I wanted this to work so badly, as our boutique but well-established agency has spent tens of thousands of dollars on Cision and other top media bases. Those kind of fees are unjustifiable in the age of SaaS and cloud computing.

The problem is that no matter how we search--and we know what we are doing and even confirmed with the developer that we are doing it right--we get bunk results in return--except for podcasts.

On the media side, we've searched for assignment editors, GARs, program managers, you name it, in various cities. Even in NYC, only a few results will come up, and they are the wrong people. One guy had moved to another city six years ago. I know, because I helped him pack the truck.

For example, choose "Assignment Editor" for the role and New York City for the location. Nothing at all comes up. Nothing. And so the same results in various locations for education editors, public affairs, you name it--nothing or a few come up. And every time we email the developer, he helps find us what we are looking for--but will not explain what we are doing wrong. I believe that it's because we are not doing anything wrong. It's simple stuff. I can't help but wonder if he's using Cision to fill in our blanks.

And on the Publisher feature, it gets worse. Only 47 results come up when you search for African American publishers, and some of the most prominent are absent from the results.

Here's why I gave 3 stars instead of 1—one star because its podcast search is pretty good, but I've only tested 4 start podcasts. I don't know if niche podcasts are searchable with Press Ranger.
One star because the system is improving on general searches such as ABC 7.
And the 3rd star for Steve's responsiveness and obvious dedication to perfecting his craft. But come on—when I search Assignment Editor (role) and ABC7 (location) and nothing comes up, we have a problem. I want a useful list at the click of the button, not Steve to help me with one-offs here and there.

Although we bought multiple tiers, we are now negotiating with several media database reps for our year-end purchases, because if we don't, Press Ranger will put us out of business.

Steve, it's not us. I've seen your answers to other subscribers suggesting user errors and mistakes. Tell us what we are doing wrong. Don't go to another database to help us find what we can't find. I've given you plenty of chances. I hope you can fix what's broken, and when you do, I will give a more positive review.