By Jessie Koerner, Manager, Novitas Communications
“Claude, I need a communications strategy for my client.”
Every executive and intern can now produce a workable strategy document, social media posts, or blog content in seconds — jobs that used to take communications professionals’ serious time. Our clients know this, and they’re more skeptical than ever about what PR pros are doing with these tools on their accounts to get the work done.
It’s a fair question. And the honest answer is: the best practitioners are using them. Extensively. Because the 90-second strategy doc isn’t the threat — it’s the new floor. What used to pass as a solid deliverable is now table stakes, producible by anyone with a decent prompt.
So, what exactly does “the work” entail in the current AI age?
That depends entirely on whether you understand what content is actually for.
Content is a conversation with your audience — which is why your communications advisors groan when you say you want to talk to “everyone.” As the saying goes: if you try to please everyone, you’ll please no one. Great content starts with knowing exactly who you’re talking to, and it succeeds when those people talk back.
That engagement isn’t abstract. It’s literally social. When someone likes, shares, or comments, their network sees it — family, friends, colleagues, bosses. A journalist’s byline goes on the story your pitch inspired. A professional’s LinkedIn reputation is staked to every article they share. Your audience isn’t just consuming your content; they’re vouching for it.
That’s the real quality bar. Not “is this accurate.” Not “is this well-written.” But — would a discerning person voluntarily put their name behind this?
That question is where the human element hasn’t been replaced. Because answering it requires understanding ego, ambition, reputation, and relationships. It requires knowing why this reporter wants to own this story right now, and why this audience shares things that make them look smart, compassionate, or ahead of the curve. No prompt captures that. Judgment does.
That is the quality bar, where human judgment shines… but it is also where automation can augment our efforts.
Current AI tools pass the information test. Wire releases drafted for compliance’s sake. Boilerplate strategy frameworks. First-pass social calendars.
Social currency is a different test entirely, and it requires something the tools can’t supply on their own: a human who actually understands the person on the other end. That judgment is what clients have entrusted their brands to––and it is what creates content that moves action.
Take Jim at CBS 32. We know Jim is on the business beat right now, but what we really know — because we’ve paid attention — is that Jim wants to be city editor someday. That ambition shapes everything: the stories he’s angling for, the bylines he wants to own, the portfolio he’s quietly building. No AI knows that. We do.
But here’s where the tools earn their place. Once you know Jim, you can use them to go deeper faster than ever before. What have his last ten stories been, and how did they perform? What angles is he missing that would build his portfolio? What has he shared, liked, engaged with on social? Tools from ChatGPT to Meltwater can surface that research in minutes — work that used to take hours, if it got done at all.
That’s the shift. AI handles the information layer so humans can operate entirely at the relationship layer. The result is a pitch that doesn’t just reach Jim — it lands for Jim, because it’s built around what he actually needs right now.
That’s the difference between content that earns engagement and what’s increasingly being called AI slop: mass-produced, plausible-sounding, and addressed to no one in particular. Journalists and editors have developed a sharp nose for it. Audiences are fatigued by it. In that environment, a pitch or a post that clearly knows its audience doesn’t just stand out — it’s a relief.
The tools didn’t lower the bar for that kind of work. They made it inexcusable not to do it.
Done right, automation has stripped communications work down to what actually matters. The commodity output — the compliance releases, the boilerplate frameworks, the first-draft calendars — gets handled. What remains is pure craft: personalized pitches with tailored angles, well-researched op-eds that carry a genuine point of view, pithy social posts that earn engagement.
Communications professionals have more tools than ever to go deeper into the work that moves people. More ways to find the right contact, research the right angle, reach the right audience on the right platform. The expectation — from clients, from audiences, from the market — is that those tools get used in service of content worth putting our audiences’ names on. Not content that merely floods the zone.
The bar isn’t new. It’s always been whether a journalist would own the story, whether an audience would share the post, whether the content earns the identity someone stakes to it. What’s new is that AI has made the floor so accessible that the ceiling is the only place left to compete. Judgment and execution — knowing who you’re talking to, why it matters to them, and how to make them feel that — those are the skills that can’t be prompted away.
For practitioners, that means no more hiding behind volume. There’s no excuse now for skipping the foundational work of a good communications campaign in the name of time. The time is there.
For clients, it means understanding where the invoice reflects value. The 90-second strategy draft is the starting point, not the deliverable. What your communications professionals do with it — how they pressure-test it, personalize it, and execute it in ways that make real people respond — that’s what you’re paying for.
Audiences are still willing to engage, even drowning in content, when something feels personally relevant. That feeling doesn’t come from a prompt. It comes from a professional who took the time to understand them — and now, finally, has the tools to act on that understanding at scale.
The automation didn’t replace the best communicators. It retired everything that was getting in their way.
