Recently, PRNEWS caught up with Aaron Kwittken, PR industry and agency veteran, and Founder and CEO of PRophet, an AI-driven marketing and PR platform that is changing how the communications industry operates.
Kwittken considers himself a “comms futurist” and believes that any PR tech should be “human-led and AI-fed, where tools enhance the ability to not only craft effective pitches, but also track media, identify relevant journalists, and predict what’s around the corner for key news topics.
We talked to Kwittken at the Institute for Public Relations’ 2025 Bridge Conference, where he presented practical approaches to upskilling communications professionals for the age of AI in communications, and chatted about emerging trends in tech for PR.
PRNEWS: What are you seeing as the main issues/obstacles/opportunities for PR and tech right now?
Aaron Kwittken: Culture. The PR industry is both precious, and can also be a little pretentious. I say this as a recovering agency guy, who's been in the business 32-33 years—where we are like, “it’s all about relationships,” and “don’t ruin our art form.” I come from the trade side, moved over to the tech side, and I value narrative and storytelling, but the truth is that we've also been very starved for data. It's an industry that's based on instinct. “I think.” “I believe.” “I know.” And it's because we've never had data to suggest those answers or to help guide us on what's the next trend, what's the next threat, what's the next issue. We’re not looking at data enough, and I think that has to change.
PRNEWS: How does PR education and professional development need to change to reflect that?
Kwittken: You need to be a communications engineer. And what is a communications engineer? What are those skills you need to have when you're hiring people into your organization, whether it's an agency or corporate? The first thing is, I would ask people, do they understand statistics? If they don’t, well, are they willing to take a course on stats 101?
The second thing is, can people understand data visualization? We're entering this post-script, post-literate world, where stories are now being told through video and memes and images. So when we're looking at talent now in the organization, you have to ask them, can you be a visual storyteller? Do you have a background in production or theater?
And also critical thinking. Can you not just write, but can you prompt, and prompt engineering is part of it. So I think in order for this change, we need to understand what new skills are that we're looking for.
PRNEWS: With AI search taking over, what happens to the value of SEO, and what happens to a company’s web content or press releases?
Kwittken: What's old is now new. I used to say a couple years ago—the press release is dead. But now, the press release might be your only single source of truth for what's called GEO—generative engine optimization, not SEO–anymore. You need to make sure that your press release is being surfaced by Gemini and by OpenAI. You are the source of truth for your brand.
PRNEWS: While some people may be hesitant, a majority of the industry has used AI at some point. What are some wins for AI and PR?
Kwittken: I think probably the biggest win is we're starting to see agencies and brands hire people who have specific purview over data and analytics. And I think you're also starting to see an increase in investment for platforms, not just people. I know that sounds horrible, but it's actually not. I think that's a good thing [as it helps your employees be more efficient].
Message testing too is huge. So someone like Starbucks, they'll take a statement, and they can run it through an AI program and track to see how the statement resonates for favorability with certain demographics such as the general population versus with 18 to 34 year olds. Being more predictive, that's where the real gains are going to be.
PRNEWS: How can PR pros approach AI in this current moment?
Kwittken: My biggest piece of advice is they have to experiment for at least an hour a day. Somebody on the team should be testing and playing around with different tools and platforms to help improve their performance. And they have to go into it with the attitude of, how do I improve my efficiency? And efficiency will follow. If you go in with a problem set—maybe trying to identify a new trend that my competitors have not identified and become part of that conversation. Maybe I need to discover an influencer or series of creators that my competitors have not engaged with. So you go in with what's the business problem, or what's the performance problem I'm trying to solve for, and you get efficiency gains after that.