As AI-driven content is making headlines, one of the most popular questions out there is, “When are we all going to be replaced by machines?”
In fact, no matter how skeptical you may be, we are still witnessing the very beginning of that future, and AI is already scary good at completing some of the human tasks, even creative ones, like writing.
How can content marketers adjust to this fast developing trend?
AI can write “better than average” content
AI-generated content is still in its infancy. In fact, most of us started seriously discussing it only in late 2022 as the first iteration of ChatGPT became public. Merely three months later, ChatGPT is producing content of unquestionable quality. It writes better essays than college students which means that it can quickly produce content better than average web content for free.
But content quality is not about reading levels or proper Grammar structures. It is much more than that.
While ChatGPT can (and will) become even better and smarter, it will never produce human content for one single reason: It doesn’t have personality, in a sense that it cannot rely on personal experience, personal expertise and personal opinion.
AI is only as good as the data it was trained on. It can only repurpose already existing knowledge, albeit smartly. It cannot add anything essentially new to the web.
Human writers can.
Reading and writing critically and creatively remains key to producing impactful content, being known and establishing your authority.
If there’s one important lesson Covid taught us, it’s that human beings prefer human beings. Regardless of all the technology that came to help during lockdown months, people were eager to risk to see and talk to people.
And we will also value human writing above all, for the same reason.
ChatGPT can write. It cannot teach us to think.
That is not to say, you need to ignore ChatGPT if you are a writer, a blogger or journalist… which brings us to the next point:
AI can make your writing more productive
This is becoming a cliche saying by now but here you go again: AI is not going to replace you but someone using AI will.
AI can make you a much more productive writer:
- Research keywords
- Create content outlines and briefs
- Structure your content with HTML subheadings
- Ask for trusted sources
- Identify what is missing in your listicles or step-by-step instructions
- Create scripts for videos and podcasts
- Generate video descriptions
- Create content summaries and takeaways
- Get help writing an effective introduction or conclusion…
The opportunities are almost limitless. Here is ChatGPT breaking an existing article into sections using HTML subheadings and even providing an HTML output:
Don’t forget that ChatGPT is only as good as your prompt, so don’t take your request lightly. For example, you can ask it to write an intro to an article on a topic or you can prompts it to write an effective and engaging intro to your article:
Another AI-driven content marketing platform, Narrato, allows you to create content briefs based on a single keyword. Just put in your main keyword and (optionally) select your area you are focusing on:
You can edit any of the suggested sections, keywords and references and hand it to your team right away!
And let’s not forget about those genius AI integrations that open up even more opportunities for writers. One of the most exciting ones is Text Optimizer that married AI with its semantic analysis. As a result, you get a well-optimized copy you can use as a summary for your content that is semantically optimized to your core topic:
AI can actually be surprisingly creative
Historically, creativity has been considered an exclusively human trait.
Our ability to create beautiful things, and more importantly imagine them, is what makes us human.
Well, I hate breaking it to you, but AI has that trait as well. It can be amazingly creative. There are multiple examples and stories about that, and some of them are actually hard to believe.
One of my favorite examples is this woman who asked ChatGPT to write a letter to her kid explaining that Santa wasn’t real. The result is unbelievably touching to the point you cannot believe a machine could have come up with it:
So ChatGPT is smart and creative. It is not (and will never be) human but it can change the way you do things, for the better.
Conclusion
The world is divided in two parties these days: Those that are skeptical about ChatGPT and those that spend days and weeks playing with it. Regardless of which side you belong to, you need to be paying attention to AI and how it is developing. There’s no ignoring this trend that’s going to be our future.
Creating impactful content that will build brand awareness is much more than writing a good copy. AI is not going to replace a talented writer but it can sure make them more efficient and allow to focus more on creativity.
And it’s not just about writing, of course. AI us touching every bit of our industry. You can use it for customer support (IVR), search (conversational search), marketing personalization, business naming (Namify), accessibility and usability optimization, etc. Keeping an eye on emerging technology is key to creating an effective digital marketing strategy.
Image: Depositphotos
This article, “Artificial Intelligence for Content Marketing: It May Not Be a Matter of a Choice” was first published on Small Business Trends