9,000 quarterly performance bonus when either of two conditions is achieved:
- A 10% Share of Answer lift during the quarter.
- A 1% increase in citation rate.
The bonus is payable at the end of the quarter.
Only one threshold needs to be achieved. Pasted markdown
A well-written agreement should define the baseline, monitored prompts, platforms, calculation method and whether percentage changes mean relative percentages or percentage-point changes.
For example, moving from 20% Share of Answer to 22% represents a 10% relative increase, while moving from 20% to 30% represents a ten-percentage-point increase.
Those are very different outcomes.
The commercial terms need to make that distinction explicit.
Performance-linked fees can help align agency compensation with client objectives, but only when the measurements are transparent and consistently applied.
How long should a growth-stage company commit to PR and GEO?
Our typical engagements run for six to twelve months.
That’s a reasonable planning horizon for programs involving media relations, category positioning, content development and AI visibility.
But expectations should change over that period.
Months 1–3: Establish the foundation
The first quarter should focus on strategy and execution infrastructure.
For PR, that means understanding the company, developing messaging, identifying media opportunities and beginning outreach.
For GEO, it means customer research, establishing the prompt universe, measuring baseline visibility, assessing competitors and identifying priority gaps.
By the end of the first quarter, the company should have a clear view of where it stands and a functioning program.
Months 4–6: Build authority and evaluate progress
This is where the work should begin accumulating.
Media relationships develop.
Content is published.
Executives participate in industry conversations.
Reviews and third-party references may begin appearing.
The GEO program should be measuring whether visibility is changing.
The CMO should also understand which tactics are producing useful results and where adjustments are needed.
Months 7–12: Strengthen competitive position
The second half of the year should build on what has been learned.
Which categories are responding?
Which prompts remain difficult?
Where do competitors retain an advantage?
Which publications are producing useful authority?
Which content performs?
Which executives are gaining traction?
The program should become more informed as the evidence accumulates.
That’s the advantage of treating PR and GEO as ongoing optimization programs.
Should a growth-stage company hire internally or use an agency?
This is another reasonable question.
A company spending $15,000 per month is committing $180,000 annually before any performance bonuses.
That’s a meaningful investment.
Could the company hire someone internally instead?
Possibly.
But the comparison should be based on the work required.
A combined PR and GEO program may involve media relations, writing, technical SEO, customer research, content strategy, AI visibility monitoring, analytics and executive communications.
Those responsibilities span several disciplines.
One employee may be excellent at some of them.
It’s unlikely that one person will be equally strong at all of them.
An agency can provide access to a broader set of capabilities without requiring the company to build an entire internal team.
That doesn’t mean outsourcing is always the better choice.
For companies with substantial internal communications and marketing resources, a hybrid arrangement can work well.
An internal marketing leader owns strategy and coordination.
The agency supplies specialist expertise, media relationships, execution and measurement.
The important question is whether the company has the capabilities needed to accomplish the objectives.
How should a CMO decide which budget is appropriate?
I would start with the business problem.
A company with strong organic visibility but little editorial credibility may need a focused PR program.
A company with excellent press coverage but weak AI visibility may need to invest in GEO diagnostics, content and technical improvements.
A company entering the US market may need to build local editorial authority, customer proof and category recognition simultaneously.
A company competing against entrenched category leaders may need a more intensive program.
The budget should reflect the size of the gap and the speed at which the company needs to address it.
Here’s how I’d approach the decision.
| Business situation | Suggested investment | Primary objective |
| Need consistent media coverage and executive visibility | 7k–10k/month | Establish earned media authority |
| Need PR plus AI-search visibility | 12k–15k/month | Build a measurable PR + GEO program |
| Competing aggressively across several categories or markets | 17k–20k/month | Strengthen competitive and category authority |
| Want to build a dedicated editorial platform | Up to $540k/year | Develop a long-term category information asset |
These are Proper Propaganda program examples, not minimum industry requirements.
The correct investment ultimately depends on the company’s goals, existing capabilities and competitive environment.
What should a CMO ask before hiring a PR or GEO agency?
I’d ask six questions.
1. What exactly are we buying?
Ask for the actual scope.
Strategy, execution, content, research, reporting and measurement should be clearly defined.
2. Who will do the work?
Understand who owns the account, who handles media relations, who creates content and who manages GEO.
3. How will success be measured?
The answer should go beyond placements, impressions and vague promises of improved AI visibility.
4. How will the agency determine which prompts matter?
A GEO program built around arbitrary prompts can produce impressive-looking reports with limited commercial value.
5. How will PR and GEO work together?
Ask how media relations, content, third-party authority and technical optimization inform one another.
6. What should we reasonably expect after three, six and twelve months?
The agency should be able to describe the work, milestones and intended outcomes without guaranteeing editorial coverage or AI recommendations.
These questions are more useful than asking which agency promises the most placements.
The real question is; What should your PR and GEO budget accomplish
Growth-stage CMOs have plenty of places to spend money.
Paid search.
Paid social.
SEO.
Content.
Events.
Influencers.
Sales enablement.
PR.
GEO.
Every discipline wants a larger share of the budget.
The challenge is deciding what the business actually needs.
For some companies, a focused $7,000 monthly PR program will be the appropriate investment.
Others will need a combined $12,000 to $20,000 monthly PR and GEO program.
A smaller number may justify building an entire editorial operation around their category.
The amount matters.
But the outcome matters considerably more.
A growth-stage PR and GEO investment should leave the company with stronger authority, clearer competitive positioning, more credible third-party evidence and better visibility where customers research their options.
The agency should be able to explain what it is doing, why it matters and how performance is changing.
That’s what a growth-stage CMO should expect to buy.