Is AI-generated content friend or foe of marketing teams?

It's not just you — we’ve all been inundated by the noise around ChatGPT. Metia research has shown a 295% increase in conversations about AI-generated content over the past 18 months.   

It would be remiss to create a blog on AI-generated content without asking for help from AI. So, I asked ChatGPT to help me explain the role of AI in generating marketing content?  

“AI-generated content can take many forms, from automated social media posts to product descriptions and even entire articles. The key benefit of AI-generated content is its ability to quickly produce high-quality content at scale. For example, an AI-powered content creation tool can write product descriptions for hundreds or even thousands of products in a matter of minutes (ChatGPT).” 

That’s a solid answer on topic ChatGPT should be well placed to describe. Yes, there’s more to be said, considered and reflected upon but a solid answer. Perhaps that’s the point: solid but not great, yet. 

Who is talking about AI? 

Aside from Developers who lead the conversation with 17% but are something of special case in discussing AI, most digital conversations about AI-generated content are being had by non-technical roles such as Marketing Leaders (12%), Education Leaders (9%), Solopreneurs (9%), and Artists and Designers (9%). These audiences represent industries with notoriously stretched bandwidths and limited resources, often primarily spent writing or creating content. ChatGPT and its counterparts are free, easy to understand, and easy to use, enabling quick and widespread adoption.   

A study by Capterra found “45% of marketing professionals spend half of their working week creating content.” That’s nearly 20 hours a week that could be ‘better’ spent developing marketing strategies, analyzing customer data, and making critical decisions that more directly impact the success of a business (ChatGPT). Less time spent working on deliverables has the potential to improve content performance by freeing bandwidth for the high-impact strategic thinking that tends to get pushed aside by deadlines. 

But solid content isn’t inspired, engaging or resonant with the audience’s current topics of conversation, yet. 

Limitations of AI-generated content 

Despite the hype cycle, AI-generated content is not a perfect substitute for content shaped by human insight. Aside from lacking creativity and human touch that comes with content created by a human writer, AI-generated content may also lack the ability to understand the nuance and context of language, which can lead to awkward or inappropriate phrasing (ChatGPT).  

AI models are only as good as the data they are trained on, and with limited ability to parse semantic meaning, AI struggles to create complex and thoughtful writing. Because of this, Google has only recently become more amenable to AI-generated content, despite still prioritizing human subject-matter expertise as a better demonstration of their E-E-A-T principles.  

But AI assistance doesn’t have to mean asking a bot to write your entire blog post. It can mean requesting copy edits, filling in templates for email or newsletter marketing campaigns, or optimizing specific phrasing to improve SEO. Or, as was the case with this article, asking prompts to help organize thoughts and synthesize public knowledge quickly. 

The question all content creators are asking 

I asked ChatGPT should content creators be worried about their jobs? Is this the end of creative writing? 

AI-generated content can help you to automate certain tasks, but it cannot replace the creativity, critical thinking, and strategic planning that are necessary for success in marketing (ChatGPT). 

Next steps for content and AI 

Regardless, artificial intelligence isn’t going away. Nor is it showing any sign of decreasing its relevance to content creators and marketers. Between 2020 and YTD, 70% of digital conversations about AI-generated content have occurred within the past 3 months alone.  

Instead of worrying about AI taking your job, it's important to embrace new technologies and learn how to use them to enhance your skills and capabilities as a marketing professional. Ultimately, AI is a tool that can help you to become a more effective and efficient marketing professional, rather than a threat to your job security (ChatGPT). Practicing now with AI tools, developing a culture that supports ethical AI utilization, and creating workflows that scale at pace with AI development can enable us to collaborate effectively with our artificial co-workers.  

Metia is already working to apply AI in our work running content engines and our audience-focused content resonance programs, if you want to know more get in touch.