Digital PR Summit - Using AI & Custom GPTs To Take Your Digital PR Campaigns To The Next Level [Amanda Walls]

In this talk, Amanda Walls explores how AI and custom GPTs can be used to enhance digital PR strategies without replacing the human expertise that underpins successful campaigns. She begins by emphasising that AI should not be used to cut corners, fabricate insights, or automate relationships with journalists, but instead to improve efficiency and support better decision making. Drawing on her experience as both a journalist and agency owner, she positions AI as a tool to strengthen processes such as compliance, research, and outreach while maintaining editorial integrity and trust.

Amanda then introduces a framework of five custom GPTs designed to streamline digital PR workflows, including tools for compliance and risk assessment, newsjacking, coverage tracking, link gap analysis, and journalist intelligence. Through practical examples, such as validating financial claims in PR campaigns, she demonstrates how these tools can reduce risk, improve relevance, and uncover more targeted opportunities. The overarching message is that the future of digital PR lies not in AI driven creativity, but in using AI to remove manual workload, enabling PR professionals to focus on building stronger stories, relationships, and authority signals that drive meaningful coverage.

Transcript

3. Let me start off by saying…
4. We’re not here to replace humans. At no point in this talk will I: • Tell you to spam journalists with AI releases • Tell you to cut corners by faking real expertise • Tell you that AI will replace journalist relationships • Tell you that AI should automate mass outreach without oversight • Tell you that AI should fabricate data or insights.
5. AI should be used to help efficiency not replace human intelligence.
6. Why am I qualified to talk about this? • Fully qualified journalist (degree and masters) • Worked across broadcast & print journalism for five years • Owner of a digital agency for 10 years - Cedarwood Digital • I’ve seen both sides • I’ve been on the receiving end of press releases, I understand how a newsroom works, I’ve worked in some of Australia’s busiest newsrooms.
7. Five GPTs To Maximise Efficiency
8. Compliance & Risk GPT
9. Compliance & Risk GPT Pre-Publication Claim Verification Regulatory Alignment Reputation Scoring Trust-Debt Prevention
10. Compliance & Risk GPT How To Build It: • Define risk appetite • Create a policy pack • Train on sector rules • Standardise input template • Enforce structured output
11. Example One - Insurance Comparison Website Input to GPT: Client: Insurance comparison website Sector: Financial services Campaign claim(s): • “Drivers can save up to £500 a year by switching car insurance providers.” • “Millions of UK drivers are massively overpaying for cover.”
12. Example - Insurance Comparison Website Sources provided: • Internal price comparison data • Analysis of 50,000 quotes from January–March 2026 Draft quote: “Many drivers are unknowingly paying hundreds more than necessary for their car insurance. Switching providers could easily save motorists up to £500 a year, yet millions continue to renew without checking the market.”
13. Example - Insurance Comparison Website Compliance & Risk GPT Output Decision: Revise before publication Risk score: 46 / 100 (moderate)
14. Example One - Insurance Comparison Website Key Compliance Flags: Financial claim substantiation • The statement “save up to £500” must be supported by clear methodology explaining how savings were calculated. Implied universal savings • Language suggests that switching will reliably produce savings for most drivers, which may be misleading.
15. Example One - Insurance Comparison Website Key Compliance Flags: Evidence transparency • The data source (50,000 quotes) should specify: a. Timeframe b. Methodology c. Whether savings represent average or maximum outcomes.
16. Example One - Insurance Comparison Website Evidence Requirements: Include clarification such as: “Based on analysis of 50,000 UK car insurance quotes between January and March 2026.” Specify whether £500 represents: • maximum observed saving • average saving • potential saving for certain driver profiles.
17. Example One - Insurance Comparison Website Suggested Safer Rewrite: Original: “Switching providers could easily save motorists up to £500 a year.” Suggested revision: “Our analysis shows that some drivers could save as much as £500 by switching providers, although the amount varies depending on individual circumstances.”
18. Example One - Insurance Comparison Website Reputational Risk Assessment: Topic sensitivity: Medium Potential criticism themes: • misleading savings claims • oversimplifying financial decisions Mitigation recommendation: Use conditional language and emphasise that savings vary between drivers.
19. Benefits Campaign Idea Risk GPT Safer Outreach Trusted Coverage Authority Signals
20. Newsjacking Scout GPT
22. Newsjacking GPT - Input How To Build It: • Define the purpose & workflow - regions, dates, frequency, volume of outputs • Added detailed client rules - i.e. sentiment, specific topics/targets • Structured output format - clear bullet points, source link, expert comment hook • Content filtering safeguards - avoid restricted topics, duplicates • Integrated trend awareness - TikTok, Pinterest, Google Search
25. Benefits Faster Opportunity Discovery Better Story Relevance Improved Media Success Rates Reduced Manual Monitoring Consistent Coverage Opportunities
26. Coverage Scanner GPT
