Public relations has always been an industry that rewards curiosity.
When I started Fishman PR more than 35 years ago, staying sharp meant knowing the media landscape, understanding what made a strong story, building relationships with reporters, and learning as much as possible about the businesses we represented. Those skills still matter enormously, but the amount of knowledge required to advise a franchise brand well has expanded.
Today, a strong franchise PR professional needs to understand much more than media relations. Our team needs to know how artificial intelligence is changing search behavior, how an executive’s online presence affects brand credibility, how platforms are evolving, how to prepare a client for a crisis, and how franchise economics influence the stories we recommend telling in the first place.
That is why continuing education has always been part of the culture at Fishman PR. We work exclusively with franchise brands, and our clients rely on us for more than media coverage. They expect us to understand the environment around their businesses well enough to recognize opportunities, anticipate challenges, and give informed strategic counsel.
The subjects we are teaching today look very different from what they did even five years ago. The objective, however, remains the same: make sure our team understands where communications is headed before our clients need us to explain it.
AI Is a Tool, But Knowing How to Use It Is the Skill
Artificial intelligence has quickly become part of the communications workflow. Our team uses AI tools to support research, identify patterns, explore ideas, analyze information, and work more efficiently behind the scenes.
The important word there is support.
A tool can help someone gather information faster, but it cannot replace judgment. It does not know a client the way an account team does, understand the history behind a reporter relationship, or recognize when an idea may technically make sense but feel completely wrong for a particular founder.
That distinction is important enough that our AI education focuses as much on judgment as it does on technology. We want our team to understand what these tools are good at, where they fall short, how to verify what they produce, and when human expertise should take over.
The goal is not to make our team dependent on AI. It is to give talented PR professionals better tools while preserving the critical thinking, creativity, and emotional intelligence that make them valuable in the first place.
For our clients, that should translate into better research, faster access to useful information, and more time spent on strategy and relationships.
Search Is Changing, and PR Has a Bigger Role in What People Find
Search behavior is changing alongside artificial intelligence.
Prospective franchisees, customers, reporters, investors, and other stakeholders no longer rely exclusively on a traditional Google search to learn about a company. Increasingly, they may ask an AI-powered search engine or conversational platform to explain a brand, compare opportunities, identify industry leaders, or summarize what others have said about a company.
That creates an important new responsibility for public relations.
Generative engine optimization, or GEO, is focused on helping brands become more understandable, authoritative, and visible within AI-generated answers. For franchise brands, that means the information published across earned media, owned content, executive profiles, websites, and other credible sources increasingly works together to shape how the brand is understood online.
This is an area where PR and search strategy are becoming much more connected.
We are teaching our team to think beyond the individual media placement. A strong article can build credibility with a reader today while also strengthening the body of information that search engines and AI platforms may encounter tomorrow. The clearer and more consistent a franchise brand is across credible sources, the easier it becomes for people and technology alike to understand who that company is, what it does, and why it matters.
That does not mean chasing algorithms or manufacturing content for machines. It means doing the fundamentals of good communications exceptionally well: creating useful information, earning credible coverage, establishing subject-matter expertise, and making sure the brand tells a consistent story wherever people encounter it.
Media Training Has Become Broader Than Preparing for an Interview
Media training used to have a relatively defined purpose. A spokesperson had an interview coming up, so we prepared them to answer questions clearly, stay on message, and communicate effectively with a journalist.
We still do that, but executive communications now extend far beyond the traditional interview.
A founder might appear on a podcast, speak at a franchise conference, participate in a webinar, record a video, write on LinkedIn, respond to a customer issue, or find an offhand comment circulating online. The boundaries between media relations, executive visibility, and everyday communication have become much less distinct.
Our team therefore needs to prepare clients for the broader reality of being a visible leader.
That includes helping executives understand their core messages, communicate complex ideas simply, respond thoughtfully when challenged, and recognize that every public interaction contributes to the reputation of the brand.
In franchising, this carries particular weight. A founder or CEO may be speaking simultaneously to existing franchise owners, prospective franchisees, employees, consumers, investors, and industry peers. Each audience hears the same words through a different lens.
Good media training helps leaders communicate with confidence while still sounding like themselves. The goal has never been to create a perfectly scripted spokesperson. It is to help a knowledgeable executive become an effective communicator.
Crisis Preparation Has to Happen Before the Crisis
The worst time to build a crisis communications plan is when the crisis has already started.
That has always been true, but the speed of modern communications makes preparation even more important. A local incident can reach a national audience quickly. Employees and customers can publish information before corporate leadership knows an issue exists. Social platforms can accelerate speculation, and incomplete information can spread while a company is still determining what actually happened.
Franchise systems add another layer of complexity because a situation involving one location or franchisee can affect perceptions of the entire brand.
That is why crisis preparation is an ongoing part of how we train our team. They need to understand how information moves through a franchise system, who should be involved in decision-making, what questions to ask before recommending a response, and when communicating too quickly can create additional problems.
Preparation also means understanding the client long before something goes wrong.
