What users are saying about
Cision Communications Cloud
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Top Rated
458 Ratings
<a href='https://www.trustradius.com/static/about-trustradius-scoring' target='_blank' rel='nofollow noopener'>trScore algorithm: Learn more.</a>Score 8.5 out of 100
Based on 458 reviews and ratings
30 Ratings
<a href='https://www.trustradius.com/static/about-trustradius-scoring' target='_blank' rel='nofollow noopener'>trScore algorithm: Learn more.</a>Score 8.6 out of 100
Based on 30 reviews and ratings
Attribute Ratings
- Cision Communications Cloud is rated higher in 1 area: Implementation Rating
- Muck Rack is rated higher in 4 areas: Likelihood to Recommend, Likelihood to Renew, Usability, Support Rating
Likelihood to Recommend

8.4
Cision Communications Cloud
84%
277 Ratings
8.9
Muck Rack
89%
15 Ratings
Likelihood to Renew

7.1
Cision Communications Cloud
71%
17 Ratings
8.0
Muck Rack
80%
1 Rating
Usability

7.0
Cision Communications Cloud
70%
53 Ratings
9.5
Muck Rack
95%
2 Ratings
Availability

9.1
Cision Communications Cloud
91%
3 Ratings
Muck Rack
N/A
0 Ratings
Performance

9.1
Cision Communications Cloud
91%
3 Ratings
Muck Rack
N/A
0 Ratings
Support Rating

8.9
Cision Communications Cloud
89%
321 Ratings
9.5
Muck Rack
95%
6 Ratings
Online Training

8.0
Cision Communications Cloud
80%
3 Ratings
Muck Rack
N/A
0 Ratings
Implementation Rating

10.0
Cision Communications Cloud
100%
7 Ratings
5.0
Muck Rack
50%
1 Rating
Product Scalability

7.3
Cision Communications Cloud
73%
1 Rating
Muck Rack
N/A
0 Ratings
Likelihood to Recommend
Cision Communications Cloud
For a small start-up, the cost-benefit to add lift to press releases [and] particular milestone accomplishments is definitely there with the Cision [Communications] Cloud. Much of what we do, by necessity, is done internally without the benefit of outsourced press folks, so the Cision [Communications] Cloud ease of use and reporting is very important.
CEO (Chief Executive Officer)
DriveItAway IncAutomotive, 11-50 employees
Muck Rack
Muck Rack has been well suited for me when reporting and providing value add and ROI reporting to clients who are investing in publications. Not only has it been great creating media lists, drafting, sending out, and tracking pitches, but the ability to track coverage and export a report that showcases the reach, impact, and media value has been so beneficial for me. So, if you are working with clients in an external communications capacity, then the Muck Rack tools are very flexible and can fit your needs very well.
Founder/Director of Marketing & Public Relations
The D2 GroupPublic Relations & Communications, 1-10 employees
Pros
Cision Communications Cloud
- Their upgraded press release templates and ability [to] pull in an entire, completed release makes the [process] faster and easier, and allows for more graphics, such as company mastheads, [are done well].
- The media tracking offers the ability to find relevant placements across the entire country.
- The journalist database streamlines the process of finding relevant reporters to directly connect [to] on news releases that are relevant to their beats.
- The process of setting up, creating, and distributing a release is seamless, easy to use, and not labor-intensive.
Managing Director, Public Relations
Point Park UniversityHigher Education, 501-1000 employees
Muck Rack
- Muck Rack offers a robust and highly targeted media research tool that allows you to build a customized media list to launch a media relations campaign.
- Muck Rack's customer support team is quite good and is very responsive.
- Muck Rack's sales team does a great job of explaining how their solution will effectively address the needs of the organization.

