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Digital PR For Automotive Brands icon

Digital PR For Automotive Brands

Drive your brand to the front of the conversation. Partner with a digital PR agency that understands the road ahead.

Wondering if we can deliver?
Check out our credentials deck.

Building topical authority that earns your automotive brand visibility across Search & AI, and the conversations shaping the automotive industry.

The automotive industry is going through one of the most significant periods of transformation in its history - buying has been rewired. The shift towards electric vehicles, the rise of flexible ownership models like EV subscriptions and leasing, and AI-led research mean consumers reach a shortlist before they ever land on a brand site - and brands that don't show up in those upstream conversations get filtered out before the comparison even starts.

With the industry predicted to continue to grow, from software and electronics through to the used car market, automotive brands can’t afford to be left behind or forgotten. 

For brands in this space - whether you're a car manufacturer, a fast-growing EV leasing startup, a subscription service, a comparison platform or an automotive insurance provider - building topical authority and brand visibility through earned coverage, to support GEO (visibility in generative AI and traditional search), has never been more important.

That's where digital PR comes in. It builds the brand authority that gets you cited where your customers - and the AI systems they're asking - are already looking.

Earning coverage and links on the authoritative, automotive-relevant websites that will actually move the needle.

We bring together insights from your brand, your specific niche and the media landscape, and pair it with our team's expertise to create stories that earn coverage in the right places - the ones that build authority over time and drive results.

Aira's digital PR team is in regular contact with journalists and editors across national press, lifestyle, motoring, consumer finance and automotive trade titles. Our automotive stories have landed coverage on publications such as Honest John, This is Money, The Guardian, Drive, Motoring Research, and many more.

A proven roadmap to automotive authority.

We don't just build links. Earning the right coverage, in the right automotive titles, with the topical authority that follows, that's where we make the difference. Take a look at some of our automotive case studies below.

Using expert comments to land hyper-relevant national coverage (within a few hours)
Quick Backstory:
Marketing Mix:
Pssst... seen enough? Get in touch.
Curious about our track record? Check out our credentials deck.
Driving Share of Voice Through Scaled Link-Building
Quick Backstory:
Maintained a dominant position with a strong link-building strategy

Effective collaboration with the in-house Uswitch team

Strong focus on high quality and diverse links
Marketing Mix:
Digital PR
20% increase in share of voice
200+ links built in 6 months
Pssst... seen enough? Get in touch.
Curious about our track record? Check out our credentials deck.
Scalable Link Building and Content Creation
Quick Backstory:
Delivering content-led link building at scale

High focus on consistent, sustainable campaigns

Marketing Mix:
Content-led Digital PR & Link Building
1,100+ pieces of coverage
12+ campaigns per quarter
Pssst... seen enough? Get in touch.
Curious about our track record? Check out our credentials deck.
A six-month project far exceeding the initial goals set.
Quick Backstory:
A technical audit health check to identify any issues on the website.

A competitor SERP review and more technical SEO tasks.

Digital PR campaigns to further increase TravelSim’s organic presence.
Marketing Mix:
Technical SEO, Digital PR
95% increase in organic traffic
354% revenue increase YoY
Pssst... seen enough? Get in touch.
Curious about our track record? Check out our credentials deck.

Great automotive stories don't just happen. They're engineered.

Not ready to talk yet? Check out our credentials deck.

Whether you're an EV brand, a comparison platform or an automotive insurer, we know your niche isn't one-size-fits-all.

Automotive is one of the broadest industries we work in. The PR approach we'd take for a premium car manufacturer is completely different to the one we'd take for a comparison platform or a vehicle subscription service, or even a specialist car insurer like Hagerty.

However, for all clients we take an "always on" approach to maximise coverage opportunities, dialling our tactics up and down in line with the news agenda, key calendar moments and what's working across your specific niche.

PR Campaign Icon

PR Campaign

A data or insight-led creative piece of content that tells a new, unique automotive story. In this industry, proprietary data is gold for journalists who can't get it anywhere else. We use proprietary data to tell new trend stories or anchor a wider campaign to what your target personas actually want.

