How AI is Changing PR, Not Replacing It
Artificial intelligence is changing how PR teams work—but not in the way many people assume. Yes, AI can draft press releases, summarize coverage and even surface trending topics. But the rise of these tools isn’t the end of human-led public relations. It’s a shift in what’s valued.
When the routine work is done by machines, the real value lies in the judgment and experience only people can bring.
AI Has Made Basic PR a Commodity
Press release templates. Headline generators. Coverage summaries. Today, almost anyone can access tools that do what used to require time, judgment and a trained eye. The result? The PR floor has been raised. Entry-level tasks are now faster and cheaper to complete than ever before.
But that speed comes at a cost. The more brands rely on identical tools and generic prompts, the more their voices begin to blur. Coverage becomes repetitive. Social posts sound alike. Earned media starts to feel like ad copy. The risk isn’t just inefficiency—it’s irrelevance.
What AI Can’t Do: Navigate the Real Work of Reputation
No algorithm can read the room in a board meeting. It can’t manage the emotional temperature of a live crisis. It won’t build long-term trust with a skeptical journalist or know when not to send a statement.
That’s because PR is fundamentally about relationships, timing and context. These are areas where human instincts, honed over years of experience, remain irreplaceable.
As AI tools take on the time-consuming labor of media summaries, logging coverage and even first-draft writing, the best PR professionals are focusing their energy where it matters most:
- Managing reputational risk
- Shaping long-term narrative strategy
- Coaching executives on media presence
- Handling sensitive inquiries and building journalist trust
This is where AI isn’t a replacement—it’s an accelerant.
Making Strategy Easier to Execute: Where Broadsight Fits
At Broadsight, we’ve seen how AI can actually make strategic work more effective—not by replacing expertise, but by removing the friction that gets in its way.
One of the biggest time sinks for PR teams? Logging media inquiries. Manually entering who asked what, when they asked, how it was answered, and whether it was consistent with past statements can take hours every week.
Broadsight’s AutoTracker feature solves this. Teams simply forward media requests to a dedicated inbox. From there, AutoTracker:
- Automatically extracts key information
- Cross-references previous journalist interactions
- Logs everything into a centralized dashboard
- Drafts a suggested reply based on approved messaging
Instead of filling out a spreadsheet or chasing down colleagues for context, teams get a full picture of what was said, to whom, and why. That context fuels better decisions. And faster ones.
Broadsight doesn’t replace strategy. It clears space for it.
The Future of PR Is Human-Led, AI-Enabled
History has seen this pattern before.
When electronic spreadsheets became widespread in the 1980s, many feared that accountants would be made obsolete. After all, much of their work involved manual calculations and ledger keeping—tasks that spreadsheet software could suddenly perform in seconds. But the opposite happened. With tools like Lotus 1-2-3 and Excel automating the math, accountants evolved. They began modeling scenarios, advising leadership and playing a far more strategic role in shaping business decisions.
Their work didn’t disappear. It became more valuable.
We’re now seeing the same shift in PR.
There will always be brands that chase low-cost solutions and quick fixes. They’ll publish AI-written press releases, auto-generate social content and call it a day. But the companies that care about their reputation—and understand the cost of getting it wrong—will keep investing in real expertise.
Those teams will still use AI. But they’ll use it to enhance their judgment, not replace it. They’ll demand tools that make their high-level work easier to execute at scale.
That’s what Broadsight is built for. And it’s why we believe the best PR teams of tomorrow won’t be the ones who write the fastest. They’ll be the ones who think the smartest—with tools that help them move just as quickly.
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