By Chloe Buchanan, Head of PR and social media
For eternity PR has been about shaping narratives, building trust, and securing visibility in exactly the right places. Done well, PR influences how people think, what they believe, and the decisions they ultimately make. But as technology transforms the way we search for and consume information, PR is (once again) entering a new era, one where its commercial impact is more visible, measurable, and powerful than ever before.
The catalyst is Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO).
I know what you’re thinking - here we go again.
But…the way we find information online is shifting and it’s happening at a pace. Traditional search engines deliver a list of links, leaving the user to click, explore, and piece together an answer. Generative engines take a more proactive role. They pull information from multiple trusted sources and distill it into a single response that feels both direct and authoritative.
For brands, this subtle change has dramatic consequences. The challenge is no longer about climbing search rankings and hoping to be spotted. Instead, the priority is ensuring your voice appears in the sources that generative engines draw on to form their answers. If you are absent from those conversations, you risk being absent from the answers that matter most to your audiences.
This is where PR comes to the fore. When earned media is optimised for generative engines, your brand becomes the first voice that prospects, investors and partners encounter. Coverage no longer sits quietly on a publisher’s website, waiting to be discovered. It is brought to the surface in the answers that AI platforms present, and those answers are exactly what people rely on when they are researching, comparing options, or making critical decisions.
In that moment, the impact of PR goes beyond ‘awareness’, something that can feel intangible. A thought leadership article or profile interview becomes more than a piece of visibility, it becomes a decisive factor in whether your brand is trusted, selected, and advanced in a process. Your expertise is positioned not at the edge of the conversation but at its heart, influencing the outcome before you even enter the room.
This is the real shift that GEO creates. For years, PR has been seen as essential for reputation, credibility and trust, yet often struggled to prove a direct line to commercial outcomes. With GEO, that connection is far easier to see.
When your insights appear in the very answers that prospects read, the path to revenue becomes clearer. When investors encounter your perspective consistently across the sources they trust, conversations accelerate. When your voice is heard alongside or ahead of your competitors, the playing field tilts in your favour. PR, once considered intangible, is revealed as a driver of measurable business advantage.
GEO does not demand tricks or technical manipulation. It demands quality, authority and consistency. Organisations that want to take advantage of this shift must prioritise coverage in outlets that engines recognise as credible. They must invest in thought leadership that demonstrates expertise. And they must ensure that their media presence aligns closely with their commercial objectives, so that the influence they secure is not only visible but also valuable.
This is not about changing the fundamentals of PR. It is about sharpening them. Strong stories, meaningful commentary and authentic perspectives have always been the raw materials of effective communication. GEO ensures that these assets now travel further, working harder and delivering returns at the moment of decision.
For decades, communications leaders have faced the question of return on investment, often trying to quantify the value of reputation in commercial terms. Generative Engine Optimisation changes that conversation. It makes the influence of PR visible at the most critical point, when someone is ready to act.
When earned media is tuned for generative engines, it places your brand in the answer that matters most. It ensures you are trusted, credible and influential at exactly the moment your audience is deciding who to engage with, who to invest in, or who to buy from. That is when PR stops being an abstract exercise in awareness and firmly demonstrates its role in delivering measurable commercial impact.
PR has always mattered. GEO proves just how powerful it can be.
