Many entrepreneurs and public relations professionals view the traditional PR process as challenging, leading to questions about whether artificial intelligence can improve outcomes.
Scaling PR Expertise with AI
Startup Honeyjar aims to apply artificial intelligence to make the judgment and expertise of experienced PR professionals available to founders and individuals who lack formal communications backgrounds.
The company was founded by CEO Michelle Masek and CCO Nadia Jamshidi, both veterans of agency and in-house communications. Masek previously served as senior vice president of marketing and communications at Obvious Ventures.
Masek experienced firsthand the communications challenges faced by early-stage portfolio companies, prompting the idea to scale senior-level expertise through artificial intelligence to assist with proactive PR workflows.
Automating Workflows and Strategy
Honeyjar automates tasks such as drafting announcements, identifying journalists to pitch, and finding speaking opportunities. However, the platform's vision extends beyond securing press coverage to unify the entire communications workflow.
The software is designed to find reporters, build media lists, monitor news and social channels, track coverage, and surface opportunities by combining signals, context, strategy, and execution.
The platform targets a broad audience of unassigned communicators who handle marketing and publicity tasks without holding official PR titles, including investors, authors, creators, and team leaders.
The need for strategic communications is widespread across various industries, yet the core problems remain frequently unsolved for non-specialists.
Image Credits:Honeyjar
Human Oversight and Industry Impact
Rather than replacing PR professionals, the founders built the tool to make agencies and in-house teams more efficient, enabling independent practitioners to scale their client capacity.
Honeyjar reported 10,000 signups within the first 24 hours of opening its waitlist. Beta testers include Nextdoor, Coco Robotics, Bloomberg Beta, Mission North, and Full Picture.
While automated tools offer efficiency for companies seeking visibility, they raise concerns among journalists who already receive high volumes of AI-generated pitches.
Addressing these concerns, Masek emphasized that while Honeyjar assists in drafting emails or social media posts, users retain final control over when to send or publish content.
Human oversight remains central to the platform's design philosophy to ensure accountability in communications.
The platform encodes professional judgment into its system, training the product on industry expertise through a broader initiative called the Comms Lab.
Professional judgment involves understanding organizational goals, timing, and situational context to determine appropriate messaging and target audiences.
In certain instances, the tool may advise founders that their organization is not yet prepared for media coverage.
The founders envision a future where automated guidance helps reduce low-quality outreach, resulting in more credible pitches for journalists.
