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How to Increase Media Coverage for B2B Companies: 6 Ways That Actually Work
Sit down with almost any B2B founder in India and, sooner or later, you’ll hear some version of this: “We sell to businesses. The media isn’t interested in us.” It sounds sensible. It’s also mostly wrong.
The procurement head evaluating your software reads the Economic Times over breakfast. The CFO approving your contract scrolls LinkedIn between meetings. The plant manager choosing a supplier asks peers what they’ve heard. B2B buyers aren’t a separate species. They’re people who happen to be buying on behalf of a company. That changes how you should think about media coverage for B2B companies.
Here’s what actually works.
The short answer
The best ways to increase media coverage for B2B companies are to treat buyers as people rather than “trade”, show up consistently between big announcements, stay transparent when the news isn’t good, give journalists data they can’t get anywhere else, lead the conversation for your whole category, and make your spokespeople fast and easy to reach. B2B companies that do this stop being seen as vendors and start being treated as sources.
6 Ways to Increase Media Coverage for B2B Companies
1. Stop Treating "Trade" as a Different Planet
The market parameters differ, of course. Sales cycles are longer, decisions involve committees, and ticket sizes are bigger. But the human instincts underneath don’t change. People want to buy from companies they trust, and they want proof of quality before they commit.
Zoho is a good example. For years the company didn’t advertise heavily, yet it became one of the most written-about technology firms in the country. The coverage wasn’t driven by product launches. It came from a story people found believable: a bootstrapped company that refused venture funding, built offices in rural Tamil Nadu and hired people without insisting on degrees. Journalists wrote about Zoho because readers cared, and readers cared because the story said something about values. None of that is a “B2B” angle. It’s a human one.
2. Show Up Consistently, Not Only When There's News
Many companies treat media relations like a tap. They open it for a funding round or a launch, then shut it for eight months. Journalists notice. So do readers.
Consistency builds familiarity, and familiarity builds trust. Naukri’s monthly JobSpeak index shows how this works. It isn’t a big announcement, but it’s a reliable one, and over time it has made the brand shorthand for the Indian job market.
We saw the same thing with LP Logiscience, the warehousing and contract logistics arm of the Liladhar Pasoo Group. Its operations had real scale, but outside trade circles very few people knew the name. Being part of a respected group helped. It didn’t automatically give a newer entity its own recognition. So instead of waiting for one big moment, we built a steady rhythm. Each warehouse expansion in a Tier 2 or Tier 3 city became a local story that also fed a national growth narrative. Leadership wrote and spoke regularly on Grade A warehousing, sustainability and the shift from 3PL to 4PL. Budget season brought considered commentary rather than silence. No single piece changed things. The cumulative presence did.
That’s the real lesson for media coverage for B2B companies: no single article builds trust. A steady, credible presence does.
This matters well beyond visibility. When an enterprise buyer has already read about you several times, the first meeting starts from a different place. You aren’t introducing yourself anymore. You’re continuing a conversation they’ve half-followed, and that shifts the tone of everything that follows, including the commercial discussion.
You don’t need a monthly index to do this. You need a rhythm: a quarterly insight, a regular column, a steady flow of expert commentary. The goal is to stay in the conversation between your big moments.
3. Be Transparent, Especially When the News Isn't Good
This is where many B2B companies lose credibility without realising it. They announce the wins loudly and go quiet on everything else. Journalists have long memories, and a company that only talks when things are going well eventually stops being believed even when it is.
India’s large IT services firms offer a useful contrast. Infosys, for example, issues annual revenue guidance and revises it publicly every quarter, including when the number goes down. Leadership states the cut plainly and takes questions on it. That discipline doesn’t always make for comfortable headlines, but it’s a big part of why the company’s statements on the industry are taken seriously.
Transparency doesn’t mean oversharing. It means being clear about what you’re announcing and what it means, being honest about what you can’t say yet, and not dodging the obvious follow-up question. A reporter who feels you were straight with them will come back to you.
