7 Benefits of Press Releases for Small Businesses in 2026

Key takeaways

Press releases put your business on news sites, which adds credibility customers and AI assistants both recognize.
AI answers lean on earned media: about 82% of AI-cited links in Muck Rack's December 2025 study came from earned media.
Releases with real statistics, quotes and sources are the kind AI is most likely to cite.
A release isn't a link-building shortcut: Google treats keyword-stuffed links in distributed releases as link spam.

Press releases have been declared dead more times than we can count. Yet they keep working, and in 2026 they do something new: they feed the AI assistants your customers ask for recommendations. Here's what a press release genuinely does for a small business, and where its limits are.

1. Credibility you can point to

"As seen on" carries weight. A story about your business on recognizable news sites tells customers that you're established and newsworthy, and it gives you real links to share on your website, in proposals and on social media.

2. Coverage on sites AI trusts

This is the biggest change. AI assistants like ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google's AI features read the web and cite sources they consider credible. Muck Rack's December 2025 analysis of more than one million links cited by AI found about 94% came from non-paid sources, and earned media alone made up 82%. Press releases also showed up more and more: Muck Rack reported their citations in AI answers grew five-fold in the second half of 2025.

3. Your story, in your words

A press release lets you decide how your news is framed: the facts, the numbers, the quote. When it's published, that framing is what readers and AI encounter first.

4. Search visibility for your name

Published releases on indexed news sites can appear when people search for your business name, giving searchers more trustworthy results about you beyond your own website and review profiles.

5. Content that keeps working

An ad stops the moment you stop paying. A published article stays up, so each release adds to a growing body of coverage that people and AI can find months later.

6. A reason to share

Coverage gives you ready-made content for your newsletter, social media and sales conversations, and a natural reason to reach out to customers and partners.

7. A clear record of your milestones

Launches, new locations, anniversaries, awards and community work all become part of a public, dated record of your business. That consistent history helps AI assistants describe you accurately.

What press releases won't do

They're not a link-building trick. Google's spam policies list "links with optimized anchor text in articles, guest posts, or press releases distributed on other sites" as link spam. Link your business name naturally and move on.
They don't guarantee AI recommendations. Nobody controls what AI says. Coverage improves the evidence AI relies on.
One release isn't a strategy. Visibility builds from steady, real news over months.

How to get the benefits

Write releases that AI and editors can actually use. In the KDD 2024 study on generative engine optimization, adding statistics, quotations and cited sources raised a source's visibility in AI answers by roughly 30-40%. That means real numbers, a named spokesperson and plain, objective language. Then publish on sites that are trusted and indexed.

That's exactly what AImpact's PR campaigns do every month: our team writes the release, you approve it, and we publish it on news sites up to USA Today, TheStreet and Street Insider. Get a free AI visibility check to find your first story.

AImpact Editorial Team

Our team plans and writes press campaigns, builds cloud stacks and runs AI visibility tracking for businesses every month. We check every claim in our articles against the sources listed below.

Sources

Muck Rack (via MarTech Series): Earned Media Still Drives Generative AI Citations as Press Release Visibility Grows, December 2025
Aggarwal et al., "GEO: Generative Engine Optimization" (KDD 2024, arXiv 2311.09735)
Google Search Central: Spam policies for Google web search — link spam in distributed press releases

The benefits of press releases for small businesses (in the age of AI)