View all guides AI in PR: What you need to know

Among the wide spectrum of industries that AI is revolutionizing, comms and journalism are among those most impacted.

AI will not replace PR professionals, but it will transform the way we do our jobs. AI tools enable you to level up, automate and personalize repetitive workflows and focus on the things that truly matter – building rock-solid media relationships, crafting captivating narratives, and shaping game-changing communications strategies.

AI usage in today’s PR industry

GenAI and machine learning aren't new developments, but it wasn’t until 2022 that ChatGPT made them more widely commercially accessible. AI-powered tools transformed PR workflows by automating traditionally manual tasks like media monitoring and even the creation of original content.

The swift rise of AI has consequently yielded unclear standards about usage and disclosure between brands and agencies. Questions about transparency, ethical considerations and compliance are still being debated, leaving PR pros navigating gray areas. As the role AI in PR grows, establishing clear industry standards and guidelines will be essential to ensure its responsible use.

How AI will help PR pros–now and looking forward

AI tools are reshaping the PR landscape, offering innovative ways to optimize the time-consuming tasks of yesteryear. This shift affords teams the bandwidth to dive deeper into audience insights, design more tailored campaigns and focus more on the relationships that keep their efforts going. Here’s a look at how AI will benefit the profession now and still to come.

Give back more time in the day

There’s no shortage of essential daily endeavors–each crucial for maintaining good PR. Everything from news scanning, to media monitoring to coverage clipping and reporting eats into precious time that could be used on actual strategy.

AI is changing that by reducing the manual work required to filter, validate and organize coverage. Instead of relying on tools that surface large volumes of mixed results, Muck Rack uses newer approaches with Curation Engine to analyze coverage in context—helping teams quickly focus on what matters while minimizing false positives and missed mentions.

Existing tools can be helpful, but many still lack the level of sophistication required to accurately filter for relevance. As these capabilities advance, PR teams can spend less time refining searches and cleaning up reports, and more time developing creative campaigns, building relationships and driving meaningful impact.

Surfacing audience insights

AI’s power to predict consumer interest and uncover emerging trends will enable

brands to delve deeper into their target audience, reaching them with precision on a more personal level.

This precise level of intel is foundational for crafting more sophisticated, targeted campaigns, tailored to specific audience segments. The outcome is PR strategies that evolve and adapt as the landscape changes, staying aligned with market realities and ensuring maximum impact with every campaign.

Boosting social interaction

Good PR has long been dependent on human involvement. But what if chatbots could streamline your social media interactions? Continuous AI advancements are giving rise to more intelligent chatbots that go beyond the abilities of today’s most prevalent chatbots (think Siri and Alexa).

These smarter chatbots point to a not-so-distant future where PR pros can reliably implement AI to further meaningful brand engagement. For example contributing to the discourse of social media where chatbots could respond to comments, engage with trending hashtags, and even manage direct messages—all while maintaining brand voice.

Drafting impactful content

With GenAI taking the spotlight, the use of content generating tools has exploded this year. The number of PR pros that reported using generative AI in their workflow has more than doubled from 23% to 64% in the span of the last year.

GenAI tools are giving teams the boost they need to draft concise, targeted PR pitches and press releases in seconds.

Journalist outreach

A great media list has simple requirements: accurate, organized data. In practice, it’s a bit more… complicated.

Adding AI to the mix, activates the ability to significantly simplify your outreach. AI tools have the ability to analyze large datasets, keeping your media lists updated and fresh. Gone are the days of bounced emails, unannounced job changes and scouring socials for contact info. AI streamlines journalist outreach and media list building by quickly identifying relevant reporters based on beat, outlets, and past coverage.

AI tools for PR Pros

We can break down useful AI-powered tools into two basic types: Larger Language Models like Claude, Gemini and ChatGPT, and PR management platforms that integrate AI into their workflow.

It should be noted that other types of workflow platforms are now incorporating AI. For example, Zoom is using it to generate meeting transcripts.

Press release generator

This handy tool works with GenAI to help PR pros draft impactful press releases with the click of button. Simply input a brief description of your news and it produces a first draft instantly. All that’s left to do is review and personalize.

A built-for-purpose press release generator’s advantage over alternatives (like ChatGPT) is the data it has access to. A functional press release generator will have access to a large and accurate media database that includes all of your team’s most relevant data.

