Role of AI in Public Relations (PR)
22 Apr 2024, By Deya Bhattacharya
22 Apr 2024, By Deya Bhattacharya
With AI becoming an integral part of business processes everywhere, it’s natural to have questions about how exactly it fits into your PR practice. Given how integral authenticity is to PR campaigns, the human touch should always come first. However, there’s no denying that AI can save a lot of time and effort, which can be a key player in a field where getting the right stories out at the right time is vital.
So what exactly is the right balance to strike? Here are our practical, tried-and-tested tips to incorporate the advantages of AI into your PR agency while avoiding the pitfalls.
AI tools can process large volumes of data in seconds, making it an excellent aid to research. It can also quickly summarise the main points in any lengthy whitepaper or research report. However, be cautious when using ChatGPT to find statistics, as it doesn’t yet possess the ability to reference any data after 2021(unless it is a paid version).
Editing and organising
Generative AI, in our opinion, still has a long way to go before it can write content that comes anywhere close to what a good writer can accomplish. However, it can be a useful tool for editing your work and organising your thoughts. Some applications include:
Sentiment analysis
This is an extremely useful application of AI that can help you stay on top of what people are saying about your client’s brand. AI can trawl online platforms and detect the tone in conversations that mention the brand, allowing you to take any action necessary to tackle negative sentiment. For instance, if AI detects that people are unhappy with your client’s latest ad campaign, you can proactively work on making adjustments to the next one.
Lead generation
AI tools are ideally designed to collect lead information from across multiple sources. This helps you proactively reach out to potential clients for your agency.
Personalisation
AI is excellent at identifying patterns in consumer behaviour, allowing you to personalise marketing campaigns to suit their interests, such as by sharing targeted ads with limited period offers on items they have browsed.
Scheduling and cross-posting
AI tools are ideal for scheduling posts, press releases and other pieces of content across multiple platforms. You can also use them to quickly repurpose the same piece of content for different formats, such as turning a press release into a LinkedIn post.
Responding to comments
While having a human support team is always necessary, AI can quickly respond to social media comments at scale and redirect users to any help they need, such as the link to a “Buy Now” page or creating a ticket to resolve an issue.
Treat AI as an assistant, and no more
There is no doubt that AI has a lot of benefits for businesses everywhere, and PR agencies are no exception. Remember, however, that creativity and human strategic insight have no substitute, no matter how advanced AI becomes. The best way to incorporate AI is to treat it as a way to be faster and more streamlined in the way one researches on, creates and distributes content. This allows your agency to be proactive about opportunities, while retaining your original creative touch.
