Copywriting Use Cases for Generative AI
Generative AI: Is there a bigger buzzword or, for some people, panic inducer? And am I even a marketer if I don’t have a POV on it?
Recently, I signed on for an ongoing copywriting gig with a company who uses the generative AI tool Jasper as part of their content development. I share a healthy skepticism with my fellow copywriters who aren’t sure what AI means for our career prospects, but I also believe in learning new skills and adapting to changing market dynamics, so I was excited for the opportunity. (Also it’s for a fun podcast, so there’s that.)
I’m about two months into this work, and honestly, I’m impressed. It’s my job to get the words just right for my clients, and to see AI crank out copy that doesn’t suck in seconds was, well, humbling. That said, I’ve also seen some copywriting projects AI really isn’t suited for.
Here are a few of my initial observations about where a generative AI tool is and isn’t useful when it comes to copywriting.
Generative AI is useful when:
You don’t need a unique POV.
Sometimes we don’t need original content; we need to get as many miles as we can from what we already have. Writing a truly excellent white paper or blog post and then repurposing that content into lots of social media posts, blog posts, PPC ads, and more is an excellent way to run a broad campaign while stretching your marketing budget. Here’s where AI can be a great asset. Put your human copywriter on the one original piece of content and then use AI to help you slice and dice it.
You don’t know where to start.
Maybe it’s a topic you’re not familiar with or maybe it’s just a case of the Mondays, but there’s nothing useful about staring blankly at a screen and watching your deadline get closer. AI can be a huge help here by giving you a jumping off point. Data dump all the info you have into the background section, and go get a quick coffee while AI does something useful with it. Sometimes I edit what I’m given and sometimes I rewrite it completely, but either way, my brain isn’t stuck anymore.
Generative AI is not useful when:
I’m the SME.
There are times when I can write the content faster than I can edit the outputs I get from AI, especially if it’s a topic I know really well or if the article has a very specific angle or audience. In these cases, I’ve learned to just go for it. If I sit down at my computer and already know what I want to say, it’s not worth the time to see if AI has a better way to say it (spoiler alert, it never does).
There are limited inputs.
Like most areas of marketing, quality in equals quality out. If I don’t give AI solid information to work from, it’ll crawl the web looking for more info, and the result is never what I had in mind. I much prefer a short, well-written article to a longer one with a bunch of stuff that won’t be interesting to the audience.
Summing Up: My Human POV
Generative AI isn’t a solution for all of our marketing challenges but if you know how to guide it, it definitely offers some efficiencies. I’m really excited to be hands-on with this technology and learn more use cases for integrating it into the copywriting process. There will always be a place for highly skilled copywriters who can write for specific business objectives and understand audience nuances (or so I’m manifesting!) but to stay relevant, it’s also important for us to stay on top of trends and be able to mesh with modern marketing and MOps teams, and that includes making friends with AI.
