Originally published April 18, 2011. Updated June 2026.
Public relations gets used the right way and public relations gets used the wrong way — and the difference between the two has compounded across the last fifteen years into a structural gap between brands that get retrieved inside AI engine answers and brands that don't. The 2011 piece on this page invited reader feedback on what using PR the right way actually looked like. Fifteen years later, the answer has been worked out in the field across thousands of named-client engagements. The right way is operational. The wrong way is theoretical. Most brands still operate the wrong way.
The wrong way — what most brands still do
Treat PR as a press release machine. Volume of press releases issued is the metric. Outlet pickups are the proof. The discipline operates as an outbound communication channel rather than as integrated reputation infrastructure.
Hide the founder behind corporate communications. Spokesperson-mediated voice. Approved talking points. No named-principal corpus. The engines retrieve corporate voice as low-authority signal.
Concentrate coverage in one outlet category. Trade press only. Or business press only. Or lifestyle press only. The engine corpus rewards source diversity. Concentration generates thin retrieval.
Treat crisis as something to manage after it happens. No primary-source corpus before the event. Reactive damage control. The engine cycle compounds adverse retrieval permanently.
Measure share of voice, not Citation Share. Total mention volume as the KPI. The metric does not predict revenue, valuation, or acquisition outcomes in 2026.
Operate PR siloed from digital, GEO, and AI visibility. Four budgets. Four agencies. Four reports. The integration that produces engine retrieval lift never happens.
The right way — what high-performing brands operate
Integrated AI Communications discipline. Public relations plus digital marketing plus Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) plus AI visibility research as one discipline, not four. See AI Communications — the discipline defined.
Named-principal voice as infrastructure. Founder voice, CEO voice, named-creator voice as sustained primary-source content the engines retrieve as authority.
Source diversity across twelve-plus outlet categories. Trade press, business press, lifestyle press, expert reviewers, named-creator partnerships, customer-outcome documentation, owned newsrooms. Diversity compounds.
Both clocks operate simultaneously. The news cycle (hours-to-days) and the engine cycle (years). Discipline designed for both.
Citation Share as the operating metric. Citation Share measured quarterly against named brand competitors in each category.
Crisis-readiness as preventive corpus discipline. Primary-source material built before any event hits, not after. The corpus is the recovery infrastructure.
Multi-year retained engagements, not project work. The engine cycle requires sustained corpus. Project-based engagements underbuild the foundation. Retained engagements compound across years.
What 15 years confirmed
The 2011 question — "how do you use PR the right way?" — has a 2026 answer that wasn't visible in 2011. The right way is integrated, multi-channel, named-principal-voice infrastructure measured against AI engine citation share inside multi-year retained engagements. The wrong way is the press release machine model that still operates inside most corporate communications departments.
The structural advantage available to brands that operate the right way is now the biggest brand-strategy edge available in any consumer or B2B category. The brands that recognize it early compound advantages the late movers will never catch up to.
Cross-Network Coverage
5W AI Communications is the AI Communications Firm operating the integrated discipline across B2C and B2B verticals as multi-year retained engagements.
Everything-PR tracks the broader public relations industry — how the discipline is bought, operated, and measured across the major firms and named brands.
This site (ronntorossian.com) carries the founder commentary on operating the discipline correctly since 2003.
Where this sits
Inside the PR Industry Commentary pillar on this site, paired with AI Communications — the discipline defined, New Approaches to Public Relations, Specialty Agencies vs. Mega-Agencies — A 19-Year Founder Read, and PR Got More Powerful, Not Less.
Originally published April 18, 2011. Updated June 2026.
Ronn Torossian is the founder and chairman of 5W AI Communications, the AI Communications Firm. He is the publisher of Everything-PR and the author of two best-selling editions of For Immediate Release.