28. Coverage Scanner - Input How To Build It: • Brand and brand name variations • Spokespeople names • Keyword and topic universe • Link and citation detection rules • List of publications previously contacted (upload)
30. Benefits Monitor Brand Mentions Track Valuable Links Measure Traffic & Impact Identify Trends & Risks Report ROI Automatically
31. Link Gap Analyser GPT
32. In competitive niches, link gaps matter - building and closing link gaps play a key role in digital pr performance.
33. Area Traditional Link Gap Tool Custom GPT Link Gap Analyser Why It Matters for Digital PR Data Source Pulls backlink data from a fixed index of crawled links within the tool. Can combine backlink data with scraped articles, brand mentions, journalist coverage, and topical context. Creates a broader view of where authority and relevance exist beyond just link databases. Niche Targeting Primarily compares domains linking to competitors but not to you. Can filter opportunities by niche, topic clusters, journalist beat, or publication relevance. Helps teams prioritise highly relevant publications rather than generic high-DR domains. Context & Insight Shows link metrics such as DR, traffic, and anchor text with limited context. Can analyse article context, sentiment, topic relevance, and why competitors earned coverage. Provides strategic insight into how links were earned, not just where they came from. Opportunity Prioritisation Opportunities are usually ranked by link metrics and domain authority. Can score opportunities using relevance, topical authority, editorial style, and likelihood of coverage. Enables smarter outreach targeting aligned with brand expertise and PR angles. Workflow Integration Requires manual analysis, filtering, and exporting into spreadsheets. Can summarise gaps, generate outreach angles, and identify journalists automatically. Reduces manual analysis time and turns link gap data directly into campaign ideas.
34. Link Gap Analyser - Input How To Build It: • Define competitor and brand inputs • Integrate backlink and coverage data sources • Create topical and niche classification rules • Build an opportunity scoring framework • Automate insight and outreach outputs.
35. Niche Client Links Competitor Links (Combined) Link Gap Technology & Digital 120 1,213 +1,093 News & Media 147 505 +358 Finance & Lending 44 361 +317 Business & Trade 22 153 +131 Blogs & Personal Sites 14 125 +111 Entertainment & Gaming 3 90 +87 Home & Property 5 83 +78 Education 0 49 +49 Health & Lifestyle 5 43 +38 Government & Nonprofit 3 39 +36 Comparison & Directories 99 122 +23
36. Niche Client Links Competitor Links Link Gap Description Technology & Digital 120 1,213 +1,093 Covers links from tech news, AI blogs, digital innovation sites, and IT resources. Indicates competitors are earning links through fintech and digital transformation stories. News & Media 147 505 +358 Editorial mentions, finance commentary, and data-led PR coverage in consumer or national media outlets. Finance & Lending 44 361 +317 Core industry links from lenders, financial comparison websites, and credit advice platforms — highly authoritative and directly relevant Business & Trade 22 153 +131 B2B, SME, and trade portals where competitors are featured as business resources or contributors. Blogs & Personal Sites 14 125 +111 Individual and lifestyle blogs offering reviews, opinion pieces, and backlink opportunities via guest content or partnerships. Entertainment & Gaming 3 90 +87 Broader cultural and entertainment outlets that cover finance through lifestyle, games, or pop-culture-related PR campaigns. Home & Property 5 83 +78 Property, mortgage, and home improvement sites where financial content intersects with lifestyle and borrowing topics. Education 0 49 +49 Financial literacy, student finance, and educational resource websites — valuable for building trust and authority.
37. Niche Client 1 Client 2 Client 3 Client 4 Client 5 Client 6 News & Media 180 111 37 54 35 88 Finance & Lending 181 83 10 29 24 34 Business & Trade 28 69 10 13 13 37 Comparison & Directories 20 47 9 47 7 7 Blogs & Personal Sites 55 32 5 10 7 22 Entertainment & Gaming 68 17 4 6 6 12 Home & Property 41 26 4 4 9 2 Education 8 31 3 4 5 8 Health & Lifestyle 15 18 1 1 6 5 Government & Nonprofit 15 14 1 9 3 3
38. Link Gap Analyser GPT - Benefits Competitor Link Discovery Missed Link Opportunities Authority Gap Analysis Topical Link Clustering Priority Outreach Targets
39. Journalist & Outlet Intelligence GPT
40. The problem with media lists… PR Story Generic Media List Many Journalists Low Response
41. Journalist & Outlet Intelligence GPT So let’s use AI to understand how journalists actually write: • Analyse journalists past articles • Identify topics they cover most • Detect how they frame stories • Recommend the best reporters for each story.
42. Journalist & Outlet Intelligence GPT To build it: • This is perhaps the GPT with the biggest input required • Collect journalist articles • Analyse topics and sentiment • Build journalist profiles • Match stories to reporters.
43. Journalist & Outlet Intelligence GPT To collate journalist information: • Identify journalist author pages • Crawl those pages to extract articles • Supplement with Google Discovery • Capture new articles via RSS feeds • Store articles in structured datasets.
44. Journalist & Outlet Intelligence GPT
45. Benefits Competitor Link Discovery Outlet History & Preferences Beat & Coverage Mapping Pitch Personalisation Relationship Insights
47. The future of Digital PR isn’t AI-driven creativity - it’s AI removing the busywork so humans can build the stories that actually earn coverage.