Is your PR strategy ready to tackle the year ahead?
Whether you’re fine-tuning an existing plan or crafting one from scratch, having a PR strategy which is timely, relevant and impactful will be key to its success.
In this blog, we share three considerations to help you nail your PR efforts for 2025. From aligning with sales teams to leveraging AI tools, we’ve got actionable insights to set your business up for PR success this year. Best of luck!
While we know many businesses finalise their PR strategy for the year ahead during Q4, we also know that it’s not uncommon – wise even – for those same businesses to revisit and tweak around at a later date to ensure it stays relevant and effective.
We also know – having worked with countless startups in our time – that young or agile organisations deliberately lock in their plans a little later in Q1, benefitting from clearer industry trends and market predictions for the coming year.
So with that in mind, we thought now was an apt time to share our top three considerations when setting your PR strategy:
1. Prioritise purpose, authority and relevance
2. Align PR with your sales team
3. Leverage AI for content. Where does it work? Where does it not?
We explore each of these in more detail below, with notes specifically in line with what we believe 2025 has in store.
1. Prioritise purpose, authority and relevance
For PR to make an impact this year – a year where copious amounts of content and rehashed opinions will continue to flood the internet – it needs to be about more than just securing media coverage, more than just a tick box exercise. To stand out – and actually establish credibility, trust and meaningful connections with stakeholders – a strategic, purpose-led and multidimensional approach is needed. This is where relevance, authority and purpose come in:
Relevance
Audiences of today want – even expect – tailored, personalised messaging that evolves with market trends. Whether through industry-specific insights, data storytelling, or hyper-relevant case studies, your PR must feel timely and relevant to your audience. Consider using data analytics and audience insights to ensure your PR content keeps its relevance as trends shift. This could mean tailoring your messaging to specific industries, geographies or demographics, or simply responding quickly to market changes with fresh, impactful commentary. For example, if new regulations impact your target market, make sure you’re the first to offer expert insights to journalists.
Authority
This year, it’s no longer enough to be seen as a thought leader – you need to prove it. This means pulling out the unique insights, predictions and practical expertise offered by your brand and its bench of spokespeople, and backing any claims up with data-led industry insights. Showcasing your efforts through case studies is also a great way to highlight real-world authenticity and impact.
Purpose
Ensure your PR strategy has a clear and measurable purpose that aligns with your company’s values so that you can build trust and loyalty – as well as impact. Whether your focus is sustainability, innovation or social responsibility, your PR efforts must reflect that mission. For example, brands in tech might highlight how their innovations are driving positive change, while consumer brands could showcase charity partnerships. Find your purpose and shine a light on it.
2. Align PR with your sales team
In 2025, the lines between PR, marketing and sales are blurrier than ever thanks to a number of ongoing trends, one of them being a rise in account-based marketing (ABM). Instead of marketing to a broad audience, ABM involves the sales team identifying a select group of target accounts, usually companies/organisations that are ideal customers and tailoring marketing/PR efforts specifically to them.
We’ve also seen lots more data-driven storytelling in the media, which really bridges the gap between emotional appeal (a hallmark of PR) and logical persuasion (a key driver in sales).
And finally, we’ve noticed a growing emphasis on personalisation across the board; a trend that aligns with and supports ABM and data-driven storytelling efforts perfectly.
The bottom line here is PR efforts can no longer live in a silo. It’s all about creating a cohesive narrative that works across all teams, ultimately converting leads into customers.
Here’s how to make it happen:
Ensure your PR strategy is reinforcing your sales messaging
If your sales team is emphasising business benefits like cost-efficiency, innovative technology or another key advantage that sets you apart from competitors, make sure your PR strategy is also driving these same points. Media coverage in trusted outlets is one of the best ways to validate your claims, which sales teams can leverage.
Equip the sales team with PR wins
When your company secures PR wins – whether it’s a journalist’s product/service review, a thought leadership in an industry outlet or an award announcement – don’t let them sit in a vacuum. As we’ve just mentioned, sales teams can leverage these wins, so make sure they’re actively shared with them so they can use them in sales decks, emails and even drop them into direct client conversations.
