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| Andrew Blum |
ChatGPT, Anthropic, Gemini … AI is everywhere these days. It’s in the news, and it’s in your google searches and your email. PR vendors are seizing on AI as the hot marketing topic for press releases, search optimization and media databases, to name a few. How far will it go and how much does PR need to adopt it?
The vendors are telling PR people that they can help with AI. PRSA and other PR groups are also out there talking about AI. Meanwhile, the AI companies are doing their own PR to promote AI use.
Notified (GlobeNewswire) says AI search is changing how the PR audience discovers content and traditional PR tactics aren’t enough anymore.
Peter Woolfolk, host of Public Relations Review podcast, says in a post that AI search is rewriting the rules of visibility into a “zero-click reality, and it's exactly why Answer Engine Optimization (AEO), is becoming one of the new search engines for brands that rely on discovery … and reputation.”
This all may be true but there is still reason to be skeptical of AI, and its overall use and accuracy. AI slop is a concern, and newsrooms are trying to deal with too much AI in journalism and in contributed content.
So, what does AI mean for PR departments, agencies, and clients? Should you or should you not use AI? Should you use AI to write a press release or not? Are you equipped to use AI and make it work for you? Should we be worried if our work or client mentions end up in AI slop or if influencer posts are impacted by AI?
(Note: while I was writing this article and did google searches, it was hard to avoid AI overviews in search results!)
Here are some examples of where we are on AI in PR and the media.
Only 30% of PR teams are “very confident” in their ability to take advantage of AI, according to Cision,
More than 50% of journalists are opposed to PR professionals using AI in their pitches or press releases, Cision notes in its 2026 State of the Media Report.
Jane Rosenthal, co-founder of the Tribeca Film Festival, said of AI: “Pandora’s out of the box. We’ve got to learn it.” She was quoted in a New York Times article about the first full-length live action film completely generated by AI to be accepted by a major film festival – in this instance Tribeca.
In a bizarre use of AI in PR, it was reported that the restructuring business Coots & Boots has, according to The Times of London, created a lead marketing and communications person who is, wait for it -- a fake PR director, generated by AI.
Let’s think about that for a moment: the head of PR here was an AI fabrication.
“PR and comms is there to help a firm tell its story, to be the corporate conscious of a firm, to address head on these kinds of stories,” says Matt Baldwin of Coast Communications in a post. “It is unconscionable to fabricate any role in an organi(z)ation, but why create a fictitious PR lead? It is staggering that someone inside that firm gave this the green light. And I do not envy their real PR leads.”
The company was later reported to have hired a PR agency.
Hovering over all of this, are warnings that AI will cost jobs and hurt the economy. And at the state and federal level in the U.S., legislation and executive orders are in the pipeline to regulate AI or deregulate it.
AI has become an issue for book authors, book reviewers using AI, journalists caught with allegations of AI plagiarism, newsrooms such as McClatchy where unions filed grievances against using AI, and at the New York Times.
After several AI controversies, the NY Times emailed a “periodic reminder” to freelancers reminding them of its AI policy, according to Futurism. It said submissions "must be the product of human creativity and craft, and all submissions must consist solely of their original reporting, writing and other work."
The NY Times also cut ties with a freelance journalist after discovering he used AI to help write a book review echoing elements of a review of that book in the Guardian. Meanwhile, Bloomberg reports that CNN, NBC and USA Today are working to cut storage of content in an internet archive used by AI companies.
We need to be aware of all of this, and also about whether AI is being used to write and produce content that an agency or a client produces which is then submitted to the media.
Legal news publication Law360 now has rules on AI use in bylined article submissions.
“Artificial intelligence tools may be used for research and refining, but the author must independently verify the accuracy of all content. Additional use of IA must be disclosed to Law360,” it says.
I am sure other media outlets are considering similar policies.
Over the years, we’ve been through a never-ending change in media technologies from newspapers to radio to TV, from silent movies to talkies to HBO to streaming, and to the internet, online video, paywalls, social media, content, podcasts and now AI. PR has had to adapt to these.
So, what now with AI? We may not all like it but we are going to have adapt to it.
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Andrew Blum of AJB Communications is a PR consultant and media trainer who has directed proactive and crisis PR for a wide range of clients and issues, including a Sandy Hook parent, John Edwards, Jack Abramoff, Richard Scrushy, and former NY governor George Pataki. He has also directed PR for more than 50 authors, and for professional and financial services firms, NGOs, startups and PR agencies. He has also directed PR on issues relating to technology, the internet and IP. [email protected] or on X at @ajbcomms
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