How Ruder Finn Atteline added AI visibility to its client services with HeyAmos

Customer: Ruder Finn Atteline, the MENA arm of Ruder Finn, an integrated communications agency and HeyAmos partner.
Stakeholder: Samar Saliba, SVP of Growth
Focus: MENA (Middle East and North Africa)

The agency and the challenge

Ruder Finn Atteline is the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) arm of Ruder Finn, a global agency based in New York.

It is an integrated communications agency covering PR, content, thought leadership, influencer marketing, social media and digital, for brands in finance, automotive, entertainment and fashion.

A big part of the agency's work is knowing where each client's audience gets its information. In the region, most people now go to ChatGPT.

Samar Saliba, SVP of Growth at Ruder Finn Atteline, explains why that matters:

"What's the point of putting out a press release into the ether or working with whatever influencer if our audiences are not there?"

Ruder Finn had followed AI search for a couple of years. The MENA team now needed a way to offer it to clients.

Why Ruder Finn Atteline picked HeyAmos

Samar leads the agency's Tech Lab in MENA, which brings research, data and analytics to clients.

Her team's task was to find the right partner and the right way of working. As Samar puts it:

"When it came to the nitty-gritty and really making sure that we could deliver the best offering for our clients, it came down to expertise, finding the right platform."

AI search changes often, so the agency has to track it regularly. Samar says:

"So that was really important for us as an agency, making sure that the partner that we work with were able to get data quickly and in a very user-friendly way so anyone could understand it easily and advise our clients."

HeyAmos goes well beyond tracking what AI tools say about a brand and which sources they cite. Every week it shows the agency what changed and why, recommends the actions to take next, and measures the impact of the actions already taken.

Agencies can also run detailed audits on a client's brand, and generate a full AI visibility audit for a pitch in one click.

Ruder Finn Atteline uses this workflow to plan its PR, content, social media and influencer work.

In HeyAmos's view, PR agencies are well placed for this, because earned media, consistent messaging and influencer content all affect what AI says about a brand.

How they rolled it out

The first step was training the team. Samar says the platform made that straightforward: "I would say HeyAmos is quite user friendly."

The team learned the main features first. Samar's favourite is the main dashboard page, which shows what changed and why.

With the team trained, the agency made AI visibility part of its integrated offer, next to PR, social media and influencer work.

For each client, the agency audits the sources AI tools cite about the brand and sorts them into owned, shared and earned media.

For one large client in the region, the audit showed two things.

• Missing outlets. Many of the titles, editors and platforms that AI tools cited were not in the client's media plan. They now need to be in it.
• Different content. Most of the cited content was reviews and comparisons, which the client would not usually have focused on. The agency changed its communications strategy to include more of this content.

After the audit, the team checks every week what has changed for each client and why. Samar explains:

"So being able to see at a glance what's changed over the past week is extremely helpful because then we're able to give live updates to our clients."

For example, the team can tell a client that a prompt got more attention over the past week, or that a type of content improved results.

Samar says a big chunk of her job is now her work with HeyAmos.

How clients responded

Samar says client reaction has been strong:

"The rollout has been fantastic. I would say 99% of our clients have been deeply interested. It's firmly on their radar."

Clients look to the agency to explain how AI tools work and how AI search fits with the work the agency already does for them.

They also find the audit patterns interesting. For example, does AI link the brand to its key messages, such as luxury and comfort, or to something else?

HeyAmos showed the team how AI tools turn a customer's question into an answer, and the agency now walks clients through the same steps. Clients do not need to be technical to follow it, whether or not they have their own data teams.

"Explaining to our clients how the tech works is so helpful," says Samar.

Selling AI visibility to clients

AI visibility is now one of the services Ruder Finn Atteline offers, delivered with HeyAmos, and it has helped the agency win business.

When the agency starts with a client, it makes the case directly: AI search has to be part of the strategy.

Samar says the agency could not do its job as communications consultants without checking how AI tools see the brand.

Clients have questions, because this is a new field. The agency answers them openly.

As Samar puts it, "We approach it in a very transparent and genuine way."

The service also gives PR a bigger role. AI tools draw heavily on earned media, which is PR's core work.

A few years ago, PR teams were often brought in at the last minute. Samar says AI search now gives them "even more gravitas".

What's next

Clients get weekly updates on what changed and why, so the team can adjust strategy quickly.

AI tools change every day, so the team keeps learning.

Next, Samar is watching how ads in AI tools will affect the industry, and whether paywalled media will open their content to AI tools.

"We're all about speed here. We have to know quickly what's changing."
Samar Saliba, SVP of Growth, Ruder Finn Atteline