How AI Is Changing B2B Journalism

Sophie Wilson

Forget the panic: AI isn’t here to steal our bylines, it’s here to force us to be better journalists, sharper thinkers, and braver truth-hunters. At least, that’s the view from inside Today Digital – and Rob Scott, our founder, has plenty to say about it.

Because if AI is anything, it’s a very shiny mirror – one that reflects the shortcuts, habits, and creative instincts that make (or occasionally maul) modern journalism.

In Rob’s eyes, AI isn’t replacing journalists; it’s reminding them what journalism actually is: curiosity, skepticism, and originality under pressure. He tells me that:

“Good journalists are skeptical by nature. The job is to think critically on behalf of readers. That’s exactly how we should treat AI”

This statement becomes the heartbeat of our whole conversation.

From the Vanity Metric Era to the Infinite Feed

Let’s be honest, digital publishing hasn’t always done journalism favors.

Over the past decade, even respected outlets have fallen into the vanity metric trap: chasing clicks, page views, and social virality while real value quietly eroded.

Now, generative AI has made the content supply chain… well, infinite. The cost of creation has collapsed, and that means every B2B journalist – from niche SaaS analysts to cybersecurity editors – is competing not just with other humans, but with tireless algorithms that never sleep.

Paradoxically, that’s the best thing that could have happened to journalism.

Because when the internet is flooded with content, depth, timeliness, and originality suddenly matter again. It’s forcing us to rediscover the craft we lost somewhere between “engagement rates” and “SEO optimizations.”

As Rob puts it:

“AI can help me tighten ideas, find flaws, improve flow – like having a second pair of eyes.”

It’s not about surrendering your creativity. It’s about stress-testing it.

The Co-Author Mindset: Working With AI in Journalism, Not Under It

Think of AI as a creative sparring partner – one that never gets tired of asking “why?”

AI tools allow you to have a conversation, between you and your AI co-editor. Draft ideas, run them through a custom GPT you have trained in your own editorial style, and ask it to critique your thinking.

Rob says it’s important to not always agree with it – and that’s the point.

“It makes me think again about what I’ve written, it prompts me back, the way a good editor would.”

That’s the key. AI doesn’t write for you. It writes back to you.

It’s a dialogue that sharpens ideas, exposes lazy phrasing, and demands clarity – the same way a seasoned editor would challenge a reporter to “find the story under the story.”

For B2B journalists, this partnership is pure opportunity. It means you can ideate faster, surface hidden angles, and even test relevance through the audience’s eyes (“Would this matter to a CTO in a mid-market SaaS firm?”).

How Journalists Sustain Trust When Information Is Everywhere

Of course, there’s a catch. Public confidence in both journalism and AI is fragile. That means credibility has become our most valuable currency.

Let’s be real: audiences are getting smarter. They can spot formulaic content a mile away. They’ve been burned by generic “insight” pieces written by anonymous bots or half-hearted humans.

In B2B tech media, where audiences are highly literate and deeply informed, this trust gap is amplified. These readers know the industry. They live it. They don’t just want information – they want interpretation, validation, and context they can’t get elsewhere.

So, how do we maintain credibility when machines can draft faster than we can think?

By doubling down on three principles:

Transparency: AI assistance doesn’t have to be a secret – but it should never be invisible. If it helps us structure or sense-check ideas, that’s fine. But the human voice must stay front and center.

Editorial Oversight: Every piece of AI-assisted content still needs an editor. Always. LLMs predict patterns; they don’t understand facts. That’s where journalism – real, critical, context-aware journalism – begins.

Human Depth: The one thing AI can’t fake is lived experience. It can remix what’s been said, but it can’t bring a fresh perspective or first-hand observation. Journalists must continue to provide that perspective through original interviews, on-the-ground insight, and expert interpretation.

For B2B journalists, maintaining trust means showing why you covered a story, what it means for your niche audience, and how your analysis adds value beyond a simple newswire rewrite.

In other words: don’t just tell your readers what’s happening. Tell them why it matters – to them.

From Reach to Relevance: What B2B Needs to Get Right

“Reach” once ruled everything. Today, it’s relevance that separates the noise from the note.

Rob puts it simply:

“What B2B needs to do to build value is move away from reach. It’s about speaking to a defined audience and actually answering their need.”

That means knowing your reader better than AI ever could. What pressures keep them up at night? What new regulation just landed in their inbox? What’s the unspoken question behind the press release?

AI can help find data. You find meaning.

In practice, that might look like this:

Using AI to analyze conversation trends in your vertical – then interviewing a human expert to test those trends.

Letting AI outline potential pain-points – then writing from lived industry context to show you get it.

Asking AI for counterarguments – then using them to strengthen your stance.

The result? Smarter journalism, faster, but never soulless.

A Glimpse Ahead: The Inevitable Integration

Rob predicts that AI will eventually become invisible in journalism – built into tools, workflows, even CMS platforms.

“I would suspect that we will see the adoption increase as people get past it – It’s like the stages of grief, there’s a bit of denial going on at the moment.”

But soon enough, you won’t need to be an expert in “prompt engineering” to use it; you’ll just use it like you use spellcheck.

But that’s exactly when the risk creeps in: complacency.

In most newsrooms, AI is still the elephant in the Slack channel: everyone’s curious, some are experimenting, a few are pretending it’s not happening. But the truth is, AI isn’t waiting for our comfort.

And that’s when the real challenge begins.

As Rob warns, familiarity breeds complacency.

“As it becomes more widely accepted, and the skepticism starts to drop, there’s a risk of becoming lazy with the system – relying on the answers it spits out too easily, without checking credibility or fact-checking first.”

That’s the line between useful and dangerous. Because AI’s biggest weakness isn’t speed or syntax, it’s conviction without understanding. It sounds right, even when it isn’t.

So what’s the fix? A new kind of editorial discipline.

“The thing that will make GenAI successful in journalism, is if you’re using AI to sense-check yourself – and you sense-check AI – and you go around in a virtuous circle rather than a vicious one.”

That’s the key to sustainable adoption: journalists and machines working in tandem, holding each other to account. The goal isn’t blind trust, or blind fear. It’s a partnership where both improve the other.

“If we’re doing that, then we should get to a point where we’re helping make it better for us, while it makes us better at what we do as well.”

Inside Today Digital: Practicing What We Preach

At Today Digital, we don’t just talk about AI – we use it. Thoughtfully. Experimentally. Critically.

We treat generative tools like collaborators in the creative process – they help us tighten copy, test tone, and rethink headlines. But every idea still passes through a human editor, because the goal isn’t automation; it’s optimization.

Rob encourages his team to “think with AI” – not outsource thinking to it.

“Having that dialogue makes you think differently, and that, in itself, is useful.”

It’s not about replacing editorial judgement – it’s about amplifying it.

And if AI helps us write smarter, fairer, faster, more audience-relevant journalism? Then that’s not a threat. That’s progress.

The Final Word – and a Wink from the Co-Editor

In this article, AI flagged a clunky paragraph, questioned a metaphor, and nudged me to sharpen the headline.

And in doing so, it reminded me of Rob’s central point: the best thing AI does is prompt you back.

If that’s not the essence of good journalism – constant reflection, rethinking, and rewriting – then what is?

So here’s to our new co-editors. May they challenge us, not charm us; refine us, not replace us. And may we never stop asking the awkward questions – of technology, of ourselves, and of the stories we tell.

Now, if you’ll excuse me – my AI editor says this ending could use a stronger kicker. Typical.

Want to take your editorial quality further? – read The Complete Guide to Content Creation in B2B Tech Media.