If proprietary data isn't available, we'll build the story from credible third-party sources, for example public datasets, regulator data, platform APIs, survey work commissioned for the campaign.
Thought Leadership Icon

Thought Leadership

We’d use your internal experts to provide timely commentary on the topics your target audience and key target publications care about. We know these can change quickly, so we’re always keeping an eye on what’s most important to them.

For automotive brands, being a trusted expert voice in the media is incredibly valuable to help build brand authority.
Reactive PR Icon

Reactive PR

The automotive news cycle moves fast: new ULEZ schemes, hybrid (HEV) adoption, road tax changes, battery life and health concerns, and more. There are constant news hooks to tie your brand into - that could be using thought leadership, re-using campaigns or creating new insights with fresh data.

We don't just wait for requests, we monitor the news and proactively pitch so your brand is part of the conversation when it matters.
Existing Content Icon

Existing Content

You might already have useful data, guides or research sat on your website. We can give it a new angle, turn it into expert tips, or update it with fresh data, and turn it into something journalists actually want to write about.
Brand News Icon

Brand News

If there's something worth shouting about, we can help you get it in front of the right media contacts. Many of the Aira team came from traditional PR backgrounds, so this is right in our wheelhouse.

Why automotive brands choose Aira.

Every automotive brand is different, and every partnership with Aira reflects that. But here are the things that underpin every single piece of work we do in this space…

We understand the nuances between the many different automotive niches and how to tailor strategies to maximise visibility and brand strength. 

To stay current with the fast-moving nature of the industry, we run ongoing analysis of:

  • what's being covered in your specific niche, and what isn't
  • which competitors are earning coverage, and on which titles
  • which publications your target audience trusts most
  • which sources generative AI platforms cite when answering questions in your space

We build the kind of authoritative coverage that compounds - in publications target personas and AI systems both treat as credible.

To do this, your brand and your target personas are at the heart of everything we do. Stories that are brand relevant and resonate with your audience will resonate with key target publications for your niche. 

This means better, more relevant coverage and links (and more meaningful referral traffic), but ultimately increased brand authority to support search visibility over time.

We also integrate with your wider SEO and marketing activity to maximise the impact of every piece of coverage.

We have experience navigating the compliance pressures that come with regulated automotive niches.

Automotive insurance sits in Google's 'Your Money or Your Life' category, where the bar for source credibility is higher, and finance-led content across leasing and subscription models brings its own approvals overhead.

We've worked with clients in regulated industries for years and know how to work with compliance and legal teams without losing momentum or compromising creativity.

We manage automotive digital PR from strategy through to execution, outreach and reporting. You get the results without the heavy lifting.

We can work with as much or as little day-to-day input from you as you need, though we always benefit from a thorough brand immersion at the start to reduce friction further down the line.

We measure what matters to you - not just coverage volume.

In automotive, that might be quote requests, policy starts, lease enquiries or test drive bookings. We work with you to connect the dots between coverage and the metrics your CFO or board actually cares about - and adapt the reporting format to match how you work internally.

Here's what only Aira will tell you:

Digital PR might not be right for you.

What’s more important: the results you get from your marketing, or the channels you use?

10/10 sensible people agree: it’s the results.

So if a digital PR agency wasn’t the best investment for your business, wouldn’t you want a partner who’d speak up?

But we can help you find what is.

Aira has experts across every channel collaborating on your account—so we don’t have to force a fit that isn’t there. We start with goals, THEN we choose channels.

You’re gaining a partner willing to say ‘no’— and then show you where the highest returns for _your business_ are based on your situation and goals. We can even discuss flexing budget between our services over the course of our partnership to deliver the best impact for you.

A great strategy is the blueprint.
But people get it done.

Meet the people who'll actually be working on your account - the strategists, creatives and outreach leads who own delivery day-to-day, not just the names on the pitch deck.

