As a content-focused digital marketing agency, we’re always interested in tools that can help us produce better work more efficiently. So, when ChatGPT came out last November, we started experimenting with the app right away.
AI writing tools have been around for a while. We find they can be useful in writing short-form content for social media posts and online ads, but not so much for long-form content such as blog posts and web pages, which don’t come anywhere near our quality parameters.
GhatGPT is different. It generates comprehensive, in-depth responses to the most elaborate questions in a way that seems produced by a human. It’s no wonder it has become the new internet sensation, with just about every sector discussing their respective concerns, fears, and/or excitement about how this new AI technology will affect their industries — and jobs.
Is ChatGPT A Threat To Content Writers?
I’ve seen quite a few people claiming that ChatGPT is the end of bloggers and content writers. So we ran a few experiments to evaluate this app in an objective way.
These are the results:
1. We Asked The App: Can ChatGPT Write Blog Posts?
We started the experiment by asking the app:
Question: “Can ChatGPT write blog posts?”
Response: “Yes, ChatGPT is capable of writing blog posts, as well as other forms of text. It can be fine-tuned to write on specific topics and can generate text that is coherent and grammatically correct. However, it is important to keep in mind that the quality of the output will depend on the training data and the specific parameters used during fine-tuning”
In conclusion, according to the app, it can produce coherent and grammatically correct content, but it will need to be revised … by a writer.
2. ChatGPT Content Lacks a Voice
Provided you give it detailed instructions, the app can produce surprisingly high-quality output in just about any subject. However, the app has been designed to keep things neutral, which we think is a good thing. But a neutral voice lacks the emotions that connect content to readers and perform to achieve marketing results. Again, it needs a writer to add the human touch.
3. It Can Save Bloggers From a Blank Page
Content writers spend a great deal of time conducting research and gathering information to come up with ideas. Provided you ask detailed questions, ChatGPT can produce accurate and thorough summaries on specific topics that writers can use as guides and starting points, saving tons of time.
Writers still need to check for accuracy, as the app often gets things wrong. They’ll also need to add context and style to fit the brand’s voice and personality, and match the target audience and SEO guidelines.
So, at this time, ChatGPT can increase the productivity of good writers, but by no means will it make poor writers competent.
4. The Plagiarized Content Test
One of the standard procedures we follow in our content production process is to test for plagiarism before publishing. We tested a few topics we typically produce content for clients.
The results showed an average of 57% plagiarized content — way too high for us (or any serious content writer) to consider using it as is.
One particularly crazy thing we noticed was that we recognized some of the content as produced by us. We still don’t know how to feel about that….
5. Producing Content for SEO with ChatGPT
Content is a critical component of SEO, and we’ve heard a few recognized (non-SEO) experts in the promo industry talk about how ChatGPT can be used successfully for this purpose, which couldn’t be further from the truth.
When writing for SEO, your content must meet certain criteria not only for Google, but also for your target end-user. Google recently published its Helpful Content System and E.A.T. Guidelines, which aim to favor content that provides visitors with a better experience, while ignoring content that doesn’t meet a visitor’s expectations. The system generates a site-wide signal that we at ACTION, consider among many other factors for ranking web pages.
As for this type of content, for starters, Google has made it clear that AI-generated content violates Google’s guidelines. So it’s important to keep that in mind, especially because ChatGPT-generated content is watermarked and can be detected by Google.
Google’s quality rater standards measure expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness (Google EAT Guidelines). These three elements are measured on every page a GoogleBot crawls and renders.
The key to writing good SEO content is to structure it in a way that “demonstrates expertise” on the relevant topic (target keywords), positions the author as an “authority” on the topic, and creates and builds trust for the reader that the content is reliable and “trustworthy.”
In conclusion, spitting out content for the sake of publishing content will not help your SEO, and it might end up hurting it.
6. How We Use AI Writing Tools at ACTION
Our team is usually quick to try new tools and evaluate whether they can provide value to our processes, and over time, we have adopted some and discarded many. As far as AI writing apps, we don’t find they are capable to produce long-form quality content such as blog posts and web pages, but we find them very helpful for the following:
- Content topic ideas
- Headline ideas
- Short-form content for social media posts and ads
- Blog post outlines
As for ChatGPT, we’ve been testing the app and discussing use cases, but have not yet produced any content for clients — or ourselves — with it. But, we have started using it for the research portion, and it’s really amazing.
But, we structure our content in a way that no AI tool can produce, at least for now, so we have no intention or plans of replacing any of our writers with this app. We have to basically rewrite it, so it’s well differentiated, has the brand voice and point of view of our clients, and has the proper structure for SEO.
Conclusion
ChatGPT can be very useful in producing the standard or generic information needed to write a good piece. But hoping to hand off content creation to an AI tool to publish it as is might not be the most effective use of the app for many reasons, including the possibility of it being detected and causing a site to be sent down the bottom of search results.
That said, it can have many other uses for a distributor, such as generating ideas for themed events for clients — something they do every day — that would enable them to create outstanding presentations that will separate them from the average distributor and position them as the top choice for clients to work with.
This article was first published in the ActionMarketing.com blog.
