Expert commentary should be one of the most valuable parts of a press release.
It gives journalists additional context, demonstrates genuine expertise and helps turn a collection of facts or data into a meaningful story.
Yet many expert quotes do little more than repeat the headline.
They confirm what the journalist has already been told, describe an obvious trend as “increasingly popular” or add a vague sentence about why businesses should pay attention.
The quote might sound credible, but it does not actually say anything.
From a digital PR perspective, this is a missed opportunity. A strong expert quote should not simply decorate a press release. It should make the story more useful, provide a journalist with a new angle and establish why the person or brand commenting deserves to be part of the conversation.
What does a generic expert quote look like?
Generic expert quotes often sound professional at first glance. The problem is that they could have been attributed to almost anyone.
They tend to include statements such as: “This trend is becoming increasingly popular, and we expect more people to take advantage of it in the future.” or “These findings demonstrate how important it is for businesses to stay aware of changing consumer behaviour.”
Neither quote is necessarily incorrect. However, neither adds information that could not already be inferred from the story and it doesn’t give the journalist anything of value to add to their story. A strong relationship with a journalist may help your expert quote be seen, but it won’t make weak commentary worth using. In digital PR, success isn’t just about who you know. It’s about how you approach the story and the value you can add.
If a press release reveals that searches for a particular product have increased, a quote confirming that the product has become more popular is simply repeating the finding.
Journalists do not need an expert to describe the data back to them. They need the expert to interpret it.
A quote should move the story forward
Before including any expert commentary, ask one simple question:
What does this quote add that is not already contained elsewhere in the press release?
A useful quote should give the journalist at least one additional reason to include it in their coverage.
It might explain:
- Why the trend is happening
- What has recently changed
- What people commonly misunderstand
- What the data does not immediately reveal
- What is likely to happen next
- What action readers should take
- What risks or opportunities are being overlooked
This is the difference between commenting on a story and contributing to it.
For example, imagine a campaign showing an increase in searches for last-minute holidays.
A generic quote might say: “Last-minute holidays are becoming increasingly popular as more people look for flexible and affordable ways to travel.”
A more useful expert quote could say: “The increase in last-minute searches is not necessarily being driven by spontaneous travellers. Many holidaymakers are delaying bookings because they are uncertain about prices, flight disruption and household spending. That means travel brands may need to provide greater reassurance around flexibility and cancellation policies, rather than relying solely on late discounts.”
The second quote explains the possible motivation behind the behaviour, challenges an easy assumption and gives businesses something practical to consider.
It earns its place in the story.
Explain why something is happening
Data can tell us what is happening, but it does not always tell us why.
This is where genuine expertise becomes valuable.
An expert may be able to connect a trend to changing regulations, seasonal behaviour, economic pressure, new technology or shifts within a particular industry.
Rather than saying: “More businesses are investing in cybersecurity.”
An expert could explain: “Cybersecurity investment is increasing partly because businesses are becoming more dependent on external platforms, cloud services and third-party suppliers. This creates a wider network of potential vulnerabilities, meaning organisations are no longer only responsible for securing their own internal systems.”
The improved version provides context that strengthens the story and makes the expert’s knowledge visible.
Challenge what people are getting wrong
Some of the strongest expert commentary questions the obvious interpretation of a story.
Journalists are often interested in the gap between public perception and professional reality. If your expert can highlight a misconception, the quote immediately becomes more distinctive.
This might involve explaining why:
- A popular solution does not address the real problem
- A commonly quoted statistic is being misinterpreted
- Consumers are focusing on the wrong risk
- An industry trend is more complicated than it first appears
- Conventional advice no longer reflects current behaviour
For example: “Although many businesses assume a technical SEO audit is a one-off project, websites are constantly changing. New templates, plugins, redirects and content can introduce fresh issues, so technical performance needs to be monitored rather than treated as a completed task.”
This does more than confirm that technical SEO is important. It corrects a misunderstanding and explains why the misconception matters.
Show what has changed
Words such as “growing,” “changing” and “evolving” regularly appear in expert quotes without any explanation of what the change actually involves.
A better quote identifies the specific shift.
Has customer behaviour changed? Has a new platform affected the market? Are people making decisions differently? Has a previously effective tactic become less reliable?
Specificity creates authority.