Pitching tool

Like a Press Release generator, AI pitching tools work with purpose-made datasets to deliver concise, formatted pitches that will expedite the time it takes to land valuable press coverage.

Journalist suggestions

A good AI tool should be able to instantly generate a viable list of relevant journalists alongside your pitch or press release.

Public Relations Management platforms

PR platforms are software solutions that help PR teams streamline and manage key workflow tasks, such as media monitoring, outreach, press release distribution, analytics and reporting.

If you’re using a PR management platform, it should be leveraging AI throughout to maximize its potential. Without AI, these platforms’ usefulness is increasingly limited.

Brand perception tracker

A brand perception tracker helps PR pros understand how their organization is portrayed in AI-generated answers across platforms like ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini. Tools like Muck Rack’s Generative Pulse make this possible by surfacing which journalists, outlets, and stories most often shape those mentions.

With these insights, teams can spot visibility gaps, correct inaccuracies, and refine outreach strategies that influence how large language models describe their brand. Tracking this “AI share of voice” connects earned coverage to audience perception in generative search, helping communicators measure and guide the narratives that matter most.

Understanding AI's risks

Most companies don’t have an AI use case policy. Thinking back to the advent of social media, having clear policy in place was critical. Likewise, and perhaps even more critical is the creation of AI policy, considering the risks involved.

One such risk? It’s not uncommon for AI models to generate “hallucinations”—or statements that aren’t true. But, there’s a lot more at stake for companies leveraging AI tools.

These areas will see the biggest impact for PR pros and their organizations:

• Reputational – Especially relevant to brands with a large reach, AI-generated content errors or misinformation can quickly and swiftly damage a brand’s reputation. It can be as simple as a social media post reaching millions of followers.
• Financial consequences – the bigger the company, the higher the stakes. AI misuse could result in costly legal or PR crises, or even substantial loss of revenue.
• Regulatory issues – With the increasing regulation of AI usage, a company that fails to remain compliant around data privacy transparency could face substantial fines and/or legal action.

Common AI risks for PR pros

Let’s take a look at some of the potential risks PR teams face when working with AI.

• Bias – AI models can reflect the biases of their training data, which can inadvertently lead to discriminatory or exclusionary content. Ensuring diversity in datasets and human oversight are essential to mitigating bias.
• Misinformation – Failing to fact check can magnify and spread misinformation, creating false narratives damaging brand credibility and public trust.
• Plagiarism – AI can be susceptible to generating content that too closely resembles existing works. PR pros should always moderate for originality.
• Authenticity - Deviating from brand voice can easily lose you valuable audience engagement. Maintaining brand authenticity will be an ongoing effort of reviewing and adding a human touch.
• Environmental impact – AI systems can require significant processing power. It’s important to be aware of the environmental implications of implementing AI solutions.

Evaluating AI tools: questions PR teams should ask

Before adding one to your PR workflow, take time to understand how it works and what data powers it. Ask whether the tool connects to accurate, up-to-date media databases. Understand how it handles proprietary information. Confirm that it has safeguards in place to mitigate bias and misinformation.

A responsible AI partner should not only speed up workflows but also strengthen your ability to build accurate, trustworthy relationships with journalists and audiences alike. Tools like Muck Rack’s PressPal.ai, for example, anonymize user data and integrate directly with trusted media data—ensuring your results stay both relevant and secure.

Common concerns around AI

The foremost concern regarding AI use is proprietary information. Without proper safeguards in place, using AI can expose proprietary or confidential information to third parties.

Additionally, there are significant concerns about the accuracy of AI generated content, and its potential to spread misinformation. Other worries PR pros and agencies have voiced include:

• Over reliance on AI. Relying too much on automation can weaken human instincts that drive good storytelling and relationships. AI should support creativity and judgment, not replace them.
• Potential loss of human jobs. AI changes how PR work gets done but does not replace skilled professionals. Many tasks are shifting toward strategy and analysis, creating a need for reskilling and adaptation.
• Bias in AI algorithms. AI systems learn from existing data, which can include bias. This can lead to content that excludes or misrepresents certain groups. Using diverse datasets and maintaining human review help ensure fairness.
• Environmental impact of high-energy consumption AI tools. Running large AI models consumes a lot of energy. PR teams should choose vendors that prioritize efficient systems and sustainable infrastructure.

