There are more than 4.9 billion internet users worldwide, and many businesses are leveraging this by adding blogs to their websites. Blogging helps drive traffic to your site and build customer trust while promoting your services and products. The content you produce on your website can also be used in your social media marketing efforts.
However, having a blog also means hiring writers to write the content for you, especially if you are too busy focusing on other parts of your business. Thankfully, in this day and age of technology, artificial intelligence (AI) tools have been introduced to assist business owners in growing their business without needing to hire an extra team member. One of these tools is an AI content writer.
But is it worth it to use an AI content writer, or is hiring a human writer still the better option? Let’s find out!
What Is AI Content Writing?
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AI content writing is a method of writing that uses artificial intelligence to generate various content pieces based on user input.
The AI utilizes algorithms and natural language processes (NLP) to craft content according to your chosen parameters. These parameters include length, tone, keywords and key phrases for SEO purposes, and other factors that allow the AI to produce the output you’re expecting. All these functions run thanks to activation functions that help the neural networks activate and the AI model recognize different data patterns. Once it has all the necessary information from you, it will research different blogs, articles, and websites as a part of its content writing process.
As a result, you’ll get factually-based and unbiased content since the AI won’t have any personal opinion on a given topic. Apart from that, the plagiarism checker algorithms will also check the content for plagiarism and correct any spelling or grammar errors while determining the readability level of the content. Once the writing is done, you can still edit and polish the content before publishing it.
AI content writing doesn’t only involve blogs. Now, some tools allow you to generate different content types, including landing pages, product descriptions, social media captions, and other marketing copies.
Why Use AI for Content Writing?
AI writing tools like Shopia and Ask Writer offer numerous benefits to business owners. While relying on a machine for a human’s work may sound odd, AI content writers can deliver and do the job well. They can produce more content in less time compared to human writers. Thanks to NLP and algorithms, they can research the web quicker.
This is perfect for marketers and anyone else who needs to create vast amounts of content in a short period. So, if you have a lot on your plate right now and need to pump out content fast on your blog, it can be a good idea to get yourself an AI writer.
Source: Screenshot by Chris Bournelis Plenty of templates to choose from!
Plus, they don’t need rest as we do, so you can let them work for 24 hours straight without feeling guilty about overworking your team members. Instead, you can organize meetings on your Virto calendar for brainstorming and team building activities, which will result in more productivity.
Since you can set keywords and topics for the AI, they are perfect for your SEO strategy. You have to input the keywords you want to target and let them do their magic. Some tools even allow you to input the article’s intent, giving you more powerful, relevant, and relatable content.
At the same time, writers can also benefit from AI content writing. Sounds counterintuitive, right? But since AI writers can generate topic ideas, keywords, and other recommendations, they can make the writing job more manageable. For example, if you feel like you can’t think of a new topic for a blog or need help with copywriting, the AI content writer can generate a content structure for you, giving you that push you need.
Lastly, AI content writing is ideal for small business owners who don’t have enough budget to hire new team members. It frees up your time and allows you to focus on more critical aspects of your business while having a content arm to support your marketing needs.
Is AI Content Writing Worth It?
Well, that depends on where you intend to use it. Do you value quality or quantity when it comes to your content? If you value the latter, it will be highly worth it. It can provide you with many blogs and other marketing copies in record time without relying on another person’s schedule.
But if you value the former, in my opinion, it is still valuable but depends on how you use it. Unfortunately, even with all the algorithms and advanced technology, it will still be unable to provide you with high-quality long-form content.
Yes, the quantity of content they can produce can help your SEO, helping you rank in search engines. But internet marketers (and even people from the general public!) can often spot AI-generated content easily because of its redundancy and lack of human touch, which may throw off your target audience and lack trust.
Blogs or other marketing-related copies should represent your brand, helping you build relationships and trust with your customers. While you can use a logo generator or the help of a designer to add visual elements, it’s still crucial to share relevant content to improve audience engagement.
If they feel that your messaging seems robotic and transactional, they become skeptical of doing business with a company. A study published in Corporate Communications And International Journal says that customers are more engaged with brands that include a human touch in their content.
So, what exactly is a human touch in content?
Source: Screenshot by Chris Bournelis Have a tone of voice for anyone you want!
When humans write web content, they write with passion, humor, and emotion. Even though AIs can be an expert in a subject in a matter of hours, they can never share the same wit and emotion we humans have. There’s still no technology that can replace that.
Apart from the human touch, what makes AI-generated content subpar quality is accuracy. If you’ve ever tried using AI content writing tools or read content written by an AI, you can see that it lacks the natural flow.
Sure, they can produce unique content that’s free from plagiarism. They can also be unbiased and well-researched. Most of the time, their content is repetitive and senseless. Some paragraphs talk about the same idea, only reworded with different variations.
But maybe, as technology advances, we can see better AI-generated content. But for now, it’s still not worth it if you are looking for high-quality content for your business.
Will AI Content Writing Be the Next Big Thing?
According to World Economic Forum research, AI will eliminate 85 million jobs by 2025 and introduce 97 million new ones.
Will content writing be one of the eliminated ones? The good news for us as bloggers is not yet. AI may be powerful enough to create content for you faster than any human can, but it still lacks the substance and “human touch” that many readers are looking for in long-form content in particular.
While it can’t replace human writers, it can definitely help many businesses with their digital marketing efforts.
Author Bio:
Chris Bournelis is a writer and marketing consultant. With 5+ years of digital marketing experience, he’s passionate about leveraging the right strategic partnerships, content, and software to scale digital growth. Chris writes about how to blog like a business on his website.