Why You Don’t Want 100 AI Blog Posts and Other AI Considerations

At IDS, we stay current on industry trends, with every member of our team following the latest in their areas of expertise. We regularly host company-wide meetings so all departments can come together to discuss topics of interest relative to the prevailing zeitgeist.

The use of artificial intelligence (AI) in digital marketing has become a hot topic of discourse, generating informative and passionate discussions surrounding its usage and implications.

The Rise of AI

When ChatGPT was launched in November 2022, the large language model-based AI chatbot immediately caught the attention of the masses.

Within weeks, consumers began sharing their experiences with ChatGPT, with accounts spanning the spectrum of possibilities, from increasing productivity at work to generating health and wellness routines and everything in between. The sudden influx of AI-generated applications started reshaping how businesses operate, affording companies numerous financial and productivity benefits, while creating exciting discussions about how the technology could continue augmenting human work for the foreseeable future.

In the first few months of its existence, ChatGPT has shown us its value as a gateway to endless online information, offering users a platform for piloting new tools, creating content faster and more efficiently, providing a boost for coders, and even diagnosing a child’s chronic disease when doctors were otherwise stumped. The tool’s performance thus far is a testament to its incredible computing power.

The positive possibilities seemed endless, with ChatGPT regarded as an overnight success. That is until more users began sharing their experiences with the tool, and its widespread use started conversations that conveyed an increasing number of clearer and, quite frankly, scarier considerations. These concerns caused a wave of panic about how this new technology could impact labor displacement in virtually every industry, fuel a maelstrom of misinformation, and set the stage for cyberattacks and fraud. Now, seemingly, hardly a day goes by without someone expressing concerns about AI taking over the world.

Common Questions We Are Asked About AI

In recent meetings at IDS, we’ve discussed how clients have been approaching our team members with questions about the use of AI, and we’re answering those queries in this blog, from the benefits of AI in digital marketing to why you don’t want 100 AI-generated blog posts.

What is artificial intelligence, and how does it work?

Artificial intelligence is a technology that utilizes computer science and datasets to perform functions normally associated with human intelligence. As Encyclopedia Britannica defines it:

“Artificial intelligence is the ability of a digital computer or computer-controlled robot to perform tasks commonly associated with intelligent beings. The term is frequently applied to the project of developing systems endowed with the intellectual processes characteristic of humans, such as the ability to reason, discover meaning, generalize, or learn from past experience.”

AI tools like ChatGPT enable users to interact with the chatbot conversationally, with the interface generating content based on length, format, style, level of detail, and language prompts from the user.

ChatGPT is hardly alone as an AI chatbot. Since its release, several other generative artificial intelligence chatbot technologies have also been developed and released, each with unique functions, capabilities, and datasets.

How can AI benefit my franchise, business or organization?

AI offers a myriad of advantages to businesses, including the ability to make more accurate, data-driven decisions; provide efficiency, productivity, and profitability gains; improve services; increase the speed of business; fuel innovation and expansion efforts; create personalized customer services and experiences; enhance monitoring capabilities; reduce human errors; better manage talent; offer industry-specific improvements, and more.

Does your digital marketing agency use AI?

Yes! We believe in being transparent in our methods, and most of us interact with AI every day. Departments across the company use AI tools to better analyze our clients’ data and provide them with impactful and integrated strategies to improve their performance.

Here are some of the ways our team uses AI in the workplace:

• Generate outlines and provide a framework
• Correct grammatical and spelling errors
• Rewrite existing copy
• Improve content
• Generate brand enhancement and content ideas
• Create SEO, PPC, and social media updates and recommendations
• Edit emails, help answer basic questions, and find ways to word tricky conversations
• Create Google Sheets and template documents
• Create Google Business Profile descriptions
• Construct initial email proposals
• Research and blend thoughts
• Create summaries for longer content
• Fix small bits of code
• Generate new reporting, prospecting, and researching companies and technology
• Summarize YouTube videos, create new images, and scan for news
• Conduct keyword research on prospecting websites
• Make the tone of writing coherent, perform topic ideation, and facilitate the refinement of initially constructed sentences
• Source information on a specific topic

But what about my content?

The content team employs a conservative approach in utilizing AI tools, as we believe that the best content is human-generated content. Through thorough research and testing, we’ve found processes that can be improved with AI and use it sparingly. We are big believers that humans are still very much integral to the process of creating engaging, accurate, and valuable content for your audience, so our agency never uses content that is 100% AI-generated.

How can we use this?

AI can be used to enhance employee productivity, time management, and task automation. The suitability of AI for your specific situation depends on several factors, like the type of content, quality and context requirements, and project goals. AI-generated content can be used in a variety of ways, including blog posts, articles, product descriptions, or social media posts.

Here are some applications where AI-generated content excels: structured data and reports, natural language generation, translation, chatbots and virtual assistants, data analysis and insights, repetitive tasks, and multilingual content.