Verified User
Vice-President in Other
Public Relations and Communications Company, 51-200 employeesCons
Cision Communications Cloud
- In the media influencer database, the classic Cision allowed us to do a zip code radius search to really drill down to the neighborhood level. That's because we do localized media advisories and press releases for events at neighborhood schools. One part of a big city like Chicago really doesn't care what's happening in another part of Chicago that's too far away. The zip code radius search was a feature in the classic Cision but not with the current Cision Communications Cloud. We've asked for this to be restored several times, but nothing's happened. In fact, we were told to use DMA — which actually goes wider in a search (bigger than a city), not more narrow as needed. This reflects a basic misunderstanding of what we need.
- Another missing feature involves a merge field when sending out an email press release through Cision. This is the "select insert field" button in the upper right that's used to personalize a release with the media contact's name and other information. This is key for localization of the release. Many media outlets won't run a release unless it's local. While "county" is a feature in the influencer database when putting together a media list in Cision, "county" is not available to insert into a press release as a merge field. Counties are important because this is how many newspapers and health departments are organized and identify themselves. I've asked for this to be implemented, to no avail. As a workaround, we've had to use "contact city" or "outlet city."
- After refining a media list in Cision using filters, I've had to download the list and take it offline to see the big picture, screen for duplicates, etc. While there is a button on the bottom left intended to help with this, it doesn't do the trick. That's because there may be multiple contacts with the same email address. In addition, one media contact may represent numerous media outlets, so this same contact could show up several times. It would be nice to have a better way to see the whole list online and eliminate both duplicates as well as those who previously opted out.
Public Relations Manager
MeyocksPublic Relations & Communications, 51-200 employees
Muck Rack
- Creating coverage reports is time-consuming and it is difficult to filter out unrelated coverage with the Boolean operator-driven functionality
- Muck Rack does not integrate with our other monitoring and reporting tools, so for sharing reports everything needs to be manually exported and added to our reporting software.
- Muck Rack does not include broadcast coverage monitoring in its normal package, and the functionality of the added broadcast tool is limited compared to other coverage monitoring tools.

Verified User
Strategist in Marketing
Marketing & Advertising Company, 11-50 employeesPricing Details
Cision Communications Cloud
General
Free Trial
—Free/Freemium Version
—Premium Consulting/Integration Services
—Entry-level set up fee?
No
Starting Price
—Cision Communications Cloud Editions & Modules
—
Additional Pricing Details
—Muck Rack
General
Free Trial
—Free/Freemium Version
—Premium Consulting/Integration Services
—Entry-level set up fee?
No
Starting Price
$5,000 per year
Muck Rack Editions & Modules
Edition
Muck Rack | $5,0001 |
---|
- per year
Additional Pricing Details
—Likelihood to Renew
Cision Communications Cloud
Cision Communications Cloud 7.1
Based on 17 answers
While I am happy with the product performance overall, TrendKite's recent merger with Cision is cause for concern. When we first signed on with TrendKite, I spoke with several users and the best response I received was that the company was a startup and we could expect there to be hiccups along the way as the company grew and the platform got more robust. That has certainly been the case. However, now that they have merged with Cision — a company that has grown too fast, has not focused on improving its product and has poor customer service — I have concerns that TrendKite will lose some of the qualities that have made it a great company and great product to work with.
Vice President
NewmanPRPublic Relations and Communications, 1-10 employees
Muck Rack
Muck Rack 8.0
Based on 1 answer
It's the best tool we've found for this type of product. It is not 100% critical to our daily responsibilities, but as a corporate tool made available to us, it is something we leverage on a weekly basis.
Director Direct Response Marketing
Pimsleur Language Programs / Simon & Schuster AudioPublishing, 501-1000 employees
Usability
Cision Communications Cloud
Cision Communications Cloud 7.0
Based on 53 answers
The flexibility and customization of Cision Communications Cloud (TrendKite)* is among its most important features. Changing the dashboards, using keywords in the saved searches to pull out the best stories and the integration with marketing automation tools gives me confidence that I will able to continue using this tool well into the future. The future implementation and integration of the media contact database will complete the suite, making list management and email marketing programs much smoother. *This review was written before Cision acquired TrendKite. TrendKite is now part of Cision Communications Cloud.
Manager, Public Relations
Kawasaki Motors Corp., U.S.A.Consumer Goods, 201-500 employees
Muck Rack
Muck Rack 9.5
Based on 2 answers
Little training was required to leverage the tool. It is a very intuitive platform. The only troublesome aspect of the tool has been the email integration features, but that may be more of a security/IT issue with our corporate requirements than a Much Rack problem. Overall, it is a tool that anyone can leverage without much effort.
Director Direct Response Marketing
Pimsleur Language Programs / Simon & Schuster AudioPublishing, 501-1000 employees
Reliability and Availability
Cision Communications Cloud
Cision Communications Cloud 9.1
Based on 3 answers
Easily accessible 24/7.

