By: Julia Fitzgerald, Senior Account Manager
Public relations is evolving, and artificial intelligence is playing an increasingly prominent role in what the campaigns of the future will look like. ChatGPT may have the potential to transform how businesses interact and work with their customers, but what exactly does that look like?
Despite its convenience, ChatGPT generates its responses based on existing text that has been fed to its machine learning algorithm, it then uses this to generate answers. It is incapable of having original thoughts, and those it does provide could be out of date or just wrong. Journalists can also spot pieces that have been written by AI, which then leads to articles being rejected.
For B2B PR agencies, we rely on our relationships, expertise and skills to effectively build and increase each clients’ brand and spokesperson’s profile, placing them as experts in their respective industries. Even with the likes of ChatGPT this hasn’t changed, there are just more resources available.
Chatbot vs human
Employers and clients want teams who are creative, hiring people with strong analytical and critical thinking skills that can manage challenges, adapt to changes, and handle stress – characteristics that a chatbot lacks.
Thought leadership articles are a valuable platform for industry leaders to showcase their expertise and credibility, and while chatbots like ChatGPT can impress by quickly putting responses together, it’s incapable of providing content that showcases a company’s knowledge and achievements, and is unable to keep up with the latest industry trends.
That said, tools such as ChatGPT can help PR professionals by automating certain tasks and prompting those ideas, but they won’t provide the human touch, creativity and background knowledge that clients expect.
Competition goes beyond the platform
Uncertainty remains front of mind, with employees wondering where AI is heading and what it mean for jobs. While the future of its capabilities is still unknown, it is also important to remember that we're in competition not just with the AI itself, but also with those already using it, and using it better.
Those in roles like PR can utilise the tools that are out there to maximise efficiency, and by educating ourselves on what it can do it also allows us to teach our clients, making them more aware of how best to use it and what to stay away from.
It’s clear that ChatGPT can’t be ignored, but neither should it be relied upon for the accurate delivery of PR, marketing or SEO strategies. As professionals we bring strategy to the campaigns our clients need, something that ChatGPT cannot replicate.
As a PR agency with an office in Wales, it was great to hear that earlier this year that The Welsh government signed a partnership deal with OpenAI as part of a plan to increase Welsh speakers in the country and help it meet its target of one million Welsh speakers and use of the language by 2050. A great case study of what the platform can achieve. You can read my blog on it here.