What’s In and Out in the World of Cybersecurity PR 2025

Like any good trend, ‘ins and outs’ are back (Notes App imagery still in tow, thankfully). Personal trend forecasting has reigned supreme and, once again, the world is declaring what’s ‘in’ and ‘out’ for 2025, some predictions more earnest than others. This trend provides a unique insight into the mind of the consumer, which can, in turn, be helpful for organisations looking to scope the market. For PR and marketing professionals, this trend is nothing new. For decades PR professionals, alongside journalists and clients, have been predicting and promoting the next big thing. PR people know how to spot a good story and the best ones can spot, run with and influence trends as they emerge.  In 2024, on our blog, we outlined our ‘ins’ and ‘outs’ for the year. In 2025, we’re doing the same.  In: Moving the Story Forward The cyber media landscape is becoming increasingly harder to navigate, with less publications and more spokespeople vying for the chance to be featured. As such, it’s critical that comments are succinct, impactful and move the story forward. Additionally, comments must strike the right balance between detail and timeliness. Good commentary doesn’t have to be pages, but it often needs to be rapid!  As well as this, journalists are becoming more savvy to commentary that’s been obviously generated by AI and submitting them puts everyone in the bad books!  Eskenzi’s 2024 Media Barometer Report revealed that cyber comms leaders believed that thought leadership would be a key driver of coverage and an important measure of campaign success in 2024. Whilst there continues to be value in great thought leadership, it’s often worth being savvy about what you write about and comment on.  Out: Being Too Narrow Minded!  Whilst there’s definitely merit in strategic goals and outlining dream publications, sometimes there’s value in casting a wider net when it comes to media coverage and comment opportunities. Whilst PR people can help to craft stories and campaigns to draw the attention of top tier publications and align to business goals, it is important to understand that cyber PR is all about brand building and speaking to a wide variety of press on a wide variety of topics is sometimes necessary. Before aiming for the business pages, it’s important to build a trusted reputation and authoritative voice with trades. In any case, these journalists often move around to different publications. This definitely doesn’t mean that you should be commenting on everything (see above), but it does mean that you have to work your way up to getting into the Financial Times of this world, one comment and press release at a time.  In: Micro Influencers  In 2024, influencers (general) were in. What we’re seeing now is a shift towards the micro influencer for more targeted and impactful business outcomes. Many organisations are turning away from the huge influencers (perhaps due to budgetary constraints) and becoming more conscious of the grass roots influencers with big swaying power.  Out: Asking for Backlinks  A hard truth: Journalists don’t like PR people who pester for backlinks. In fact, many of them don’t have the editorial power to add them in altogether. In any case, it’s highly unlikely that a journalist would go back and amend a piece (unless factually incorrect). We’ll always add a link in, but we can’t guarantee it’ll be used. A clever way to get a link into a piece? Owned research that can be cited as a source!  In: Community Getting involved with the wider community is critical to understanding the needs of the industry, as well as the needs of potential customers. Community building can be a good way of breathing life into campaigns that will actually be insightful and impactful too. Keeping a finger on the pulse is more critical than ever, as many orgs fight to be heard above the large volume of noise – The creative ideas and campaigns will follow. Additionally, conducting research among the wider community can be a great way to get headlines, whether that’s surveying customers and partners or conducting third party research.  Out: Predictions? In the cybersecurity industry, things move fast. In fact, there’s a growing resistance to ‘predicting’ anything. Cybersecurity is, by its very nature, unpredictable. There’s no crystal ball to discover the next breach (someone would be very rich if there were), but there are patterns, trends and proactive measures that can be taken to reduce risk. One can only forecast. We’re likely to see more unpredictability as the landscape evolves, security and comms teams should brace themselves and get creative.