As the energy continues to ramp up with AI, more and more people are shifting away from Google searches and instead redirecting questions to their new BFF Chat GPT (or Claude…or Gemini). At Olive Public Relations, we are over here making shifts just as quickly. You might be asking yourself: Is public relations important now that people are searching for answers in AI?
The answer is yes. In fact, many people would argue that AI has made public relations more important than ever because your brand’s messaging directly impacts the results AI will produce when asked about your reputation. The same goes for someone using questions to discover the best in your industry. On top of your own messaging, AI pulls from media coverage because media pages tend to have high index value and fresh content, which AI sees as relevant in order to provide the most current results. In fact, Muck Rack recently reported that 89% of citations come from earned media.
Did you hear me in the back? You need to ramp up your media coverage if you want to stay discoverable in AI.
This is exciting news for public relations agencies who have always loved this stuff. It is also very exciting for shady businesses pretending to offer amplified AI strategies in expensive packaging. Do not be fooled. The route to being discovered through questions on AI is simply SEO + media coverage + a few new things… I can’t give you all the secrets on my blog, but at Olive Public Relations, we are working diligently to ensure all of our clients have the details.
There have been times when SEO didn’t seem that important, but that time is not today. It’s really important to take a look at how your brand is showing up in AI and ensure your messaging is properly telling your story. The process of optimizing your website is the process of optimizing for AI. If you are already investing in SEO, you are all set. A great SEO partner will support you in optimizing all of your business listings and make recommendations on how you can improve your online presence and media relations will support you with the most powerful links – and you are on your way to winning.
Working with a team like Olive Public Relations can support you in developing a strategy and finding the very best partners to support your AI journey. This is not scary, it is a lot of fun.
You might be thinking… can’t you just use AI to do your messaging and social media? The answer is no. If you want to build trusting relationships with the audiences you serve, you are gonna have to keep it real.
At Olive, we are committed to keeping it real. We believe trust is built on truth and while these tools are amazing for certain things, they will not replace our commitment to excellence in the way we have always known it.
Real is from the heart… it’s a true connection. Whether we are launching a national campaign for a hospitality group, a consumer lifestyle brand or a regional campaign for a community, there is one thing you can be certain of… our approach is authentic and heartfelt. The tools just aren’t there yet, but AI is really everywhere you look. Just open up your Instagram app and you will see very questionable videos of grizzly bears licking people’s faces while they sleep. I personally think this use of AI is very dangerous because I’m afraid someone may try to befriend the local mountain lion in hopes for their viral moment…
I digress, but one consequence of AI is that it has shifted social media away from online community building to an entertainment platform. Perhaps this shift started with YouTube or TikTok, but the use of AI bots has really changed the way our feeds show up.
In a meeting recently, I had a powerful realization that our brands need to be the influencers of their community. The days of super polished video on social media have lost out to the noise of content creators. In order to keep up and stay relevant, at Olive we believe our clients need to be content creators in their own right, building entertaining and educational content that can contend with the Mr. Beasts of the world. Well, maybe not Mr. Beast, but a few influencers come to mind.
So, how do you keep up? You don’t. You let us handle it. At Olive Public Relations, we are obsessed with figuring out how to bring our clients the biggest return on investment when it comes to cracking the code on the latest technology breakthroughs and algorithms. This is one of the major advantages of hiring a public relations firm. We pick up on trends immediately because we can see it happening across our portfolio of work. We watch behavioral shifts before they become headlines. We track algorithm changes before they impact results and we’re consistently adjusting. We test, refine, and build systems across our portfolio so our clients aren’t guessing, they’re leading. We do the work to understand what’s happening deeply enough to operationalize the changes.
I don’t want to exhaust you, but we should also talk about your blogs and newsletters. AI is also pulling from this content, so you better believe it’s important to keep things fresh and on message. We know how hard it is… we can also get behind on our own posts, but now, more than ever, it’s important. Just please, please don’t ask AI to write your blogs. If you must get ideas there, okay, but original content is so important. If you are best in class in your industry, you should be best in class in your marketing. Also, people are smart and can easily detect AI content (don’t even get me started on AI generated photos… Let’s just say six fingers and backwards hands).
Here’s the bottom line. AI is a tool, it is not a silver bullet solution, and it is not the end of the world, but it is here to stay. As someone who remembers the beginning of websites and transitioning to email, I can tell you that this change is not bad, it’s just a transition and we can support you as you ride into the next phase standing in integrity and authenticity.
If you are interested in a consult to learn more about how to improve your AI presence, please contact us at info@olivepubicrelations.com.
Written by Jennifer von Stauffenberg, founder of Olive Public Relations