Use PR wins elsewhere
As well as sharing PR wins directly with the sales teams, remember that the sales journey – from awareness to conversion – often involves multiple touchpoints and PR is uniquely positioned to warm up leads. With this in mind, it’s wise to highlight major PR wins on your website’s homepage, blog or socials, or even consider creating a dedicated “As seen in” section in your sales collateral.
Encourage a feedback loop
Alignment is a two-way street – especially when it comes to ABM efforts – so encourage sales to share insights with PR too. What objections do they encounter most frequently? What resonates most with prospects? Where do sales need support in creating awareness? This feedback can inform PR campaigns, ensuring they tackle relevant pain points and generate meaningful content that supports the sales process.
Personalise
Instead of releasing a generic cybersecurity trend report, create sector-specific insights (e.g., ransomware risks in healthcare or retail). The PR team can then use those insights to personalise media pitches, press releases and thought leadership so that content really resonates with the target audience, while the sales teams can then use the same industry-tailored insights to craft proposals that directly address the challenges of leads in those industries.
3. Leverage AI for content. Where does it work? Where does it not?
The rise of GenAI tools has very quickly – and very drastically – changed the way we create and consume content. Granted, it’s offered PR pros new opportunities to save time and boost efficiency. But on the flip side, it’s also brought significant challenges that are worth considering in your PR strategies this year.
Where it works
Research and insights
Because AI tools can process vast amounts of information quickly, it can help PR teams identify trends, extract key insights and find data-driven narratives. For example, you have a huge 40-page white paper to read and need to find one key point to back up a point; let AI find it for you and save your time.
Content structure
If you’re struggling with how to lay out a complex or lengthy piece of content, AI can help – but use with caution (continue reading where it doesn’t work to see what we mean by this).
Proofreading and grammar checks
While we often don’t think of tools like Grammarly and Microsoft Word as AI, their AI functions have long been used to catch basic errors and improve the readability of content, so make the most of them to ensure polished content.
Idea generation
AI can help as part of the brainstorming process, whether it be content angles, headlines or campaign ideas. But don’t expect a fresh perspective, instead use it to help jump start human ideas.
Where it does not work
Originality
Because AI relies on pre-existing data, it often recycles common, generic ideas. This not only risks undermining the unique tone of your brand or campaign, but makes it very hard for your content to stand out in a sea of others doing exactly the same.
Accuracy and intended tone
AI tools have become known for pushing out fake news or incorrect facts. Even tools like Word are not infallible, where suggestions are based on general rules and patterns. So always fact-check, and keep an eye out for recommendations that don’t align with your intended meaning or tone, or tone changes that don’t fit the audience or purpose of the content.
Deep understanding of your brand/company
AI tools often lack the deep understanding of a brand’s identity, values, or target audience, which can very easily lead to content that feels disconnected or even completely misrepresent a company’s voice. Keep this in mind if/when dabbling in AI.
Journalist relationships
Journalists value originality and expertise in contributed content, and are becoming increasingly wary of AI-generated content – meaning using AI could erode that trust and potentially damage relationships that can take years to establish. In fact, many publications now employ AI detection tools to screen contributed material, with flagged content at risk of being rejected. Discover more: AI’s impact on the media and the sacred client-PR-journalist relationship.
Brand reputation and audience trust
Much like journalists, consumers are also increasingly sceptical of AI in content creation, particularly after high-profile missteps by publishers using AI-generated articles. Remember that even a slight perception of inauthenticity can harm both brand reputation and audience engagement.
Whether you’re a marketing professional, PR pro or startup founder, feel free to reach out to the Luminous PR team for any help or guidance needed to finalise your PR strategy for 2025.
By Amanda Bunn
Amanda is a strategic communications leader with over two decades’ of experience delivering award-winning PR campaigns for global consumer brands to helping ambitious startups build brand awareness, authority and momentum.
Meet Amanda