4. Give Journalists Something They Can't Get Anywhere Else
B2B companies often sit on remarkable data without realising it. A payments company can see how businesses transact. A logistics firm can see freight movement. A SaaS platform can see how small businesses adopt technology.
Razorpay has used this well. Its reports on digital payment trends, and its annual FTX event, give journalists fresh numbers and a clear hook. The coverage that follows isn’t really about Razorpay. It’s about Indian commerce, with Razorpay as the credible source. That’s the best kind of coverage there is.
If you have anonymised, aggregated insight that tells a larger story about your industry, package it. It’s often more newsworthy than anything on your product roadmap, and it’s one of the most dependable ways to earn media coverage for B2B companies that don’t have a launch to announce.
5. Lead the Category, Not Just Your Company
People like to be associated with the best. In B2B, “the best” usually means the company that understands the category deeply and is seen to care about the whole trade, not just its own share of it.
This is why industry representation matters so much. When your leadership speaks at NASSCOM forums, CII sessions or sector-specific trade platforms, you’re not only getting visibility. You’re being positioned as someone the industry listens to. Journalists covering the sector then treat you as a go-to voice.
Freshworks’ Girish Mathrubootham took this a step further. He helped build SaaSBoomi, a community for Indian SaaS founders. That work made him one of the most quoted people on Indian SaaS long before Freshworks listed on Nasdaq in 2021. When the listing happened, the media already saw him as a spokesperson for the entire category, not just one company.
We took a similar approach with Celcius Logistics. Instead of talking repeatedly about the company, we built conversations around India’s cold chain gaps, food wastage and the journey of perishables from farm to fork. Celcius became one of the voices on the category itself, and that credibility was one of the pillars supporting the company through its ₹100 crore Series A.
The lesson is that category leadership is earned by contributing to the category. Speak on panels, but also mentor, share lessons openly and back industry initiatives that don’t directly benefit you.
6. Make Your Spokespeople Easy to Reach
This one is unglamorous, but it decides a surprising amount of coverage. Journalists work to deadlines measured in hours. If they need a comment on a new RBI circular or a policy change and your CEO takes two days to respond, the quote goes to someone else. Speed and clarity will win you more column inches than any press release.
Keep a short, approved list of topics each spokesperson can comment on, a current bio and photo ready to send, and one person responsible for responding to media requests within hours, not days.
The Bottom Line
Media coverage for B2B companies isn’t a matter of luck, and it isn’t reserved for consumer brands. It comes from treating buyers as people, showing up steadily, telling the truth when it’s uncomfortable, and earning a seat at the head of your category’s table. Do that for long enough, and the media stops seeing you as a vendor. It starts seeing you as a source.
Frequently Asked Questions
How can a B2B company get media coverage without a big announcement?
Share expert commentary on industry developments, publish insights from your own data, write bylined articles and offer leadership for interviews on trends in your category. Journalists need informed sources year-round, not just on launch days.
Do journalists cover B2B companies in India?
Yes. Business publications, trade media and sector-specific platforms regularly cover B2B companies, especially those with clear industry insight, credible data or a strong point of view.
How long does it take to build media coverage for a B2B company?
Early coverage can come within a few months, but recognition as a go-to industry voice usually builds over a year or more of consistent effort.
What makes a B2B story newsworthy?
Relevance beyond your own company: industry data, a trend you’re seeing early, a clear position on a policy change, or a story that says something about the wider market.
Should B2B companies work with a PR agency?
An experienced B2B PR agency helps with media relationships, story-finding and consistency, which are the areas companies struggle to sustain on their own alongside running the business.
What next
If your B2B company has a strong story but limited media presence, reach out to Umanshi. We help B2B companies across logistics, SaaS, manufacturing and enterprise services earn consistent media coverage and become trusted voices in their category.
About the Author
Arunisha Sengupta is the Co-Founder of Umanshi Marketing & Branding Pvt. Ltd. and a PR professional with nearly two decades of experience across agencies including Percept and JWT. She has advised founders and leaders across healthcare, finance, tourism and technology.
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