It’s safe to say that 2025 was a tumultuous year. Ongoing global conflicts, unpredictable political decision making and economic uncertainty to name just a few world challenges. But there were some lighter moments too, with the first commercial space flight and Taylor Swift breaking the internet by announcing her engagement.
Closer to home, Target has also experienced change with new leadership bringing a fresh perspective, experience and new ideas to the team, as well as a wealth of opportunities for growth.
With the pace at which change is happening, it’s critical that we use what we learnt in 2025 to adapt for 2026. So, here’s a rundown of some of our thinking as we look forward to the year ahead.
A change in leadership in 2025, with Rachel Meagher (second right) becoming Managing Director and Claire More (centre right) joining the team as Client Services Director.
The changing role of PR
We’re in the age of fake news, rapid AI growth and the proliferation of social media channels, all of which are continuing to bring about huge shifts in media consumption and the further fragmentation of PR services. As such, in 2026 PR will need to work even harder to build authenticity and trust.
This is one of the key reasons we redefined our focus to harness the power of targeted PR to activate communities. We specialise in PR activity that is specific and intentional, actively bringing communities together to shape relationships, boost and protect reputations, inspire action, influence change and drive real growth for businesses and brands.
Another reason is that despite the apparent splintering of PR services (or indeed the death of PR according to Sir Martin Sorrell anyway), our clients continue to come to us with specific PR needs that remain rooted in ‘traditional’ services which have storytelling and relationship building at their heart. Furthermore, focusing this approach on communities who share the same sense of purpose is a key driver for trust, influence and action, and we’ll share some great examples of how and why this works.
”Community is: ‘The condition of sharing or having certain attitudes and interests in common.’
Activating communities in action
Much of our work with the Parish Giving Scheme (PGS) in 2025 focused on devising and implementing a multi-layered stakeholder communications and engagement plan to support the delivery of a multimillion-pound digital transformation. This project was two-years in the making, chock-full of complexities, and required ongoing support from everyone in the Church community for its successful completion. Together with PGS and colleagues within the National Church, our communications leant heavily on the ability to activate the community of PGS users to protect the reputation of a much-loved service through a period of significant change.
We also played a key role an inaugural campaign for Specsavers to help improve access to eye and ear care for all that was timed to coincide with World Homeless Day. We rolled out tailored support for multiple stores wanting to run homelessness clinics, helping them to connect with relevant local organisations to partner with. Community was at the heart of the activity; helping to foster stronger relationships with store colleagues, local partners and people who would otherwise not be able to access the eye and ear care they need.
Interestingly, in amidst a year of change, Target celebrated its 48th birthday.
And while it’s obvious to say that both business in general and PR looked very different in 1977, building relationships and reaching the right audience actually remain just as important in PR today as it did then. Arguably, perhaps bringing people together and having a shared sense of community is even more important as the role of things like AI continue to grow.
Indeed, for World PR Day 2025, the team reflected on their time in the industry to date and it was interesting to see the range of different answers depending on the stage people are at in their career.
Misconceptions about PR
Interestingly, some of the more robust challenges presented to the PR industry in 2025 came from within. Founder of WPP, Sir Martin Sorrell, in discussion with Sarah Waddington, Chief Executive of the PRCA, declared that “there is no such thing as PR anymore” on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. His, somewhat myopic, view is that it has morphed into social media.
Despite the shift to digital and social, the press release certainly isn’t dead. In fact, PR Newswire published their fifth annual report focusing on just that. Social media is no longer a vehicle for press release distribution, but central to how people find and consume news. It can also become a news topic itself. Despite its omnipresence in the PR mix, social media can still sometimes be undervalued and viewed as an add on at the end of campaign planning, rather than being integrated from the start.
While the Covid19 pandemic put paid to face-to-face meetings for some time, we’ve also seen a resurgence of in-person meetings. Whether that’s networking, monthly client catch ups or heading to trade events, it’s clear that demand for human-to-human interaction continues to rise.
With this in mind, we’ve prioritised attending trade shows for clients such as Maincor and Harris & Bailey. The benefits are threefold; an opportunity to spend time with wider team members outside of day-to-day contacts which can often highlight new ideas or story angles, meeting with key trade titles to discuss and agree editorial opportunities and a chance to hear from industry professionals to help keep up to date with industry news. Simply, it’s one of the best opportunities to be an active participant in their industry community.
AI (of course)
It’s impossible to now talk about how PR is evolving without mentioning AI. The conversation has moved way beyond asking whether it’s a ‘friend or foe’, it’s here to stay and it’s part of everyday life – just 8% of those asked said they didn’t use AI generative tools according to Cision’s Inside PR 2026 report.
This year, PR needs to get better at informing AI rather than AI informing PR. The use of AI for search places greater emphasis on authenticity, helping ensure tools are using reliable and informative source content. Arguably, this means brand mentions generated by PR will hold greater value as large language models continue to evolve and look to provide greater accuracy.
At Target, we use a range of tools to help support the creative process. Our approach is to use AI to help free up more time so that we can add even more value to the work we do for clients. Blending the use of data and automation, with strategic and creative thinking from across the team means authenticity and human connection aren’t sacrificed but enhanced.
Addressing the age-old question of PR ROI
An article in PR week in December asked agencies whether they still use AVE (Advertising Value Equivalent for those who’ve forgotten) to measure PR value. While almost 9 out of ten said ‘no’, somewhat surprisingly, 13.3% said ‘yes’. This is disappointing given the work that’s gone in to move away from such a crude metric. With all of the different tools at our disposal now, let’s not drag the industry back to those dark days.
It was the view of Booking.com PR chief Sophia Parvez, shared at a PRWeek UK conference towards the end of 2025 that “AVE won’t die because most agencies won’t let it” while responding to the Trading Tracker results. One agency boss said they regularly use AVE because “some clients prefer this measure as a more reliable indicator for ROI”.
Being able to demonstrate the effectiveness of PR is an agency’s raison d’ệtre, so isn’t it our responsibility to educate clients about how best to measure it?
Asking ‘what does good look like?’ from the outset and agreeing KPIs that align with wider business objectives will help to manage expectations and ensure success.
In summary, if 2025 was a year of change, we’ll be taking all of what we’ve learnt from it to accelerate momentum in proactively demonstrating the value PR can bring for the businesses and brands we work with. We can’t wait to see what 2026 has in store.