None of these concerns are insignificant on their own. Collectively, their potential impact at scale should not be overlooked.

Tips for using AI responsibly

Responsible use of AI should be top of mind for PR Professionals and the organizations they represent. Let’s explore due diligence around AI use.

1. Be proactive in conversations with clients about AI use

Transparency between all relevant parties is essential when incorporating AI into PR strategy. A formal process to acknowledge how AI is being used and the safeguards in place should be industry standard in conversations with clients. Open dialogue about AI use can help PR pros align with their client’s culture around AI adoption.

2. Guidance should be provided on how to use AI

Guidance helps to prevent negative outcomes caused by simple lack of education or awareness. For example, guidance on preventing data leaks or sharing proprietary information can address some of the most prevalent concerns about AI use.

3. Review and validate AI-generated content

In order to avoid inaccuracies, misinformation and the potential fallout of either, PR pros must embody their roles as experts, validating AI content that will be used publicly.

4. Vet and evaluate potential tools before adopting them

PR pros should always consider who created the technology they’re using as an indicator of the level of investment and resources involved. This speaks to the tool’s design of necessary safety precautions.

It’s important to be aware of potential competitors to avoid missing the possibility of an existing better, safer option.

5. Stay curious about the wider impact of AI

Remaining curious about emerging trends allows PR Pros to look beyond just how AI tools will impact PR jobs. It opens up the question of how the technology will impact Journalism. That curiosity allows PR pros to move forward mindfully when adopting new technology into their strategy.

AI Compliance checklist

This checklist can help you develop compliance guidelines for your organization.

A look at the State of AI in PR today

Muck Rack’s senior director of communications and community Linda Zebian, recently moderated a conversation between Stephen Waddington and Matt Dzugan, Muck Rack’s director of data, about the state of AI in PR. Their findings were based on Muck Rack’s latest State of AI in PR survey that polled around 1,000 PR and communications pros.

Below are some key takeaways that illuminate where PR Pros are collectively when it comes to AI.

Brands want to know when agencies use AI—but agencies aren’t always disclosing

A number of respondents from both the brand and agency perspective answered, “It depends” when surveyed about the need to disclose when AI is used.

Matt’s take: “If people are going through high levels of scrutiny to make sure their content is accurate, making sure they’re willing to put their own reputation on the line… there’s probably not a huge need to disclose it.”

But what if you use AI to create images, videos and other content? Stephen’s perspective, “it’s more nuanced about when you disclose depending on the complexity of the application.”

Most PR pros say AI improves quality and efficiency

Right now, AI can be used for basic content creation, task management, performance analytics and more. Note that basic is the word to keep in mind when it comes to content creation.

“AI will write incredibly good low-grade content,” Stephen said. “It will do a good first draft. It will not bring in human nuance and human emotion into the language. There’s absolutely still a requirement within the creation of content to have a human being.”

In terms of efficiency, he added that one of the most valuable use cases of AI is using it to distill large amounts of data, whether that’s a transcript, a research paper or an annual report. This is called reductive AI.

“It’s going to take you a half a day to read that and turn it into a press release,” he said. “AI is very, very good at creating summaries and saving me hours of time every week.”

PR pros mainly use AI for writing tasks

In Muck Rack’s survey, 64% of respondents use AI to write social copy, 58% use AI for research as well as writing press releases, and 54% use AI to craft pitches.

Much of the narrative around AI is that it’s going to take junior-level jobs, which would include those tasks, Stephen said. But the survey revealed 43% of PR pros also use AI for strategy and planning—a management-level function.

Matt warned PR pros not to use AI when citing specific anecdotes or data points.

PR pros who oppose AI worry it’s too unpredictable

With AI, it’s important not to fall into an all-or-nothing approach—relying on AI to craft a perfect, ready-to-send pitch, for example.

Matt suspected this mindset is why PR pros are worried about AI’s unpredictability because, right now, you cannot rely on AI to do an entire task.

If you’re working with a larger language, then there are opportunities to give it feedback and “train” it, Stephen pointed out. Prompting is important—knowing how to instruct these models.

Stephen summed up the conversation nicely: “It’s often said our jobs aren’t going to be taken by AI but will be taken by someone who uses AI.”

