AI continues to dominate the conversation in 2025, with advancements reshaping industries and driving innovation. With tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, Co-Pilot etc leading the charge since their inception, the capabilities of AI have grown exponentially. Yet, this evolution has only reinforced the indispensable value of human expertise. Now more than ever, human-centric roles are pivotal for directing AI effectively and addressing its inherent limitations.
Human insight remains irreplaceable when deciphering the nuances of media stories and understanding complex topics. As highlighted in an article on Forbes, AI is still significantly flawed when it comes to understanding human language, particularly around understanding ‘common sense’ and advanced concepts such as sarcasm, which can return many inaccuracies that need to be fact-checked by a human. As AI technology progresses, integrating human expertise into media analysis is crucial to extracting the most value from data and insights.
Let’s explore how media analysis trends are evolving in 2025, reinforcing the critical role of human-driven insights.
AI technology has made significant strides in supporting media analysis, but gaps remain. One of the main issues is that AI algorithms are based on data sets that are limited and full of assumptions. As a result, AI programs can be found to be inaccurate and lack the ability to comprehend new ideas and new ways of thinking. These limitations affect AI’s ability to detect subtle details in text, audio, and video, leading to potential misinterpretations.
Take sentiment analysis for example, a key metric used to determine how an audience feels or reacts to a brand or its message. Have a read of the example sentence below and decide how you would rate the sentiment yourself - positive, neutral or negative?
"The new traffic plan is the best thing to happen to this city since the invention of the wheel. I can't wait to spend hours sitting in gridlock every day."
Whilst we may read this and understand the overall sentiment is negative, an AI-based sentiment analysis program might struggle because it contains sarcasm which often involves saying the opposite of what one means. The statement appears to be positive with the use of words like "best" and "can't wait," but the context of the statement, specifically the phrase "spend hours sitting in gridlock every day," makes it clear that the sentiment is actually negative.
In 2024, Medianet developed the technology to introduce “Entity-Level Sentiment”. This means that instead of just measuring sentiment broadly, we can pinpoint sentiment around specific people, brands, or issues within an article or media item, giving you a more targeted understanding of public perception. Through this unique feature, businesses can combine sentiment data with other media insights and can make informed decisions that align with customer expectations and market shifts.
This new technology is currently only available in Medianet’s Media Monitoring solution.
You’d be forgiven if you hadn’t heard of the term 'Consultative Insights' before, insights by nature can be a very niche topic after all. In short, Consultative Insights is the step beyond data collection to understand the meaning and impact of media coverage in the context of a company’s goals.
Let’s use an example to explore this further.
Say you're running a media campaign to launch a new partnership. You’ve sent out a press release and Journalists have been publishing your story left, right and centre.
How would you evaluate the success of the campaign?
You could start by looking at key metrics such as the volume of coverage that you’ve generated or reviewing any changes in traffic to your site, likely caused by the campaign.
Both of these metrics however only tell one part of the story and can be misleading without the right insights to back them up. If you start combining these metrics you get even closer to the source of truth but this is where Consultative Insights come in.
Let’s expand the scenario further and give the campaign a goal. Let’s say “bring awareness to the partnership and the brands involved.”
Looking at the volume of coverage here alone might indicate awareness of the partnership, but you won’t know for sure until you dig deeper to explore what the media is covering. Supporting metrics such as key message delivery (you can learn more about that here) can aid in understanding if the media actually picked up on the message you were pushing (in this case the announcement of a new partnership) or if they were focusing on something else (perhaps changes happening to one of the brands involved).
This is where the human element of Consultative Insights comes in. Throughout the process of media analysis, an analyst looks at every media item separately and generates a complete picture of the campaign to give you the answers you need, supported by the data they themselves have analysed. Medianet’s Insights team specialises in such bespoke analysis, leveraging both AI-generated data and human interpretation to deliver actionable recommendations.
So, how will it impact the role of humans when it comes to media analysis?
AI is here to stay, and its role as a tool for communication professionals is solidifying. While AI excels at processing large volumes of data quickly, it’s not infallible. Its limitations in understanding context, common sense, and cultural nuances make human oversight indispensable.
It’s important to not get too caught up in the current buzz and recognise its limitations. As such, this exciting technology is best placed as a supporting tool for companies and analysts alike to use.
At Medianet, we combine technology and human expertise. Our platform leverages the latest AI tools, large language models, and advanced data science to generate tailored metrics quickly and accurately. In addition to cutting-edge technology, Medianet’s platform is supported by our exemplary customer service team.
Similarly, other tech tools such as media monitoring can be an important part of the process to gather and organise media data (such as media clippings) before being passed on to an expert analyst to process and interrogate that data further. Data and technology are also boosted by the human analysis from our Media Analysis team - Medianet Insights - who can create bespoke reporting based on your media monitoring data and share actionable insights that respond to your objectives.
Striking the right balance between human expertise and AI technology is crucial for driving long-term industry growth. AI is designed to complement human efforts and simplify our lives, not to replace them entirely. Embracing this synergy will ensure sustainable progress for years to come.
Are you ready to kickstart your journey in media analysis with Consultative Insights? Get in touch with us to find out more.
Read how media monitoring can help improve your PR strategy here.
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