Why You Need to Start Using ChatGPT For PR Pitches & Campaigns

Jul 17, 2023

Artificial Intelligence (AI) can be a little overwhelming from the outside, but implementing it into your agency is more than worth it. Tons of PR pros already use AI to streamline their processes and improve their results. Their main tool is ChatGPT: a text-based program that can help you write pitches, brainstorm campaigns, do research, and more! Let’s dive into everything you need to know about using ChatGPT for PR the right way.

Let’s Back Up a Bit…

Before you use AI and ChatGPT for PR, you need to know what they are! Here’s a quick rundown of the key details of these disruptive technologies.

What Is AI?

AI stands for Artificial Intelligence — but you already knew that! AI uses computers and machine learning to generate content humans would create. You can use AI to generate text, images, videos, audio, and more. AI is also a big part of software you might already use in your agency, like Grammarly, Google Assistant, and Amazon Alexa.

AI is more accessible than ever right now…which means now is your chance to jump on it and uplevel your agency with all of AI’s automation and time-saving solutions! A lot of people’s first instinct is to catastrophize as soon as new tech bursts onto the scene, but I promise that AI won’t replace every PR pro and copywriter out there! This is just a new shift in the media landscape — if you dive into AI and ChatGPT for PR and look at them as tools, you’ll learn to harness their powers for good.

What Is ChatGPT?

Lots of AI-generated content is writing-based, and ChatGPT is the huge new writing AI tool out there. With ChatGPT, you just type a prompt into its query box and wait for the program to give you its response. Your prompt can be as simple as “What words rhyme with ‘star’?” or as complicated as “Create a social media strategy to boost engagement for an influencer in the beauty industry.”

When you utilize ChatGPT for PR, you need to know that it’s just a starting point. AI pulls information from all over the internet, whether it’s correct or not — any text that ChatGPT gives you needs to be fact-checked for accuracy before you consider it for a pitch.

And ChatGPT’s response is just information! As a PR pro, you need to tell a story. Text from ChatGPT can’t be sent directly to a media contact, client, or other collaborator; you’ll need to heavily edit it to get everything up to your standards. It’s best to use ChatGPT as a way to spark ideas instead of a total content creation shortcut.

Why You Need to Start Using ChatGPT for PR Pitches, Campaigns, and More

AI and ChatGPT might seem like a passing trend, but they’re here to stay. You can’t bury your head in the sand and wait for it all to blow over — if you do, you’ll just get left behind! But if you’re not convinced yet, here are three key reasons why you need to start using ChatGPT for PR pitches, campaigns, research, and more.

#1: It’s a MAJOR Time-Saver During Your Pre-Pitching Research

ChatGPT isn’t advanced enough to be your full-time research assistant, but it can save you tons of time in front of your screen! If you’re looking to pitch your client for podcasts in your niche, ChatGPT can compile a list of your niche’s podcasts in seconds. Sure, you’ll have to double-check to ensure your client is truly relevant to each podcast, but that takes minutes; searching for these podcasts on your own could take an hour or more.

The same goes for finding new media contacts, looking for direct competitors to your client’s latest product, or searching for up-and-coming influencers. The more detailed your prompt, the better results you’ll get, and the less time you’ll have to spend on research.

All that extra time can be used to focus on the rest of your pitching routine, or you could work on high-impact tasks that move the needle for your clients. Even if using ChatGPT for PR only helps you save an hour a day, that hour would be put to much better use in your zone of genius than on research! You’ll have more space in your day to work through tough pitch angles, brainstorm big client campaigns, or develop stellar proposals for your dream clients.

#2: You Can Sidestep Writer’s Block When Pitching

Staring at a blank screen is no fun. Staring at a blank screen after spinning your wheels trying to come up with a pitch angle is even worse. But when you use ChatGPT for PR, you type a quick prompt into the query box and instantly get thought starters for pitches, blog posts, social media captions, and more!

Remember: ChatGPT isn’t here to do your job for you! These quick responses will only give you the building blocks for a killer pitch. Your final email should be super targeted and tailored to the editor and publication you’re pitching.

When using ChatGPT to generate text, none of ChatGPT’s responses should end up verbatim in your pitch. The program takes text from all corners of the internet, so it could spit out a completely plagiarized response and you would have no idea. Keep ethics in mind and only use ChatGPT as a starting point — the final product should be completely your own.

#3: It’ll Lead You to Ideas, Contacts, and Collaborators You Would’ve Never Found

You don’t know what you don’t know, right? Well, ChatGPT can find it for you! Things fall through the cracks when you do manual research, but an AI tool can fill in the gaps when you’re looking for new media contacts and influencers, or are trying to brainstorm new ideas.

There are some influencers you just won’t find no matter how much research you do. Just like some ideas would never come to you without the right inspiration! You can leverage ChatGPT’s ability to scope out the internet to do the discovery for you.

Utilizing ChatGPT for PR will lead you to these connections, but you have to do the outreach yourself! Once you have your list of new contacts or potential influencer collabs, do further research to check that they’re right for your client before you start building those relationships. If ChatGPT gives you a genius new idea for a brand campaign, set up a brainstorming session with your team to work out the kinks and make sure it’s fully customized to your client.

How to Effectively Use ChatGPT for PR

You can’t just register for a ChatGPT account (don’t worry — it’s powered by OpenAI and it’s free) and start typing away. To effectively use ChatGPT for PR, you need to go into it with a solid strategy. Luckily, I’ve got a bit of a shortcut for you…

#1: Paste a Powerhouse Prompt Into the Query Box

If you’ve never used AI before, the empty query box on ChatGPT’s home screen can look a little daunting! That’s why I’ve created Powerhouse Prompts: a new resource of over 100 AI prompts to help you save time and energy as you get your creative juices flowing. The first part of the guide is a short (but info-packed!) two-part video series to get you up to speed on the basics of using AI and ChatGPT for PR — even if you’ve used AI before, don’t skip these trainings!

Once you’ve watched those, you just need to paste in your prompt! Powerhouse Prompts has 100+ plug-and-play prompts that you can use to get targeted responses from ChatGPT. You’ll need to tweak them slightly to fit your client and niche, but you’re good to go from there.

#2: Let the Responses Spark Your Creativity!

From there, it’s all up to you! You can try new prompts to find further ideas or take what ChatGPT has given you and run with it. Just make sure you’re using ChatGPT for PR ethically. Fact-check all the info it gives you before putting it into a pitch or reaching out to a new media contact. Be wary of accidental plagiarism and use copy and creative ideas as a jumping-off point for your own content.

AI can be intimidating at the start, but implementing it into your agency is much simpler than it seems! When you use ChatGPT for PR, you can save time, find new and creative ideas, and expand your contact list with game-changing media players. And with Powerhouse Prompts, you’ll find the exact information you need, exactly when you need it!