An exponential world, linear organisations
We are entering a period in which technological capabilities are advancing faster than organisations can absorb them. While new AI models, platforms and applications are redefining what is possible in a matter of months, sometimes weeks, most businesses continue to operate around annual budgets, quarterly planning cycles and established approval processes. Put simply, technology is advancing exponentially, while businesses are still thinking linearly. The gap between technological potential and organisational readiness is becoming one of the defining management challenges of our time. And few business functions are experiencing this tension more acutely than marketing and communications.
According to the Gartner CMO Spend Survey 2026, the marketing leaders surveyed allocate an average of 15.3% of their budgets to AI initiatives. Yet only 30% report having sufficiently mature capabilities to scale AI effectively.
Research by Boston Consulting Group reveals an equally striking disconnect. While 96% of 300 surveyed CMOs report significant AI-driven transformation across their marketing functions, 42% still use generative AI primarily to assist with individual tasks rather than fundamentally redesigning workflows.
That distinction matters. Using ChatGPT to draft a press release is not the same as transforming corporate communications. Genuine transformation begins when AI becomes embedded in the way organisations gather intelligence, make decisions, manage knowledge, execute campaigns and measure performance. As Harvard Business Review observes, AI transformation can initially increase complexity and costs before delivering the productivity gains businesses expect. The challenge is therefore not simply technological. It is organisational, strategic and cultural. And that is precisely where a new generation of communications agencies can create meaningful value.
From search engines to answer engines
For more than two decades, digital marketing operated according to a relatively predictable model.
Consumers entered a query into Google, received a list of links and chose which websites to visit. Brands competed for search rankings, website traffic and conversions. Search engine optimisation became a fundamental component of digital visibility.
That model is now evolving. Increasingly, consumers are turning to AI assistants not merely to find information, but to interpret it, compare alternatives and recommend solutions. Instead of receiving ten links, they may receive a single, synthesised answer. Google is not disappearing. Traditional search remains essential. But AI is introducing a new layer between consumers and brands, fundamentally changing how information is discovered and evaluated. The scale of this shift is already measurable.
A 2025 study by Pew Research Center found that users clicked on a traditional search result in just 8% of Google visits where an AI-generated summary appeared. Without an AI summary, the figure was 15%.
For marketers, this raises a fundamental question: What happens to a brand's digital strategy when consumers can obtain answers without ever visiting its website?
This is where Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) enters the conversation. GEO is not simply a replacement for SEO. Rather, it introduces another dimension of brand visibility, one in which technical accessibility, credible content, independent sources and corporate reputation increasingly intersect.
Brands need to understand not only where they rank in search results, but whether AI systems recognise them, how they describe their products and services, when they recommend them and which information sources influence those answers. As we explore in our analysis of brand visibility measurement in AI, measuring a brand's presence in generative AI requires considerably more than asking ChatGPT a single question.
A meaningful approach should monitor brand mentions, competitive share of voice, recommendation rates, cited sources and factual accuracy across multiple AI platforms. Above all, it requires consistent measurement over time. For public relations, this creates a significant opportunity. Strong reputations, expert commentary, independent media coverage and consistently communicated expertise may help shape the information environment on which AI systems draw. But no individual article or media placement can guarantee a recommendation from an AI assistant. The objective is no longer simply to generate visibility. It is to build an authoritative, credible and accessible body of information about a brand.
The attention economy is changing faster than media strategies
A similar transformation is taking place in the way people spend their time. Not long ago, streaming services such as Netflix were considered the greatest challengers to traditional television. Today, the competition for attention extends far beyond professionally produced entertainment.
According to Nielsen's April 2026 Media Distributor Gauge, YouTube accounted for 13.4% of total television viewing in the United States, making it the largest individual media distributor measured. In other words, a platform built around creators, communities and algorithmic discovery is competing directly with traditional broadcasters and global streaming companies.
The transformation is equally apparent in news consumption. The Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2026 found that social media and video networks had become the most widely used way of accessing online news across the 48 markets surveyed, reaching 54% of respondents compared with 51% for news organisations' own websites and apps. Attention is not merely becoming fragmented. The mechanisms determining what audiences encounter are changing. In the past, media owners, editors and advertising budgets played a dominant role in shaping distribution. Today, platform algorithms exercise extraordinary influence over which content is discovered, amplified or ignored. This creates another important paradox.
Creators own the audience relationship. Platforms control the reach.
While many established brands struggle to capture attention, individual creators and influencers are building communities that rival the audiences of major media organisations.
Their competitive advantage often lies in personality, accessibility, authenticity and the ability to establish a direct emotional connection with their followers. People are frequently more interested in hearing from someone they recognise and relate to than from an anonymous corporate brand. According to the Reuters Institute's 2026 research, 46% of respondents encountered at least some news or current affairs content from creators of various types during the preceding week.
But popularity should not be mistaken for independence. Creators may own their content and cultivate loyal communities, yet much of their distribution remains controlled by platforms such as Meta, YouTube and TikTok. A single algorithmic change can affect visibility, engagement and commercial performance almost overnight.
The same vulnerability applies to brands. Building an entire communications strategy around one platform effectively means surrendering a significant degree of control over customer access to a third party. The future role of communications agencies will therefore extend well beyond selecting influencers based on follower counts.
It will involve understanding audience quality, credibility, content relevance and measurable business impact, while developing integrated communications systems that connect creators, earned media, owned channels and direct customer relationships. Algorithms will continue to evolve. A brand's ability to establish trust and maintain meaningful relationships must endure beyond those changes.
Content is becoming a commodity. Trust is not.
