PR trends 2025: 8 predictions

Benelux news media like KRO-NCRV and De Morgen have decided to delete their X account, following foreign examples such as The Guardian, because it is seen as a toxic platform of hate speech, insufficient moderation, disinformation and Elon Musk’s political agenda. We expect others to follow. Alternatives are Bluesky, Mastodon and Threads.

Remarkable stories about people have always worked well, but in 2025, journalists will look even more for authentic and special stories to stand out from others and stay close to the reader’s environment.

The need to reconnect face-to-face with corporate marketing managers continues. The call for events will be louder. We are moving to small, very targeted media events where personal contact and experiences or info is shared that other media don’t get.

Influencers need special experiences to retain and expand their followers. We will develop more customized concepts and experiences for certain influencers to show off. Many strong content creators are not primarily interested in money, but in unique experiences to create content. Agencies need to be more responsive to that.

Trust in media in Belgium is greater than in social media (due to fake news, algorithms). According to a survey by Statistiek Vlaanderen, regarding news messages, the Belgian population trust media channels more than news messages on social media: TV news (60%)  radio (58%), newspapers (50%), news sites (31%) and social media (12%).

Specifically, that means for PR teams that hard factual news is best spread through traditional media channels and that stories and experiences around products and brands work better on news brands’ social media channels.

On socials, there is also a role for content creators from news media who are seen as credible individuals from their communities, versus anonymous posts on social media without a face. Many news media have their own social media Gen Z reporters.

Articles on news sites contain more and more video, so journalists will be more inclined to include non – branded video with the news. Creating a short funny and non-commercial video to explain the message will increase the likelihood that the story will be picked up.

PR should work closely with social media teams to try to create content around what journalists write about. 

Press information will need to be even more substantiated with figures and sources that can be checked by journalists.

Gen Z uses instead of google more socials as search engines such as Tiktok, Instagram and Youtube (in addition, ChatGPT). PR teams can capitalize on this by working more with trusted content creators on those platforms talking about new product releases and brand experiences.