7 AI Tools That Draft Your HARO and Qwoted Pitches for You

Last updated: October 28, 2026

The old Help A Reporter Out inbox is not what it was. HARO changed hands, was rebranded as Connectively, and was then reported to have shut down, which pushed PR and link building teams toward platforms like Qwoted, Featured, and Source of Sources. The platforms changed, but the hard part did not: journalists get hundreds of replies to each request, and generic answers get deleted in seconds. That is where AI HARO pitch tools help, as long as you treat them as drafting assistants and not autopilots. Here are 7 worth trying, and where each one stops being useful.

Quick comparison table

1. Claude

Claude is strong at turning a messy brain dump into a tight, quotable answer. Paste in the journalist’s request, your raw notes, and two or three examples of your own past writing, and ask for a 120 word response that leads with the answer. It handles tone matching well and will push back if your claim is vague. The catch: it knows nothing about the reporter unless you tell it, so you still supply the facts and the real numbers.

Best for: founders who have expertise but dislike writing.

2. ChatGPT

ChatGPT, especially with custom GPTs or saved instructions, works well as a repeatable pitch template engine. You can store your bio, company facts, and approved stats once, then paste each query and get a first draft in seconds. It tends to produce polished but generic phrasing, so budget time to rewrite the opening line. Never let it invent a statistic, because reporters check.

Best for: teams answering many queries a week who want consistency.

3. Featured.com

Featured is built around expert Q&A, where publishers post questions and experts submit answers that may be published with a link. It includes some AI assistance for drafting answers, and the format itself forces short, specific responses, which is half the battle. Pricing and plan details change, so check the current page, but expect a paid tier for serious volume. Answers are still judged by editors, so thin AI text gets passed over.

Best for: SaaS and B2B brands chasing steady, mid-tier backlinks.

4. Qwoted

Qwoted connects sources with journalists and also lets you build a profile that reporters can browse. It is known for a more curated feel than the old HARO firehose, and it has been adding workflow features such as response drafting help. The value is less about the AI and more about verified identities, which tend to improve response quality. Free and paid access levels exist, so confirm current terms before committing.

Best for: experts who want a reputation on the platform, not just one-off quotes.

5. Muck Rack

Muck Rack is a media database and monitoring platform, not a HARO clone, and it is priced for professional PR teams rather than solo operators. Its AI features help research journalists and shape pitches around what they actually cover. If you are doing proactive outreach beyond reactive source requests, this is the grown-up option. For a small budget it is probably overkill.

Best for: in-house PR teams and agencies running proactive pitching.

6. Perplexity

Perplexity is not a pitch writer, but it is useful for the research step that makes pitches land. Ask it to summarize a reporter’s recent articles and the angles they keep returning to, then reference one in your reply. Always click through the cited sources, since summaries can be wrong. Used this way it turns a generic response into one that clearly came from someone who read the beat. Our post on AI ghostwriting tools that do not sound like a robot covers the same voice problems from the writing side.

Best for: anyone who wants relevance without spending an hour per pitch.

7. Source of Sources

Source of Sources is a free email-based service, started by Peter Shankman, that sends journalist requests to subscribers. It has no built-in AI, so it earns its place here as the input side of your workflow: free requests you can feed into Claude or ChatGPT. Volume is lower than the old HARO days and request quality varies. At zero cost, it is still worth a subscription.

Best for: tight budgets and testing whether source-request pitching is worth the time.

Where AI HARO pitch tools fall short

Journalists have said publicly and often that they can spot AI pitches quickly. The tells are consistent: a flattering opener, filler like “in today’s fast-paced landscape,” three bullet points of obvious advice, and no original data. Fix that and your hit rate improves, whatever tool you use. A few rules help:

Answer the question in the first sentence. Include one concrete detail that only you could know, such as a number from your own account or a specific mistake you made. Keep it under 150 words unless asked. Include your credentials in one line. And reply fast, since many requests close within hours.

It also helps to build your own answer bank. Our walkthrough of AI tools that turn sales calls into case studies shows one way to pull quotable moments from material you already have, which gives you real stories to pitch instead of invented ones.

How to measure whether it is working

Track three numbers for the first 30 days: pitches sent, replies or acknowledgments from journalists, and published placements with a link. Most people see a low hit rate at first, so judge the workflow over a few dozen pitches, not five. If your response rate is near zero, the problem is usually topic fit or specificity, not which AI model you used. Also log how long each pitch took. A tool that saves ten minutes per reply is worth keeping even if the hit rate barely moves.

A sensible starter stack

If you are starting from zero, subscribe to Source of Sources for free, join Featured or Qwoted at the lowest tier that fits, and use Claude or ChatGPT with a saved profile of your facts for drafting. Add Perplexity for the five minutes of research before each send. That covers the workflow for little spend. Move up to Muck Rack only when you are doing proactive pitching at scale. Whatever you choose, edit every draft by hand. The tool gets you to a draft faster, but the reporter decides based on whether a real person with real experience wrote it.

Frequently asked questions

What happened to HARO?

HARO changed hands, was rebranded as Connectively, and was then reported to have shut down, pushing PR people toward alternatives.

Which AI tool is best at writing quotable pitch answers?

Claude is strong at turning a messy brain dump into a tight, quotable answer when you paste in the journalist’s query.

Can ChatGPT draft HARO pitches?

ChatGPT, especially with custom GPTs or saved instructions, works well as a repeatable pitch template.

Which tools are covered for HARO-style pitching?

The list covers Claude, ChatGPT, Featured.com, Qwoted, Muck Rack, Perplexity and Source of Sources.