Alex Fiske

Digital PR Lead

Laura Brothers

Senior Content Strategist

Chloe Osunsami

Head Of Digital PR

Q&A for the curious

Most of our automotive partnerships start at £3,000 a month or above. Investment level is a real lever on how fast we can build momentum - a specialist insurer competing against Comparethemarket and MoneySuperMarket has a different starting point to a regional EV leasing brand competing locally, and the retainer reflects that.

If you're working with a tighter budget, we're good at helping clients prioritise spend for maximum impact. Just get in touch and we'll be straight with you about what's realistic.

We'd usually recommend a 12-month contract, but we're flexible. If that doesn't work for your situation, let's talk about what does.

Coverage and links from digital PR activity in the automotive sector typically start building within the first couple of months - depending on processes and approvals brand-side too.

The impact on SEO and GEO - generative engine optimisation, the discipline of getting cited in AI answers - generally takes three to six months to start materialising, and continues to compound over time. This is why we recommend a 12-month partnership as a starting point wherever possible.

Every brand and niche is different, and therefore the strategy and approach is different. But a typical retainer for an automotive client will include a blend of tactics. 

We’ll usually include some data-led creative campaigns, thought leadership outreach, and reactive monitoring, alongside the usual things you expect from an agency like reporting and account management. 

The specific mix will depend on your niche. We'll shape the approach around what's most likely to land in the right publications for your brand and target audience.

We have plenty of experience helping in-house teams at automotive brands set up the right approval processes, so we can help remove blockers and keep momentum on track.

The team will map out activity so everyone knows what's needed and when. We can build in your internal lead times for sign-off (including those with legal and compliance) to make sure stories still launch at the right moment to hit the media cycle. And when it comes to sharing final content for approval, we'll make sure everything is packaged with the right level of detail to help you move it through your internal teams with as little friction as possible.

We predominantly focus on English-speaking markets, and that’s where most of our experience is within the automotive industry - including UK, US and Australia. 

However, we do work with a network of in-market specialists that can help us target other markets too if they’re important to you and your business growth. If this is the case, get in touch and we can chat about if we can support - we’ll always be honest if it’s not something we have the skills or in-market specialists to help with.

Absolutely. As long as your brand website has a solid technical foundation, digital PR can be one of the most effective tools available to a newer brand, because it builds brand awareness and search credibility simultaneously. 

In fact, being a small brand could be your secret weapon in Digital PR. Big corporations often have separate legal teams and longer lead times for approvals and sign-offs for activities. Smaller brands, with less ‘red tape’ could see a trending topic at 9am and have an expert quote in a journalist's inbox by 10am. That speed is how small brands can win.

Publications do not care how big your office is or how much money you make. They care about your expertise, your point of view, and whether the story is of interest to their readers.

A well-executed digital PR strategy builds authority in your niche, by earning coverage and links from the publications your target audience trusts. Importantly, these are the ones that Google and AI platforms trust too. 

So you’re building brand strength (in the eyes of those that matter; consumers, Google and AI) and increasing your chances of being visible in these spaces too. 

For automotive brands, over time this might mean appearing in the AI overview when someone searches "Which EV has the longest range", or being cited in AI queries such as “Why has car insurance gone up?” (targeting earlier on in the consumer search journey too). It can also help your deals comparison pages start ranking more highly in Google. 

Over time, this compounds. More relevant coverage leads to a stronger brand and better visibility, which leads to more qualified traffic, which leads to more enquiries and sales.

We use a combination of methods: 

  • Reviewing which publications link to and mention your competitors (but not yet you).
  • Identifying which sites are most cited by generative AI when answering questions in your niche.
  • Using our media database and SEO tools to uncover additional relevant and authoritative targets.
  • Drawing on our team's existing relationships with automotive journalists. 

We assess every potential target for relevance to your brand and audience to maximise impact of our activity and build brand strength. 

Promises are easy.
Proof is better.

Getting started is as easy as having a conversation.

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