What Email Did to PR, AI Is Doing Faster

Lessons from 30+ years of disruption and why this one demands your attention

Remember when email changed everything?

When press kits went from FedEx to file attachments? When the web gave every company a voice and every journalist a research tool? When broadband, commercial browsers, and Google News collapsed the news cycle from days to seconds?

We’ve had a lot of disruption over the last four decades.

But none of them compares to AI.

Not email.
Not the Internet.
Not even the rise of social media.

AI is bigger.
And it’s here to stay.

As PR communicators, we cannot afford to resist it. Nor should we. Our job has always been to translate complexity into clarity. To anticipate change and prepare clients for it. To shape stories that resonate.

Right now, the story is AI, and we need to write ourselves into it.

Whether you are a PR veteran, a brand manager, or a founder learning to pitch yourself, this shift affects you. AI is rewriting the playbook for how stories are shaped, shared, and seen. Those who understand it early will have a serious edge.

From Manual to Machine Aided

When I launched Vorticom in 2003, I was still shipping VHS clips to clients and Betacam SP b-roll footage to broadcasters. Since then, I’ve written more than 1,000 original bylined articles for clients on topics ranging from workplace violence prevention to the rare earths race to the geopolitical risks of foreign ownership in U.S. infrastructure.

In 2009, I wrote “Beware of China Buying U.S. Infrastructure” for a client published in The Huffington Post back when it welcomed guest contributors. That piece was part of a broader series I developed on China’s strategic investments, and it triggered a wave of national broadcast coverage. I secured client interviews on CNBC, Fox News, Bloomberg, and other major networks.

I continue to lead thought leadership efforts for clients today, writing and placing articles across trade publications, daily newspapers, and general business magazines. I focus on open-access outlets where links can be shared freely. A shareable link is a powerful tool for building momentum with other reporters and for driving follow-up coverage, including broadcast.

None of the content I produce is generated by AI. These articles are the result of original interviews, deep research, and careful editorial framing. But AI, like search engines, can be used to dig deeper to ascertain facts and trends that may support the article’s hypothesis.

That level of originality and credibility still matters. It’s what separates real thought leadership from generic content dressed up to look like it.

Email Was the First Digital Disruption and I Lived It

Long before AI, email transformed the way PR got done.

In the early 1990s, I was already immersed in digital media. I was an editorial contributor to Ziff Davis, had authored four books on the Internet, and was using early platforms including bulletin board systems, eWorld, Prodigy, CompuServe, Mindspring, and AOL. These weren’t hobbies. They were tools I used to research, communicate, and build media relationships before most people had ever typed "http."

By the time I joined the agency LobsenzStevens, I had been pitching by email for years. My first system was MCI Mail, which was fast, reliable, and surprisingly advanced for its time. You could even fax from it. Its directory included the email addresses of tech legends like Peter Norton and Michael Dell. It was efficient, professional, and powerful.

At LobsenzStevens, I worked alongside

Naomi Burton

, one of the most brilliant communicators I’ve ever known. Naomi has an instinctive ability to find the most creative and compelling angle to land major national coverage. Her phone presence with reporters was electric. She didn’t pitch. She performed.

Still, I believed email had a role to play and encouraged Naomi to try it. At first, she looked at me like I was crazy. But before long, she developed a digital voice just as distinctive and persuasive as her spoken one.

That moment captured what I’ve seen through every wave of disruption.

The best communicators do not resist new tools. They adapt, refine, and use the medium without compromising their message.

The Perils of Letting AI Write for You

Is it wrong to draft thought leadership with AI?

Not entirely.

But here’s what’s risky:

• Publishing bland, unearned expertise

• Faking POV perspectives that you have no ownership of

• Mistaking fast output for actual insight

• Undermining journalistic trust when editors can sniff out generic content

Authenticity still matters. Credibility still matters. And relationships with editors and audiences are still built on trust. AI can help sharpen client viewpoints, but it should never replace them.

Where AI Belongs in PR Workflows

Used strategically, AI is a supertool. It’s not your copywriter. It’s your research assistant, brainstorming partner, and headline tester.

Here’s how I use it every day:

• Reporter research: Even though I pay a premium for Cision which falls up short continually, I often ask ChatGPT to generate reporter shortlists by beat and region. While not always perfect, it often surfaces names and angles I hadn’t considered. Cision requires that their customers (me) let them know when the database is inaccurate. (Not a great business plan, which is why I’m exploring other databases that have team members who review and update the data). Starting up a new client, I was going deep in a new mining subsector, and it was ChatGPT that was able to get me the correct beat reporters at various far flung bureaus relevant to this client.

• Subject headers: Getting a journalist to open your email is often the hardest part of media relations. A strong, very short subject line can make or break a pitch. AI helps generate fast variations that test tone, urgency, and curiosity. It usually requires repeated requests to land exactly what you intuit will work.

• Brainstorming: While I no longer manage large creative teams, I’m responsible for generating original content and campaign ideas. AI has become a valuable partner for breaking mental ruts, framing narratives, and unlocking angles that might otherwise stay hidden.

Embrace the Shift but Stay in the Driver’s Seat

We’ve always adapted. PR pros learned email. Mastered search. Navigated social. Built strategy across broadband and mobile. Now we’re adding AI to the mix.

But let’s be clear. We aren’t replacing ourselves.

We’re amplifying ourselves.

We still set the vision. We still define the narrative. AI cannot pitch a reporter at the right moment or intuit the phrasing that makes an editor lean in. That is human. That is instinct. That is PR.

The communicators who’ll thrive in this next era are the ones who treat AI not as a shortcut but as an accelerant. The ones who use it to deepen insight, not dilute it.

Be Curious, Not Cynical

If you’re in PR or managing your own brand and haven’t explored AI tools yet, start now. Experiment. Study the outputs. Learn the limitations. Know what AI does well and what it doesn’t. Just like we once had to learn HTML, email or SEO, we now need to understand how large language models work.

The bots are only as good as the brains behind them.

And we, as communicators, are still the ones behind the keyboard.

What I’m curious about:
How are you using AI in your PR work or brand storytelling? What’s working, and what feels off-limits? I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments.

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