The future is here. There are already a number of software companies offering to solve your content marketing problems at the click of a mouse, and arguing that their artificial intelligence (AI) content-production products will improve content creation and performance.
Could it be that this is the answer to a marketer’s budgeting dreams? Is this the stuff of nightmares for writers and content producers? Let’s see …
What is AI content production?
When we talk about AI content production, we’re speaking of software tools that can create written, audio and video content.
That’s right, these days software can produce a blog at the click of a button, write an email or even create a video with sound.
How does it work?
Content-producing software requires that a person inputs a set of guidelines on subject matter and target audience, and prompts on tone, length and so on, and then, in seconds, creates what’s been requested. Often, however, a human writer will have to go over the content that has been created and, well, add a human touch.
Content-creation AI uses natural language processing and natural language generation models that “learn” the cadences of human language, using these models to create content that sounds like a person has written or created it. And, yes, already this software is scarily accurate.
AI software can also help human writers or video producers identify what to write about, who the content should be pitched at and what tone to use – great for a case of writer’s block! The data they can collate can help marketers decide when to send emails or post advertisements.
One of the great powers of AI software is that it can be used to crunch data far faster than you or I can. AI content-creation software can help marketers decide on topics by trawling through the many, many articles and other pieces of content on your particular topic that are available on the internet and identifying what works best, or what gaps there are available for a marketer to exploit.
Content-creation software can create blogs, articles, social media posts, videos and other forms of content that are better and more comprehensive than can be created by humans, so that you give your audience the information they need, thus building trust and credibility.
The end of the human writer?
Not so fast on thinking that this means human writers will lose their jobs. According to the website Will Robots Take My Job?, writers, editors and graphic designers should not yet be planning career changes.
The website projects there is only an 8% chance that writers will lose their jobs to software, a 7% chance for editors and a 4% automation risk for graphic designers.
This is because people have emotional and mental advantages that software doesn’t have, yet – empathy, sympathy and creativity. AI can produce content with title suggestions and writing and visual prompts, but there still has to be a creative human brain at work to produce content that will effectively connect with other humans.
“This is going to be a continuously moving target, but for the time being, what AI can’t do well is use emotional intelligence, understand situational context, make judgement calls, and generally see nuance and meaning like we do,” Kate O’Neill, author of Tech Humanist and founder of strategic advisory firm KO Insights, told HubSpot.
“That means any kind of job that benefits from these kinds of human attributes is better off done by a human. A computer or robot may assist you in performing efficiently, but for now, you’re the one who adds the expertise on how to perform appropriately,” she added.
For now, anyway.
AI content-generation software is great for creating generic content, as well as personalising email newsletters, and useful for predicting when best to send email marketing so that it has the greatest chance of being opened. It empowers marketing in ways humans just cannot.
How to use AI-generated content
One thing is certain – AI-generated content will become increasingly ubiquitous. For now, however, it is just an aid that can help content creators and marketers to produce content in large quantities, and quickly.
AI content software is best used to quickly personalise content, and to better understand individual customers, so that the information you send them best suits their interests and preferences. This should lead to better engagement and lead-generation.
The software can also be used to quickly create a lot of data-specific content, although you might need a human hand (and brain) to take what is produced and finesse it. If you want to provide data-heavy information such as brief statistical reports, news updates and notifications for personal messaging apps, then AI is your go-to guy.
(Image: Arif Riyanto (Unsplash))
AI can also produce valuable insights and prompts that can spark human creativity, helping writers, designers and video producers to provide an enhanced customer experience by coming up with fresh topics and providing information that people need and want. It can help people create content that is search engine optimised, curate user-generated content (such as via social media platforms), track sales leads, and improve social media performance by “going beyond demographics” to home in on an individual’s particular preferences, sentiments and behaviours.
Up to us
All of this is likely exciting to marketers, and unsettling to writers, graphic designers and other content producers. Perhaps we should end with the words of Kai-Fu Lee, an AI investor who used to be Google’s top executive in China: “Whether we point at a future that is utopia or dystopia, if everybody believes in it, then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. I’d like to be part of that force which points toward a utopian direction, even though I fully recognise the possibility and risks of the negative ending.”