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Shaping the future of PR: key trends from Q1 2025
This year is already shaping up to be one of the most turbulent but how can we use what we’ve learnt so far to our advantage to stay ahead in public relations?
As we progress past the first quarter of 2025, the PR industry continues to evolve quickly. The recent CIPR State of the Profession Report highlighted AI, fake news and disinformation as key challenges for the communications sector. These factors, alongside increasing distrust in traditional advertising, are reshaping storytelling, media engagement and brand advocacy.
In this setting, PR professionals in 2025 must understand the trajectory of these trends to refine strategies and ensure they can still increase share of voice for their clients in a crowded market.
Authentic messaging
Today’s news and social media landscapes are increasingly intertwined, creating both amplification opportunities and misinformation concerns. In the context of social media users posting content as news and many traditional news platforms recruiting specialist teams to verify the truth of stories, brands must move beyond polished narratives to embrace transparency. As an example, influencer marketing is already shifting, with many consumers favouring relatability and trust over extravagance.
Recently, UK beauty brand Refy succeeded with this strategy, by prioritising community voices over social media personalities. In this campaign big-name influencers were swapped for loyal customers and gifted an exclusive brand trip to Mallorca. By focusing on peer-to-peer marketing and real connections over celebrity endorsements, this campaign resonated deeply with its audience, proving that genuine engagement can be more effective than influencer hype in 2025.
Digital and data-driven storytelling
Authentic communication begins with understanding your audience. Understanding audiences better through targeted monitoring and social listening, communications specialists can develop stories that engage honestly with target markets, appeal to media and generate positive brand affiliations. One of the ways in which this authenticity can be showcased is through data-driven narratives.
Digital and data-driven storytelling remains a key driving force of effective PR, blending traditional tools used to convey a narrative, such as case studies with real life examples, combined with multimedia elements like short form video and audio.
Moving forward, data-driven storytelling will be crucial, as misinformation continues to grow across media. This will require brands to use transparent, data-backed insights to build credibility.
Platforms that integrate social listening can help PR professionals demonstrate why their stories matter, by providing real-time and relevant sentiment tracking and data. This will enable PR professionals to present more credible data-driven stories that appeal to journalists in their fight against misinformation.
At the same time, it enables PRs to tailor messaging and resonate with audiences who increasingly value authenticity, ultimately strengthening overall brand affiliation.
AI and automation in PR
The rise of AI can revolutionise PR workflows, especially for time-sensitive and repetitive tasks. PRs are dealing with an increasingly fast-paced news agenda, with time always of the essence. AI automation can alleviate some of these pressures by streamlining laborious tasks such as research, freeing up time to concentrate on higher-level strategic work.
Generative AI tools are being used by approximately 82% of PR professionals, to ideate or brainstorm, according to a Statista report conducted over the course of 2024. However, a 2024 report from the World Federation of Advertisers has found that 80% of brand leaders are concerned about agency leaders using these on their behalf.
These concerns are not unfounded, as in some cases, users must train tools with confidential information, raising legitimate issues around privacy and brand safety. That’s why it’s essential that PR professionals are properly trained to use AI tools responsibly and strategically. With the right guidance, AI can enhance creativity and efficiency without compromising trust or ethical standards.
New challenges
As much of the PR industry has already proven, AI can provide significant assistance in research tasks, used as a starting point to generate ideas for content and campaigns. Assessing enormous chunks of data at speed using AI enables PR professionals in 2025 to gather meaningful audience insights at a previously unattainable pace.
AI is also becoming an important tool for media relations, providing intel on the types of stories and topics that are likely to generate rewarding earned media coverage, by assessing large data sets and performance variables across multiple journalists, sectors, publications and themes.
As the PR industry adapts to new challenges, platforms are providing tools that help PR professionals navigate the evolving landscape. From media contact databases and social listening to media insights and online newsrooms, these resources support more informed decision-making and authentic communication. By embracing these tools, PR professionals can better address misinformation and build trust with their audiences.
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With 18 years' experience in PR and marketing leadership, Miranda Smith joined Notified in the summer of 2024 as vice president for EMEA and Emerging Markets. Prior to this role, she held positions at Onclusive and YouGov. Notified is launching a generative AI tool which will help PR teams craft more tailored pitches based on contact-specific data.