Direct answer
It can strengthen public third-party signals when coverage is relevant to your services, verifiable, and still current. A brand mention is not a backlink: the original article must actually link to your domain. Do not present coverage as an award, certification, ranking, or guarantee of service results.
Scope and limitations
Media coverage cannot replace your own brand entity, service, knowledge, case study, and evidence pages. Bulk advertorials with little relevance or paid link networks may also reduce source quality.