Each week we’ll gather headlines and tips to keep you current with how generative AI affects PR and the world at large. If you have ideas on how to improve the newsletter, let us know!
What You Should Know
When Communicators Become AI Builders
Axios reports that communication teams at companies like Cognizant and Instacart are going beyond simply adopting AI — they’re building their own tools. Cognizant’s group used a no-code platform to create a sentiment tracker tied to stock performance, an executive dashboard to measure messaging effectiveness, and a message-cascade optimizer. Instacart has an internal assistant that compiles headlines, summarizes coverage, and drafts wrap-up emails. PR firms and startups are building proprietary tools with specialized focus, like CrisisCalm for crisis communications, or Newsprint for news monitoring.
The move toward custom tools highlights a growing divide. Not every organization has the time or budget to build apps in-house — even with low-code platforms, there’s still a learning curve and the need to test and iterate. Off-the-shelf platforms remain more practical for many teams, especially if the need is straightforward. What matters is recognizing your pain points and asking whether an existing tool solves them before deciding to build from scratch.
Most communicators already treat AI as part of their toolbox, using it for drafting, monitoring, or reporting. The question is whether a need truly calls for something new. If you can clearly define a gap and articulate how to close it, you may even be able to build a new tool yourself.
Elsewhere …
- PODCAST: Agents, Startup Investing with $10K, and AI’s Provenance Problem
- OpenAI, Anthropic Swapped AI Models: Here’s the Dirt They Uncovered
- Meet the Guys Betting Big on AI Gambling Agents
- OpenAI to Safeguard ChatGPT for Teens and People in Crisis
- AI-Driven Drug Discovery Picks Up as FDA Pushes to Reduce Animal Testing
How to build a better award nomination
What’s happening: We’re approaching the end of the year and a big push for annual award submissions. This is far from a new use for AI, but just like there are “tells” in AI-generated content, there are some signs it was used to produce submissions, too, and they might hurt your nomination.
Like what?: The biggest we’ve noticed are repeated information across questions, stretching the truth in hopes of impressing judges, and vague superlatives without evidence (like industry-leading, unparalleled, cutting-edge, etc.).
Try this: The best way to beat these tells is to start with detailed source material. Press releases and case studies are often most valuable here because they typically contain relevant statistics or quantify the benefits of a product or service, which is something you’d want judges to see.
When that’s not enough to go on, we also interview the people involved to better understand any relevant background, the significance of what’s being nominated, and the results achieved.
Feed the AI tool all the information at once, along with the nomination questions, and instruct it not to repeat information unless it has to. For instance, if one question asks for the biggest accomplishments of the year and another asks for how your organization is innovating, you might mention a new AI tool in passing among the list of accomplishments, but save the details for the innovation question. From there, work one question at a time to ensure the answers are detailed and compelling.
Be sure to include: In addition to the nuanced instruction about repetition, you may want to adjust the tone you usually use, since award submissions are typically different from other content. To balance this puffy language with the truth, include some instruction like, “Be sure to write this in a way that would impress and convince a panel of judges from Organization X without stretching the truth or exaggerating the source material.”
Quote of the Week
“Our CEO talks constantly about the future of work and what it’s going to take to succeed in the future economies — and he’s made it very clear that coders of the future are people who can master large language models and prompt engineering. And there is nobody better positioned in the world to do that than professional communicators.”
— Jeff DeMarrais, Chief Communications Officer at Cognizant, to Axios in a story about communicators using AI
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