Let’s be honest. Coming up with new content ideas day after day can drain even the most creative person faster than a smartphone battery scrolling Instagram. Creating fresh content for your brand’s digital assets is time-consuming (and quite frankly exhausting). You feel pressured to perform because you know the benefits of producing consistent high-quality content. Stop posting for even a few days, and the Almighty Algorithm punishes you for your insolence by downgrading your content in search results. AI content creation tools can help alleviate that stress. I’m not suggesting you use AI to generate new posts for you. As we learned in our last blog about best practices for AI content creation, you must review, edit, and customize the output before it meets the high standards for your brand. There’s a better way to use AI to reduce the time you spend creating content. Refreshing and reusing existing content is a task at which AI excels. Some of the ways AI can breathe new life into old content include:
Revive your best stories: turn top blogs into social media postsYou’ve probably figured out by now that your social media audience prefers a different style of content than visitors to your blog. Shorter, punchier posts tend to perform better on social. One of the easiest ways to repurpose in-depth content from your blog is to turn it into bite-sized chunks of compelling copy for your social accounts. Here’s where AI content creation tools come in handy. Pick the AI content generator you prefer and upload your blog post in its entirety (for the best results). Then, create a prompt that details how you want to use that information to create smaller social media posts. Get specific, right down to the tone of voice you want to use and the purpose of the content (drive more website traffic, generate more leads). Take it one step further by asking AI to generate attention-grabbing captions or questions for polls and quizzes to accompany your posts when appropriate. Adding polls and quizzes is an effective way to boost engagement. Blogs to social media carouselsBlogs with multiple talking points make excellent social media carousels. Visually pleasing carousels draw people in. Once they’ve found your post, you can impart the same wisdom from your blog in a more palatable format for social media scrollers. Remember not to put too much text on each carousel slide. Likewise, creating a 60-page carousel is overkill. Limit it to 8 to 10 pages maximum for the best results. A note of caution: never upload content that contains sensitive information about your organization or its customers to AI tools. Everything you feed to AI is stored in its database for reference later. You can get yourself in hot water if you overshare after signing a non-disclosure agreement. Repackage podcast gems: turn audio insights into viral blog wisdomAccording to the Pew Research Center, 42% of Americans over the age of 12 listen to at least one podcast a month. That’s a marked increase from the 12% who tuned in just one decade ago. It’s not difficult to see the allure. Podcasts are an engaging, amusing way to pass the time. You can use them to learn new information or explore topics in depth. They’re also an effective way to create a sense of community among your brand loyalists who feel connected to the podcast host and each other. If your small business has invested in producing a podcast, you can easily take episodes and turn them into blogs. Several AI tools specialize in performing this task. You’ll want to do some fine-tuning to the output to add links, images, section headers, and other elements that make blogs more engaging. Consider adding an introduction and conclusion in your brand voice to add some personality to the piece. Bring your content to life: transform written insights into viral visualsSocial media is the perfect opportunity to pack your content into snackable visual media bites. You don’t have to be a skilled graphic artist to take data from blogs, case studies, and even podcasts and turn it into an appealing chart, diagram, or other graphic. AI tools such as Adobe Creative Express, Midjourney, and Dall-E 2 can take text prompts and turn them into eye-catching social graphics, quotes, and charts. The image that accompanies this section was generated by using Adobe’s text-to-image generating software. For instance, a key statistic from a podcast episode can become a colorful infographic that educates and engages your audience. You can even use it to direct them back to the podcast to learn more. As with anything else AI produces, check the output for accuracy before publishing. Give your content the Hollywood treatmentYou don’t need fancy video equipment to repurpose written or audio content into video clips. Using an AI text-to-speech narration combined with royalty-free media gives your content the Hollywood treatment, red carpet entrance and all. Most AI tools that do this task work similarly. You input your existing blog post text or podcast transcript. Then, select visual themes, graphics, and music to match your brand style. When prompted correctly, the AI should spit out a video clip you can share on social media or use in digital ads. Touches that individualize the video can include an intro and outro of you or another brand representative. Always manually include captions to ensure your content is accessible to everyone. AI content creation repurposing saves time and moneyAI isn’t a magic wand for repurposing your content. You can’t just wave it and expect miracles. You must invest your time to learn how to breathe new life into old blogs, transform podcasts into long-form content, and create eye-catching visuals from written passages. With some strategic effort, you can get significantly more mileage out of your high-quality content. Do it well, and you’ll save time and money down the road while keeping your brand top-of-mind. Need help with AI content creation tools? The Write Reflection offers 1:1 content marketing training for entrepreneurs and small business owners that’s customized to meet your needs. Reach out today to schedule a session. Mention this blog to receive a 25% discount on your first session fee. About the Author - Shari Berg
0 Comments