AI Prompts for PR pros

Use these expert-recommended prompts to help you generate new ideas for pitches, press releases, blogs, socials–you name it.

Experts answer AI FAQs

The influx of information available on AI coupled with rapid advancements, can make it a challenge to stay in the know-how. Here are some quick reference answers to commonly asked questions–direct from PR and data experts at Muck Rack and Wadds Inc.

What is generative AI?

Simply put, it’s a type of artificial intelligence that works with a set of algorithms to create new content based on the data it’s been trained with. This content can include: text, images, music, and even videos. A popular example is OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

In PR, GenAI can be used to write press releases, pitches and even social media content.

What should I use AI for in my daily tasks?

GenAI can do the heavy lifting of drafting copy for everything from press releases to blog posts, streamlining your time spent writing (or staring at a blank page). Best practices calls for approaching it as a brainstorming session rather than a final draft.

Everything written by an AI tool, or human for that matter should be reviewed, edited and/or improved on–no exceptions.

AI tools can also instantly produce starter lists of viable journalists to pitch based on your news and medium. But in order to maximize the potential of this, it's crucial that the media database powering your tool is accurate and up-to-date.

Will AI replace PR professionals?

No. But AI is a powerful tool for enhancing their outputs. Designed to automate time-consuming tasks, AI frees up PR pros to innovate, cultivate relationships, and improve their strategies and storytelling. Artificial Intelligence can not replace the human ability to build relationships based on trust, provide strategic counsel or navigate nuanced media challenges.

Researchers from OpenAI and the University of Pennsylvania found that up to 80% of the US labor force could see "at least 10% of their work tasks affected" by AI language models and that 19% of workers "may see at least 50% of their tasks impacted.”

Among the top jobs exposed are public relations specialists (66.7%+ exposure) and news analysts, reporters and journalists (100% exposure).

What are the key components of an organizational AI policy?

In a recent webinar, our experts discussed AI policy. Here are the main takeaways.

When creating an AI policy, it’s necessary to think about any of your deliverables AI could touch. Looking at the policy through a workflow lens is key.

Other things that should be considered:

• What are the parameters of AI?
• Where in the workflow are employees allowed to use AI?
• What practices are expected and encouraged?
• When and how do you disclose the use of AI?
• How do you prevent issues around the protection and ownership of IP?
• How do you deal and manage aspects of the output?
• What fact-checking policies are required?

Stephen Waddington of Wadds, Inc. says “Think back to when social media first became a thing. Every organization created a social media policy—the guidelines for using social media as an employee of an organization. We need exactly the same level of governance here.”

As a PR professional, is it safe to put confidential information into ChatGPT?

OpenAI’s privacy policy outlines its use of your data, including recording conversations and sharing logs with 3rd parties and AI trainers. ChatGPT also requires an email and phone number to register. When using ChatGPT directly, it’s best to proceed with caution.

Your safest channel is a tool that is powered by OpenAI, but does not use data submitted by customers to improve its models. Muck Rack’s PressPal.ai does just that while anonymizing all data passed to ChatGPT, providing an extra layer of privacy.

What are the telltale signs a PR pro used AI to generate content?

AI output, like any other content, should always be reviewed by a human editor. Some things to look out for are:

• Grammar
• Formatting
• Word choice
• Lack of emotional language

Without a human editor, AI generated content tends to lack nuance, relying instead on language that can be described as “flat.”

How do you deal with copyright issues?

Laws will ultimately vary by jurisdiction. In the U.S., the issue is playing out in real time with the New York Times suing OpenAI for copyright infringement.

Matt Dzugan at Muck Rack weighed in on the topic, “There are actually multiple flavors of the copyright issue. There’s the fact that maybe OpenAI is training the models based on data that they might not have the rights to transmit and publish, and then there’s the fact that they can output facts that are almost the same as an article but have a few key details different

Expect the conversation around copyright issues to continue to evolve.

How can I prepare for what’s next in AI?

Data will continue to reign supreme as AI takes hold at scale. The smarter that AI becomes, the more it will depend on accessible, organized, and reliable data. PR pros who centralize their media lists, pitches, coverage reports and analytics will be best-positioned to benefit from and leverage AI’s growing capabilities.