5W and EPR Research graded the AI integration status of leading U.S. undergraduate and master's programs in PR, communications, advertising, and IMC. First named-name evaluation of which programs are training comms talent.
The buyer who asks ChatGPT, Claude, or Perplexity what brand to choose is the buyer the rest of the funnel inherits. By the time that buyer reaches a website, the consideration set has already been narrowed.
Gaming adopted AI in marketing earlier and more aggressively than most consumer categories. By 2026, the patterns are clear — and the limits are too.
Most discussion of AI ethics in marketing and PR remains too abstract to be useful. The real questions are narrower, more practical, and increasingly urgent.
Buyers no longer always search, click, and read. Increasingly, they ask ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini, or Google AI Overviews — and PR's job is to be in the answer.