Verified User
Professional in Other
Public Relations & Communications Company, 1-10 employeesMuck Rack
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Performance
Cision Communications Cloud
Cision Communications Cloud 9.1
Based on 3 answers
Generally, Cision performs well day to day, but it's got some annoying bugs that slow down usage/require user workarounds which is inefficient. More seriously, a few months ago, as a result of a major system upgrade, certain critical functionality was not working and I was unable to use the service for more than a day when I had time-sensitive work to execute
Founder and Principal
Susan Tull CommunicationsPublic Relations and Communications, 1-10 employees
Muck Rack
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
Cision Communications Cloud
Cision Communications Cloud 8.9
Based on 321 answers
For Cision TrendKite in particilar, support always responded, but it was sometimes slow. For some of our booleans and search queries, we would need help refining and excluding terms/phrases that weren't relevant to our client or campaign. This sometimes took 1-2 days just to get a response back, which sometimes was too late when a last-minute report was due. This was only with the support staff, not necessarily our customer success manager or sales rep.

Verified User
Strategist in Marketing
Marketing and Advertising Company, 51-200 employeesMuck Rack
Muck Rack 9.5
Based on 6 answers
I'm sure it's fine. I have never used their customer support, not even when a list does not save. I just figured there isn't much they can do since it was a search. They do have live chat to get answers quickly but most of the time I'm working on lists after hours (since it's a lot of admin and I can do it front of the TV) and no one is available.

Verified User
Executive in Marketing
Public Relations and Communications Company, 1-10 employeesOnline Training
Cision Communications Cloud
Cision Communications Cloud 8.0
Based on 3 answers
The online training sessions available for the Cision Communications Cloud are helpful and informative. There's more than one option - initially, I signed up for the live webinar classes on basic functions and that is what I recommend other new users do as well. If I have specific questions or something I want to learn more about, I can search the online database and find article or online training videos to get the information I need.
Public Relations Manager, Florida Region
ComcastTelecommunications, 10,001+ employees
Muck Rack
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
Cision Communications Cloud
Cision Communications Cloud 10.0
Based on 7 answers
There is no implementation at the customer's end so this doesn't really apply to my instance of Cision (possibly to all instances of it).
Founder and Principal
Susan Tull CommunicationsPublic Relations and Communications, 1-10 employees
Muck Rack
Muck Rack 5.0
Based on 1 answer
I was not involved with the implementation.
Director Direct Response Marketing
Pimsleur Language Programs / Simon & Schuster AudioPublishing, 501-1000 employees
Alternatives Considered
Cision Communications Cloud
It's a similar product. I think Meltwater sells itself as being a bit more niche, but I have not found many significant differences between Meltwater and Cision. Meltwater's sales process is a very high pressure and their prices are inflated.
Content Strategist
Willow MarketingMarketing & Advertising, 11-50 employees
Muck Rack
Cision Media Contact Database. Honestly, it has been a long time since I used it, but I do remember being unhappy with the service. I thought its UI/UE was clunky at the time, but I didn't complain because I had free access to it.
President/Founder
LEVEL PRPublic Relations & Communications, 1-10 employees
Scalability
Cision Communications Cloud
Cision Communications Cloud 7.3
Based on 1 answer
Easy to use, but still room for improvement.

Verified User
Professional in Other
Public Relations & Communications Company, 1-10 employeesMuck Rack
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
Cision Communications Cloud
- Cision has a net positive impact on time savings for staff so we can be quicker to market
- Cision has a positive impact on internal savings as it is used internally across multiple accounts and with the internal PR team
- Cision is extremely useful when it comes to resourcing and conducting outreach in those DMA's where our agency doesn't have a physical presence
Vice President, Marketing Communications
rEvolutionMarketing and Advertising, 51-200 employees
Muck Rack
- It's hard to measure ROI but I can say this: I have discovered and build relationships with media I may have had a hard time locating before. MuckRack has probably increased my efficiency by 50 percent and doubled my effectiveness.
- I haven't looked a media databases in about 2 years but it is a much more cost effective media database than the big, traditional ones that everyone else has.
Principal
J Harrison Public RelationsPublic Relations and Communications, 1-10 employees