When an agency knows the leadership team, franchise system, brand values, operating structure, and potential areas of vulnerability, it can provide much better counsel during a high-pressure moment. There is far less time to build context once reporters are calling and conversations are already happening online.
Strong crisis communications depend on preparation, judgment, speed, and trust. All four have to be developed before they are needed.
Platform Changes Matter Because Audience Behavior Changes With Them
Every few months, another platform changes its algorithm, introduces a new format, adds an AI feature, or alters how content is distributed.
Our team does not need to chase every update, but they do need to understand when a change meaningfully affects the way clients communicate with their audiences.
LinkedIn is a good example. For many franchise founders and executives, the platform has evolved from a networking tool into an important channel for executive thought leadership. A founder’s posts may now be read by prospective franchisees, industry media, investors, employees, conference organizers, and other operators before those people ever visit the company website.
Other platforms play different roles. Podcasts can create depth and credibility. YouTube can help audiences understand the people behind a brand. Newsletters and owned content give companies more control over education and storytelling. Search platforms increasingly connect all of those sources.
The lesson for our team is not that every client needs to be everywhere.
Quite the opposite.
We want them to understand how platforms are changing so they can help clients identify which channels actually matter to their business, how those channels work together, and where the founder or brand has something meaningful to contribute.
Strategy should determine the platform, not the other way around.
Understanding Franchise Economics Makes Us Better Communicators
Some of the most important continuing education we do has nothing to do with PR.
If you work with franchise brands, you need to understand how franchising works as a business.
Our team needs to understand the basics of franchise development, unit economics, franchise fees, royalties, system growth, franchisee profitability, local-market dynamics, capital requirements, and the relationship between the franchisor and franchise owner.
That knowledge changes the questions we ask.
A milestone such as opening 100 locations means more when you understand what it takes operationally to reach that point. A new leadership hire becomes more interesting when you understand the business challenge that person was brought in to solve. A franchise development story becomes stronger when you understand what prospective owners are actually evaluating before investing.
It also helps us recognize when something that sounds impressive from a communications perspective may not be the most important story from a business perspective.
That is one of the reasons we place so much emphasis on franchise education internally. We don’t want our team to only understand how to communicate about franchising; we want them to understand franchising well enough to contribute meaningfully to the conversation.
The deeper that business knowledge becomes, the better our strategic counsel becomes with it.
Continuing Education Is Part of Client Service
The tools will keep changing.
AI platforms will evolve. Search behavior will change again. Social networks will rise and fall. New communications channels will emerge, and the franchise industry will continue adapting to economic conditions, changing consumer behavior, and new expectations from franchise owners and candidates.
We cannot control any of that.
What we can control is how prepared our team is to respond.
At Fishman PR, continuing education is part of how we protect the quality of our work. We want our people to understand new technology without becoming distracted by every new tool, recognize communications trends without chasing every fad, and understand our clients’ businesses deeply enough to separate what is interesting from what is actually important.
More than 35 years into building a franchise public relations agency, I still believe the best PR professionals share one characteristic: they never assume they have finished learning.
The media may change. The technology certainly will. But curiosity, sound judgment, strong relationships, and a deep understanding of the businesses we represent will continue to make the difference.
Staying Ahead Without Chasing Every Trend
Franchise brands do not need an agency that adopts every new tool simply because it exists. They need a communications partner that understands what is changing, determines what actually matters, and knows how to apply those changes to the business.
That is the standard we set for our own team.
If your franchise brand needs a PR partner that combines deep franchise expertise with an evolving understanding of media, technology, search, and reputation management, learn more about how Fishman PR approaches strategic franchise public relations.
Frequently Asked Questions
How is AI changing franchise public relations?
AI is changing how PR teams conduct research, analyze information, develop ideas, and understand how brands appear across digital platforms. It is also changing how prospective franchisees and other audiences search for information. Strong franchise PR strategies use AI as a tool while maintaining human oversight, verification, strategic judgment, and relationship-building.
What is GEO in public relations?
Generative engine optimization, or GEO, refers to strategies that help brands become visible and understandable within AI-generated search experiences. PR can support GEO by creating credible earned media, authoritative owned content, consistent executive thought leadership, and clear information that helps establish a brand’s expertise and reputation online.
Why is media training important for franchise executives?
Franchise executives communicate with several audiences, including franchise owners, prospective franchisees, consumers, employees, investors, and media. Media training helps leaders communicate clearly, handle challenging questions, maintain consistent messaging, and represent the brand effectively across interviews, podcasts, conferences, social media, and other public channels.
Why should a franchise PR agency understand franchise economics?
Understanding franchise economics helps PR professionals identify stronger stories and provide more informed strategic counsel. Knowledge of unit economics, system growth, franchise development, franchisee profitability, and the franchisor-franchisee relationship provides important context for evaluating which milestones, trends, and business developments are truly meaningful.
How should franchise brands prepare for a communications crisis?
Crisis preparation should happen before an issue emerges. Franchise brands benefit from establishing decision-making processes, identifying potential risks, clarifying spokesperson roles, developing communications protocols, and ensuring leadership and agency partners understand the franchise system well enough to respond quickly and thoughtfully when problems arise.
