Operations
Part of How do you run digital PR operations that survive client scrutiny?
Before you hire a digital PR team, check these seven roles
A practical guide to digital PR team roles, covering the seven functions to fill, the inclusion criteria to apply and how to size each role to client work.
What to take away
- Most teams hire for outreach first and discover the gap later: nobody owns data provenance, disclosure or measurement, so coverage cannot be defended when a client asks how a number was reached.
- Seven roles cover a digital PR team end to end: strategy, data and research, media relations, content production, measurement, legal and disclosure oversight, and account ownership.
- Apply two inclusion criteria before you recruitthe role must own a deliverable a client pays for, and it must have a named backup when the holder is absent.
- Headcount should follow the mix of work, not a fixed ratio. A team running original research needs more research and data capacity than one running reactive commentary.
- This guide is written for agencies and in-house teams operating in England and the wider UK. Where a rule differs in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, check the devolved position before you rely on it.
Start with the role most teams leave empty
The mistake is treating digital PR as outreach with extras. Outreach is the visible end of a chain that begins with a claim, a source and a method. If nobody owns that chain, the coverage you win is fragile.
Data provenance chain
- Claim
- Source
- Method
- Provenance owner
- Coverage
Give one person ownership of data provenance. That person records where every figure came from, when it was published and what it actually measures. When a journalist or client challenges a number, the answer exists before the question is asked.
The Data (Use and Access) Act 2025 changed parts of the UK data framework that affect marketing and research work, so the oversight role now includes reading current law rather than relying on a 2018 understanding. The Data (Use and Access) Act 2025 is the reference point to work from.
Seven roles and what each one owns
1. Strategy and planning lead
Owns the campaign idea, the target publications and the reason each pitch exists. This role decides what the team will not do, which is often the harder call. It also sets the editorial calendar against client milestones.
2. Data and research lead
Owns sourcing, cleaning and documenting datasets. This role should be able to explain a sampling method to a journalist in two sentences. Where original research is the product, this is the busiest seat in the team.
3. Media relations lead
Owns journalist relationships and pitch quality. Success here is measured by reply quality, not volume sent. A media relations lead who cannot say why a specific reporter would care about a specific story is not doing the job.
4. Content production lead
Owns the written and visual assets that carry the story. This includes the landing page the coverage links to, because a link to a thin page wastes the coverage. Our digital PR quality checklist sets out the source standards this role should apply before anything leaves the building.
5. Measurement and reporting lead
Owns the numbers that go to the client. Attribution is the hard part: Google's guidance on web and app channel value explains why channel credit is rarely clean, and a measurement lead should be able to explain that limitation rather than hide it.
6. Legal and disclosure oversight
Owns consent, disclosure and data handling. This is often a shared role in smaller teams, held by a senior person with support from an external adviser. It should be a named responsibility, not an assumption.
7. Account owner
Owns the client relationship and the commercial picture. This person translates client objectives into briefs and translates results back into language a client's board understands.
How to size the roles to your work
Start from the deliverable mix. If most work is original research, weight the team towards research and data. If most work is reactive commentary, media relations and content matter more.
For a worked example, an agency billing a client £4,500 a month might allocate roughly £1,200 of that to research and data, £1,100 to media relations, £800 to content production, £700 to measurement, £400 to legal and disclosure oversight and £300 to account management. Those are illustrative figures, not market rates.
Before you commit to headcount, check who you are dealing with. Companies House holds company registration and filing information that supports basic due diligence on a prospective client or partner. The wider delivery sequence sits in our digital PR operations and delivery guide, which covers how these roles fit together across a campaign cycle.
Where a role is part-time, name the person who covers it during leave. A single point of failure in data provenance or disclosure is the most common reason a campaign stalls mid-flight.
Common questions
Do we need all seven roles before our first client?
No. Small teams combine them, but every function needs a named owner. The risk is not the number of people, it is the number of unowned tasks.
Which role should we hire first?
Hire the role that matches your current deliverable mix. If you sell original research, hire research and data first. If you sell reactive commentary, hire media relations first.
How do we know a role is working?
Each role should have one deliverable a client pays for and one internal quality check it owns. If neither exists, the role is not yet defined.
Does this change outside England?
Some data and marketing rules differ in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Check the devolved position before applying a UK-wide assumption.