AI content creation tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and Google Bard took the spotlight in 2023. Content creators oohed and aahed about the benefits of using them to streamline your content marketing process. Since most entrepreneurs and small business owners value tools that save them time and resources, they quickly began harnessing the power of AI to generate content quickly and affordably. However, like any powerful tool, AI content creation requires careful consideration and commitment to following best practices for its use. The problem is the technology exploded before industry professionals could weigh in on and establish accepted approaches for its use. It’s impossible to put the genie back in the bottle. If you plan to use AI content creation as part of your marketing strategy, consider the following guidelines to maximize the benefits. 1 – Become a prompt engineerThe quality of the content AI produces is only as good as the prompt you give it. Generic prompts deliver subpar results. Don’t just say, “Write a blog post about market trends.” You’ll end up with copy that isn’t what you had in mind when you asked AI for assistance. A well-crafted prompt explains the topic, purpose, target audience, tone, and any key points you want covered. AI language learning models like ChatGPT and Claude are trained to follow your instructions closely. The more information you provide, the better the output. Going back to the example about a blog on market trends, a better prompt would be: Act like a financial analyst with expertise in market trends. Write a detailed, 800-word blog post discussing current market trends and economic conditions in the U.S. as of January 2024. Cover topics such as GDP growth, unemployment rates, inflation, consumer spending, business investment, manufacturing activity, housing starts, stock market performance, interest rates set by the Federal Reserve, and other key economic indicators that provide insight into the overall health of the economy. Provide context by comparing current trends to historical norms over the past decade. Analyze the data to identify areas of strength, weakness, or uncertainty in the economy. Discuss what factors may be driving observed trends, such as government policy, consumer behavior, or global market conditions. Include perspectives from economists and industry experts on the outlook for the rest of 2024 and implications for businesses or investors. Make sure to cite any statistics, quotes, or findings from reputable published sources. The tone should be professional and analytical, written for an audience of business leaders and market analysts interested in understanding the current landscape to inform strategy and investment decisions. 2 – Review and edit outputThere’s no argument over whether AI can generate content efficiently. When prompted well, most AI tools can produce hundreds of articles in a few hours. However, the speed of AI content creation isn’t a substitute for quality. Raw AI output should never appear on your digital or print assets without the skilled eye of a human reviewing it first. You’ll want to tweak the copy to align with your brand voice. Verify the accuracy of any data the AI included in its content. One of the most concerning issues with AI-generated content is that it’s not always true. These factual errors and misleading results happen so frequently that industry leaders have given the phenomenon a name: AI hallucination. While it sounds cute, the problem can tarnish your professional reputation. Just ask Manhattan attorney Steven Schwartz, aka “the ChatGPT lawyer.” With 30 years of experience in practicing law, he was caught using case law generated by ChatGPT that didn’t exist. A New York federal judge sanctioned him in June 2023 for the faux pas. Schwartz claimed he had no idea that ChatGPT made up facts before he used it in lieu of human paralegals and then failed to check for accuracy. Don’t end up like Schwartz. Establish a thorough editing and review process to guarantee the final output meets the highest standards for your brand. 3 – Customize content to avoid plagiarismReviewing and editing any AI output involves customizing the content to avoid plagiarism. While AI tools like ChatGPT are supposed to write original text, that’s not always the case. Some output has failed to pass plagiarism checker tools because it contained significant chunks of exact wording from the original source. One of the most effective techniques you can use to combat this issue is to put your original spin on what AI spits out. Add new paragraphs that include your insights on the topic to demonstrate your subject matter expertise. Expand on thoughts the AI suggested to make the content meatier and more engaging for your ideal customer. If you use any statistics or quotes the AI generated, check for accuracy, and cite your sources to lend credibility. 4 – Steer clear of copyright infringementInformation is readily available in today’s digital age. With just a few strokes of your keyboard, you can find search results that match your queries. AI is no different. Some AI language learning tools, including ChatGPT4 and Google Bard, can access the internet to scan for documents and other materials they deem relevant to your prompt. Sounds great, right? Here’s the rub. AI tools may inadvertently generate content that includes copyrighted materials. If you’re really unlucky, it might replicate those sources word-for-word. To avoid getting into legal hot water, educate yourself (and any team members) on the basics of copyright and implement best practices that help you steer clear of infringement. Check usage rights for any external sources cited in the AI-generated copy before publishing them and offer attribution to any sources directly quoted. 5 – Offer transparencyAI content creation raises some ethical concerns around transparency. While not mandatory, it’s recommended to disclose when content is generated by artificial intelligence. Doing so builds trust with your target audience. Consider including a brief disclaimer on your website or within the content that states AI tools were used to enhance creativity and efficiency. Here’s an example of how that might look: At Pipefitter’s Dream, we value transparency as part of our commitment to customer service excellence. We want our valued visitors to know we use AI tools to create all or portions of the content they engage with and enjoy on our site.
Embracing the future of AI content creationAI content creation tools aren’t going anywhere, so we may as well learn how to use them responsibly to streamline our workloads. You can learn to harness the full potential of AI while maintaining your integrity by following the suggested AI content creation best practices in this article. Still have questions about the best approach for implementing AI tools into your content creation process? Entrepreneurs and small business owners who want to learn how to create best practices for AI content creation can schedule a 1:1 training session with a member of our team. Contact us today to schedule your lesson. About the Author - Shari Berg |
Categories
All
Archives
April 2024
|