If we compare “The digital PR landscape is constantly evolving” with “digital PR campaigns are increasingly expected to do more than generate links. Brands are also looking at how expert mentions, third-party coverage and consistent subject knowledge can support their visibility across traditional search, AI-generated answers and wider online research.”
The second version tells the reader what the evolution looks like and why it matters.
Tell the reader what happens next
Predictions can strengthen expert commentary, provided they are grounded in experience rather than vague speculation.
Phrases such as “this trend will continue” rarely add much. Instead, the expert should explain what the trend could lead to.
A useful forward-looking quote might address:
- How businesses will need to adapt
- Which groups are likely to be affected
- What the next stage of the trend could look like
- What could slow or reverse the change
- Which consequences have not yet received much attention
This gives the journalist a future-facing angle and may make the commentary relevant beyond the immediate campaign.
Give people something practical to do
Expert commentary can also turn awareness into action.
If a press release identifies a risk, problem or behavioural change, the quote can explain what readers should do with that information.
However, this advice needs to be specific.
“Businesses should review their strategy” is not particularly useful. What should they review? What should they look for? What is the first step?
A stronger quote might say: “Businesses should begin by identifying which pages generate the most revenue or enquiries before prioritising technical fixes. Resolving every issue in a crawl is not always realistic, so teams need to focus first on problems affecting their most commercially important areas.”
This advice demonstrates expertise because it shows how the expert approaches the issue in practice.
Expert quotes should sound like experts
It might sound obvious, but an expert quote should contain something that only an informed person could confidently say.
That does not mean filling it with technical language. In fact, the strongest commentary often makes a complicated subject easier to understand.
The aim is not to make the expert sound clever. It is to make their knowledge useful.
To achieve this, avoid quotes that:
- Could apply to almost any industry
- Repeat the campaign headline
- Simply describe a statistic
- Rely on vague predictions
- Include promotional claims about the business
- Contain so much jargon that the meaning is lost
- Try to cover several unrelated points at once
A quote should also sound natural when read aloud. If it feels like a paragraph from a corporate report, a journalist is less likely to use it unchanged.
The value goes beyond the press release
Strong expert commentary is not only useful for earning media coverage.
It can also help build a consistent association between a brand and the subjects it wants to be known for.
When an expert regularly provides informed commentary on a defined group of topics, they begin to create a recognisable area of authority. Journalists know what they can approach that person about. Potential customers can see evidence of their knowledge. The brand develops a clearer and more credible voice.
This can also support the organisation’s wider SEO and content strategy.
Expert commentary should reinforce the same core topics covered across the brand’s website, thought leadership, guides, case studies and media activity. Each quote becomes another opportunity to demonstrate experience and subject knowledge.
This does not mean inserting keywords unnaturally or forcing a product mention into every comment. It means being intentional about the areas in which the brand wants to develop genuine authority.
An expert in financial technology, for example, will build a stronger position by consistently contributing detailed insights on payment security, fraud prevention and consumer trust than by commenting superficially on every technology story.
Treat your experts as positioning assets
Experts should not be brought into a campaign at the final stage simply because the press release needs a quote.
Their knowledge should help shape the story from the beginning.
They may be able to identify:
- A more interesting interpretation of the data
- A caveat that needs to be included
- An emerging issue the campaign has overlooked
- A stronger angle for a particular publication
- A practical recommendation for the reader
- A claim that does not reflect how the industry actually works
Involving experts earlier can improve both the accuracy and originality of the campaign.
It also allows the PR team to build a bank of useful commentary that can be adapted for reactive media opportunities, interviews, articles and future campaigns.
A simple framework for stronger expert quotes
Before approving a quote, check whether it answers at least one of these questions:
- Why is this happening?
- What are people getting wrong?
- What has changed?
- What does the data not tell us?
- What is likely to happen next?
- What should the reader do now?
- Why is this expert particularly qualified to comment?
It does not need to answer all seven. Trying to include too much can make the quote unwieldy.
One clear, useful insight is far more valuable than several sentences of generic commentary.
Make every quote earn its place
Expert commentary should not be included simply because press releases are expected to contain a quote.
It should deepen the story.
A strong quote helps the journalist understand the significance of the information, gives the reader something they would not have known otherwise and demonstrates the expert’s authority without relying on promotional language.
The next time an expert says that a trend is “becoming increasingly popular,” ask them what is driving that popularity, what people are overlooking and what it means in practice.
That is where the real story usually begins.
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