Does AI Deserve a Seat at the Marketing Table?
A potentially controversial take on the tech takeover
Be honest: When you read the title, did you think, “Great, another article complaining that AI is taking jobs.”?
What would you say if we told you we used AI to brainstorm this post?
Whether you’re a writer, graphic designer or a leader in a business or organization, you’re bombarded with AI daily. Even as we type this, an AI generator is offering to tweak this content.
Many of us are resistant to this new trend of relying on technology to do what we’ve been doing well for decades. Although AI has been a hot topic for the last few years, many of us still associate it with a tool for students to procrastinate and avoid putting in the work.
According to ChatGPT, AI is an asset to creative teams — not a technological upstart knocking us out of our seats at the table.
If AI can generate a draft or image in seconds, why should you insist on maintaining a human voice for your clients or your own business?
The difference is writing versus storytelling.
Anyone can write. We daily write texts, to-do lists and reminders. Writing involves putting words on a page, whether a literal page or a screen.
Storytelling takes the act of pen to paper to the next level.
Whether a social media caption, newsletter or feature article, storytelling doesn’t try to convince the audience to buy or subscribe to a product. It aims to awaken the desire so many of us have to build a better world one individual, family and community at a time.
Human connection is the baseline that makes our work more than work and a story more than words on a page. The same is true for your team!
Your passion for a project sets you apart from AI.
Technology can’t capture why you believe your product could improve quality of life or bring joy to your audience.
AI builds upon existing stories and campaigns, but storytellers help you and your organization tell new ones that captivate readers, touch hearts and meet needs.
The big question: Should we abandon AI?
The short answer? No!
Although AI lacks the human element, it can strengthen your natural gifts and improve your creative process from start to finish. When used properly, AI can be a helping hand!
If you’ve felt hesitant, adversarial or overwhelmed about incorporating AI in today’s digital age, here are some tips to maintain your voice while improving efficiency:
1.Focus on the human element of your writing.
Consider why the story you’re writing or campaign you’re building resonates with you first.
What part of the story touches your own heart? What do you want other people to know about a person or cause or product?
2. Develop your own unique style — before getting the robot in on it.
Before you use AI, see what you can create on your own. When you’re stuck, that’s when it’s time to bring in your new brainstorming partner!
Give the AI generator your ideas and let it help you develop additional ideas and explore new angles you might not have considered on your own.
3. Let AI help you sort, troubleshoot and break down content.
Maybe the person you interviewed took the conversation several different directions and you don’t know which route to take. Perhaps the pages of research notes have been haunting you from the corner of your desk but the material is too overwhelming to separate into logical sequence.
AI can take somewhat jumbled ideas and organize them into a coherent plan. Once you’ve used the tool to find a route you like, you can begin writing or designing.
4. Consider AI a tool, not training wheels.
Once you’ve created a draft, turn to AI to refine your work — only if you need the help. AI can catch spelling mistakes or grammatical errors or recommend areas to reformat.
From the first word of the first draft to the last word you tweak in the finished product, AI can offer ideas for a tricky section and tighten your prose as you edit.
So if your team isn’t using AI, it’s time to reconsider.
We’re pulling up a seat at the table for AI because it won’t go away any time soon, but writers and designers aren’t losing their spot either. It’s just time for a bigger table!