Create a List of Media Contacts

Agility's media database includes more than 1.1 million verified journalists, influencers, editors, broadcasters, bloggers, and media outlets. With powerful search filters and keyword-based discovery, you can quickly identify relevant contacts, review their recent coverage, and organize them into targeted lists for future outreach.

This article explains how to:

Start by navigating to the Media Relations tab and selecting Discover Contacts. This will open the media search interface.

Searches can be as broad or as specific as you need.

Common search fields include:

You can combine multiple filters to create highly targeted media lists.

One of the most powerful search options is Mentioned Keyword.

Instead of relying only on assigned beats or subjects, Keyword Search matches your search terms against recently published content.

This allows you to discover journalists covering:

It also helps identify bloggers and influencers who may not have traditional subject classifications but regularly write about your topic.

Example

Searching for:

electric vehicles

returns journalists who have recently written about electric vehicles, even if they aren't assigned to an Automotive beat.

Tip: Use specific keywords to keep results focused. Keyword searches are limited to approximately 10,000 matching results, so more precise searches generally produce better lists.

After defining your initial search, narrow the results using additional filters.

Popular refinements include:

Combining filters usually produces much more relevant media lists than using a single search field.

If you only want a single representative from each publication, enable:

Top Contacts per Outlet Only

Agility selects one contact from each outlet based on its editorial role hierarchy, helping reduce duplicate outreach while keeping your list highly relevant.

Click Search to view matching contacts.

The results page includes:

You can continue refining your search without starting over.

Selecting a contact opens their profile in the right-hand panel.

Here you can review:

Reviewing recent coverage before adding contacts helps ensure they're actively writing about your topic.

Select one or more contacts.

Then choose:

Add to List

You can:

Your Targeted Lists are used throughout Agility, including Email Distributions, PR CoPilot, and other outreach workflows.

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Saving the search lets you rerun it at any time without rebuilding your criteria.

Select:

Save Search

Enter a descriptive name.

Unlike Targeted Lists, Saved Searches stay connected to Agility's media database.

Each time you reopen a Saved Search you can:

Agility never automatically adds contacts to your Targeted Lists—you decide which contacts to save.

Rather than creating many small searches, start with broader criteria and narrow the results using filters.

Saved Searches make it easy to maintain media lists as journalists change roles or new contacts are added.

A journalist's current work is often a better indicator of relevance than their assigned beat.

Before adding contacts, compare your results against existing Targeted Lists to avoid unnecessary duplicates.

Combining Mentioned Keyword with Covering Subjects often produces the most relevant media contacts because it combines recent coverage with Agility's editorial categorization.

Try broadening your search by:

If you still can't find the contact, you can add them as a Private Contact.

A Targeted List contains only the contacts you've chosen to save.

A Saved Search reruns your search criteria against Agility's database, helping you discover new or updated contacts over time.

Saved Searches help you keep your media lists current.

When you reopen a Saved Search, Agility automatically shows any new or updated contacts that now match your search criteria.

Yes.

A contact can belong to multiple Targeted Lists, making it easy to organize media contacts for different campaigns or clients.

Yes.

Use the Mentioned Keyword field to find journalists who have recently written about specific keywords, brands, competitors, industries, or events.

You may have Top Contacts per Outlet Only enabled.

When selected, Agility displays one representative contact per outlet based on editorial role priority.

Yes.

You can add or remove contacts from a Targeted List at any time without affecting your Saved Searches.

The easiest approach is to:

This helps ensure your outreach stays current as journalists change roles or new contacts are added to the database.

Want to learn other ways to add contacts to a list? Watch this video:

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