We’ve just flipped the switch on Synapse’s payment model, and over 3,000 PR professionals are moving from free to paid. This is a huge moment for us, and I would like to give an honest update about how it went.
Dozens of businesses are subscribing. Honestly, I was not sure what to expect. Asking people to pay for a product they’ve been using for free requires some level of trust towards it. The fact that PRs are opening their wallets early tells me two things: we’ve delivered genuine value, and people believe in what we’re trying to do. Through my conversations with PRs, I’ve got genuine feedback from our community, too.
As we have seen, there is something to believe in. The media relations process is broken. There is no efficient mechanism for story pitching and for finding relevant content for journalists. Synapse was created to fix it, and, thanks to early traction, we know that we are not the only ones who think it needs fixing.
What we see as missing in media relations is a trusted third-party marketplace. PRs need professional solutions to deliver professional service. Not workarounds, not outdated databases and spray-and-pray email lists, but modern technology built for how media relations actually needs to work in 2026.
On the other side, journalists should have access to high-quality content they can rely on and which is being delivered exactly where they need it, in their workspace.
The two sides have never been properly connected. Tech can solve that. It can strip out so many of the legacy inefficiencies that have built up over decades and replace them with something that genuinely serves both parties.
Part of what’s driving adoption is trust. Every PR professional listed on Synapse is checked and verified. So is every expert and every spokesperson.
But the media also face incredible pressure to get more done with fewer available resources. Changes in the advertising model and the growing impact of AI are just a couple of challenges to look at, but the main issue lies in the lack of trust in the content sourced from outside.
Journalists need high-quality content delivered to where they work, content that increases their productivity and reduces the risk of making mistakes, not vice versa.
This is exactly what Synapse can provide. Verified information from actual PR professionals. Verified experts and spokespeople. Trusted sources of high-quality content that reach exactly the place it should. All of this in a dedicated space tailored to the media, not an inbox. It’s why media usage on our platform is growing and why we know we’re building something the industry genuinely needs.
This is something really important for our subscribers. The access they currently have and what we’re building next will put them in a position very few PR businesses have ever been in. We’ll give them a direct, trusted route into the hands of journalists who are actively looking for what they have to offer.
If you’re an agency trying to figure out how this works for your team, our pricing is on the website, but I do want real conversations, too. I want to hear about your challenges and your pressures so I can keep innovating and building products that are genuinely useful and powerful for the people using them.
Reach out and let’s talk, I’m keen to listen and help where I can.
Charles Russell, CEO and Founder, Synapse