Artificial intelligence has dramatically reduced the cost of producing content. Articles, visuals, videos, presentations and advertising concepts that once required days of work can now be created in minutes. And increasingly, the results are not merely acceptable. AI can produce polished, professional content at remarkable speed. The problem is that almost everyone now has access to the same capability. When everyone can create good content, producing good content is no longer a competitive advantage.
As supply increases, the competition for limited human attention becomes even more intense. What was once scarce — the ability to produce — is becoming abundant. What remains scarce is originality, credibility, genuine expertise and a distinctive point of view.
Research also suggests that audiences continue to distinguish between AI-generated information and human-led journalism. The Reuters Institute's Generative AI and News Report 2026 found that only 12% of respondents across nine countries were comfortable with news produced entirely by AI. That figure rose to 45% when the content was produced primarily by humans with some assistance from AI. Authenticity does not mean rejecting technology. Nor does it mean abandoning professional standards.
It means ensuring that communication is grounded in genuine experience, expertise, insight and values that cannot simply be generated on demand. This is where we see one of the greatest opportunities for public relations. Communications agencies will need to develop a deeper understanding of their clients' businesses, identify distinctive knowledge within their organisations and transform that expertise into stories and perspectives audiences genuinely value. The objective is not to help businesses produce more content.
Performance marketing needs strong brands
The expansion of digital marketing has placed enormous emphasis on immediate, measurable results.
Clicks, leads, conversions and return on advertising spend have become the dominant language of marketing investment.
There are clear benefits to this approach. Problems emerge, however, when short-term measurability is confused with overall marketing effectiveness.
Research discussed in WARC's The Multiplier Effect demonstrates how stronger brand equity can improve the effectiveness and efficiency of performance advertising.
Brand building and performance marketing should not be competing priorities. They reinforce one another. In an AI-mediated environment, this relationship may become even more important. When consumers ask an AI assistant to recommend a product or service, the information available about a brand, its credibility and its broader reputation can influence how that brand is represented. Optimising cost per click alone is not enough. Communications agencies must therefore become better at connecting brand-building activities with commercial outcomes.
This means moving beyond traditional media reports to understand brand awareness, trust, share of voice, branded search demand, AI visibility and the broader contribution of communications to business performance. At Neopublic, we see this as a fundamental shift in how PR effectiveness should be evaluated. Knowing how many articles were published or what potential reach they generated is no longer sufficient. The more valuable questions are what those results mean, how they influence reputation and what the business should do differently as a consequence.
From communications supplier to transformation partner
When consumer behaviour, content distribution, attention economics and production processes are all changing simultaneously, it is unrealistic to expect every organisation to interpret and respond to these shifts independently. Internal marketing teams are already managing day-to-day operations, commercial objectives, budgets and stakeholder expectations. Few have unlimited resources to continuously test emerging technologies, redesign workflows and evaluate their strategic implications. This creates a compelling opportunity for communications agencies to redefine their role.
The agency of the future can help clients understand how customer behaviour is evolving, where attention and trust are being created, how AI systems represent their brands and how new technologies can be integrated responsibly into everyday operations. In practical terms, that transformation should begin with a thorough assessment of existing communications, customer questions, digital visibility and competitive positioning.
The next step is to establish a reliable knowledge foundation covering the organisation, its products, expertise, brand guidelines and communications principles. Only then does it make sense to automate repetitive activities such as research, monitoring, initial content development, data analysis and reporting. Importantly, technology adoption must be accompanied by clear governance. Protecting confidential client information, verifying AI-generated outputs, respecting intellectual property and maintaining human accountability should be fundamental requirements rather than optional safeguards. As we explain in our approach to responsible AI at Neopublic, technology should strengthen human capabilities, not replace professional judgement. In communications, experience, an understanding of context, sensitivity to brand reputation and genuine relationships remain essential.
Equally important will be the quality of client service. Speed, responsiveness, adaptability and a deep understanding of the client's business will become increasingly valuable as the pace of change accelerates. A communications strategy can no longer be treated as a document developed once a year and reviewed at the next planning cycle.
It must evolve continuously, informed by data, new insights and changing market conditions. This is where the agency's role shifts from delivering individual campaigns towards continuously improving a client's communications capabilities. Agencies do not need to become IT consultancies or replace internal technology departments.
Their distinctive strength lies in connecting technological possibilities with customer understanding, brand strategy and market intelligence. This evolution also has implications for the agency business model. Rather than defining value primarily through the number of hours spent producing content or delivering media outputs, agencies can increasingly create value through strategic advice, analytics, process improvement and measurable business outcomes.
AI will not save every agency
It would be naive to suggest that artificial intelligence will automatically increase the value of every communications agency. Quite the opposite. Agencies whose business models depend heavily on generic content production, basic research or routine execution will face growing pressure on pricing and margins. Clients can increasingly perform many of these activities internally, faster and at a lower cost. The agencies most likely to succeed will be those capable of combining technological expertise, data analytics, creativity and strategic thinking.
Above all, they will be the ones that have already transformed the way they work. We cannot credibly advise clients on AI adoption while continuing to operate according to processes designed a decade ago. At Neopublic, we believe the future of communications will be shaped by a combination of advanced technology and exceptional people. AI allows us to work faster, analyse more information and devote less time to repetitive tasks. But the time gained through technology is most valuable when reinvested in strategy, creativity, relationships and better client service.
In the years ahead, the defining competitive advantage of communications agencies will not be their ability to produce more content or launch campaigns more quickly.
It will be their ability to help businesses navigate a world in which the rules are constantly changing. Companies do not need another supplier of AI tools. They need trusted partners who can translate technological possibilities into sound decisions, effective processes and measurable business results.
