Recently, one of our clients got a call from a prospect they’d never heard of. The buyer had already done their homework and was ready to jump into a detailed conversation. When our client asked how they'd found them, the answer was surprising: ChatGPT.

This isn’t a huge, household-name company. They were founded in 2022 and just announced seed and Series A funding earlier this year. But when that prospect typed a query into ChatGPT, our client made the list. And their bigger, better-funded competitors didn’t.

The Buyer’s Journey Starts Before You Know About It

Seventy to eighty percent of B2B buyers now research independently before contacting sales. But those decision-makers aren't just Googling anymore. They're asking ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini to explain markets, compare solutions and identify vendors. These conversations happen completely off your radar—no website visit, no form fill, no marketing-qualified lead.

If your company isn't part of that conversation, you're invisible when it matters most.

Where AI Gets Its Answers (and Why PR Matters More Than Ever)

Generative AI platforms learns from massive volumes of public content. Every article, press release, and interview becomes potential training data that shapes how AI talks about you..

Recent MuckRack research found that 95% of AI citations come from earned media. Not paid ads or sponsored content. More than a quarter cite traditional journalistic outlets specifically.

But not all coverage is equal in AI’s eyes. The platforms favor authoritative sources in your industry, along with recent content and consistent messaging across credible outlets.

The New Equation: Art + Science

PR has always been about storytelling. That hasn't changed. What's changed is that your stories now have two audiences: humans and machines.

The Art: Human Stories That Earn Credibility

The fundamentals still matter most. You need compelling narratives, strong journalist relationships, and placements that resonate with real people. When your CTO gets quoted in TechCrunch or your company gets featured in The Wall Street Journal, that coverage reaches your human audience.

But it's also training AI on how to explain your market. That placement does double duty now.

The Science: Making Your Message Machine-Readable

We’re entering an era of AI optimization—structuring content so engines can easily extract and cite your key messages. Use structured data in press releases (clear headers, FAQs, consistent terms), keep keyword consistency across all materials, publish in machine-readable formats, and repeat your core phrases to reinforce your narrative.

In the SEO era, variety was good. In the AI era, consistency wins. If you want AI to describe your solution as “AI-powered predictive maintenance” instead of “industrial software,” use that exact phrase every time.

Consistency is Key

AI engines prioritize fresh, frequently cited sources. If your last major coverage was months ago, competitors are already shaping the conversation in your place.

This isn’t about vanity metrics. It’s about visibility in the datasets driving buyer decisions. To stay relevant, maintain a steady drumbeat: regular earned media and contributed content, frequent wire distributions with structured details, and ongoing thought leadership that reinforces key messages.

The Competitive Angle

Press releases and earned coverage don’t just tell your story—they shape how AI interprets your entire category.

Every release feeds AI engines structured data about market trends, customer pain points, and differentiators. Smart PR teams use that to their advantage: frame the conversation around the problems your solution solves best, highlight differentiators that make other approaches seem outdated, and seed counter-narratives that quietly reframe the market.

If competitors talk about “cloud-based solutions,” you might consistently emphasize “hybrid cloud with on-premise security.” Over time, AI associates that phrase with best practices—and your company with leadership. You’re earning coverage and training the algorithm.

Where to Start

Ready to adapt your PR strategy for the AI era? Two actions to take this week:

  • Audit your messaging consistency. Review your last 90 days of press releases and earned coverage. Are you using the same core phrases to describe your solution, or does the language vary? Identify your 3-5 key terms and commit to using them consistently going forward.
  • Restructure your next press release. Add a FAQ section that answers common buyer questions about your category. Use clear headers and repeat your key differentiating phrases. Think about what a decision-maker might ask an AI about your product space—then make sure your release provides clear, structured answers.

The Bottom Line

AI hasn’t replaced PR—it’s made it more essential than ever. Success now depends on mastering both the art of human storytelling and the science of machine optimization.

At Treble, we help brands do exactly that—craft narratives that resonate with people and shape how AI understands your company and category.

If you’re ready to future-proof your PR strategy for the AI era, let’s talk.