Why wouldn’t someone want to use AI?

While AI offers many potential benefits, it also comes with a unique set of challenges and concerns. Some reasons why someone might hesitate to use AI include privacy concerns, bias and fairness considerations, lack of transparency, job displacement, ethical concerns, technical limitations, cost and resource constraints, security risks, regulatory and legal issues, and resistance to change.

It’s important to note that these concerns don’t apply universally to all AI applications, as the appropriateness of using these tools depends on the specific use case. If you employ AI, you’ll need to address these concerns through responsible AI development and deployment practices. We have experienced instances where clients do not want AI-generated content published on their websites and we respect their decision.

Can’t you just generate 100 franchise marketing blog posts and add them to our site?

Well, yes – in theory – but also no. While AI-generated content can be a useful tool to augment your content strategy, it shouldn’t be the sole source of your blog posts. The best approach to adopting these tools is finding a balance that combines AI assistance with human creativity, expertise, and quality control.

Here are ten reasons why you don’t want 100 AI-generated blog posts:

1. It’s not very nuanced. We know and understand our clients’ preferences better than computers do and craft content tailored to your specific audience. AI tools may only partially capture the nuances of certain topics, leading to shallow or incorrect interpretations. Human writers genuinely captivate readers by creating relatable content that speaks to their audience’s needs, concerns, and interests.
2. It can damage your brand image and trust. Relying too heavily on AI-generated content can affect your brand’s image and trustworthiness if readers perceive your content as low-quality, impersonal, or robotic.
3. It lacks creativity. AI-generated content is constrained by algorithms and data and often lacks the creative spark and unique perspective human writers bring to their work. AI tools may struggle to provide fresh perspectives, opinions, or creative insights on a topic, resulting in bland and repetitive content that fails to engage readers.
4. There are issues with sources and inaccuracies. AI tools are not infallible and can produce inaccurate or information that is not current, whereas human writers can ensure the accuracy of their content by fact-checking and verifying information. Sourced information in AI can be outdated as tools may only have a knowledge base up to 2021, or may exclude sources altogether for statistical data.
5. It can generate unoriginal content. Sometimes, AI tools can inadvertently replicate existing content on the internet, leading to issues with plagiarism and duplicate content. This can harm your website’s SEO and reputation.
6. It can affect your SEO. With the Helpful Content Update, Google increasingly prioritizes and rewards high-quality, original, and authoritative content (more on that below). AI-generated content may not meet these criteria and potentially impact your website’s search engine ranking.
7. There are ethical concerns to consider. Not everyone embraces AI-generated content, and using AI to create content without proper attribution or disclosure may raise ethical issues, as readers may not be aware that the content is machine-generated.
8. It might not be current. AI tools might not always produce content that’s up-to-date or relevant to current events and trends. Human writers can adapt and respond to changing circumstances more effectively.
9. It requires editing and polishing. AI-generated content can feel robotic and disengage the audience and, as a result, require significant editing and revision to meet quality standards. Human writers can provide content with a personal touch, a relatable human voice, and closer to the desired final product.
10. It takes time. While the process of generating content with AI is relatively quick, the time you’ll spend reviewing 100 blogs defeats any efficiency and productivity benefits. Plus, realistically, who has the time?

Can AI-generated content replace human writers entirely, or is there a need for human involvement in the content creation process?

AI cannot replace our writers, but, instead, can enhance their abilities and efforts. Combining AI-generated content with human insight and creativity can often yield the best results, striking a balance between efficiency and quality while maintaining ethical standards and authenticity.

As one IDS team member put it, “The key is to maintain a human touch. As long as we shape what AI produces into something meaningful for our audiences, these technologies can help us spread ideas and touch people's lives. AI may quicken the process, but human empathy, purpose, and compassion will always be irreplaceable ingredients in content that truly matters.”

With the ability to instantly generate ideas, we can create content and drive progress faster than ever before. AI is only as smart as you make it though; it’s important to develop very specific prompts when working with AI to ensure the most effective outcome.

Can you trust AI’s marketing tools?

Trust in AI tools is a complex and multifaceted issue that depends on various factors. It's important to critically evaluate AI tools based on their transparency, data, algorithms, ethical considerations, and the context in which they are being applied. Building trust in AI requires a multidisciplinary approach involving technology, ethics, regulation, and education. More and more articles note when an article is AI-generated and whether or not human editors have reviewed it. This bolsters transparency and can make your site more credible.

One important element to consider when publishing AI-generated content is that it is never truly yours and, therefore, cannot be copyrighted. Many organizations can’t use AI because they can’t be licensed or copyrighted with content that AI generates.

While AI can do much for our clients, it cannot produce what humans can. AI should support your digital advertising strategy, not be your entire strategy. At the end of the day, you want an expert team like IDS to help you understand the impact of AI on franchise digital marketing.

Are you interested in learning more about how IDS can help your franchise business navigate AI in digital marketing? Get in touch with a member of our team today!