How Emerging Technologies Will Transform PR Strategies, Empower Professionals
Emma Okonji
Experts have taken a deep dive into the power of emerging technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Automation and how these cutting-edge technologies will transform PR strategies and empower media professionals in writing and broadcasting contents that will address real-time issues.
The experts spoke on Thursday at the second Nigerian webinar, organised by Newmark Group Limited, a Pan-African Communications and Public Relations Company, with the theme: ‘The Future of PR in Digital Age—Content Automation And The Role of AI’.
The experts explore how cutting-edge technologies like AI and automation are transforming PR strategies, empowering professionals to craft compelling content, amplify brand voices, and respond to crises in real-time.
The experts delved into topics such as: Crafting content that resonates in a crowded digital world; Leveraging AI to enhance storytelling, audience targeting, and crisis management; The role of influencers in shaping narratives and building trust during crises; Focusing on building a cohesive brand voice through internal communications in the digital age; and Best practices for integrating AI-driven insights into digital PR campaigns.
The keynote speaker, who is the Senior Account Manager, Social & Influence at Newmark Digital, Maureen Nwendwa, discussed about digital tasks such as scheduling posts, coverage, monitoring social media performance and analysing sentiments in real time, uncovering insights and driving smarter decision making. According to her, automating tasks to prepare people for creative and strategic jobs is key to thriving in today’s PR landscape.
“We are already using AI for real-time sentiment analysis, predictive insights into audience behaviour and event content creation. But as powerful as AI is, it raises some important questions. How do we maintain authenticity when using AI? What are the ethical implications of relying on these tools? Despite these challenges, one thing is clear that AI is a strategic partner and doesn’t replace human creativity, but enhances it, allowing us to craft better, more compelling narratives. As professionals, we must embrace continuous learning and foster a culture of innovation. We need to invest in training our teams, experiment with new content formats and use analytics to refine our strategies,” Nwendwa said.
Associate Director, Communications, Food & Nutrition Portfolio at Global Health Advocacy Incubator, Jill Chanley, spoke about how storytelling and data-driven strategies could create impactful digital advocacy campaigns.
Chanley discussed digital advocacy and the use of online and mobile tools to engage a target audience, in order to inspire them, and to help them achieve a specific policy goal. Chanley made a distinction between digital marketing and digital advocacy, and explained that unlike digital marketing, which focused on awareness, digital advocacy aims to generate support or pressure for specific policy actions. “So for example, a message to build awareness might be around the fact that children have limited access to healthy food at school, which is a place that they spend the majority of their day, whereas digital advocacy demonstrates the urgency of that issue and then moves to drive public action. So for example, a public petition signed by thousands of people showing demand for apartments passes school nutrition policy. But in the end, whether you’re working on public health policy or any other type of communications campaign, the goal is always the same, since we are trying to inspire our audience to take action,” Chanley said.
Head, Digital Marketing & Social Media Management at Keystone Bank, Oreoluwa Ettu, discussed about how professionals could leverage AI for enhanced digital marketing regulations in the financial services sector.
According to him, with the advent of the internet, with the advent of social media, and now with AI, we’re seeing change happen from time to time and these changes come with various opportunities as well as challenges.
“AI is critical in financial marketing because it helps us to analyze complex data, and make decisions such as computational decisions. It can also help because of the availability of data, to create a personalized experience for us and how they perceive us. There are lots of data banks in terms of what people are spending on, how people use their money, what platforms they are spending money on. The ability to harness this kind of data to make decisions is very crucial. AI can also help you segment your audiences and your customers based on demographics, based on buying habits, and based on their financial needs,” Ettu said.
Another speaker, who is the Director of Content at Pulse Nigeria, Damilola Dawson, described AI as a computer-aided learning system that allows users to make faster decisions.
He spoke about the future automation, which according to him, includes real-time content adjustments based on audience behaviour.
He advised professionals to see AI as their great companion, adding that anyone who is not engaging in AI at the moment is just dead in the digital space.
